this post was submitted on 06 Sep 2023
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They should pay a significant land tax instead of leeching off the high-density dwellers.
Funny you say that as I'm the creator and mod of !justtaxland@lemmy.world
For others curious about land value taxes:
Further, it can't be passed on to tenants, both in economic theory and in observed practice, and even a milquetoast LVT -- such as in the Australian Capital Territory -- can have positive impacts:
At least give some kind of mention to Henry George for being the magnificent bastard that came up with this. His history is fascinating and most people don't know who he is because he pissed off all the major landowners (ivy league colleges) who blackballed even mention of his name.
A fellow georgist, I see! But yeah, the legacy section on his wikipedia page is absolutely insane, and yet I had never even heard of him before about 2 years ago (which of course led to me promptly becoming georgist). Not a whole lot of people learn about the guy and about georgism without swiftly becoming a georgist themselves lol.
Sounds like it could have a lot of loopholes like any tax scheme but as long as those are addressed, this looks like a reasonable proposal.
That's actually the beauty of LVT -- the government already knows who owns what land (the landowner has the deed), and land can't be hidden or offshored. You may try having shell companies, but the tax bill comes due regardless. The reason shell companies work for avoiding other taxes is because they can allow you to offshore your on-paper profits to tax havens. LVT doesn't tax you on profits, so it doesn't matter where the profits are on paper. Similar for income or sales taxes, income and sales can be done cash-only and hidden.
To somebody else’s point, how would this compare to the what single family home owners pay now?
Where I live we have about .09 acres of land our house sits on and we pay ~$3000/year.
You might live in a place which already has some form of land value tax. Although a key distinction is that LVT is a tax on just the value of the land, not the value of the entire property that includes buildings, landscaping, ect. ...
It really depends on where the land is as it's based on value. If you are talking about replacing property taxes with land value taxes typically it's just a rate on the value but in this case it's just the land value so a higher rate but only applies to land. If you could figure out the total land value in your neighbourhood you could figure it out.
As for who is affected, single family homes on the outskirts probably see a drop in taxes while those in the inner city and vacant plots see a large increase.
So it disincentivizes living in an urban setting an penalized fixed income people already in those homes?
The people who will be impacted first will be people who own vacant lots and parking lots in and around downtowns. If you're concerned about people getting booted out of their homes, consider Estonia:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_value_tax
In general, LVT should increase overall housing supply, improve affordability, and can be used to reduce other taxes such as property, income, and sales taxes. Most serious proposals I have seen have been to replace property taxes with LVT. These factors should make it easier on average households generally, and also allow them more flexibility to downsize (once your kids have moved out, do you really need a jumbo house all to yourself?), rather than locking you into the only place you can afford.
That was one concern. Another is our specific situation. Our foundation square footage is 972, our lot is 3,991 in total, none of it yard, half is all wild growth and weed trees, the rest is clover we planted to replace the grass and support pollinators. Our property tax is $3,750 this year, our land value is $46,400. I understand the calculation would be different on LVT but if I’d end up paying more on an LVT scheme then I wouldn’t want to have it in place.
I’d be more in favor if the county determined it’s annual budget costs and then divided that by the total acreage of privately owned land and you paid the percentage equal to your total land value.
I may be misunderstanding but it reads like .09 acres I have may be assessed as more valuable because of where it is than .09 acres 20 miles away in Tre same state and county.
Not necessarily the first as long as it's done in land efficient way and the second if they are unwilling to move but otherwise yes.
Oh boy! I guess I see why people are against it. Probably should come up with a better plan.
Yeah you aren't wrong there. Figuring our a way to placated those groups is required to get it to be implemented.
Seems like a good way to get a lot of retired folk to lose their property over taxes, as land value rises above their means
Sounds like they should sell their house - which has netted them a nice profit - and downsize. Or do a reverse mortgage.
And move where? Why have retired people (who are most likely on a fixed income and have paid off their home in some cases) to move from a home they've paid off to an apartment/living center with obscene monthly payments? Or introduce another ever rising tax on something they should have been able to age peacefully in without as much financial worry? That seems cruel. I'm no fan of boomers, but damn.
I feel like best plan here would be to impose steeper taxes on second-plus properties. You can have your primary residence, but every home after that accrues a higher and higher tax. Especially on LLCs.
If tax goes up, it's because the value of your asset has gone up. Either sell it or do a reverse mortgage. I have no pity for those profiting from the system, regardless of their age. Fuck you, Grandma, pay your taxes.
That's definitely part of it, and more important than taxes on primary residence. But we should do both.
I think we have that where I live, although after 20+ years of owning I still don’t really understand property taxes here.
Anyhow, the property tax has a basic definition but I believe you get a reduction in assessed value for primary residence. That effectively taxes second homes more
There won't be any other taxes for them to pay, so they will have more purchasing power. Chances are, they're still going to have the same place unless that retired guy decides to build a hotel or something on it.