Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by zug_zug 26 days ago
Could you explain more or link a place that explains how this prevents the runaway wealth we are seeing?
1 comments

The book Progress and Poverty argues this. Basically as we see wealth increase, increases in population and productivity raise the value of land (economic rent). Landowners capture this value, while wages for labor stagnate. A Land Value Tax and other taxes on rents removes that extraction, so people are able to reap its benefits. Meanwhile it also stop taxing productive things, like capital and labor, incentivizing people to work harder and invest. Runaway wealth is often parked in land other rents, but as land is taxed it, in incentivized investment: more housing, more innovation, etc to be more utilized more efficienty.