[project2012] Against Home Ownerism | For LVT

Wed Jun 2 12:36:30 BST 2010

Forwarded from Dave:

Short notice but I'm speaking at Parliament Square Eco-Village 8pm this
Thursday 3rd June.
Best Wishes,

Dave

Dave Wetzel
"Transforming Communities".
Sustainable Transport Policies ▪ Public Finance with Social Inclusion ▪
Affordable Housing ▪ Economic Land Policies with Justice.

Tel: 0208 568 9004
Intl:+44 208 568 9004

Mobile/Cellphone: 07715 32 29 26
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e-mail: davewetzel42 at googlemail.com

40 Adelaide Terrace. Great West Road.
Brentford. LONDON. TW8 9PQ. UK
Web:
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On 31 May 2010 11:05, Mark Barrett <marknbarrett at googlemail.com> wrote:

> Hi Michael
>
> Fetished is the right way of putting it. As I understand it my colleague
> Dave Wetzel of Labourland Campaign will be presenting on LVT in Parliament
> Square to Democracy Village later this week so perhaps we could all meet
> there to discuss further. I will confirm date and time when I've received
> the exact info on this.
>
> Regards
>
> Mark
>
>   On 31 May 2010 10:56, Edwards Michael <m.edwards at ucl.ac.uk> wrote:
>
>> I missed the early part of this exchange but am interested by Harvey Cole
>> and David Griffiths etc.  I do consider  that the fetishised role now being
>> played by house ownership has contributed to the crisis and to inequality of
>> wealth, and is part of the diversion of money capital away from productive
>> investment. Most  of the money flowing into housing (and other property) is
>> driving up prices, and is not 'investment in new housing'.
>>
>> Version of the analysis which I am trying to develop is in draft at
>> http://societycould.wordpress.com and I would be glad of any comments.
>>  Michael Edwards
>>
>>  On 31 May 2010, at 10:19, Mark Barrett wrote:
>>
>>  *How housing crowds out*
>> *4th May 2010*
>> David Griffiths (Letters, May) argues that owner-occupied housing does not
>> “crowd out” other investment. I disagree. By its very nature, the housing
>> market ensures that any vendors are bound to reinvest their sale proceeds
>> into that market—unless they die or move abroad. With a new house, the
>> purchase price is split between the builder, agents and solicitors, all of
>> whom keep the money mostly in their own businesses. With existing houses,
>> purchasers’ money is used by vendors to buy another home—usually at a higher
>> price as they “trade up.” So houses are widely seen as an investment to be
>> favoured above others, producing sharply rising prices, and making the
>> market unable to meet the very real need for housing of a significant
>> proportion of the population.
>> *Harvey Cole
>> Winchester*
>>
>> *Housing error*
>>
>> *6th April 2010*
>> Philippe Legrain (April) is wrong about the economic impact of housing
>> transactions. As he points out, “swapping more or less the same stock of
>> houses with each other cannot logically create riches for society as a
>> whole.” This is because the transfer of funds from buyer to seller is a
>> zero-sum game. But his next assertion, that the exchange of existing
>> properties “has huge costs because it diverts funds from productive
>> investment,” is defeated by the same logic. Why? Because for every purchaser
>> who buys a house rather than investing elsewhere, there is a seller
>> receiving investible funds. To prove that owner-occupied housing “crowds
>> out” other investment, Legrain would need to argue that the level of new
>> housing investment is too high—a much harder case to sustain.
>> *David Griffiths*
>> *Huddersfield*
>>  Tax the ground they walk on
>> Philippe Legrain<http://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/search/magazine?s=%22Philippe+Legrain%22&search_fields=author_only&advanced=1>
>>   23rd March 2010  —  Issue 169<http://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/issue/169>
>> A new land tax is the only efficient and fair way to bring Britain’s
>> finances back into line
>> <http://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/2010/03/tax-the-ground-they-walk-on-2/>
>>
>> *The Duke of Buccleuch and Queensberry on his estate: 0.3 per cent of
>> Britain’s population owns 69 per cent of its land *
>> ------------------------------
>>
>> Consider these three facts. One: Britain is struggling to recover from a
>> crisis caused in large part by a huge property bubble. Two: unemployment is
>> painfully high. Three: the government has a huge gap in its finances. So,
>> what would you raise taxes on?
>>
>> Astonishingly, Labour is proposing to raise already high taxes on labour,
>> through an increase in national insurance contributions. Finance fails, so
>> workers pay—this is not only unfair, it will also damage future growth by
>> making labour more expensive. Existing income tax and national insurance
>> already increase labour costs by half, causing unemployment. Raising taxes
>> on something the government wants to encourage—hard work—is perverse.
>>
>> Another option is taxing harmful things, like carbon emissions. A charge
>> of £30 a tonne could raise around £16bn and reduce emissions. Even better,
>> if the tax per tonne rose as emissions fell, it would ensure a steady source
>> of revenue. But still bigger gains could come from taxing an unproductive
>> asset at the heart of our most recent bubble: land.
>>
>> Britons have long seemed addicted to property speculation. Yet swapping
>> more or less the same stock of houses with each other cannot logically
>> create riches for society as a whole. Indeed, it has huge costs because it
>> diverts funds from productive investment—while the resulting boom and bust
>> can cause havoc. Taxing land could curb property bubbles, and encourage
>> productive investment elsewhere.
>>
>> It would work by valuing all land holdings every year (based on recent
>> market transactions in the same area) and imposing a charge. If this was
>> raised when land values were rising fastest, it would take the steam out of
>> any bubbles without affecting the rest of the economy, as interest rates do.
>> And whereas taxing income from work is wasteful—if less is produced, no tax
>> is raised on the lost output—land supply is fixed. No matter how heavily you
>> tax it, land cannot be spirited away to a tax haven.
>>
>> Land already accounts for the bulk of property values, especially in
>> expensive places like central London. But taxing its value, rather than
>> property or any improvements to it, would not penalise people who do up
>> their home. It would also encourage the development of vacant and derelict
>> land. Unlike stamp duty, a land-value tax would not be a tax on property
>> purchases, so it would not discourage people moving. And it needn’t force a
>> granny in a big house out of her home; payment could be deferred until her
>> death if necessary.
>>
>> Critics say the tax is problematic because land is hard to value.
>> Nonsense. Property changes hands all the time and estate agents and
>> surveyors routinely value it. Land-value taxes could be collected easily and
>> cheaply. Hong Kong and Singapore both derive a large share of their revenue
>> from variants of this system and have very low income taxes as a result.
>> Denmark also has a tradition of land-value taxation.
>>
>> Most importantly, land taxes are also fair. In most countries history
>> means the distribution of land is highly unequal. Land in Britain is more
>> unequally distributed than in Brazil: there 1 per cent of the population
>> owns 49 per cent of the land; here 0.3 per cent owns 69 per cent. Britain’s
>> biggest private landowner, the Duke of Buccleuch and Queensberry, owns
>> 277,000 acres because he descends from a man who seized vast swathes of
>> Scotland. Far from being taxed, he is rewarded with huge handouts from the
>> common agricultural policy. What’s more, the value of land increases each
>> year not through landowners’ striving, but that of others. Mayfair and
>> Belgravia—originally 300 acres of fields passed down to successive Dukes of
>> Westminster—are now worth an estimated £6.5bn. Better, therefore, to tax
>> that windfall gain rather than the work of those who really generated it.
>> And since the distribution of land is unequal, taxing it would be
>> progressive too.
>>
>> Likewise, when a government builds a new railway line and the value of the
>> surrounding property soars, surely it is right that this unearned wealth be
>> taxed. When the Jubilee line extension to Canary Wharf was built, property
>> values adjacent to its stations rose hugely—by £2.8bn at Southwark and
>> Canary Wharf alone. Land-value taxes would pay for—and thus encourage—public
>> investment in valuable infrastructure. It could fund, for instance, the
>> high-speed rail network that Britain so desperately needs. Conversely,
>> landowners would be partly compensated for new developments that reduced the
>> value of their land.
>>
>> The concept has a fine pedigree. David Ricardo, the founder of modern
>> economics, was a fan. So is Martin Wolf, the Financial Times’s chief
>> economics commentator, while the Liberal Democrat shadow chancellor, Vince
>> Cable, has proposed a “mansions tax,” which would target the richest
>> homeowners. Perhaps the most eloquent case was made by Winston Churchill in
>> 1909. “Roads are made, streets are made, services are improved… To not one
>> of those improvements does the land monopolist, as a land monopolist,
>> contribute, and yet by every one of them the value of his land is enhanced…
>> he contributes nothing to the process from which his own enrichment is
>> derived.” A century on, the rest of us would benefit from facing down the
>> ultimate vested interest: the big landowners who still own most of Britain.
>>
>> http://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/2010/03/tax-the-ground-they-walk-on-2/
>>
>> On 31 May 2010 08:57, Robin Smith <robinsmith3 at googlemail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> Exactly!
>>>
>>> When someone who has picked berries wants to exchange them with someone
>>> who has grown some grain, a trade is made between consenting partners. A
>>> market was made for berries and grain. This is natural. A properly free
>>> market. Within a functioning social organisation. Everyone goes away happy,
>>> with enough to live on, a surplus of capital in case of hard times and with
>>> the security that their social and trading partner can by trusted.
>>> One partner is better at picking berries, the other growing grain. Both
>>> gain by trade, in a free market. This division of labour is how we can
>>> produce MORE than we need, simply by trading on our abilities, in
>>> association. We no longer need to beat against the limits of nature to
>>> survive. It requires no political dimension to sustain itself. And it
>>> applies in the smallest trade as it does the largest because it is a law of
>>> nature. And it is this miracle of society that sets human evolution/creation
>>> in the context of the rest of nature in which we remain integral parts. It
>>> is this that shows without fail that there is abundant wealth available for
>>> every man and woman born. Sustainably. There is great hope.
>>>
>>> So why does it not seem like this in real life? Injustice and Failure! By
>>> human institutions. Not nature. Stealing from each other through an almost
>>> fully monopolised market. Something is corruptly interfering with our
>>> beautiful and natural free market. Something completely unnatural. Doing to
>>> us what we would not do to others. THAT is what we need to end. Monopolism.
>>> Ignorance and selfishness prevent resolution. Socialism versus Capitalism is
>>> an ignorant and selfish battle. The real enemy are the robbers, the
>>> Monopolists. The spiteful social institutions and failed governments we keep
>>> supporting and electing. As voters that is our fault. We can change it very
>>> easily, immediately.
>>>
>>> It is this that Real Reform is attempting to address. A change of mind
>>> about who is the real enemy.
>>> http://gco2e.blogspot.com/2010/05/mirale-of-society-part-2.html
>>>
>>> Best
>>> Robin.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On 28 May 2010 02:05, Steve Gwynne <satoritree at yahoo.co.uk> wrote:
>>>
>>>>  I agree since there will always be markets and industry (capitalism)
>>>> and there will always been cooperation and mutualism (socialism) .. it is
>>>> even what we have now!!!
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> To blame markets and industry for all our problems is to blame everyone
>>>> who uses the markets and industry and who doesn’t!!!  Is it possible not to
>>>> use them in one way or another!!!
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> However, when INDIVIDUALS spend and make money or make crap decisions
>>>> and they fuck up, causing others to suffer too, then they need to be
>>>> accountable to the social body whether elected or not .. this is otherwise
>>>> known as responsibility.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> The conservatives have in a way made a brave move utilising
>>>> responsibility as one of their key principles because we will now see what
>>>> they actually mean by responsibility and how they will judge what is and
>>>> what is not fair in terms of responsibility.  Is it fair and responsible to
>>>> be long-term unemployed out of choice.  And is it fair and responsible to be
>>>> earning £10,000 a week being a privileged, private school trained, oxford
>>>> graduate, solicitors making shit loads of money out of the Iraqi war
>>>> legalizing corrupt inter-governmental deals.  Both these people ought to be
>>>> judged equally as to whether they are being fair and responsible to the
>>>> social body.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> We know that at the moment this would not happen and only the doley is
>>>> judged before the social body via the jobcentre even though both are being
>>>> paid by public money.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Obviously this is a case of discrimination and for me, just another
>>>> typical example of the discrimination against the poor or as it was in the
>>>> Victorian times, when the suffering inflicted on the poor in order to help
>>>> create industrial capital far outweighed the suffering experience by the
>>>> rich.  So for me, the war is between the rich and the poor and the fact that
>>>> there is always a limited supply of money and that pool of money is created
>>>> by everyone, not just the few that own most of it.  So whilst a billionaire
>>>> swans around being a twat spending money on all sorts of shit, communities
>>>> need much needed funding and resources to enable, empower and train the
>>>> youth in whatever it is they want to do.  At the moment, money is so short
>>>> that funding is actually being cut whilst the rich continue to give
>>>> themselves anything they want.  This might be construed as a class thing but
>>>> for me it is deeper than that.  It is simply based on social discrimination
>>>> and it is amazing how nearly everyone just plays right along with the game
>>>> as if it were natural.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> So the real war is between the rich and the poor but ..
>>>>
>>>> The yet unanswered question is that perhaps that is the ecologically way
>>>> it is supposed to
>>>> be!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Since the mere existence of LIFE depends on discrimination in order to
>>>> keep adapting and evolving.  What do I mean by this, well we (any life-form)
>>>> has to always choose what other life-form it is going to kill in order to
>>>> live.  If that isn’t discrimination I don’t what is.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> So should we tax everything that is bought, sold or utilized in the
>>>> market, including land – that is when it is a part of capitalism .. perhaps
>>>> yes but then do we leave forms of economic cooperation tax-free, that being
>>>> socialism.  But isn’t the wholesaler cooperating with the retail and the
>>>> retail cooperating with the customer .. well yes and no. And what about
>>>> between landowner, tenant and consumer. Again yes and no.  Yes because
>>>> promises, a fair deal and fair exchange largely determine the running of the
>>>> markets and this relies upon cooperation.  No because there are some rip-off
>>>> bastards out there who would rob u blind given half the chance.  Is the
>>>> state such a culprit.  Again yes and no.  Yes because it can serve itself
>>>> and can even create problems where there isn’t any in order to BE the
>>>> solution so as to justify its own existence – think 911 (maybe), think the
>>>> Iraqi Invasion, and think the Afghan invasion.  No because in all fairness,
>>>> the State probably does have a role to play in social life otherwise we
>>>> would not have democracy but tyranny under the rule of gangsters, warlords
>>>> and crime syndicates – in other words we would be ruled by the underworld
>>>> (just my opinion).  In many ways I think I am lucky to be in the UK where
>>>> democracy is pretty advanced and whilst it is a slow process – and probably
>>>> needs to be we always seem to be improving  – which is why, again in my
>>>> opinion, the conditions don’t exist for a revolution here in the UK.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> For me, it seems only fair to tax the land since it being a social
>>>> resource that is often being utilised to earn a private income, it is only
>>>> fair that a proportion of it be distributed for the social good and in an
>>>> accountable way.  For me, one cannot be fairer or more responsible than
>>>> that.  So obviously this land-tax-evasion is just another example of how the
>>>> rich stay rich and the poor stay poor.  But as above, is that determined by
>>>> our ecology.  Well it certainly seems to be at present and the only reason I
>>>> can see why it might be a part of our ecology is the idea that the few who
>>>> own most of the money are somehow more ecologically adapted to be able to
>>>> use it responsibly for the good of all.  We all know this as social
>>>> Darwinism, but If this is the case – which it might be – then for good
>>>> ecological measure and as an ecological safeguard, we should then have a
>>>> system of accountability to the social that also includes the private as
>>>> well as the public.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> So it is either tax the land or include the private into the system of
>>>> social accountability – you can’t be fairer or more responsible than that
>>>> J
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> There, there are my comments J
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Steve
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> *From:* project2012 at googlegroups.com [mailto:
>>>> project2012 at googlegroups.com] *On Behalf Of *Robin Smith
>>>> *Sent:* 28 May 2010 00:09
>>>> *To:* project2012 at googlegroups.com
>>>> *Subject:* [project2012] Capitalism: A Love Story interview
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Good interview
>>>>
>>>> 58 minutes in is a good question from the audience. This is what I'm
>>>> asking for with Real Reform!
>>>>
>>>> NO MORE SOCIALISM VERSUS CAPITALISM. IT IS A FALSE WAR
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> http://gco2e.blogspot.com/2010/05/false-battle-between-labour-and-capital.html
>>>>
>>>> Cheers
>>>>
>>>> --
>>>> Election Campaign
>>>> http://tinyurl.com/robinsmithelection
>>>>
>>>> Economics Comment
>>>> http://gco2e.blogspot.com/
>>>>
>>>> Work
>>>> http://www.systemicfiscalreform.org/
>>>>
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>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Election Campaign
>>> http://tinyurl.com/robinsmithelection
>>>
>>> Economics Comment
>>> http://gco2e.blogspot.com/
>>>
>>> Work
>>> http://www.systemicfiscalreform.org/
>>>
>>>
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>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> "We hear men speaking for us of new laws strong and sweet /Yet is there no
>> man speaketh as we speak in the street.”
>>
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>>
>>
>> *********************end********************
>>  *London Plan: UCL work at http://ucljustspace.wordpress.com  and the
>> actual submissions at http://justspace2010.wordpress.com
>> *
>> *
>> *
>> *New blog on how society could do housing and planning better
>> http://societycould.wordpress.com supporting the research project of Bob
>> Colenutt and Michael Edwards*
>> *
>> *
>> Michael Edwards, The Bartlett School, UCL
>> 22 Gordon Street
>> London WC1H 0QB
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>>
>>
>>
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>
>
>
> --
> "We hear men speaking for us of new laws strong and sweet /Yet is there no
> man speaketh as we speak in the street.”
>

-- 
"We hear men speaking for us of new laws strong and sweet /Yet is there no
man speaketh as we speak in the street.”
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