[RepAgent]

COST model popularized by Glen Weyl and Eric Posner would be perfect tax for these kind of assets. COST is a form of Harberger Tax that ensures that the t property is more productively utilized by the society.

This is how COST works:

1. The owner can determine what the value of the asset is. They can over or underestimate the value as much as they want.

2. The owner pays some percentage of that valuation as tax. If they value the asset very low, they pay very little taxes.

3. The catch. Anyone can buy the property at any time at the owner determined valuation. If you don't want anyone to buy your assets, you must value it more than other people and and pay taxes for the value.

EDIT:

It seems that many people think that COST type private property tax would extend to personal property or could be applied without modification to housing for poor people etc. Personal possessions are not taxed in any place of the world and tax deduction make sure that small personal properties can be owned without paying tax.

The system requires some adjustments, for example property taxation might be somewhat different. Vitalik Buterin discusses these issues in his review of the book: https://vitalik.ca/general/2018/04/20/radical_markets.html

[dragonwriter]

> It seems that many people think that COST type private property tax would extend to personal property

You just literally recommended it for an item of tangible personal property, so from your recommendation that's not an extension at all.

> Personal possessions are not taxed in any place of the world

Yes, ad valorem property taxes on items of personal property do exist in some jurisdictions in the world, including many in the United States. (E.g., California's Vehicle License Fee is an ad valorem tax on automobiles which are items of tangible personal property.)

> and tax deduction make sure that small personal properties can be owned without paying tax.

That doesn't make sense with the preceding claim: of personal property wasn't taxed, you wouldn't need any kind of deduction to allow owning it without paying tax. Also, deductions which allow this aren't in place where they would be needed (i.e., where certain items of personal property are taxed) to allow ownership without taxation.

[RepAgent]

>You just literally recommended it for an item of tangible personal property,

Yes. We all write somewhat inaccurately and carelessly in discussion groups. Instead of nitpicking each other, we should try to read each other favorably.

What I mean is that there is classes of tangibles from pots and pans that one commentators was worried about into paintings worth of millions. It's concealable that at some valuations artifacts worth of millions are considered different asset classes.

[dragonwriter]

It seems to me that if you want to recommend this to be applied to some particular subset of tangible real property rather than the whole class, than rather than mocking the idea that your recommendation would extend to the existing category as a whole, you ought to actually define the subset to which you would propose applying it so that your actual proposal can be evaluated.

[magicalhippo]

Say I bought a computer, which I use to do my work on. Then I have a dry spell with little work so I get poor and can't afford to buy a new computer. But it's ok cause I use the one I got. I still valuate the computer at or above market rates, because I need it.

But what's preventing someone with more money than me from threatening to buy it from me unless I do X for them, or just to be a jerk? Without the computer I lose my ability to do my job, further driving me into poverty.

Am I missing something here?

edit: basically what I wonder is, what prevents this scheme from getting weaponized, and how does it deal with wealth asymmetry?

[RcouF1uZ4gsC]

If you value it at or above market rates, then, by definition, whoever bought it from you would pay you enough money to buy another at market rate.

[magicalhippo]

Point taken. However that still leaves the possibility that I no longer am able to pay taxes according to current market rates.

edit: Basically it assumes the object is available on the market, and it's available for the price I can afford to valuate it at. How does one prevent this tax scheme from being weaponized when one of those two assumptions are not valid?

[AnthonyMouse]

In addition to the problems everyone else is pointing out, this also fails to account for labor, transaction costs and the variability of value based on relative ownership.

Suppose I'm a wildlife photographer and I have a camera that unarguably has a market value of no more than $300 (it's what the manufacturer still sells it for). But I've positioned it deep in the Alaskan wilderness at the cost of 50 hours of labor and $15,000 in travel costs. Someone who wants to troll me demands to buy it for $300, requiring payment of those same costs again to retrieve it, and then does the same thing twelve more times, one month apart, for my twelve other cameras.

Or I have a diamond as part of a laser. The diamond costs $100 but then it costs $10,000 to calibrate the laser, so someone who takes the diamond requires me to buy another for $100 and then pay another $10,000 to calibrate the laser again.

Or you have a custom component which can't be manufactured in less than ten years, because it requires a slow chemical reaction, but is a small yet blocking component of a large million dollar operation. Notwithstanding that, it's cheap to make it, because you just start the reaction and come back in ten years. But now someone who wants to shut down your operation just buys that component from you (along with your five spares) for the $10 market value and your million dollar operation is shut down for ten years.

For that matter, it can be used to monopolize the market for various commodities by offering the current market price for everything at once and then turning around to resell them for the monopoly price.

Or members of your family own shares that total 60% ownership in a company, and I own the other 40%. You personally own 12%, which I demand to buy for the market price, even though I should be paying the higher price for a controlling interest.

Or you've got a shelf full of equipment you use for your business operations, which your company manufactured itself and could quickly and inexpensively make more, but having access to any one of them would disclose millions of dollars worth of trade secrets to your competitors.

Market value is a fiction that only really applies to high volume commodities.

[kolinko]

Sounds like a great idea. I have a noisy neighbor - this would allow me to finally get rid of him.

Also, there is an old lady living in one apt since WW2, but she's short on cash. I guess I could grab her place too. She took a good care of it over the years, but made a mistake of not investing in crypto, so I can easily outbid her now.

[sukilot]

She can pay the tax via a lien on her property (payable at sale or death) or a reverse mortgage. This already happens today.

[RepAgent]

Almost all laws have exceptions for personal property and housing that is occupied. Automatic tax deduction takes car of the rest.

[boomlinde]

That reminds me of the rules of Swedish folkrace (a sort of amateur rally). You can put as much value as you want into your car, but after the races anyone can buy it off you for 8000 SEK. That way the bar of entry is kept low and the odds are evened out.

[LargeWu]

This is essentially how horse racing works as well in the US. The majority of races are "claiming" races, which means that horses are entered into a race at a given price. $5000, $10000, $50000, whatever. Before the race is run, anybody can put in a claim to buy the horse at that price after the race is run.

It's essentially how horses are kept racing against the appropriate competition. Enter your horse too low, in an attempt to win the purse, and it will get claimed. Enter your horse too high and it will not have a realistic chance of winning.

[whenchamenia]

Thats the standard 'claim' rule in many amatuer and professional motorsports. It used to be more popular.

[zepolen]

I don't get it, can't you get a friend to buy it off you.

[LanceH]

Typically if more than one person puts in a claim on a winning car, there is a drawing.

[boomlinde]

Not just anyone, but everyone can file a claim to the car. In case several claims are made for the same car, the claimant that gets to purchase the car is picked at random.

[jzwinck]

Not every game or sport has to devolve to angling for loopholes. Sure, get a friend to buy it, never be invited to compete again. Congratulations, you cheated to win a race almost nobody knows or cares about (if people did care so much about winning this race, they wouldn't think twice about "losing" a million bucks by openly over-spending).

[dsfyu404ed]

Angling for loopholes is a highly ingrained part of the sport of racing.

[C1sc0cat]

That's how 24 hours des lemons works (at the judges discretion) - its has been only be applied once.

[chii]

> Anyone can buy [it]

i think that can open up some issues with people's assets that also have sentimental value.

I think instead of "anyone", it should be just the govt. If your appraisal seems too low, then the gov't reserves the right to purchase the asset instead of charging you the owed tax.

[Nition]

Not just things with sentimental value but just anything you're still using as well. It sounds like you'd be living in fear any time you invited someone over that they'd start saying they'll buy your frying pan and your second couch or something. And you'd have to let them buy it.

Then you have to go to the shops and buy new stuff... or just go over to their house the next day and buy it all back at the same price. Maybe see if they've got any other good stuff that isn't worth much while you're there.

Or you could just buy it back immediately when they buy it from you, stuck in an infinite While loop of ownership.

[ljf]

Why would they want to buy your frying pan? Is the value you've given it very low, making it cheaper to buy yours than another one? Is there a shortage of frying pans, increasing the value of yours?

[oconnor663]

People are often angry with each other and eager to hurt each other in any legal way available. (Ask your friendly neighborhood divorce lawyer for their stories.) This sort "anyone can take your stuff if they're irrational enough" would be very easy to exploit to make someone's life miserable. And the problem only gets worse if you imagine a normal person making a very rich person angry.

[Nition]

Thank you, you said it better than me. Any system where anyone can take someone's stuff without their consent, even for a price, would never work.

[Nition]

They see you have a good pan and want one that's the same. Buying yours is less effort than going to the shops and faster than ordering one.

Obviously social decorum would usually prevent this scenario, but the fear of possibility remains.

[puszczyk]

Maybe that firing pan is owned by a rockstar ?

[IG_Semmelweiss]

Its trivial to limit this rule to assets that the government tracks transfers of

For example cars, land, air rights, real property.

This would also settle the issue of eminent domain once and for all. Put up or shut up.

[yardstick]

I wouldn’t even trust the government with this ability. Also what will the government do with these assets? Hoard them forever? Or eventually sell them back into the market. I can imagine govt employees receiving kick backs for seizing assets this way and selling them to their friend.

[lmm]

> Also what will the government do with these assets? Hoard them forever? Or eventually sell them back into the market. I can imagine govt employees receiving kick backs for seizing assets this way and selling them to their friend.

Presumably the government would auction them (as is done with seized proceeds of crime etc.). So there is no way to hand them off to a friend for a below-market price, and no way to profitably kickback.

[sukilot]

Auctions are already used today as a way for government and unethical entities to steal from the public. This is an epidemic in civil forfeiture for alleged crimes, and in property tax seizures for cash poor-homeowners.

[lmm]

The problem in those scenarios isn't the auction, it's the seizure without compensation.

[RepAgent]

Is there a reason why sentimental value should not be taxed?

I mean, you would not extend the taxation to personal holdings with little value or moderate value (automatic tax deduction of $2,000 per person from COST would probably be enough) but if someone wants to keep something very valuable for sentimental reasons, why the feeling should not have a value put on it?

[harimau777]

A couple of thoughts:

The question can easily be turned around: why should sentimental value be taxed?

It seems to me that protecting the things that are important to someone is a core purpose of society. Forcing someone to choose between the security of the things that are important to them and their financial wellbeing would undermine that.

The justifications for a high tax rate don't seem to apply to inheritance of items that have high sentimental value but low utility. Since the property does not have great utility, taxing it does not moderate income inequality due to inheriting capital. Both the idea of a higher tax rate on people who have more and the idea that it is justified to tax things higher that people didn't earn seem like an odd match for property that is high in sentimental value.

[lmm]

The tax burden is supposed to fall on those who are most able to bear it. Funding our society necessarily means inflicting a certain amount of misery on the citizens; the tax rates are supposed to share that misery out in a more-or-less equitable way.

Someone who has a lot of valuable things is better off than someone who doesn't, and so we demand a greater share of tax from them. It seems to me that that logic goes through exactly the same whether that value is nominal or sentimental.

[justin66]

> The justifications for a high tax rate don't seem to apply to inheritance of items that have high sentimental value but low utility.

There's nothing accurate about saying an expensive work of art has "low utility."

(and as I pointed out in a separate comment, an inexpensive work of art won't be taxed heavily so the whole point is moot)

[barrkel]

Because it gives wealthy people power to take things that poor people love.

[sukilot]

The solution for that is to tax wealthy people more.

[RepAgent]

As I said, there is no reason to extend tax to personal property. If poor people owns something valuable, they stop being poor when wealthy people take it.

The distinction between personal property or personal possessions and private property is important to make and the line must be drawn.

[chii]

> If poor people owns something valuable, they stop being poor when wealthy people take it.

if you owned some land which could've been mined/fracked upon, then it might make economic sense for said company to purchase your land. You'd have to either pay an above average tax rate to justify holding on to the land, or be forced to sell it.

On the one hand, it does make economic utilitarian sense. On the other hand, it prevents people from being able to control their own property. Esp. if they have no funds to fight or defend themselves.

[IG_Semmelweiss]

You foeget eminent domain.

The stack is already against the homeowner who lacks lobbyists to fight back

This achieves more of a level playing field.

[yardstick]

“If poor people owns something valuable, they stop being poor when wealthy people take it”

Only if you accept the money given makes up for the loss. Money does not make someone rich. It may put bread on the table but that poor person is still poor because they lost what was important to them.

Also the rich don’t get rich by paying more than they have to, which may not be what the property is worth to the original owner.

[seniorsassycat]

The amount they would have to value it at so they could afford the tax if they have to pay it may too low to turn them into a wealthy person if a wealthy person chooses to buy it.

[gerhardi]

Taxing sentimental value would be a perfect way to make the poor even poorer.. I don’t like the idea. Why would someone want to do this?

[RepAgent]

Did you understand the tax deduction part?

You can set the number so that if poor person must pay tax, he actually is moderately wealthy.

[gerhardi]

Yes and still, the idea of taxing sentimental value feels as absurd as tax on level of life satisfaction or something similar.

[C1sc0cat]

Your Granddads MOH or Victoria Cross for example

[dragonwriter]

Sentimental value is value and is factored in when declaring value; you are taxing the value to the owner.

> I think instead of "anyone", it should be just the govt. If your appraisal seems too low, then the gov't reserves the right to purchase the asset instead of charging you the owed tax.

For intellectual property (only), I've suggested in the past a version of this where anyone can buy it at the declared value, but it can only be bought into the public domain, which is sort of a hybrid of the anybody can buy and only the government can buy ideas.

In the more general case, an alternative is “anyone can offer to buy with a bid at or above the declared value, but unless it is the government exercising eminent domain you can refuse by increasing the declared value above the bid, posting back taxes as if the declared value for the current tax year were the new value, and for prior years as if the value had increased on some legally defined schedule over a set window of years (say, 5) or since you acquired the item, whichever is shorter, including a time-based penalty for all the ubderpayments.”

[michaelt]

So this database of everyone's valuables and how much they're appraised at - is it publicly available? I can't avoid getting bids by keeping it secret what I own? Do potential buyers have the right to inspect the thing they'd be buying?

[gamblor956]

I'm not sure where you're getting your definition of personal property from, but for tax and legal purposes generally all tangible goods that aren't permanently fixed in place are considered "personal property." So basically everything physical except for buildings and fixtures.

So as described in your comment, COST would apply to personal property.

Also, personal property owned by a business is taxed in California (under the business property tax) and generally in some European countries, some South American countries, and India.

That doesn't include the countries that impose wealth taxes, which includes items that would be considered personal property.

[chadash]

Say my name is John Smith and I inherit a Ferrari whose auction value is well established at $1 million. The first thing I do is claim the Ferrari for $800,000, taking it $200k under market. Immediately after that, I have John Smith engraved on some of the car components. Now, the car is in fact worth less than when I inherited it, because no one would be willing to pay as much for a John Smith engraved Ferrari. Maybe I didn't plan to sell it anyway, but it seems like I'm dodging the the taxes on the $200k difference here.