I found the least bad way to tax

Mr. Beat tells the story of Henry George and explains his land value tax and Georgism, while @JacobAClifford quite literally sneaks in to explain why people love a single, land value tax so much. Subscribe to Jacob's channel!

Produced by Matt Beat. All images and video by Matt Beat, used under fair use guidelines, or found in the public domain. Music by @thegreatnorthsoundsociety7093, Futuremono, and Underbelly & Ty Mayer. Filmed by Lydia Beat and Reegan Beat.

Sources/further reading and watching:
Progress and Poverty: An Inquiry into the Cause of Industrial Depressions and of Increase of Want with Increase of Wealth: The Remedy by Henry George
The Life of Henry George by Henry George, Jr.

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#georgism #henrygeorge #landvaluetax

I hope I made it obvious that I’m biased toward liking Georgism. You Georgism haters out there- I want to hear from you. Tell me why Georgism sucks.

[iammrbeat]

What are your thoughts on Georgism? Could a single land value tax actually work?

[aaronkamakaze]

Shout out to the guy who gave Henry George that 5 bucks. 5 bucks in the 1860s would be like giving someone nearly 200 bucks today. That probably helped him and his family out quite a bit.

[C.J.Kristel]

"The more I learn about it, the more I am impressed with it. Which is why it will never happen".
Truer words have rarely been spoken.

[Tucher]

I once read somewhere that wasn't Reddit that mentions someone once saw a Resturaunt shutdown, they were a kid in like 1997 or something, and they revisit the area in 2019, the place is still shutdown, imagine how many areas in this country that are for rent, lease yet are not being sold or used, just sitting there rotting.
A few years back, I heard of problems such as "no place to build homes or houses" yet there are ghost towns all over the US.
Humorously someone tried to pass a construction site that has been under construction for over 7 decades, saying the site is in Europe, but a local of the site said "dude this is in chicago"

[EvilTaco]

The thing is nowadays value isn't only produced through large operations that are on land like factories or farming. We have tech conpanies that need a relatively small amount of land to generate huge amounts of revenue

[ubernerd]

Fun fact: the game Monopoly (originally called the Landlord's Game) was created to promote Georgism. Apparently Parker Brothers removed the Georgist rules, leaving only the set of rules intended to show how bad monopolies are, which is why no one has fun playing Monopoly.

[StyxTBuferd]

So many people told him to touch grass that he actually did it. That's dedication there, Mr. Beat.

[claytondykstra]

The more I learn about the structure of our system and it's potential improvements/replacements, the more I fall into the perspective that we already have the answers to live in an efficient and equitable society and the people who benefit from the current system don't want that.

[Kackpuh]

That's literally where the game of monopoly comes from. One female professor sometime around the 1890's developed it and it was intended to be played once without land a value tax and once with land value tax by students to show them what happens without land value tax (this version is the modern Monopoly game).

[kentslocum]

The fact that I've never heard of Georgism is proof that the landowners won.

[jwacio]

My instructor at the Henry George School of Chicago said it best: "Whatever you tax you will get less of--unless it's land." When I proposed taxing consumption he said: "Taxing consumption taxes the result of investment, which taxes investment."

[BalderOdinson]

I live in a community whose largest industry is a university with decently popular sports. This means a ton of renters and visitors. We have implemented a "hospitality tax" on restaurant meals to keep property taxes low. I've long thought that while we were attempting to gouge the visitors, what we've really done is put a huge burden on the students and other renters. I've been wanting to reverse the situation and am glad to find that there is a name for it and thought that has been put in to it.

[ChristopherAbelman]

The tax code seems overly complex, making it difficult to identify the most tax-efficient strategies for my income and investments. Are there resources available to help me understand relevant deductions and credits that could maximize my after-tax returns?

[SantaClaauz]

“I fought the land, and the… land won.”
-Henry George (1897)

[blitzkrieg]

It actually sounds like a pretty good system, I doubt it would work as the only tax, but it definitely could replace a good chunk of the ones hurting the middle and lower classes.

[magneticlines]

It's an interesting idea. I'd like to know more about a couple things: 1) How does this account for the fact that vacant land can have value to society without being "productive" (a forest is valuable simply as a forest)? 2) Would a perfect Georgist utopia have zero green space in cities?

[johnromberg]

I like thinking, but I don't like learning much. And in my thinking I often think "there's no way I'm the first human ever to think of this, I probably just didn't learn about it". And here I am, learning about how good ol' Henry was thinking what I was thinking way before I thought of it.

[JJMcCullough]

In Canada, the biggest land owners are the provincial and federal governments. Canada is a very barren, empty country, and the governments control much of this "unused" territory. So how would Georgism apply here?

[danielroush]

Interesting. My family owns around 150 acres that I grew up on. We recieve a tax exemption on the property as part of a conservation initiative, since we leave it undeveloped. Something like this might need to factor into Georgism. Otherwise, it might see the total destruction of natural habitats.

[daithi]

There is a building in Providence, RI called the Superman building because it looks like the headquarters of the Daily Planet. It is the most prominent build in Providence's skyline. It was also built as a refueling station for blimps, which were competing with planes for air travel at the time. In any event, the property was vacant for over a decade because the owners just sat on it when their prior tenant left. It isn't the only building in Providence that is empty either. You also have areas in towns that are dominated by slum lords. So, don't just tax undeveloped land, but tax the crap out of unused and undeveloped commercial property as well.