this post was submitted on 07 Mar 2024
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Not American, but I would add some severe roadblocks to anything that makes basic housing an "investment".
Agree a thousand percent. Some ideas:
No corporate home ownership
If multiple properties are owned they must be run as a non-profit
Move to a land-value tax so that holding undeveloped land as an investment is not viable.
I live in a rural area. Surrounding my humble 2 bedroom home are a few acres of rocks and cliffs that are vacant land with a well I have to run a small pump to get water from. The county already taxes me on this vacant unbuildable land as separate property.
I live a very simple life and make just under median income so not rolling in money by any means. If i were to get taxed on this undeveloped land as an investment it would make it unaffordable for me and I'd have to sell for less than I could afford a new home. How is this preventing land hoarding?
it's been a while since I've heard about it, but iirc LVT generally evaluates and decides on taxes based on proximity to other developments, so undeveloped land or poor density land that is close to more developed housing, is taxed more heavily, while land out in the boonies isn't taxed very heavily. it's supposed to incentivize development in more desirable places to live, and naturally eliminate situations in which higher value plots end up getting bought up by rich people for their whims.
at the same time, it's still a solution that's ultimately relying on the free market to maximize their profit margins, and that being good for society, it's just decreasing the relative profit margins for each plot of land through higher taxes. it still retains harmful forms of development, it just, potentially, eliminates them more naturally, compared to explicit bans.
It would still work with a heavily regulated market. And in my opinion would need to be paired with zoning regulations and environmental policy. For example a stretch of wilderness that happens to be on top of a vein of coal would have the same value and tax as the same land without the coal if regulations prevent coal mining, adjusting incentives away from the most harmful uses.
Edit: grammar
It would still work in a heavily regulated market, yeah, but the thing with georgism is that it tends to be advertised as a kind of one-size-fits-all solution to the housing market, as a highly sought after "single tax" or "perfect tax". If you look at the historical ties of georgism which I also kind of struggle to remember, I think I remember that being kind of, the thing about it, was that it was aligned with like, the dominant labor parties, but was kind of seen as too moderate and singularly committed of a position.
So, the tax itself is cool, and agreeable, but the georgists as a kind of, party, and georgism as a philosophy built around a singular tax, I'm still not sure about. I'm skeptical of silver-bullet solutions, which is what georgism is often made out to be. It also gives me bad vibes because anytime I hear someone talking so highly about some obscure 19th or 20th century political philosophy, it gives me the same alarm bells as people who want to be rhodesian infantrymen, or people who want to be dengists, or shit like that. I dunno. Henry george was an interesting and prescient dude but he was also in many ways a product of his time, I think. Here's marx talking about him in a letter I haven't read, might interest you I guess.
Good point about people speaking 'highly about some obscure 19th or 20th century political philosophy' ringing certain alarm bells. I certainly share your skepticism. I wouldn't call myself a 'Goergist'. I do think LVT is worth looking into when trying to solve land-hoarding and wealthy entities treating property as an investment portfolio at the expense of families in need of homes.
Yeah that is a good question. It is meant to tax strictly the value of the land. So undeveloped rural land will be taxed very low, vs say undeveloped urban land. The idea is to incentivize productive land use of more valuable land so that as the value of the land goes up, it becomes untenable not to put it to use. In your case, it the land is unbuildable then then the tax would be quite low, even if things to get built up around you. This is just the tip of the iceberg of an economic theory called Georgism, that I am still wrapping my head around.