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Joe Bourke

Opinion: Land Value Tax – an old idea with lots of modern supporters

By Joe Bourke | Thu 10th May 2012 - 5:56 pm

Adam Smith in the Wealth of Nations (1776) was an early proponent of land taxes as was that great radical Tom Paine.

John Stuart Mill was an advocate and Henry George put the case in ‘Progress and Poverty’ (1879).

The economist David Ricardo gave us the concept of economic “rent” – that land or property derives its value from scarcity rather than investment.

In the debates before and after the peoples budget of 1909 both Winston Churchill and David Lloyd George argued strongly for the introduction of a land tax.

The economists John Kenneth Galbraith and Milton Friedman recommended Land Value Tax (LVT) for …

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Recent Comments

  • Mick Taylor
    @ColinMurphy. Yes and you could close all the tax loopholes and greatly reduce the huge number of pages in the tax codes that take a highly qualified accountant...
  • colin murfin
    There are numerous untried ways to generate more tax Heres a few 1. Change NIC for employers to a tiered system like PAYE ie 0% for low paid 200% for hi...
  • Ernest
    I agree. We need to explain the bases of liberal democracy. To build a fair,free and open society with the values of liberty, equality and community and to w...
  • Tim
    It just isn't true to say we used to tax the rich more. The richest 1% now pay more than twice the proportion of income tax that they did in the 1970s. Although...
  • David Raw
    For recent recruits to the party, Lib Dem MP Alan Beith played a leading part in establishing base rate changes to be under the Bank of England....