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by hellojesus 950 days ago
> They can't force you to sell, you have the option of just updating the declared value to the new market price.

This isn't implicationless. What if you can't afford the taxes on the newly declared price?

A whale could conceivably force people out by offering a price above their ability to afford the taxes. If they don't sell, they get evicted due to tax nonpayment. If they do sell, they get the money but now need to find a new place to live in an appreciated market. Their autonomy is removed by force.

1 comments

To be honest, I wish the authors hadn't framed their idea on property taxes because there are a lot of obvious practical and political issues with doing it. And I don't personally think this would be a good way to do property taxes on owner-occupied housing. I only brought it up originally because I think a lot of issues with it are irrelevant when applied in the domain of intangible economic assets like patents. In that particular domain I think the overriding principle of intellectual property law should be to maximize economic efficiency.