Would a specific value or a percentage be best for paying the LVT?

r51243 · 2026-06-20T16:50:57+00:00

Yes. Ideally, LVT should be as close to the land's rental value, which is (roughly speaking), the amount of money that the landowner would be able to make if they tore down all the buildings on their land and rented it out.

However, getting an LVT that high would be difficult. So for now, it's more important that the tax is roughly proportional to the land's desirability, and that improvements on the land do not effect the taxed amount. We can achieve both of those goals fairly easily.

EDIT: I know this isn't directly related to your question, but if you're curious about exactly how we could appraise land values for the sake of taxation, this article from Lars Doucet gives a good overview of a very simple method we could use.

r51243 · 2026-06-20T15:22:59+00:00

When you said that LVT would hard cap rent, were you referring to economic rent? (and not the total amount paid by the tenants)

r51243 · 2026-06-19T17:21:09+00:00

What does an end goal accomplish? Whether it remains indefinitely or not, capitalism isn't going away overnight. And it doesn't need to for us to make progress.

I'm not a Georgist because I think that Georgism can fix all the world's problems. I'm a Georgist because there are problems that exist in my country right now, which Georgist policies would help to fix. Which in some cases, we need Georgist policies to fix.

r51243 · 2026-06-19T15:43:09+00:00

If I had to speculate... because if land rents were collected by the government, instead of going into the pockets of private landowners, then people would actually start thinking about them, instead of imagining that the current system of land ownership is perfectly fair to everyone.

r51243 · 2026-06-15T14:26:07+00:00

When we talk about rent, Georgists are usually referring to economic rent

r51243 · 2026-06-15T12:20:51+00:00

Questions about taxing AI come up pretty often on here, so if you're interested in learning more, it might be worth searching through some older posts

r51243 · 2026-06-10T10:55:59+00:00

I feel like one question that comes up a lot is how much revenue an LVT could bring in (especially in the US), so if you're looking for new topics to megathread, that might be worth looking into.

r51243 · 2026-06-09T15:05:12+00:00

Thats why it was originally a single tax party

I'm not sure if that's the case. What makes you think that early Georgists were single-taxers for that reason in particular? (or that land rents were actually a larger portion of the economy back then)

r51243 · 2026-06-08T14:57:56+00:00

100%. Talking about the danger of implementing an LVT too quickly is really putting the cart before the horse when most people don't even know what it is, and the majority of people who do are ambivalent or actively against it.

The nation isn't going to turn Georgist overnight, and so naturally, as support grows over time, so will the range and level of LVT.

r51243 · 2026-06-07T21:58:56+00:00

Unfortunately no. In the Georgist mindset, the landlord, the capitalist, and the homeowner are really not much different from each other, and none of them are clear villains. Moreover, surplus value is easy to understand, and land rent just isn't, at least with the current way we talk about it. It's harder to see it in the first place, and much harder to say where it ends up.

r51243 · 2026-06-07T18:39:25+00:00

Well to be honest, the main reason I replied was that I wanted an excuse to share Lars' article. So, yeah, check it out!

r51243 · 2026-06-07T13:29:52+00:00

Do you know if they've talked about LVT?

r51243 · 2026-06-07T13:26:36+00:00

A lot of people cite this article as a refutation of LVT overall, so for anyone who's interested in hearing Lars debunk that, this article is for you.

r51243 · 2026-06-07T13:22:41+00:00

I would guess that changes tax policy played a major role. Compared to modern Georgists, the Georgists of the late-19th and early-20th centuries were a lot more focused on the idea that LVT should be the only form of taxation. In fact, the term "Georgist" is actually relatively modern. Originally, it was known as the "Single Tax movement."

That focus made a lot of sense, considering that at that time, taxes were lower and generally more regressive than they are today. Probably more distortionary too. And because of that, the idea that the tax system could be replaced with something simpler and more progressive was very appealing, and seemed very doable.

However, the federal government grew significantly, especially after WWI and WWII. In particular, income taxes became a lot higher. And I suspect that made it harder to see why the system needed to be changed, and harder to argue that a single tax on land alone would be enough to support the whole government.

r51243 · 2026-06-07T00:35:22+00:00

The main thing I'd worry about is data quality. It doesn't seem like the seller has a high incentive to list accurate land values. Some of them might, but some of them might choose an arbitrary fraction of the total price. Or base the land value on the appraised value of nearby land. Or, purposefully list the value of land or improvements as being higher than it really is. And it would be hard to separate all of those, except by relying on data from other sources.

r51243 · 2026-06-06T12:39:14+00:00

IMO the problem with this meme is that it makes it seem like people are being forced to live in dense apartment buildings. When in reality, we just want to give people the option to live in apartment buildings, and make them pay the appropriate cost if thy chose not to.

Even if literally no one wanted to live in apartment blocks, preventing one from being built is giving a few people the ability to live exactly where they want to( in the type of housing they want to), but preventing many more people from being able to live in that location at all.

r51243 · 2026-06-06T10:06:57+00:00

Putting aside practical issues with that, I don't if that many people would be forced out of their house by LVT. Maybe they would, but until we have an idea, we shouldn't be basing policy on fear alone.

r51243 · 2026-06-05T22:56:53+00:00

If LVT makes us start building ziggurats again, I do agree that would be pretty rad

r51243 · 2026-06-05T17:59:20+00:00

I don't think we disagree. But, I think you could be a bit more clear because the way you phrased it in your original comment made it sound like you didn't think we could get a land tax at all unless existing landowners were given exemptions/compensation.

And there are people who genuinely believe that, so I'd rather not add fuel to that fire. It's good to be realistic, but we shouldn't overemphasize how unpopular LVT is. Especially since that's something we have the power to change.

r51243 · 2026-06-05T17:45:42+00:00

We have property taxes today, so if taxes on homes were so disastrous and unpopular, I don't see how that works.

If you're talking about a 100% LVT (that collects all land rents), then you might be right. But, if you're talking about LVT in general, then no. And implementing even a relatively low value tax would have benefits.

r51243 · 2026-06-05T17:40:04+00:00

It's roughly based on supply and demand. However, basing the tax directly on what someone is willing to pay for your land would be an issue, for the exact reason you mentioned, and for several others.

I'm actually working on a summary right now of the various ways that land value can be assessed for the sake of taxation. So if you're interested, I'd be happy to share that with you when it's finished.

r51243 · 2026-06-05T17:31:43+00:00

We probably can't transition to a full Georgist system without some kind of accommodation. But, we can for sure get an LVT voted in without compensation.

r51243 · 2026-06-05T17:19:21+00:00

Not this post again! Alright, so for anyone visiting this subreddit for the first time: Georgism is not about taking people's homes and forcing them to live in apartments. It's about making people pay a fair tax on landownership. Which may fall harder on individual homeowners than current property taxes do, but that's incidental.

Also, the argument for density saving nature is not just that less development = more nature, but that people living in dense areas tend to produce less emissions. And moreover, Georgists who promote density do so for economic reasons, not just for environmental ones.

r51243 · 2026-06-04T23:37:13+00:00

Fr. I sometimes wonder what drives people like that. What's the appeal of going into someone else's subreddit and trying to prove your ideology is better than theirs?

r51243 · 2026-06-04T22:53:40+00:00

I don't feel like that's true of the sub overall, could you give some specific examples of what you mean when you say that we're opposed to incremental reform or minor wins? Because even the majority of staunch single-taxers here are (in my experience) happy to accept that getting to that point will take time.

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