[Retric]

Functioning governments drastically increase worker productivity through several means such as enforcing the rule of law, sanitation, infrastructure etc. This is also why people want to immigrate to countries with such high tax rates and more specifically income tax rates.

Thus as the value of wages and investment returns is a direct result of government actions just as the value of land is a direct result of government enforcement of property rights, it’s got equal legitimacy for taxing both.

[dragonwriter]

I don't disagree with anything you said but I also don't see how it bears any relationship (positive or negative) to my post that it responds to.

[Retric]

To be clear, I agree the costs of work caps maximum tax rates well below 100%.

However, I was dumping government into that same cost of work category as commuting costs. It just makes more sense to work in a country where you make 100x as much even if you’re paying 50% in taxes than a failed state with zero income taxes. As such it also makes sense for governments to impose income taxes to be able to pay for things like education that improve short or long term productivity.

[lotsofpulp]

> As such it also makes sense for governments to impose income taxes to be able to pay for things like education that improve short or long term productivity.

Why can’t land value tax be used? It already is in the USA (and probably around the world), but the labs value tax rates can be increased to properly allocate tax liability to this who consume more.

[Retric]

Because market distortion harms society?

Tax homes based on the number of rooms and people suffer without closets even though total revenue remains the same. Income taxes have this wonderful property where factory workers can’t game the system thus avoiding distortions. Land taxes high enough to offset income taxes results in all sorts of unpleasant side effects.

The US approach of funding local schools is horribly inefficient. People like it because it reinforces the class system, but just as with closets people end up with lower standards of living because they’re optimizing around arbitrary rules.

[lotsofpulp]

> Tax homes based on the number of rooms and people suffer without closets even though total revenue remains the same

How is this relevant to land value tax?

> Income taxes have this wonderful property where factory workers can’t game the system thus avoiding distortions. Land taxes high enough to offset income taxes results in all sorts of unpleasant side effects.

Why would earned income taxes not have unpleasant side effects if land value taxes have unpleasant side effects? All taxes affect the market, and they are supposed to.

Isn’t it unpleasant that people in large lots who inherited from their ancestors’ pay very little tax for all the security an orderly society provides and all the courts/police/military that keeps their land safe?

Isn’t it unpleasant that too low land value tax rates keep empty store fronts, empty lots in the middle of urban areas, increasing the lengths people have to travel and removing the ability to walk anywhere?

> The US approach of funding local schools is horribly inefficient. People like it because it reinforces the class system,

Only because it’s a flat tax rates. If it was a power law formula, then people using less land (aka those in apartments and in general, far poorer) would pay far less than those on 0.06 acre lot townhomes who would pay less than those on 0.15 acre lot mansions. Not to mention all the rich landowners (via REITs and other real estate holding companies) paying far more for commercial real estate, incentivizing them to make productive use of their land, such as dense housing and not keeping spaces empty.

[Retric]

> How is this relevant to land value tax?

It’s an example of distortion.

> Why would earned income taxes not have unpleasant side effects if land value taxes have unpleasant side effects?

Distortion requires some way to optimize for the tax by charging behavior unnaturally. Maximizing income results in the same behavior with and without an income tax. Instead distortion comes modifications like not taxing health insurance and lower rates on long term capital gains etc.

A land value tax incentivizes less efficient allocation of resources on the other hand because land becomes artificially more expensive. For example it heavily disincentivizes farming etc. Obviously you’d end up with same kind of tax breaks but now you’re further distorting the market.

[47282847]

You claimed working costs you. You’re free to have that perspective but I think it is unfortunate and does not contribute to one’s well being. You can, simply for your own benefit, decide to take a different view on it, without having to change any factual truths. You get paid for your work.

I wouldn’t want to think that somebody is taking something that belongs to me away from me. That is not a pleasant feeling.