Wealth Tax >>>MOD WARNING<<<

It is a fact of economics.

All things are in finite supply -- except the intellectual dishonesty of apologists for landowner privilege, of course. The distinguishing fact about land is that it is in FIXED supply. Its supply is determined by nature, cannot be increased by labor, and does not respond to price.

Things like baseball cards that we call "collectibles" are also in fixed supply, but their ownership does not abrogate anyone else's rights, because they originally had to be produced by labor. Ownership of land does abrogate others' rights, because it can only become legal property by being forcibly appropriated from all who would otherwise be at liberty to use it.

Baseball cards, stocks and marbles do not give their owners a privilege of pocketing other people's taxes.

 

You've confused yourself with scarcity. There is an overall limit in all factors of production. That isn't the source of rent. You'd have to refer to very specific circumstances such that monopoly power is generated. A historical example is the land renter forced to only buy from the landlord's shop. Irrelevant today mind you. Its simply ridiculous to think that the Georgist stuff works when we're referring to highly advanced economies where wealth creation is focused on manufacturing and services

 

There is no such thing as landowner privilege.

 

It's not because of supply, because the supply of land is exactly the same now as when it was worthless. So you are wrong.

Land is expensive exclusively because of DEMAND, and demand for land is simply the measure of how much the owner can expect to take from society, net of land taxes, for contributing nothing. The price of land is due to supply and demand exactly as the prices of licenses to steal would be if government were issuing them: a measure of how much the owner could expect to take from others without contributing anything in return.

I don't see any reference, and supply and demand long predate neoclassical economics.

The price of land proves you wrong.

No, Georgists are not ignored in actual economics, only in failed, unscientific and dishonest pseudo-economics like mainstream neoclassical economics, Marxist economics, Austrian economics, etc.

 

This is just repetition of Georgist out-of-date comment. My land had value to me because of the ability of the previous owners to lovingly craft home and landscape into one package. Of course the reality is that land is substantially transformed through the use of other factors of production. This wouldn't have been understood by Henry.

This is a great summary of the nature of the Georgists. Confronted with 'modern economics', they simply have to state that its wrong. They don't think 'perhaps we need to update our analysis!'

 

No, he is exactly correct. YOU are trying to pretend that scarcity is the same as fixed supply.

See? You are trying to pretend there is no difference between finite supply and fixed supply.

It also isn't the key fact about land.

Land is a canonical example of monopoly.

No, it isn't. As Ricardo proved, the landowner needn't even keep a shop to collect rent.

Why can't you ever remember that the astronomical price of land just flat-out proves you wrong?

This would be more convincing if you had ever posted any credible argument that it doesn't.

Where does manufacturing take place? Where are services performed? Ask dnsmith if manufacturing or services created his wealth, or if it was owning land.

 

There is no question in his error: he's simply said "there isn't an infinite supply of land". Of course there isn't. Basic economics: scarcity!

Monopoly is a red herring. Do I have a monopoly because of my land? Nope! I simply have one piece of land with differentiated properties. As noted previously, at best that refers to monopolistic competition. And surely you know your neoclassical economics? There isn't rent in monopolistic competition.

 

Which bears repetition as it has never been refuted.

That's utility, not value. Value is what a thing would trade for. And what land would trade for is determined by what its owner can expect to take from society and not repay in taxes.

No, that's objectively false, because they did not craft the location under the landscape, and everything they DID craft could have been crafted in some other location where you would not be the least bit interested in it.

And when that happens, the result is a product of labor, and thus not land any more.

He devoted substantial analysis to it, analysis which you have never read, let alone addressed, let alone refuted.

Which I am not one of.

Everyone who has the slightest understanding of modern economics knows it's not just wrong but wildly wrong.

Modern geoist economics, which you cannot address, let alone refute, is an update of Georgist analysis.

 

Why refute something that is irrelevant for modern economics? It was an useful school of thought. It no longer is. There is zero understanding of rent seeking; there is only the same ole "its land" crowing whilst economic relations are simply ignored

 

SOME LAND has astronomical prices. There are millions of acres of unoccupied land which is not "astronomically priced."

His argument is completely credible. Yours is not.

Foremost is, my current income is mostly from my pension which I earned and SS which I paid for. #1, I am not wealthy. #2, what wealth I have I have earned by using small purchases, keeping them, and then selling them at a higher (inflated) price. There is nothing unusual or dishonorable about buying land with an improvement, renting out that land and improvement at market rates, all the while paying property taxes to maintain the infrastructure.

There is also nothing unusual or dishonorable about investing money in land which is worth very little, allowing someone to rent that land, build a producing business, and continuing to occupy my land on which taxes are paid. It doesn't matter if the taxes are paid by the lessee or the lessor. If it is paid by the lessee the rent paid is lowered by that amount (in the case of a net lease). If the rent is paid by the lessor then the rent must be higher to compensate for that tax such that the tax continues to pay for infrastructure maintenance.

So basically the facts are, you have no argument and so far you have not provided an iota of proof that LVT will work in a modern mature economy, none, nada, nunca, zilch. If today or tomorrow the US converted to LVT and the proper actions took place and the current occupier of the land then started to pay the LVT nothing would change. So long as the taxes were paid he who has current land tenure would continue to occupy the land so long as the tax was paid. Even if to retain a semblance of fair taxation and the landowner would have to be the one producing on his land, that would work too. But nothing of significance would change. The same people would continue occupying the same land as evicting the current occupier would never happen in a fair society.

 

He made no error.

Oh? Where did he say that? Are you just making something up and attributing it to him in quotation marks, as if he actually said it, as you customarily do with me?

What I saw him say, in post #470, was that the supply of land is fixed; and I saw you quote that statement and respond to it in post #471, so you are definitely aware that he made it.

You are just so busted.

You again have to pretend he did not state that the supply of land is not merely finite but fixed.

No, it is the correct way to understand land rent.

Yep.

"Nope! I simply have one Rembrandt painting with differentiated properties."

You are destroyed.

Wrong. It is a canonical example of monopoly, as Smith, Ricardo, etc. proved.

I know neoclassical economics was contrived from the outset to be an absurd economics wherein working people collect rent, but landowners don't. Thanks for confirming it.

 

Again, there is no debate in it. By confusing limited supply with scarcity, he inappropriately implied that neoclassical theory supports the Georgist dogma. It obviously doesn't. You yourself know that, explaining why you need to dismiss all modern economics

 

He stated in post #470 that the supply of land is fixed, you quoted and responded to that statement, and now you are again pretending he did not make it.

Why?

As if we both don't know very well why....

No, he did not. He stated that it acknowledges rent seeking in cases of fixed supply.

I only dismiss the self-evidently absurd and dishonest parts, like the part you referred to that says working people collect rent but landowners don't.

 

Since it has never been factually asserted there need be no refutation.

In addition to utility, one's land also have value which is obtained when the occupying rights are sold/traded for money, product or services. What is received in return for ones property is not being taken from society as society does not lose any value as land is traded.

Which is totally irrelevant. We craft what we want in the location we want and we are willing to transfer a greater price such that it IS where we want it.

Which is also irrelevant. Since the land is fixed and paid for when the price of occupying that land has been paid for, and since the taxes are paid under whatever system in place, it makes no different, and it still doesn't take anything from society. Actually the property taxes paid and the income taxes paid from the earnings off of production and rent enhances the economy.

Has never addressed what value it (Georgist analysis) has and every point you have ever tried to make has been refuted by several people, not just Reiver.

 

The astronomical price of land proves you wrong.

Useful to whom and for what, I wonder....

There are many people who can justly complain about economic relations being ignored. But the guy whose "arguments" consist exclusively of, "It's irrelevant," "Long Dead George," "Industrialization made it obsolete," "Henry wouldn't have understood," etc., etc. is not one of them.

 

How? I'm a land owner and I'm not rich. Even if I was rich and I indeed paid bucket loads, you'd still be making inaccurate comment. There would not be any rent seeking as we have no monopoly

 

Landowners do not tend to "rent seeking" even when they offer their land for someone to rent at market value.

Bah Humbug!

 

By proving that most people have to pay landowners an immense amount of money for land. They could not do so if they were not thereby obtaining a commensurate flow of net benefits.

Can you think of a planet on which that would be relevant? Most criminals aren't rich, either. So? Does that mean they aren't taking anything from society?

No, my statement would still be indisputably corect.

Wrong on both counts: we do have a monopoly (the supply is both fixed and unique), and rent seeking does not require a monopoly. Consider doctors, who do not have a monopoly, but are enabled to collect rent because the supply of physician labor is restricted by professional licensing.

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Comedy gold....

 

Again, I'm not rich and I'm a land owner. How come? The problem is that you're still in historical terms where we had landowners versus the peasants.

 

The facts I identify which prove my statements are correct are not opinions. They are facts.

That is merely your false opinion. I have proved it is highly analogous to slavery, both in moral terms and as a matter of historical economic fact.

 

There is no reason why landowners should not receive income from their land by allowing someone else to use it, or by doing production on their land, or in paying the current occupant for the right to become the occupier. So your proof is of no value as it changes nothing.

So long as landowners are paying their taxes they are taking nothing from society, they are contributing to society, and there is no reason to believe that if someone took their place occupying that land they would take from society either.

Actually your statement is indisputably incorrect.

You have still not proved that simply owning land and collecting market value rent is "rent seeking."

But true. Rent seeking is trying to get advantage from society without reciprocating and putting something back into society. Most landowners do not take from society, they pay taxes into society, and the definition of "rent seeking" is no more relevant to landowning than any other member of society.

 

Because you had to pay taxes on your income and consumption to fund public services and infrastructure, and then pay the landowner full market value for access to the same services and infrastructure your taxes just paid for. No wonder you're not rich.

This, from a Brit...? Do you work for the Duke of Westminster or something?

 

This doesn't make sense. I'm a landowner. Am I a rent seeker? You seem to have constructed a boogie-man but can't actually place him. Its Georgism 1066 perhaps?

 

Nope, they are your opinion, and they tend to be incorrect.

Owning land or making a profit from land is in no way compared to slavery either in moral terms or in historical fact. It is nothing more than your sad story that owning land takes from society or violates someone's civil rights.

He also paid property tax which helps to build or fund maintenance of infrastructure. So he is justified as a land owner for what he owns.

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No, you are not a rent seeker, so long as you pay your due taxes. You are contributing to society and paying to maintain the infrastructure.

 

Again, you don't seem to understand what proof is or what it means to prove something. Your unsupported declarations are meaningless.

It's not an opinion. One is the ownership of another human being, and the other is owning land. That's not even apples to oranges, it's apples to moon rocks.