We still need to judge whether it is fair for only landowners to pay the
taxes, rather than to spread the burden on all who get income or spend
money or have wealth.
Natural-law philosophers such as John Locke
have reasoned that all human beings have a natural ownership right
to their labor and the products of
that labor. The fundamental equality of humanity means it is fundamentally
wrong for some to take away the labor done by others.31 That notion
is almost universally recognized today with respect to slavery, and
some folks
are beginning to recognize that the current tax system—which taxes
our earnings and taxes how we invest or spend those earnings—also
violates man’s natural right to the fruits of his labor.
If taking the fruit of one’s labor is fundamentally unjust, how
can a community raise the monies needed to build essential infrastructure
and provide public services? Land value taxation takes into account not
only the value of the land due to nature, such as soil and climate, but
also the great increase in land values that result from population, commerce,
security and other civic services, and public works—elements
beyond the activity of the property owner. The windfall increase
in the rental
or land value of the land, contended Henry George and others, is
a surplus that can be tapped by the community.32
Those suggesting positive consequences of
shifting taxation to rent have been accused of exaggerating its beneficial
effects.33 Freedom from punitive
taxation is not a panacea, but the infliction of arbitrary costs
on enterprise and the skewing of market signals such as prices and
profits is indeed
a universal and major cause of economic woes. It is not an exaggeration
to propose that removing these would have many beneficial results,
just as one’s health improves considerably if one stops taking
poison. ... read the whole document
Nic
Tideman: Applications
of Land Value Taxation to Problems of
Environmental Protection, Congestion, Efficient Resource Use,
Population, and Economic Growth
The idea that natural
opportunities are everyone's common heritage
is often defended with religious language. John Locke said:
Whether we consider
natural reason, which tells us that men, being once born, have a right
to their preservation, and consequently to meat and drink, and such
other things as nature affords for their sustenance, or revelation,
which gives us an account of those grants God made of the world to
Adam, and to Noah, and his sons, 'tis very clear that God, as King
David says, Psal. CXV. xvi. has given the Earth to the children of men,
given it to mankind in common.2
John Locke did not advocate land
value taxation. Writing in about
1690, he said that there was so much unclaimed land in America that
no one could properly complain about the private appropriation of
land in Europe.3
Writing nearly
200 year later, when it was becoming impossible for people to
appropriate good unclaimed land in America, Henry George said:
If we are all here by the
equal permission of the creator, we are all here with an equal title to
the enjoyment of his bounty -- with an equal right to the use of all
that nature so impartially offers. This is a right which is natural and
inalienable; it is a right which vests in every human being as he
enters the world, and which during his continuance in the world can be
limited only by the equal rights of others. There is in nature no such
thing as a fee simple in land. There is on earth no power which can
rightfully make a grant of exclusive ownership in land. If all existing
men were to unite to grant away their equal rights, they could not
grant away the right of those who follow them.
George preceded this argument with
a psychological and linguistic
one. He said that our conception of
property, of a right of exclusive
possession, is based on the idea that each person has a right to his
or her productive powers, and therefore to what he or she produces.
Since no one produced land, no one can properly claim to own
it.
This psychological and
linguistic argument is not entirely
convincing. It seems clear that humans, like other species, have an
impulse toward the appropriation and defense of territory. Natural
selection has worked in favor of those who are skilled in
appropriating natural opportunities and deterring others from
encroaching on them. It seems possible that, as a way of limiting
violence, humans have merged an idea of ownership based on production
with an idea of ownership based on the ability to appropriate
territory and deter encroachment.If this is the social and biological
reality, then there is a
different argument for treating natural opportunities as everyone's
common heritage. ... Read the entire article
|
To
share this page with a friend: right click, choose "send," and
add your comments.
|
|
Red
links have not been visited; .
Green
links are pages you've seen |
Essential Documents
pertinent to this theme:
|
|