Land Value Tax

[james armstrong]

Land Value Tax

 

I am against it on theoretical grounds and for it on
practical grounds.

It is wrong to treat Land as a commodity but proposing a
radical new tax would

drag the land issue  into the 
public forum.

 

Of the two,  the
latter case wins for me.  Exposing the
hidden housing land monopoly and the private regressive land tax  , also hidden, which is what CAP payments
really are, are ways of bringing home to people how important it is to end
exploitation by means of land ownership.

 

The thing about land tax is that it already exists. UK  Households , 95% of whom are in towns , pay
£200 each and every year unknowingly  to
landowners under the disguise of Common Agricultural Policy payments which cost
UK taxpayers £3.9billion
and which no politician , student- or union-leader, has suggested should be cut
to share the burden of debt. 

 

The welcome proposed refinement is that it is the Value of
the land which it is proposed should be taxed, which softens the   blow to my conscience a little, i.e. the
development value not the present value would be assessed.

Consider a field with cows 
has agricultural value. When designated as development land for houses its
value increases in SE England by £1million per
acre.   This would be the value assessed
for tax, even before it is developed. 

This would cure overnight one of the main causes of housing
shortage.  Presently corporations buy
undeveloped land with potential or actual permission and sit on it, untaxed. It
is declared in their balance sheets and attracts increases in nominal value to
boost their share value.    It pays these
plc’s not to develop it!  LVT would end
landbanking which is a serious cause of new housing shortgage which is a
serious cause of stress and a serious cause of increase in the  prices of the inadequate existing housing
stock.. 

 

Also , LVT would allow the public purse to benefit when a
new tube line is extended 

And the property value of the newly accessible  area increases explosively overnight.

At present this increase accrues to property owners in the
area  who did nothing to justify the
increase.

 

Also these dimmed furriners who pay no income tax here would
have the value of the rolling acres of England
which they ‘own’, taxed 

Of course the LVT will be abused and like all taxes have unforeseen
consequences. 

Once the Treasury get their hands on a new source of revenue
they will never let go.

They will abuse it as an extra tax, not as an alternative to
income tax, council  tax etc 

 

The main argument for me is that LVT will bring the monopoly
 land exploitation issue out of the
darkness where landowners strive to hide it while people – 75,000 of them
unbelievably, absentmindedly pay £1million every home game to watch Manchester
United  and £200 each to Madonna et al.   James 

.       

 		 	   		  
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