| Subject: | [socialcredit] Rent for everyone | | Date: | Monday, March 6, 2006 13:53:44 (-0800) | | From: | Jeffery Smith <jjs @.........org>
|
| In reply to: | Message 3558 (written by Joe Thomson) |
On Mar 5, 2006, at 6:00 PM, Joe Thomson wrote:
>
> (Jeff Smith:-) (land) Wasn't exactly scare before then, just hoarded.
>>>
> (Joe comments:-) Yes, and look at HOW it was hoarded. By the
> imposition
> of a 'tax' on the LAND ITSELF
>>
> (Jeff Smith replies:-) Please cite a time and place.
>
> (Joe responds:-) The various land 'clearances' in parts of the
> British Isles around the dawn of the Industrial Revolution, for one.
First, you said a tax resulted in hoarding. Yet the example involves no
tax, merely a governmental proclamation. A tax, historically indicated
by the experiences of places from California to Taiwan, has just the
opposite result - breaking up latifundia.
> What was done, was done by a form of 'tax' on land itself.
Neither a tax or a "tax" but a simple take-over.
> (Joe responds:-) Did the peasantry of ancient Egypt 'hoard' land
> before the time of Joseph? I don't think so.
Think about, instead, what anthropologists and historians tell us. That
is, the local leaders, such as chiefs and priests, each year parceled
out sites to families, initially rotating the best sites among all the
families.
> Each used what he could use.
Actually, authorities write that each family - not individual - used
what was assigned.
> But the tax imposed on them by Joseph certainly had the ultimate
> effect of hoarding 'their' land right into the hands of he who
> operated ''in the name of" Pharaoh. Maybe you think that was a 'good'
> thing?
Since you do such a poor job of guessing what people think, why not
give it up?
> (Jeff continues:-) The introduction of a tax on land value has always
> broken up latifundia.
>
> (Joe responds:-) I disagree. It often concentrates it further. Go
> back to 'feudal' England after the Norman conquest of 1066. Starting
> with William the Conqueror's 'Domesday Book', we began to see a 'tax'
> imposed on land value. For was it not King John's attempt to further
> 'tax' the Baron's lands on threat of dispossession that led to their
> mass revolt, and the Magna Carta? The first instance of a long
> struggle against arbitrary 'taxation'.
A tax set arbitrarily is not a tax set by land value. The former is by
political fiat, the latter by the market. A tax set that collects the
annual value of a location and no more is fair and affordable; a tax
that goes over that is unfair, unaffordable, and does concentrate land
into the hands of those passing the laws. So there are separate issues.
One, who deserves the value of land? (Ans: the society creating the
land's value). Two, how much should the owner(s) pay their neighbors
(ans: the annual value, no more). Three, who should administer the
collection of land dues? (Ans: not a lord or any one high up in a
hierarchy but a local democracy).
> 'ownership' over land
"Own" and "owe" and "ought" used to be one word.
> But a 'tax' on it, threatening dispossession if not paid, is still a
> tyranny.
Depends on the tax, whether it's fair or not. Another tyranny, far more
common today, is to hoard the socially-generated value.
> And what some of the 'Georgists' propose looks to me like something
> that could easily evolve into that ultimate tyranny.
Please look again. In the Middle Ages when the only tax levied was one
on land (mainly) and government was exceedingly hierarchical, of course
you sometimes had abuse in assessing a site's value, in exempting the
rich, etc. The problem was not trying to recover compensation for
excluding all others from a parcel of nature, the problem was hierarchy
and zero democracy. Don't toss the baby with the bathwater. Since then,
every introduction of a tax on land value has created more freedom and
democracy, not less, as you can see at our website.
> now you're going to vest title
You're far too comfortable with distortion. attributing to others your
own fears. Please work on that.
> to ALL real property
You know where "real" comes from - "royal".
> in an abstraction called ''the STATE'', or "the GOVERNMENT', or "the
> PUBLIC".
False, again. Paying land dues does not change how much one pays but to
whom, from a seller or lender to one's neighbors - land dues into the
common kitty, rent dividends back.
> If one can't be totally as 'secure' as possible on one's 'OWN' land
OWED land
> , held under the form of title that is most 'common' (known), and
> commonly desired by most of us~ as individual OWNERS
OWERS
> of individual properties with tenancy-for-life and statutory rights
> of disposition to our heirs, just where can we be secure?
In a geonomy. Even without the rent dividend (which you constantly
overlook), every place that has a land tax today (e.g., Australia) has
higher owner occupancy than places that have little or no tax on land
(e.g., Latin America) or buildings (which is a bad tax, but common
stand in).
SMITH, Jeffery J., President, Forum on Geonomics
7536 SE Milwaukie Av, Portland Oregon 97202 USA
503/232-1337; jjs@geonomics.org; www.geonomics.org
Share Earth's worth to prosper and conserve.
|
Rent for everyone
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