Living rooms have shrunk?

[SirGalahad]

All taxes are distortionary. The most efficient tax is a lump sum tax like LVT.

Even right wing think tanks agree.
https://capx.co/land-value-tax-is-a-great-idea-but-itll-never-happen/

I'd rather people incomes are taxed less and wealth is taxed more. Wealth that was created by everyone economic activity but appropriated by the land owners.

 

[bernardgreen]

Just 6,000 or so landowners - mostly aristocrats, but also large institutions and the Crown - own about 40 million acres, two thirds of the UK.

I used to be one of those 6,000 or so landowners, bought 1/4 acre of land to build a house on. There are millions of other people who own the land their house is built on.....O am still a lsnd owner, I own the land on which my cottage and the ajacent retail unit are built on...

 

[SirGalahad]

I used to be one of those 6,000 or so landowners, bought 1/4 acre of land to build a house on. There are millions of other people who own the land their house is built on.....O am still a lsnd owner, I own the land on which my cottage and the ajacent retail unit are built on...

LVT would replace many taxes so it would be revenue neutral in many cases but hit those who have vast tracts of land doing nothing.

It would encourage more efficient use of land. Your argument that you own your land and have built on it is an argument for LVT as you have used your land by building on it.

 

[SirGalahad]

A simple example.

You have 2 plots of land A and B.

Plot A the industrious individual builds a mall, roads, cinemas etc.

Plot B owner does nothing.

Currently plot B land has shot up in value with him doing nothing but gaining from the economic activity on plot A.

Under LVT both would be paying LVT but plot A would be able to cover his costs through his product use of the land. Plot B owner can let his land lie vacant but there is a cost now.

So plot B owner has now more incentive to release his land for development. So less land banking.

Also it's easy to check and tax as the land isn't going anywhere.

 

[hard-work]

All taxes are distortionary. The most efficient tax is a lump sum tax like LVT.

Even right wing think tanks agree.
https://capx.co/land-value-tax-is-a-great-idea-but-itll-never-happen/

I'd rather people incomes are taxed less and wealth is taxed more. Wealth that was created by everyone economic activity but appropriated by the land owners.

You got it! It is called "economic rent" and is currently appropriated by private individuals and organisations.
Economic rent is when there is no:

1. Enterprise
2. Costs of production.

Appropriating land values falls into the above. Also charging for the use of the: electromagnetic spectrum, the surrounding seas, the air space, making money from the roads, extraction of natural resources (oil, ores, gas, etc), electro-magnetic spectrum, etc. This all falls into "economic rent". Reclaim this economic rent and we have no need for income and sales taxes. Income tax is a penalty on the productive and sales tax a penalty on trade, the last two we should be taxing. What people earn productively they should keep - all of it.

LVT need not be a lump sum tax, it could be calculated to be paid monthly/weekly.

 

[hard-work]

Kankerot, Land Value Tax is due on all land, whether used or not, occupied or not. Land Value Tax is Zero tax on buildings. This prevents land hoarding. Harrisburg in the US Rustbelt, a victim of off-shoring US industry to China, with the city ending up a derelict mess, implemented Land Value Tax and cleared up 90% of derelict buildings and vacant plots on the city. The land was put to productive use and eyesores removed. Liverpool tried to get LVT about 10-12 years ago, but HMG Whitehall heavies clamped down on them. Scotland and Wales can implement LVT.

Yep, the location of land is known to the inch and it cannot be taken offshore. The levy cannot be avoided.

 

[hard-work]

I used to be one of those 6,000 or so landowners, bought 1/4 acre of land to build a house on. There are millions of other people who own the land their house is built on.....O am still a lsnd owner, I own the land on which my cottage and the ajacent retail unit are built on...

Bernard, listen to Martin Wolf, chief economist at the Financial Times, he puts himself in your category, a mini landowner.
Why we must halt the land cycle:

 

[bernardgreen]

he puts himself in your category, a mini landowner.

Invalid comparison. We bought land to build a house on. Not as an investment.

 

[hard-work]

Invalid comparison. We bought land to build a house on. Not as an investment.

Bernard, owning land is owning land, no matter what you put, or do not put on it, or what you use it for or not use it for, or use it at all. You did not listen to Martin Wolf, he only owns the land under his house.

 

[hard-work]

 

[hard-work]

Bernard, the economic activity of the surrounding community soaks into the land crystallizing as land values. Land is a sponge of the economy, soaking in wealth. Land Value is not manna from heaven it comes from somewhere and that is us. But private individuals appropriate this commonly created wealth. Legalised stealing.

The London Jubilee Line extension costed £3.4bn to build. A conservative estimate of land value rises around the stations was that land values rose £14bn. Those land owners got rich in their sleep while men were being injured underground in dangerous conditions, beneath them. We could have built 3 Jubilee line extensions for nothing (well not using income tax) if we reclaimed the value this infrastructure created. Infrastructure we paid for with our income taxes.

 

[SirGalahad]

LVT has nothing to do with who owns the land it's all about the economic productivity of land.

I explained it above. In many cases you could get rid of other taxes.

 

[hard-work]

LVT has nothing to do with who owns the land it's all about the economic productivity of land.

I explained it above. In many cases you could get rid of other taxes.

Yep, LVT cares not a hoot who owns the land. It will act as a mechanism to redistribute land, as those who cannot make land viable will have to sell to those who can. It will see the end of tenant farmers, they will all own their own the land they work, by allowing the free market to operate.

 

[JohnD]

It's useful to remember that it is very difficult to hide land in the Cayman Islands or Panama in order to be a tax-dodger.

Every pound of tax dodged by, for example, a newspaper-owner or a Prime Minister, is a pound that has to be paid by the less devious citizen, or a pound taken away from public service.

 

[Brigadier]

Humans are already worse than cockroaches, and lvt (if it doesn't already) ought to have something built in, where land can be left to nature or the like.
Rather than us continue to infest the planet until there is nothing left.