Georgism, in modern times also called Geoism, and known historically as the single tax movement, is an
economic ideology
An economic ideology is a set of views forming the basis of an ideology on how the economy should run. It differentiates itself from economic theory in being Normative economics, normative rather than just explanatory in its approach, whereas the ...
holding that people should own the value that they produce themselves, while the
economic rent
In economics, economic rent is any payment to the owner of a factor of production in excess of the costs needed to bring that factor into production. In classical economics, economic rent is any payment made (including imputed value) or bene ...
derived from
land
Land, also known as dry land, ground, or earth, is the solid terrestrial surface of Earth not submerged by the ocean or another body of water. It makes up 29.2% of Earth's surface and includes all continents and islands. Earth's land sur ...
—including from all
natural resources
Natural resources are resources that are drawn from nature and used with few modifications. This includes the sources of valued characteristics such as commercial and industrial use, aesthetic value, scientific interest, and cultural value. ...
, the
commons
The commons is the cultural and natural resources accessible to all members of a society, including natural materials such as air, water, and a habitable Earth. These resources are held in common even when owned privately or publicly. Commons ...
, and urban locations—should belong equally to all members of society.
Developed from the writings of American economist and social reformer
Henry George
Henry George (September 2, 1839 – October 29, 1897) was an American political economist, Social philosophy, social philosopher and journalist. His writing was immensely popular in 19th-century America and sparked several reform movements of ...
, the Georgist paradigm seeks solutions to social and ecological problems based on principles of land rights and public finance that attempt to integrate
economic efficiency
In microeconomics, economic efficiency, depending on the context, is usually one of the following two related concepts:
* Allocative or Pareto efficiency: any changes made to assist one person would harm another.
* Productive efficiency: no addit ...
with
social justice
Social justice is justice in relation to the distribution of wealth, opportunities, and privileges within a society where individuals' rights are recognized and protected. In Western and Asian cultures, the concept of social justice has of ...
.
Georgism is concerned with the distribution of economic rent caused by land ownership,
natural monopolies, pollution rights, and control of the commons, including
title
A title is one or more words used before or after a person's name, in certain contexts. It may signify their generation, official position, military rank, professional or academic qualification, or nobility. In some languages, titles may be ins ...
of ownership for natural resources and other contrived
privileges (e.g.,
intellectual property
Intellectual property (IP) is a category of property that includes intangible creations of the human intellect. There are many types of intellectual property, and some countries recognize more than others. The best-known types are patents, co ...
). Any natural resource that is inherently limited in
supply
Supply or supplies may refer to:
*The amount of a resource that is available
**Supply (economics), the amount of a product which is available to customers
**Materiel, the goods and equipment for a military unit to fulfill its mission
*Supply, as ...
can generate economic rent, but the classical and most significant example of
land monopoly involves the extraction of common
ground rent
As a legal term, ground rent specifically refers to regular payments made by a holder of a leasehold property to the freeholder or a superior leaseholder, as required under a lease. In this sense, a ground rent is created when a freehold piece of ...
from valuable urban locations. Georgists argue that taxing economic rent is
efficient, fair, and
equitable. The main Georgist policy recommendation is a tax assessed on land value, arguing that revenues from a
land value tax
A land value tax (LVT) is a levy on the value of land (economics), land without regard to buildings, personal property and other land improvement, improvements upon it. Some economists favor LVT, arguing it does not cause economic efficiency, ec ...
(LVT) can be used to reduce or eliminate existing taxes (such as on
income
Income is the consumption and saving opportunity gained by an entity within a specified timeframe, which is generally expressed in monetary terms. Income is difficult to define conceptually and the definition may be different across fields. F ...
,
trade
Trade involves the transfer of goods and services from one person or entity to another, often in exchange for money. Economists refer to a system or network that allows trade as a market.
Traders generally negotiate through a medium of cr ...
, or
purchases
Purchasing is the procurement process a business or organization uses to acquire goods or services to accomplish its goals. Although there are several organizations that attempt to set standards in the purchasing process, processes can vary gr ...
) that are unfair and inefficient. Some Georgists also advocate for the return of surplus public revenue to the people by means of a
basic income
Universal basic income (UBI) is a social welfare proposal in which all citizens of a given population regularly receive a minimum income in the form of an unconditional transfer payment, i.e., without a means test or need to perform Work (hu ...
or
citizen's dividend
Citizen's dividend is a proposed policy based upon the Georgist principle that the natural world is the Commons, common property of all people. It is proposed that all citizens receive regular payments (dividends) from revenue raised by leasin ...
.
Henry George
Henry George (September 2, 1839 – October 29, 1897) was an American political economist, Social philosophy, social philosopher and journalist. His writing was immensely popular in 19th-century America and sparked several reform movements of ...
popularized the concept of gaining public revenues mainly from land and natural resource privileges with his first book, ''
Progress and Poverty
''Progress and Poverty: An Inquiry into the Cause of Industrial Depressions and of Increase of Want with Increase of Wealth: The Remedy'' is an 1879 book by social theorist and economist Henry George. It is a treatise on the questions of why pov ...
'' (1879). The philosophical basis of Georgism draws on thinkers such as
John Locke
John Locke (; 29 August 1632 (Old Style and New Style dates, O.S.) – 28 October 1704 (Old Style and New Style dates, O.S.)) was an English philosopher and physician, widely regarded as one of the most influential of the Enlightenment thi ...
,
Baruch Spinoza
Baruch (de) Spinoza (24 November 163221 February 1677), also known under his Latinized pen name Benedictus de Spinoza, was a philosopher of Portuguese-Jewish origin, who was born in the Dutch Republic. A forerunner of the Age of Enlightenmen ...
, and
Thomas Paine
Thomas Paine (born Thomas Pain; – In the contemporary record as noted by Conway, Paine's birth date is given as January 29, 1736–37. Common practice was to use a dash or a slash to separate the old-style year from the new-style year. In ...
. Economists from
Adam Smith
Adam Smith (baptised 1723 – 17 July 1790) was a Scottish economist and philosopher who was a pioneer in the field of political economy and key figure during the Scottish Enlightenment. Seen by some as the "father of economics"——— or ...
and
David Ricardo
David Ricardo (18 April 1772 – 11 September 1823) was a British political economist, politician, and member of Parliament. He is recognized as one of the most influential classical economists, alongside figures such as Thomas Malthus, Ada ...
to
Milton Friedman
Milton Friedman (; July 31, 1912 – November 16, 2006) was an American economist and statistician who received the 1976 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences for his research on consumption analysis, monetary history and theory and ...
and
Joseph Stiglitz
Joseph Eugene Stiglitz (; born February 9, 1943) is an American New Keynesian economist, a public policy analyst, political activist, and a professor at Columbia University. He is a recipient of the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences (2 ...
have observed that a public levy on land value does not cause
economic inefficiency
In microeconomics, economic efficiency, depending on the context, is usually one of the following two related concepts:
* Allocative efficiency, Allocative or Pareto efficiency: any changes made to assist one person would harm another.
* Productive ...
, unlike other taxes.
A land value tax also has
progressive tax
A progressive tax is a tax in which the tax rate increases as the taxable amount increases. The term ''progressive'' refers to the way the tax rate progresses from low to high, with the result that a taxpayer's average tax rate is less than the ...
effects.
Advocates of land value taxes argue that they reduce
economic inequality, increase economic efficiency, remove incentives to under-utilize urban land, and reduce
property speculation.
Georgist ideas were popular and influential during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Political parties, institutions, and communities were founded on Georgist principles during that time. Early devotees of George's economic philosophy were often termed ''Single Taxers'' for their political goal of raising public revenue mainly or only from a land-value tax, although Georgists endorsed multiple forms of rent capture (e.g.
seigniorage
Seigniorage , also spelled seignorage or seigneurage (), is the increase in the value of money due to money creation minus the cost of producing the additional money. Monetary seigniorage is where government bonds are exchanged for newly create ...
) as legitimate. The term ''Georgism'' was invented later, and some prefer the term ''geoism'' as more generic.
Main tenets
Henry George
Henry George (September 2, 1839 – October 29, 1897) was an American political economist, Social philosophy, social philosopher and journalist. His writing was immensely popular in 19th-century America and sparked several reform movements of ...
is best known for popularizing the argument that government should be funded by a
tax on land rent rather than
taxes on labor. George believed that although
scientific experiment
An experiment is a procedure carried out to support or refute a hypothesis, or determine the efficacy or likelihood of something previously untried. Experiments provide insight into cause-and-effect by demonstrating what outcome occurs when ...
s could not be performed in political economy, theories could be tested by comparing different societies with different conditions and by
thought experiments
A thought experiment is an imaginary scenario that is meant to elucidate or test an argument or theory. It is often an experiment that would be hard, impossible, or unethical to actually perform. It can also be an abstract hypothetical that is ...
about the effects of various factors.
Applying this method, he concluded that many of the problems that beset society, such as poverty, inequality, and economic booms and busts, could be attributed to the private ownership of the necessary resource: land rent. In his most celebrated book, ''
Progress and Poverty
''Progress and Poverty: An Inquiry into the Cause of Industrial Depressions and of Increase of Want with Increase of Wealth: The Remedy'' is an 1879 book by social theorist and economist Henry George. It is a treatise on the questions of why pov ...
'', George argues that the appropriation of land rent for private use contributes to persistent poverty in spite of technological progress, and causes economies to exhibit a tendency toward boom-and-bust cycles. According to George, people justly own what they create, but natural opportunities and
land
Land, also known as dry land, ground, or earth, is the solid terrestrial surface of Earth not submerged by the ocean or another body of water. It makes up 29.2% of Earth's surface and includes all continents and islands. Earth's land sur ...
belong equally to all.
[
George believed there was an important distinction between common and collective property.] Although equal rights to land might be achieved by nationalizing land and then leasing it to private users, George preferred taxing unimproved land value and leaving the control of land mostly in private hands. George's reasoning for leaving land in private control and slowly shifting to land value tax was that it would not penalize existing owners who had improved land and would also be less disruptive and controversial in a country where land titles have already been granted.
Georgists have observed that privately created wealth is socialized via the tax system (e.g., through income
Income is the consumption and saving opportunity gained by an entity within a specified timeframe, which is generally expressed in monetary terms. Income is difficult to define conceptually and the definition may be different across fields. F ...
and sales tax
A sales tax is a tax paid to a governing body for the sales of certain goods and services. Usually laws allow the seller to collect funds for the tax from the consumer at the point of purchase. When a tax on goods or services is paid to a govern ...
), while socially created wealth in land values are privatized in the price of land titles and bank mortgages. The opposite would be the case if land rents replaced taxes on labor as the main source of public revenue; socially created wealth would become available for use by the community, while the fruits of labor would remain private. According to Georgists, a land value tax can be considered a user fee instead of a tax, since it is related to the market value of socially created locational advantage, the privilege to exclude others from locations. Assets consisting of commodified privilege can be considered as wealth since they have exchange value, similar to taxi medallions. A land value tax, charging fees for exclusive use of land, as a means of raising public revenue is also a progressive tax
A progressive tax is a tax in which the tax rate increases as the taxable amount increases. The term ''progressive'' refers to the way the tax rate progresses from low to high, with the result that a taxpayer's average tax rate is less than the ...
tending to reduce economic inequality, since it applies entirely to ownership of valuable land, which is correlated with income, and there is generally no means by which landlords can shift the tax burden
In economics, tax incidence or tax burden is the effect of a particular tax on the distribution of economic welfare. Economists distinguish between the entities who ultimately bear the tax burden and those on whom the tax is initially imposed. The ...
onto tenants or laborers. Landlords are unable to pass the tax on to tenants because the supply and demand
In microeconomics, supply and demand is an economic model of price determination in a Market (economics), market. It postulates that, Ceteris_paribus#Applications, holding all else equal, the unit price for a particular Good (economics), good ...
of rented land is unchanged. Because the supply of land is perfectly inelastic, land rents depend on what tenants are prepared to pay, rather than on the expenses of landlords, and so the tax cannot be passed on to tenants.
Economic properties
Standard economic
An economy is an area of the Production (economics), production, Distribution (economics), distribution and trade, as well as Consumption (economics), consumption of Goods (economics), goods and Service (economics), services. In general, it is ...
theory suggests that a land value tax would be extremely efficient—unlike other taxes, it does not reduce economic productivity. Milton Friedman
Milton Friedman (; July 31, 1912 – November 16, 2006) was an American economist and statistician who received the 1976 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences for his research on consumption analysis, monetary history and theory and ...
described Henry George's tax on unimproved value of land as the "least bad tax", since unlike other taxes, it would not impose an excess burden on economic activity (leading to zero or even negative "deadweight loss
In economics, deadweight loss is the loss of societal economic welfare due to production/consumption of a good at a quantity where marginal benefit (to society) does not equal marginal cost (to society). In other words, there are either goods ...
"); hence, a replacement of other more "distortionary" taxes with a land value tax would improve economic welfare. Joseph Stiglitz argues that value tax can improve the use of land and redirect investment toward productive, non-rent-seeking
Rent-seeking is the act of growing one's existing wealth by manipulating the social or political environment without creating new wealth.
Rent-seeking activities have negative effects on the rest of society. They result in reduced economic effi ...
activities. Because land value tax would apply to foreign land speculators, the Australian Treasury estimated that land value tax was unique in having a negative marginal excess burden, meaning that it would increase long-run living standards.
It was Adam Smith
Adam Smith (baptised 1723 – 17 July 1790) was a Scottish economist and philosopher who was a pioneer in the field of political economy and key figure during the Scottish Enlightenment. Seen by some as the "father of economics"——— or ...
who first noted the efficiency and distributional properties of a land value tax in his book ''The Wealth of Nations
''An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations'', usually referred to by its shortened title ''The Wealth of Nations'', is a book by the Scottish people, Scottish economist and moral philosophy, moral philosopher Adam Smith; ...
''.
Benjamin Franklin
Benjamin Franklin (April 17, 1790) was an American polymath: a writer, scientist, inventor, statesman, diplomat, printer, publisher and Political philosophy, political philosopher.#britannica, Encyclopædia Britannica, Wood, 2021 Among the m ...
and Winston Churchill
Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (30 November 1874 – 24 January 1965) was a British statesman, military officer, and writer who was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1940 to 1945 (Winston Churchill in the Second World War, ...
made similar distributional and efficiency arguments for taxing land rents. They noted that the costs of taxes and the benefits of public spending always eventually apply to and enrich the owners of land. Therefore, they believed it would be best to defray public costs and recapture value of public spending by applying public charges directly to owners of land titles, rather than harming public welfare with taxes assessed against beneficial activities such as trade and labor.
Henry George wrote that his plan for a high land value tax would cause people "to contribute to the public, not in proportion to what they produce ... but in proportion to the value of natural ommonopportunities that they hold onopolize. He went on to explain that "by taking for public use that value which attaches to land by reason of the growth and improvement of the community", it would, "make the holding of land unprofitable to the mere owner, and profitable only to the user".
A high land value tax would discourage speculators from holding valuable natural opportunities (like urban real estate) unused or only partially used. Henry George claimed this would have many benefits, including the reduction or elimination of tax burdens from poorer neighborhoods and agricultural districts; the elimination of a multiplicity of taxes and expensive obsolete government institutions; the elimination of corruption, fraud, and evasion with respect to the collection of taxes; the enablement of true free trade; the destruction of monopolies; the elevation of wages to the full value of labor; the transformation of labor-saving inventions into blessings for all; and the equitable distribution of comfort, leisure, and other advantages that are made possible by an advancing civilization. In this way, the vulnerability that market economies have to credit bubbles and property manias would be reduced.
Sources of economic rent and related policy interventions
Income flow resulting from payments for restricted access to natural opportunities or for contrived privileges over geographic regions is termed economic rent
In economics, economic rent is any payment to the owner of a factor of production in excess of the costs needed to bring that factor into production. In classical economics, economic rent is any payment made (including imputed value) or bene ...
. Georgists argue that economic rent of land, legal privileges, and natural monopolies should accrue to the community, rather than private owners. In economics, "land
Land, also known as dry land, ground, or earth, is the solid terrestrial surface of Earth not submerged by the ocean or another body of water. It makes up 29.2% of Earth's surface and includes all continents and islands. Earth's land sur ...
" is everything that exists in nature independent of human activity. George explicitly included climate, soil, waterways, mineral deposits, laws/forces of nature, public ways, forests, oceans, air, and solar energy in the category of land. While the philosophy of Georgism does not say anything definitive about specific policy interventions needed to address problems posed by various sources of economic rent, the common goal among modern Georgists is to capture and share (or reduce) rent from all sources of natural monopoly and legal privilege.
Henry George shared the goal of modern Georgists to socialize or dismantle rent from all forms of land monopoly and legal privilege. However, George emphasized mainly his preferred policy known as land value tax
A land value tax (LVT) is a levy on the value of land (economics), land without regard to buildings, personal property and other land improvement, improvements upon it. Some economists favor LVT, arguing it does not cause economic efficiency, ec ...
, which targeted a particular form of unearned income
Unearned income is a term coined by Henry George to refer to income gained through ownership of land and other monopoly. Today the term often refers to income received by virtue of owning property (known as property income), inheritance, pensio ...
known as ground rent
As a legal term, ground rent specifically refers to regular payments made by a holder of a leasehold property to the freeholder or a superior leaseholder, as required under a lease. In this sense, a ground rent is created when a freehold piece of ...
. George emphasized ground-rent because basic locations were more valuable than other monopolies and everybody needed locations to survive, which he contrasted with the less significant streetcar and telegraph monopolies, which George also criticized. George likened the problem to a laborer traveling home who is waylaid by a series of highway robbers along the way, each who demand a small portion of the traveler's wages, and finally at the very end of the road waits a robber who demands all that the traveler has left. George reasoned that it made little difference to challenge the series of small robbers when the final robber remained to demand all that the common laborer had left. George predicted that over time technological advancements would increase the frequency and importance of lesser monopolies, yet he expected that ground rent would remain dominant. George even predicted that ground-rents would rise faster than wages and income to capital, a prediction that modern analysis has shown to be plausible, since the supply of land is fixed.
Spatial rent is still the primary emphasis of Georgists because of its large value and the known dis-economies of misused land. However, there are other sources of rent that are theoretically analogous to ground-rent and are debated topics of Georgists. The following are some sources of economic rent.
* Extractable resources (minerals and hydrocarbons)
* Severables (forests and stocks of fish)
* Extraterrestrial domains (geosynchronous orbits and airway corridor use)
* Legal privileges that apply to specific location (taxi medallions, billboard and development permits, or the monopoly of electromagnetic frequencies)
* Restrictions/taxes of pollution or severance ( tradable emission permits and fishing quotas)
* Right-of-way (transportation)
A right of way (also right-of-way) is a specific route that people, animals, vehicles, watercraft, or utility lines travel, or the legal status that gives them the right to do so. Rights-of-way in the physical sense include controlled-access h ...
used by railroads, utilities, and internet service providers
* Issuance of legal tender
Legal tender is a form of money that Standard of deferred payment, courts of law are required to recognize as satisfactory payment in court for any monetary debt. Each jurisdiction determines what is legal tender, but essentially it is anything ...
(see seigniorage
Seigniorage , also spelled seignorage or seigneurage (), is the increase in the value of money due to money creation minus the cost of producing the additional money. Monetary seigniorage is where government bonds are exchanged for newly create ...
)
* Privileges that are less location dependent but that still exclude others from natural opportunities (patents
A patent is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the legal right to exclude others from making, using, or selling an invention for a limited period of time in exchange for publishing an sufficiency of disclosure, enabling discl ...
)
Where free competition is impossible, such as telegraphs, water, gas, and transportation, George wrote, " ch business becomes a proper social function, which should be controlled and managed by and for the whole people concerned." Georgists were divided by this question of natural monopolies and often favored public ownership only of the rents from common rights-of-way, rather than public ownership of utility companies themselves.
Georgism and environmental economics
The early conservationism of the Progressive Era
The Progressive Era (1890s–1920s) was a period in the United States characterized by multiple social and political reform efforts. Reformers during this era, known as progressivism in the United States, Progressives, sought to address iss ...
was inspired partly by Henry George
Henry George (September 2, 1839 – October 29, 1897) was an American political economist, Social philosophy, social philosopher and journalist. His writing was immensely popular in 19th-century America and sparked several reform movements of ...
, and his influence extended for decades afterward. Some ecological economists still support the Georgist policy of land value tax
A land value tax (LVT) is a levy on the value of land (economics), land without regard to buildings, personal property and other land improvement, improvements upon it. Some economists favor LVT, arguing it does not cause economic efficiency, ec ...
as a means of freeing or rewilding
Rewilding is a form of ecological restoration aimed at increasing biodiversity and restoring natural processes. It differs from other forms of ecological restoration in that rewilding aspires to reduce human influence on ecosystems. It is also d ...
unused land and conserving nature by reducing urban sprawl
Urban sprawl (also known as suburban sprawl or urban encroachment) is defined as "the spreading of urban developments (such as houses and shopping centers) on undeveloped land near a city". Urban sprawl has been described as the unrestricted ...
.[Daly, Herman E., and Joshua C. Farley. Ecological Economics: Principles and Applications. Washington: Island, 2004.]
Pollution degrades the value of what Georgists consider to be commons
The commons is the cultural and natural resources accessible to all members of a society, including natural materials such as air, water, and a habitable Earth. These resources are held in common even when owned privately or publicly. Commons ...
. Because pollution is a negative contribution, a taking from the commons or a cost imposed on others, its value is economic rent
In economics, economic rent is any payment to the owner of a factor of production in excess of the costs needed to bring that factor into production. In classical economics, economic rent is any payment made (including imputed value) or bene ...
, even when the polluter is not receiving an explicit income. Therefore, to the extent that society determines pollution to be harmful, most Georgists propose to limit pollution with taxation or quotas that capture the resulting rents for public use, restoration, or a ''citizen's dividend''.
Georgism is related to the school of ecological economics
Ecological economics, bioeconomics, ecolonomy, eco-economics, or ecol-econ is both a transdisciplinary and an interdisciplinary field of academic research addressing the interdependence and coevolution of human economy, economies and natural ec ...
, since both propose market-based restrictions for pollution. The schools are compatible in that they advocate using similar tools as part of a conservation strategy, but they emphasize different aspects. Conservation is a central issue of ecology, whereas economic rent
In economics, economic rent is any payment to the owner of a factor of production in excess of the costs needed to bring that factor into production. In classical economics, economic rent is any payment made (including imputed value) or bene ...
is the central issue of geoism. Ecological economists might price pollution fines more conservatively to prevent inherently unquantifiable damage to the environment, whereas Georgists might emphasize mediation between conflicting interests and human rights
Human rights are universally recognized Morality, moral principles or Social norm, norms that establish standards of human behavior and are often protected by both Municipal law, national and international laws. These rights are considered ...
. Geolibertarianism
Geolibertarianism is a political and economic ideology that integrates libertarianism with Georgism. It favors a taxation system based (as in Georgism) on income derived from land and natural resources instead of on labor, coupled with a minimali ...
, a market-oriented branch of Geoism, tends to take a direct stance against what it perceives as burdensome regulation and would like to see auctioned pollution quotas or taxes replace most command and control regulation
Command and Control (CAC) regulation finds common usage in academic literature and beyond. The relationship between CAC and environmental policy is considered in this article, an area that demonstrates the application of this type of regulation. Ho ...
.
Since ecologists
This is a list of notable ecologists.
A-D
* John Aber (United States)
* Aziz Ab'Saber (Brazil)
* Charles Christopher Adams (United States)
* Warder Clyde Allee (United States)
* Herbert G. Andrewartha (Australia)
* Sarah Martha Baker ( ...
are primarily concerned with conservation, they tend to emphasize less the issue of equitably distributing scarcity/pollution rents, whereas Georgists insist that unearned income not accrue to those who hold title to natural assets and pollution privilege. To the extent that geoists recognize the effect of pollution
Pollution is the introduction of contaminants into the natural environment that cause harm. Pollution can take the form of any substance (solid, liquid, or gas) or energy (such as radioactivity, heat, sound, or light). Pollutants, the component ...
or share conservationist values, they will agree with ecological economists about the need to limit pollution, but geoists will also insist that pollution rents generated from those conservation efforts do not accrue to polluters and are instead used for public purposes or to compensate those who suffer the negative effects of pollution. Ecological economists advocate similar pollution restrictions but, emphasizing conservation first, might be willing to grant private polluters the privilege to capture pollution rents. To the extent that ecological economists share the geoist view of social justice, they would advocate auctioning pollution quotas instead of giving them away for free. This distinction can be seen in the difference between basic cap and trade
Carbon emission trading (also called carbon market, emission trading scheme (ETS) or cap and trade) is a type of emissions trading scheme designed for carbon dioxide (CO2) and other greenhouse gases (GHGs). A form of carbon price, carbon pricing ...
and the geoist variation, cap and share, a proposal to auction temporary pollution permits, with rents going to the public, instead of giving pollution privilege away for free to existing polluters or selling perpetual permits.
Revenue uses
The revenue can allow the reduction or elimination of taxes, greater public investment/spending, or the direct distribution of funds to citizens as a pension or basic income
Universal basic income (UBI) is a social welfare proposal in which all citizens of a given population regularly receive a minimum income in the form of an unconditional transfer payment, i.e., without a means test or need to perform Work (hu ...
/citizen's dividend
Citizen's dividend is a proposed policy based upon the Georgist principle that the natural world is the Commons, common property of all people. It is proposed that all citizens receive regular payments (dividends) from revenue raised by leasin ...
.
In practice, the elimination of all other taxes implies a high land value tax, greater than any currently existing land tax. Introducing or increasing a land value tax would cause the purchase price of land to decrease. George did not believe landowners should be compensated and described the issue as being analogous to compensation for former slave owners. Other geoists disagree on the question of compensation; some advocate complete compensation while others endorse only enough compensation required to achieve Georgist reforms. Some geoists advocate compensation only for a net loss due to a shift of taxation to land value; most taxpayers would gain from the replacement of other taxes with a tax on land value. Historically, those who advocated for taxes on rent tax only great enough to replace other taxes were known as endorsers of ''single tax limited''.
Synonyms and variants
Most early advocacy groups described themselves as single taxers and George reluctantly accepted the single tax as an accurate name for his main political goal—the repeal of all unjust or inefficient taxes, to be replaced with a land value tax
A land value tax (LVT) is a levy on the value of land (economics), land without regard to buildings, personal property and other land improvement, improvements upon it. Some economists favor LVT, arguing it does not cause economic efficiency, ec ...
(LVT).
Some modern proponents are dissatisfied with the name ''Georgist''. While Henry George was well known throughout his life, he has been largely forgotten by the public and the idea of a single tax of land predates him. Some now prefer the term ''geoism'', with ''geo'' (from Greek "earth, land") being the first compound of the name ''George'' < (Gr.) < "farmer" or "agriculture, farming" < + "work" deliberately ambiguous. The terms ''Earth Sharing'', ''geonomics'' and ''geolibertarianism
Geolibertarianism is a political and economic ideology that integrates libertarianism with Georgism. It favors a taxation system based (as in Georgism) on income derived from land and natural resources instead of on labor, coupled with a minimali ...
'' are also used by some Georgists. These terms represent a difference of emphasis and sometimes real differences about how land rent should be spent (citizen's dividend
Citizen's dividend is a proposed policy based upon the Georgist principle that the natural world is the Commons, common property of all people. It is proposed that all citizens receive regular payments (dividends) from revenue raised by leasin ...
or just replacing other taxes), but they all agree that land rent should be recovered from its private recipients.
Compulsory fines and fees related to land rents are the most common Georgist policies, but some geoists prefer voluntary value capture
Value capture is a type of public financing that recovers some or all of the value that public infrastructure generates for private landowners. In many countries, the public sector is responsible for the infrastructure required to support urban dev ...
systems that rely on methods such as non-compulsory or self-assessed location value fees, community land trusts and purchasing land value covenants. Some geoists believe that partially compensating landowners is a politically expedient compromise necessary for achieving reform. For similar reasons, others propose capturing only future land value increases, instead of all land rent.
Some libertarians
Libertarianism (from ; or from ) is a political philosophy that holds freedom, personal sovereignty, and liberty as primary values. Many libertarians believe that the concept of freedom is in accord with the Non-Aggression Principle, according ...
and minarchists take the position that limited social spending should be financed using Georgist concepts of rent value capture
Value capture is a type of public financing that recovers some or all of the value that public infrastructure generates for private landowners. In many countries, the public sector is responsible for the infrastructure required to support urban dev ...
, but that not all land rent should be captured. Today, this relatively conservative adaptation is usually considered incompatible with true geolibertarianism
Geolibertarianism is a political and economic ideology that integrates libertarianism with Georgism. It favors a taxation system based (as in Georgism) on income derived from land and natural resources instead of on labor, coupled with a minimali ...
, which requires that excess rents be gathered and then distributed back to residents. During Henry George's time, this restrained Georgist philosophy was known as "single tax limited", as opposed to "single tax unlimited." George disagreed with the limited interpretation, but he accepted its adherents (e.g., Thomas Shearman) as legitimate "single-taxers."
Influence
Georgist ideas heavily influenced the politics of the early 20th century. Political parties that were formed based on Georgist ideas include the Commonwealth Land Party in the United States
The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...
, the Henry George Justice Party
The Henry George Justice Party, also called the Henry George League, was a minor political party in the Australian state of Victoria during the 1950s. The party followed the tenets of Georgism, an economic philosophy and ideology espoused by Amer ...
in Victoria, the Single Tax League in South Australia
South Australia (commonly abbreviated as SA) is a States and territories of Australia, state in the southern central part of Australia. With a total land area of , it is the fourth-largest of Australia's states and territories by area, which in ...
, and the Justice Party in Denmark
Denmark is a Nordic countries, Nordic country in Northern Europe. It is the metropole and most populous constituent of the Kingdom of Denmark,, . also known as the Danish Realm, a constitutionally unitary state that includes the Autonomous a ...
.
In the United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Northwestern Europe, off the coast of European mainland, the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...
, George's writings were praised by emerging socialist groups in 1890s such as the Independent Labour Party
The Independent Labour Party (ILP) was a British political party of the left, established in 1893 at a conference in Bradford, after local and national dissatisfaction with the Liberal Party (UK), Liberals' apparent reluctance to endorse work ...
and the Fabian Society
The Fabian Society () is a History of the socialist movement in the United Kingdom, British socialist organisation whose purpose is to advance the principles of social democracy and democratic socialism via gradualist and reformist effort in ...
, which would each go on to help form the modern-day Labour Party. The Liberal government included a land tax as part of several taxes in the 1909 People's Budget
The 1909/1910 People's Budget was a proposal of the Liberal government that introduced unprecedented taxes on the lands and incomes of Britain's wealthy to fund new social welfare programmes, such as non-contributary old age pensions under Ol ...
intended to redistribute wealth (including a progressively graded income tax and an increase of inheritance tax
International tax law distinguishes between an estate tax and an inheritance tax. An inheritance tax is a tax paid by a person who inherits money or property of a person who has died, whereas an estate tax is a levy on the estate (money and pro ...
). This caused a political crisis that resulted indirectly in reform of the House of Lords
The House of Lords is the upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Like the lower house, the House of Commons of the United Kingdom, House of Commons, it meets in the Palace of Westminster in London, England. One of the oldest ext ...
. The budget was passed eventually—but without the land tax. In 1931, the minority Labour government passed a land value tax as part III of the 1931 Finance act. However, this was repealed in 1934 by the National Government before it could be implemented.
In Denmark, the Georgist Justice Party has previously been represented in Folketinget
The Folketing ( , ), also known as the Parliament of Denmark or the Danish Parliament in English, is the unicameral List of legislatures by country, national legislature (parliament) of the Danish Realm, Kingdom of Denmark — Denmark proper to ...
. It formed part of a centre-left government 1957–60 and was also represented in the European Parliament
The European Parliament (EP) is one of the two legislative bodies of the European Union and one of its seven institutions. Together with the Council of the European Union (known as the Council and informally as the Council of Ministers), it ...
1978–1979. The influence of Henry George has waned over time, but Georgist ideas still occasionally emerge in politics. For the United States 2004 presidential election, third-party
Third party may refer to:
Business
* Third-party source, a supplier company not owned by the buyer or seller
* Third-party beneficiary, a person who could sue on a contract, despite not being an active party
* Third-party insurance, such as a veh ...
presidential candidate Ralph Nader
Ralph Nader (; born February 27, 1934) is an American lawyer and political activist involved in consumer protection, environmentalism, and government reform causes. He is a Perennial candidate, perennial presidential candidate. His 1965 book '' ...
mentioned George in his policy statements.
Economists still generally favor a land value tax. Monetarist
Monetarism is a school of thought in monetary economics that emphasizes the role of policy-makers in controlling the amount of money in circulation. It gained prominence in the 1970s, but was mostly abandoned as a direct guidance to monetary ...
economist Milton Friedman
Milton Friedman (; July 31, 1912 – November 16, 2006) was an American economist and statistician who received the 1976 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences for his research on consumption analysis, monetary history and theory and ...
publicly endorsed the Georgist land value tax as the "least bad tax". Economist Joseph Stiglitz
Joseph Eugene Stiglitz (; born February 9, 1943) is an American New Keynesian economist, a public policy analyst, political activist, and a professor at Columbia University. He is a recipient of the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences (2 ...
stated that: "Not only was Henry George correct that a tax on land is non-distortionary, but in an equilibrium society … tax on land raises just enough revenue to finance the (optimally chosen) level of government expenditure." He dubbed this proposition the Henry George theorem.
Communities
Several communities were initiated with Georgist principles during the height of the philosophy's popularity. Two such communities that still exist are Arden, Delaware
Arden is a village in New Castle County, Delaware, United States, founded in 1900 as a radical Georgist single-tax community by sculptor Frank Stephens and architect William Lightfoot Price. The village occupies approximately 160 acres, with ...
, which was founded in 1900 by Frank Stephens and William Lightfoot Price, and Fairhope, Alabama
Fairhope is a city in Baldwin County, Alabama, United States, located on the eastern shoreline of Mobile Bay. The population was 22,477 at the 2020 census. Fairhope is a principal city of the Daphne-Fairhope-Foley metropolitan area, which in ...
, which was founded in 1894 under the auspices of the Fairhope Single Tax Corporation. Some established communities in the United States also adopted Georgist tax policies. A Georgist in Houston, Texas
Houston ( ) is the List of cities in Texas by population, most populous city in the U.S. state of Texas and in the Southern United States. Located in Southeast Texas near Galveston Bay and the Gulf of Mexico, it is the county seat, seat of ...
, Joseph Jay "J.J." Pastoriza, promoted a Georgist club in that city established in 1890. Years later, in his capacity as a city alderman, he was selected to serve as Houston Tax Commissioner, and promulgated a "Houston Plan of Taxation" in 1912. Improvements to land and merchants' inventories were taxed at 25 percent of the appraised value, unimproved land was taxed at 70 percent of appraisal, and personal property was exempt. This was calculated using the Somers System. This Georgist tax continued until 1915, when two courts struck it down as violating the Texas Constitution in 1915. This quashed efforts in several other Texas cities towards implementing the Houston Plan: Beaumont, Corpus Christi, Galveston
Galveston ( ) is a Gulf Coast of the United States, coastal resort town, resort city and port off the Southeast Texas coast on Galveston Island and Pelican Island (Texas), Pelican Island in the U.S. state of Texas. The community of , with a pop ...
, San Antonio
San Antonio ( ; Spanish for " Saint Anthony") is a city in the U.S. state of Texas and the most populous city in Greater San Antonio. San Antonio is the third-largest metropolitan area in Texas and the 24th-largest metropolitan area in the ...
, and Waco.
The German protectorate of the Kiautschou Bay concession in Jiaozhou Bay
Jiaozhou Bay (; ; ) is a bay located in the prefecture-level city of Qingdao (Tsingtau), Shandong Province, China.
The bay has historically been romanized as Kiaochow, Kiauchau or Kiao-Chau in English and Kiautschou in German.
Geography ...
, China
China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...
, fully implemented Georgist policy. Its sole source of government revenue
Government revenue or national revenue is money received by a government from Tax revenue, taxes and Non-tax revenue, non-tax sources to enable it, assuming full resource employment, to undertake non-inflationary public expenditure. Government re ...
was the land value tax of six percent which it levied in its territory. The German colonial empire
The German colonial empire () constituted the overseas colonies, dependencies, and territories of the German Empire. Unified in 1871, the chancellor of this time period was Otto von Bismarck. Short-lived attempts at colonization by Kleinstaat ...
had previously had economic problems with its African colonies caused by land speculation
In finance, speculation is the purchase of an asset (a commodity, goods, or real estate) with the hope that it will become more valuable in a brief amount of time. It can also refer to short sales in which the speculator hopes for a decline ...
. One of the main reasons for using the land value tax in Jiaozhou Bay was to eliminate such speculation, which the policy achieved. The colony existed as a German protectorate from 1898 until 1914, when seized by Japanese and British troops in World War I
World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...
. In 1922, the territory was returned to the Republic of China
Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia. The main geography of Taiwan, island of Taiwan, also known as ''Formosa'', lies between the East China Sea, East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocea ...
.
Georgist ideas were also adopted to some degree in Australia
Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...
, Hong Kong
Hong Kong)., Legally Hong Kong, China in international treaties and organizations. is a special administrative region of China. With 7.5 million residents in a territory, Hong Kong is the fourth most densely populated region in the wor ...
, Singapore
Singapore, officially the Republic of Singapore, is an island country and city-state in Southeast Asia. The country's territory comprises one main island, 63 satellite islands and islets, and one outlying islet. It is about one degree ...
, South Africa
South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. Its Provinces of South Africa, nine provinces are bounded to the south by of coastline that stretches along the Atlantic O ...
, South Korea
South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia. It constitutes the southern half of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and borders North Korea along the Korean Demilitarized Zone, with the Yellow Sea to the west and t ...
, and Taiwan
Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia. The main geography of Taiwan, island of Taiwan, also known as ''Formosa'', lies between the East China Sea, East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocea ...
. In these countries, governments still levy some type of land value tax, albeit with exemptions. Many municipal governments of the United States depend on real-property tax as their main source of revenue, although such taxes are not Georgist as they generally include the value of buildings and other improvements. One exception is the town of Altoona, Pennsylvania
Altoona ( ) is a city in Blair County, Pennsylvania, United States. The population was 43,963 at the time of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. It is the principal city of the Altoona Metropolitan statistical area, metropolitan area, w ...
, which for a time in the 21st century only taxed land value, phasing in the tax in 2002, relying on it entirely for tax revenue from 2011, and ending it 2017; the ''Financial Times
The ''Financial Times'' (''FT'') is a British daily newspaper printed in broadsheet and also published digitally that focuses on business and economic Current affairs (news format), current affairs. Based in London, the paper is owned by a Jap ...
'' noted that "Altoona is using LVT in a city where neither land nor buildings have much value".
In 2023, Detroit
Detroit ( , ) is the List of municipalities in Michigan, most populous city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is situated on the bank of the Detroit River across from Windsor, Ontario. It had a population of 639,111 at the 2020 United State ...
mayor Mike Duggan
Michael Edward Duggan (born July 15, 1958) is an American lawyer, businessman, and politician serving as the List of mayors of Detroit, Michigan, 75th mayor of Detroit, Michigan since 2014. An Independent politician, Independent, Duggan previo ...
and Michigan
Michigan ( ) is a peninsular U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest, Upper Midwestern United States. It shares water and land boundaries with Minnesota to the northwest, Wisconsin to the west, ...
State Representative Stephanie Young proposed replacing existing property taxes with a land-value tax. After the Great Recession
The Great Recession was a period of market decline in economies around the world that occurred from late 2007 to mid-2009. and city's 2013 bankruptcy, speculators bought cheap property, expecting to profit from the city's recovery. This plan to shift the cost of municipal services to owners of empty land, while exempting community gardens and parks, will require approval from the Michigan Legislature
The Michigan Legislature is the legislature of the U.S. state of Michigan. It is organized as a bicameral body composed of the Senate (the upper chamber) and the House of Representatives (the lower chamber). Article IV of the Michigan Con ...
and Detroit City Council before being added as a ballot measure
A referendum, plebiscite, or ballot measure is a Direct democracy, direct vote by the Constituency, electorate (rather than their Representative democracy, representatives) on a proposal, law, or political issue. A referendum may be either bin ...
for Detroit residents.
Institutes and organizations
Various organizations still exist that continue to promote the ideas of Henry George. According to ''The American Journal of Economics and Sociology
''The American Journal of Economics and Sociology'' is a peer-reviewed academic journal established in 1941 by Will Lissner with support from the Robert Schalkenbach Foundation. The purpose of the journal was to create a forum for continuing disc ...
'', the periodical ''Land&Liberty
''Land&Liberty'' is a quarterly magazine of popular political economics: its focus is the relationship between land and natural resource rights and 21st century economic policy. Published in the UK it covers international affairs and events fr ...
'', established in 1894, is "the longest-lived Georgist project in history". Founded during the Great Depression
The Great Depression was a severe global economic downturn from 1929 to 1939. The period was characterized by high rates of unemployment and poverty, drastic reductions in industrial production and international trade, and widespread bank and ...
in 1932, the Henry George School of Social Science in New York offers courses, sponsors seminars, and publishes research in the Georgist paradigm. Also in the US, the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy was established in 1974 based on the writings of Henry George. It "seeks to improve the dialogue about urban development, the built environment, and tax policy in the United States and abroad".
The Henry George Foundation
The Henry George Foundation is an independent UK economic and social justice think tank and public education group concerned with "the development of sound relationships between the citizen, our communities (from the local to the global) and ou ...
continues to promote the ideas of Henry George in the United Kingdom. The IU is an international umbrella organisation that brings together organizations worldwide that seek land-value tax reform.
Reception
The economist Alfred Marshall
Alfred Marshall (26 July 1842 – 13 July 1924) was an English economist and one of the most influential economists of his time. His book ''Principles of Economics (Marshall), Principles of Economics'' (1890) was the dominant economic textboo ...
believed that George's views in ''Progress and Poverty
''Progress and Poverty: An Inquiry into the Cause of Industrial Depressions and of Increase of Want with Increase of Wealth: The Remedy'' is an 1879 book by social theorist and economist Henry George. It is a treatise on the questions of why pov ...
'' were dangerous, even predicting wars, terror, and economic destruction from the immediate implementation of its recommendations. Specifically, Marshall was upset about the idea of rapid change and the unfairness of not compensating existing landowners. In his lectures on ''Progress and Poverty'', Marshall opposed George's position on compensation while fully endorsing his ultimate remedy. So far as land value tax moderately replaced other taxes and did not cause the price of land to fall, Marshall supported land value taxation
A land value tax (LVT) is a levy on the value of land without regard to buildings, personal property and other improvements upon it. Some economists favor LVT, arguing it does not cause economic inefficiency, and helps reduce economic inequali ...
on economic and moral grounds, suggesting that a three or four percent tax on land values would fit this condition. After implementing land taxes, governments would purchase future land values at discounted prices and take ownership after 100 years. Marshall asserted that this plan, which he strongly supported, would end the need for a tax collection department of government. For newly formed countries where land was not already private, Marshall advocated implementing George's economic proposal immediately.
Karl Marx
Karl Marx (; 5 May 1818 – 14 March 1883) was a German philosopher, political theorist, economist, journalist, and revolutionary socialist. He is best-known for the 1848 pamphlet '' The Communist Manifesto'' (written with Friedrich Engels) ...
considered the single-tax platform as a regression from the transition to communism
Communism () is a political sociology, sociopolitical, political philosophy, philosophical, and economic ideology, economic ideology within the history of socialism, socialist movement, whose goal is the creation of a communist society, a ...
and referred to Georgism as "capitalism's last ditch". Marx argued that, "The whole thing is ... simply an attempt, decked out with socialism
Socialism is an economic ideology, economic and political philosophy encompassing diverse Economic system, economic and social systems characterised by social ownership of the means of production, as opposed to private ownership. It describes ...
, to save capitalist domination and indeed to establish it afresh on an even wider basis than its present one." Marx also criticized the way land value tax theory emphasizes the value of land, arguing that George's "fundamental dogma is that everything would be all right if ground rent were paid to the state."
Silvio Gesell
Johann Silvio Gesell (; 17 March 1862 – 11 March 1930) was a German-Argentine economist, entrepreneur, and social reformer. He was the founder of (German language, German for "free economy"), an economic model for market socialism. In 1900, ...
disagreed with Henry George
Henry George (September 2, 1839 – October 29, 1897) was an American political economist, Social philosophy, social philosopher and journalist. His writing was immensely popular in 19th-century America and sparked several reform movements of ...
that land value tax
A land value tax (LVT) is a levy on the value of land (economics), land without regard to buildings, personal property and other land improvement, improvements upon it. Some economists favor LVT, arguing it does not cause economic efficiency, ec ...
es could solve the problem of land rent, as he believed that the taxes could be passed onto the tenants.
Instead, he proposed that public ownership of land should be accomplished by making the government purchase all land from current landowners through a massive amount of government land bonds, which would be paid over in 20 years by leasing
A lease is a contractual arrangement calling for the user (referred to as the ''lessee'') to pay the owner (referred to as the ''lessor'') for the use of an asset. Property, buildings and vehicles are common assets that are leased. Industrial ...
the land through a system of competitive bidding for leases.
This would achieve many of the intended effects of Georgism, but two of the main differences are that it would compensate previous landowners through bond payments and it would not be necessary to repeatedly re-appraise the value of land.
Landowners would no longer own their land, but they would be compensated through the bond payments and could obtain private possession of their land if they pay the leases.
Richard T. Ely agreed with the economic arguments for Georgism but believed that correcting the problem the way Henry George wanted, without compensation, was unjust to existing landowners. In explaining his position, Ely wrote, "If we have all made a mistake, should one party to the transaction alone bear the cost of the common blunder?"
John R. Commons
John Rogers Commons (October 13, 1862 – May 11, 1945) was an American institutional economist, Georgist, progressive and labor historian at the University of Wisconsin–Madison.
Early years
John R. Commons was born in Hollansburg, Ohio o ...
supported Georgist economics but opposed what he perceived as an environmentally and politically reckless tendency for advocates to rely on a one-size-fits-all approach to tax reform, specifically, the "single tax" framing. Commons concluded ''The Distribution of Wealth'', with an estimate that "perhaps 95% of the total values represented by these millionaire 'sic''fortunes is due to those investments classed as land values and natural monopolies and to competitive industries aided by such monopolies", and that "tax reform should seek to remove all burdens from capital and labour and impose them on monopolies." However, he criticized Georgists for failing to see that Henry George's anti-monopoly ideas must be implemented with a variety of policy tools. Commons wrote, "Trees do not grow into the sky—they would perish in a high wind; and a single truth, like a single tax, ends in its own destruction." Commons uses the natural soil fertility and value of forests as an example of this destruction, arguing that a tax on the in-situ value of those depletable natural resources can result in overuse or over-extraction. Instead, Commons recommends an income tax-based approach to forests similar to a modern Georgist severance tax
Severance taxes are taxes imposed on the removal of natural resources within a taxing jurisdiction. Severance taxes are most commonly imposed in oil producing states within the United States. Resources that typically incur severance taxes when ...
.
Other contemporaries such as Austrian economist Frank Fetter
Frank Albert Fetter (; March 8, 1863 – March 21, 1949) was an American economist of the Austrian School. Fetter's treatise, ''The Principles of Economics'', contributed to an increased American interest in the Austrian School, including the t ...
and neoclassical economist John Bates Clark
John Bates Clark (January 26, 1847 – March 21, 1938) was an American neoclassical economist. He was one of the pioneers of the marginalist revolution and opponent to the Institutionalist school of economics, and spent most of his career as a ...
argued that it was impractical to maintain the traditional distinction between land and capital and used this as a basis to attack Georgism. Mark Blaug, a specialist in the history of economic thought, credits Fetter and Clark with influencing mainstream economists to abandon the idea "that land is a unique factor of production and hence that there is any special need for a special theory of ground rent" claiming that "this is in fact the basis of all the attacks on Henry George by contemporary economists and certainly the fundamental reason why professional economists increasingly ignored him".
Robert Solow
Robert Merton Solow, GCIH (; August 23, 1924 – December 21, 2023) was an American economist who received the 1987 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences, and whose work on the theory of economic growth culminated in the exogenous growth ...
endorsed the theory of Georgism, while being wary of the perceived injustice of expropriation
Nationalization (nationalisation in British English)
is the process of transforming privately owned assets into public assets by bringing them under the public ownership of a national government or state. Nationalization contrasts with p ...
. Solow stated that taxing away expected land rents "would have no semblance of fairness"; however, Georgism would be good to introduce where location values were not already privatized or if the transition could be phased in slowly.
George has also been accused of exaggerating the importance of his "all-devouring rent thesis" in claiming that it is the primary cause of poverty and injustice in society. George argued that the rent of land increased faster than wages for labor because the supply of land is fixed. Modern economists, including Ottmar Edenhofer have demonstrated that George's assertion is plausible but was more likely to be true during George's time than now.
An early criticism of Georgism was that it would generate too much public revenue and result in unwanted growth of government, but later critics argued that it would not generate enough income to cover government spending. Joseph Schumpeter
Joseph Alois Schumpeter (; February 8, 1883 – January 8, 1950) was an Austrian political economist. He served briefly as Finance Minister of Austria in 1919. In 1932, he emigrated to the United States to become a professor at Harvard Unive ...
concluded his analysis of Georgism by stating that, "It is not economically unsound, except that it involves an unwarranted optimism concerning the yield of such a tax." Land use economists conclude that Schumpeter's criticism is unwarranted because the rental yield from land is likely much greater than what modern critics such as Paul Krugman
Paul Robin Krugman ( ; born February 28, 1953) is an American New Keynesian economics, New Keynesian economist who is the Distinguished Professor of Economics at the CUNY Graduate Center, Graduate Center of the City University of New York. He ...
suppose. Krugman agrees that land value taxation is the best means of raising public revenue but asserts that increased spending has rendered land rent insufficient to fully fund government. Georgists have responded by citing studies and analyses implying that land values of nations like the United States, the United Kingdom and Australia are more than sufficient to fund all levels of government.
Anarcho-capitalist
Anarcho-capitalism (colloquially: ancap or an-cap) is a political philosophy and economic theory that advocates for the abolition of Sovereign state, centralized states in favor of Stateless society, stateless societies, where systems of p ...
political philosopher and economist Murray Rothbard
Murray Newton Rothbard (; March 2, 1926 – January 7, 1995) was an American economist of the Austrian School,Ronald Hamowy, ed., 2008, The Encyclopedia of Libertarianism', Cato Institute, Sage, , p. 62: "a leading economist of the Austri ...
criticized Georgism in ''Man, Economy, and State
''Man, Economy, and State: A treatise on economic principles'' is a 1962 book of Austrian School economics by Murray Rothbard (orig. abridged ed.). It was originally intended as a textbook form of Human Action by Ludwig von Mises, but became ...
'' as being philosophically incongruent with subjective value theory, and further stating that land is irrelevant in the factors of production, trade, and price systems, but this critique is seen by some, including other opponents of Georgism, as relying on false assumptions and flawed reasoning.
Austrian economist Friedrich Hayek
Friedrich August von Hayek (8 May 1899 – 23 March 1992) was an Austrian-born British academic and philosopher. He is known for his contributions to political economy, political philosophy and intellectual history. Hayek shared the 1974 Nobe ...
credited early enthusiasm for Henry George with developing his interest in economics. Later, Hayek said that the theory of Georgism would be very strong if assessment challenges did not result in unfair outcomes, but he believed that they would.
Economists Bryan Caplan
Bryan Douglas Caplan (born April 8, 1971) is an American economist and author. He is a professor of economics at George Mason University, a senior research fellow at the Mercatus Center, an adjunct scholar at the Cato Institute, and a former c ...
and Zachary Gochenour have argued that a 100% Georgist tax would destroy the incentive to search for natural resources and discover optimal locations for businesses, as the additional profits that would result from such discoveries would lead to a corresponding increase in the unimproved value of the land, and so be taxed away. Georgist economist Fred Foldvary has responded by arguing that Caplan and Gochenour rely on a confused definition of land that includes produced capital goods. If land does not include any produced capital goods and is merely an unproduced natural resource, then their claim that LVT is distortionary does not follow. Additionally, Caplan and Gochenour build on Frank Knight
Frank Hyneman Knight (November 7, 1885 – April 15, 1972) was an American economist who spent most of his career at the University of Chicago, where he became one of the founders of the Chicago School.
Nobel laureates Milton Friedman, George S ...
's critique of Georgism, which Foldvary claims has been refuted.
List of Georgists
Economists
* Harry Gunnison Brown
* John R. Commons
John Rogers Commons (October 13, 1862 – May 11, 1945) was an American institutional economist, Georgist, progressive and labor historian at the University of Wisconsin–Madison.
Early years
John R. Commons was born in Hollansburg, Ohio o ...
* Raymond Crotty
* Herman Daly
Herman Edward Daly (July 21, 1938 – October 28, 2022) was an American ecological and Georgist economist and professor at the School of Public Policy of University of Maryland, College Park in the United States, best known for his time as a ...
* Paul Douglas
* Ottmar Edenhofer
* Fred Foldvary
* Milton Friedman
Milton Friedman (; July 31, 1912 – November 16, 2006) was an American economist and statistician who received the 1976 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences for his research on consumption analysis, monetary history and theory and ...
[ Excerpt: Prof. Friedman:... In my opinion, and this may come as a shock to some of you, the least bad tax is the property tax on the unimproved value of land, the Henry George argument of many, many years ago. "]
* Mason Gaffney
* Silvio Gesell
Johann Silvio Gesell (; 17 March 1862 – 11 March 1930) was a German-Argentine economist, entrepreneur, and social reformer. He was the founder of (German language, German for "free economy"), an economic model for market socialism. In 1900, ...
* Max Hirsch
* Harold Hotelling
Harold Hotelling (; September 29, 1895 – December 26, 1973) was an American mathematical statistician and an influential economic theorist, known for Hotelling's law, Hotelling's lemma, and Hotelling's rule in economics, as well as Hotelling ...
* Wolf Ladejinsky
* Donald Shoup
* Herbert A. Simon
Herbert Alexander Simon (June 15, 1916 – February 9, 2001) was an American scholar whose work influenced the fields of computer science, economics, and cognitive psychology. His primary research interest was decision-making within organi ...
* Robert Solow
Robert Merton Solow, GCIH (; August 23, 1924 – December 21, 2023) was an American economist who received the 1987 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences, and whose work on the theory of economic growth culminated in the exogenous growth ...
* Joseph Stiglitz
Joseph Eugene Stiglitz (; born February 9, 1943) is an American New Keynesian economist, a public policy analyst, political activist, and a professor at Columbia University. He is a recipient of the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences (2 ...
* Nicolaus Tideman
* William Vickrey
William Spencer Vickrey (21 June 1914 – 11 October 1996) was a Canadian-American professor of economics and Nobel Laureate. He was a lifelong faculty member at Columbia University. A theorist who worked on public economics and mechanism design, ...
* Léon Walras
Marie-Esprit-Léon Walras (; 16 December 1834 – 5 January 1910) was a French mathematical economics, mathematical economist and Georgist. He formulated the Marginalism, marginal theory of value (independently of William Stanley Jevons and Carl ...
* Philip Wicksteed
Philip Henry Wicksteed (25 October 1844 – 18 March 1927) was an English scholar and Unitarian theologian known for his contributions to classics, medieval studies and economics. He was also a Georgist and literary critic.
Family background
...
* Michael Hudson
Heads of government
* John Ballance
John Ballance (27 March 1839 – 27 April 1893) was a New Zealand politician who served as the 14th premier of New Zealand from January 1891 until his death in April 1893. He governed as the leader of New Zealand's first organised List of pol ...
* Winston Churchill
Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (30 November 1874 – 24 January 1965) was a British statesman, military officer, and writer who was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1940 to 1945 (Winston Churchill in the Second World War, ...
* Alfred Deakin
Alfred Deakin (3 August 1856 – 7 October 1919) was an Australian politician who served as the second Prime Minister of Australia, prime minister of Australia from 1903 to 1904, 1905 to 1908, and 1909 to 1910. He held office as the leader of th ...
* Andrew Fisher
Andrew Fisher (29 August 186222 October 1928) was an Australian politician and trade unionist who served as the fifth prime minister of Australia from 1908 to 1909, 1910 to 1913 and 1914 to 1915. He held office as the leader of the Australian ...
* George Grey
Sir George Grey, KCB (14 April 1812 – 19 September 1898) was a British soldier, explorer, colonial administrator and writer. He served in a succession of governing positions: Governor of South Australia, twice Governor of New Zealand, Gov ...
* Rutherford B. Hayes
Rutherford Birchard Hayes (; October 4, 1822 – January 17, 1893) was the 19th president of the United States, serving from 1877 to 1881.
Hayes served as Cincinnati's city solicitor from 1858 to 1861. He was a staunch Abolitionism in the Un ...
* Billy Hughes
William Morris Hughes (25 September 1862 – 28 October 1952) was an Australian politician who served as the seventh prime minister of Australia from 1915 to 1923. He led the nation during World War I, and his influence on national politics s ...
* Robert Stout
* Sun Yat-sen
Sun Yat-senUsually known as Sun Zhongshan () in Chinese; also known by Names of Sun Yat-sen, several other names. (; 12 November 186612 March 1925) was a Chinese physician, revolutionary, statesman, and political philosopher who founded the Republ ...
Other political figures
* Herbert Evatt
* John Peter Altgeld
* Newton D. Baker
Newton Diehl Baker Jr. (December 3, 1871 – December 25, 1937) was an American lawyer, Georgist,Noble, Ransom E. "Henry George and the Progressive Movement." The American Journal of Economics and Sociology, vol. 8, no. 3, 1949, pp. 259–269. w ...
* Willie Brown
* Clyde Cameron
Clyde Robert Cameron, (11 February 191314 March 2008) was an Australian politician. He was a member of the Australian Labor Party (ALP) and served in the House of Representatives from 1949 to 1980, representing the Division of Hindmarsh. He was ...
* George F. Cotterill
* William Jay Gaynor
* Frederic C. Howe
* Blas Infante
Blas Infante Pérez de Vargas (5 July 1885 – 11 August 1936) was an Andalusian socialist politician, Georgist, writer, historian and musicologist. He is considered the "father of Andalusia" by Andalusian nationalists.
He initiated an Andal ...
* Tom L. Johnson
* Samuel M. Jones
* Frank de Jong
* Franklin Knight Lane
* Hazen S. Pingree
* Philip Snowden
Philip Snowden, 1st Viscount Snowden, PC (; 18 July 1864 – 15 May 1937) was a British politician. A strong speaker, he became popular in trade union circles for his denunciation of capitalism as unethical and his promise of a socialist utop ...
* Josiah C. Wedgwood
* William Bauchop Wilson
* Jackson Stitt Wilson
* Andrew MacLaren MP
* Joshua Nkomo
Joshua Mqabuko Nyongolo Nkomo (19 June 1917 – 1 July 1999) was a Zimbabwean revolutionary and politician who served as Vice-President of Zimbabwe from 1990 until his death in 1999. He founded and led the Zimbabwe African People's Union (ZAPU) ...
* Baldomero Argente
* Ro Khanna
Rohit Khanna (born September 13, 1976) is an American politician and lawyer serving as the United States House of Representatives, U.S. representative from California's 17th congressional district since 2017. A member of the Democratic Party (Un ...
* Jared Polis
Jared Schutz Polis ( ; ; born May 12, 1975) is an American politician and businessman serving as the 43rd governor of Colorado since 2019. He served one term on the Colorado State Board of Education from 2001 to 2007, and five terms as the Unite ...
Activists
* Jane Addams
Laura Jane Addams (September 6, 1860May 21, 1935) was an American Settlement movement, settlement activist, Social reform, reformer, social worker, sociologist, public administrator, philosopher, and author. She was a leader in the history of s ...
* Peter Barnes
* Sara Bard Field
* Michael Davitt
Michael Davitt (25 March 1846 – 30 May 1906) was an Irish republicanism, Irish republican activist for a variety of causes, especially Home Rule (Ireland), Home Rule and land reform. Following an eviction when he was four years old, Davitt's ...
* Samuel Gompers
Samuel Gompers (; January 27, 1850December 11, 1924) was a British-born American cigar maker, labor union leader and a key figure in American labor history. Gompers founded the American Federation of Labor (AFL) and served as the organization's ...
* Bolton Hall
* Hubert Harrison
Hubert Henry Harrison (April 27, 1883 – December 17, 1927) was a West Indian-American writer, orator, educator, critic, race and class conscious political activist, and radical internationalist based in Harlem, New York. He was described by a ...
* John Haynes Holmes
* Stewart Headlam
Stewart Duckworth Headlam (12 January 1847 – 18 November 1924) was an English Anglican priest who was involved in frequent controversy in the final decades of the nineteenth century. Headlam was a pioneer and publicist of Christian socialism, ...
* Mary Elizabeth Lease
* Benjamin C. Marsh
* James Ferdinand Morton
* Thomas Mott Osborne[Gorgas, William Crawford, and Lewis Jerome Johnson. Two Papers on Public Sanitation and the Single Tax. New York: Single Tax Information Bureau, 1914. https://books.google.com/books?id=v3NHAAAAYAAJ][Ware, Louise. George Foster Peabody, Banker, Philanthropist, Publicist. Athens: U of Georgia, 1951. http://dlg.galileo.usg.edu/ugapressbks/pdfs/ugp9780820334561.pdf]
* Amos Pinchot
* Terence V. Powderly
* Samuel Seabury
Samuel Seabury (November 30, 1729February 25, 1796) was the first American Episcopal bishop, the second Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church in the United States of America, and the first Bishop of Connecticut. He was a leading Loyalis ...
* Catherine Helen Spence
Catherine Helen Spence (31 October 1825 – 3 April 1910) was a Scottish-born Australian author, teacher, journalist, politician, leading suffragist, and Georgist. Spence was also a minister of religion and social worker, and supporter of el ...
* Helen Taylor
* William Simon U'Ren
* Ida B. Wells
* Frances Willard
Authors
* Ernest Howard Crosby
* Charles Eisenstein
Charles Eisenstein (born 1967) is an American public speaker, author, and activist. His books include ''The Ascent of Humanity'', ''Sacred Economics'', and ''The More Beautiful World Our Hearts Know is Possible.''
Eisenstein's work covers a wid ...
* Hamlin Garland
* Fred Harrison
* James A. Herne
* Ebenezer Howard
* Elbert Hubbard
* Aldous Huxley
Aldous Leonard Huxley ( ; 26 July 1894 – 22 November 1963) was an English writer and philosopher. His bibliography spans nearly 50 books, including non-fiction novel, non-fiction works, as well as essays, narratives, and poems.
Born into the ...
* Monteiro Lobato
José Bento Renato Monteiro Lobato (; 18 April 1882 – 4 July 1948) was one of Brazil's most influential writers, mostly for his children's books set in the fictional Sítio do Picapau Amarelo (Yellow Woodpecker Farm) but he had been previous ...
* James Howard Kunstler
* Jose Martí
* William D. McCrackan
* Albert Jay Nock
* Kathleen Norris
* Upton Sinclair
Upton Beall Sinclair Jr. (September 20, 1878 – November 25, 1968) was an American author, muckraker journalist, and political activist, and the 1934 California gubernatorial election, 1934 Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party ...
* George Bernard Shaw
George Bernard Shaw (26 July 1856 – 2 November 1950), known at his insistence as Bernard Shaw, was an Irish playwright, critic, polemicist and political activist. His influence on Western theatre, culture and politics extended from the 188 ...
* Leo Tolstoy
Count Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy Tolstoy pronounced his first name as , which corresponds to the romanization ''Lyov''. () (; ,Throughout Tolstoy's whole life, his name was written as using Reforms of Russian orthography#The post-revolution re ...
* Charles Erskine Scott Wood
* Frank McEachran
* Arthur Desmond
Journalists
* William F. Buckley Jr.
William Frank Buckley Jr. (born William Francis Buckley; November 24, 1925 – February 27, 2008) was an American conservative writer, public intellectual, political commentator and novelist.
Born in New York City, Buckley spoke Spanish as his ...
* Timothy Thomas Fortune
* Theodor Herzl
Theodor Herzl (2 May 1860 – 3 July 1904) was an Austria-Hungary, Austro-Hungarian Jewish journalist and lawyer who was the father of Types of Zionism, modern political Zionism. Herzl formed the World Zionist Organization, Zionist Organizat ...
* Michael Kinsley
Michael E. Kinsley (born March 9, 1951) is an American political journalist and commentator. Primarily active in print media as both a writer and editor, he also became known to television audiences as a co-host on '' Crossfire''.
Early life and ...
* Suzanne La Follette
* Dylan Matthews
* Raymond Moley
Raymond Charles Moley (September 27, 1886 – February 18, 1975) was an American political economist. Initially a leading supporter of the New Deal, he went on to become its bitter opponent before the end of the Great Depression.
Early life and ...
* Charles Edward Russell
* Jacob Riis
Jacob August Riis ( ; May 3, 1849 – May 26, 1914) was a Danish-American social reformer, " muck-raking" journalist, and social documentary photographer. He contributed significantly to the cause of urban reform in the United States of Ame ...
* Reihan Salam
* Horace Traubel
* Martin Wolf
Martin Harry Wolf (born 16 August 1946 in London) is a British journalist who focuses on economics. He is the chief economics commentator at the ''Financial Times''. He also writes a weekly column for the French newspaper ''Le Monde''.
Earl ...
* Merryn Somerset Webb
* Brand Whitlock
* Tim Worstall
Tim Worstall (born 27 March 1963, Torquay) is a British-born writer and blogger and Senior Fellow of the Adam Smith Institute. He writes on the subjects of environmentalism and economics, particularly corporate tax, his contributions having appe ...
* Matthew Yglesias
Matthew Yglesias (; born May 18, 1981) is an American blogger and journalist who writes about economics and politics. Yglesias has written columns and articles for publications such as ''The American Prospect'', ''The Atlantic'', and ''Slate''. I ...
Artists
* David Bachrach
* John Wilson Bengough[Mills, Allen. "Single Tax, Socialism and the Independent Labour Party of Manitoba: The Political Ideas of F.J. Dixon and S.J. Farmer." Labour / Le Travail 5 (1980): 33–56. JSTOR. Weborn 04 Dec. 2014. https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.2307/25139947?ref=no-x-route:ace15c2e1d6b230b7bafc46e82f39f89]
* Daniel Carter Beard
* Matthew Bellamy
Matthew James Bellamy (born 9 June 1978) is an English singer, songwriter and producer. He is the lead vocalist, guitarist, pianist, and lyricist for the English rock band Muse (band), Muse. He is recognised for his eccentric stage persona, wid ...
* George de Forest Brush
* Walter Burley Griffin
Walter Burley Griffin (November 24, 1876February 11, 1937) was an American architect and landscape architect. He designed Canberra, Australia's capital city, the New South Wales towns of Griffith, New South Wales, Griffith and Leeton, New So ...
* John Hutchinson
* George Inness
George Inness (May 1, 1825 – August 3, 1894) was an American landscape painting, landscape painter.
Now recognized as one of the most influential American artists of the nineteenth century, Inness was influenced by the Hudson River Schoo ...
* Emma Lazarus
Emma Lazarus (July 22, 1849 – November 19, 1887) was an American author of poetry, prose, and translations, as well as an activist for Jewish and Georgism, Georgist causes. She is remembered for writing the sonnet "The New Colossus", which wa ...
* Agnes de Mille
* Henry Churchill de Mille
* William C. deMille
* Francis Neilson
* Eddie Palmieri
Eddie Palmieri (born December 15, 1936) is an American Grammy Award-winning pianist, bandleader, musician, and composer of Corsican and Puerto Rican ancestry. He is the founder of the bands La Perfecta, La Perfecta II, and Harlem River Drive.
...
* Banjo Paterson
Andrew Barton "Banjo" Paterson, (17 February 18645 February 1941) was an Australian bush poet, journalist and author, widely considered one of the greatest writers of Australia's colonial period.
Born in rural New South Wales, Paterson worke ...
* Louis Prang
Louis Prang (March 12, 1824June 15, 1909) was an American printer, lithographer, publisher, and Georgist. He is sometimes known as the "father of the American Christmas card".
Youth
Prang was born in Wrocław, Breslau in Prussian Silesia. ...
* William Lightfoot Price
* Frank Stephens
* Frank Lloyd Wright
Frank Lloyd Wright Sr. (June 8, 1867 – April 9, 1959) was an American architect, designer, writer, and educator. He designed List of Frank Lloyd Wright works, more than 1,000 structures over a creative period of 70 years. Wright played a key ...
Philosophers
* Ralph Borsodi
* Ludwig Büchner
* Nicholas Murray Butler
Nicholas Murray Butler (April 2, 1862 – December 7, 1947) was an American philosopher, diplomat, and educator. Butler was president of Columbia University, president of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, a recipient of the Nobel ...
* Frank Chodorov
Frank Chodorov (February 15, 1887 – December 28, 1966) was an American intellectual, author, and member of the Old Right, a group of classically liberal thinkers who were non-interventionist in foreign policy and opposed to both the America ...
* John B. Cobb
* John Dewey
John Dewey (; October 20, 1859 – June 1, 1952) was an American philosopher, psychologist, and Education reform, educational reformer. He was one of the most prominent American scholars in the first half of the twentieth century.
The overridi ...
* Leon MacLaren
* Franz Oppenheimer
Franz Oppenheimer (March 30, 1864 – September 30, 1943) was a German sociologist and political economist, who published also in the area of the fundamental sociology of the State (polity), state.
Life and career
Franz Oppenheimer was born int ...
* Philippe Van Parijs
* Bertrand Russell
Bertrand Arthur William Russell, 3rd Earl Russell, (18 May 1872 – 2 February 1970) was a British philosopher, logician, mathematician, and public intellectual. He had influence on mathematics, logic, set theory, and various areas of analytic ...
* Hillel Steiner
* Curtis Yarvin
Others
* Martin Luther King Jr.
Martin Luther King Jr. (born Michael King Jr.; January 15, 1929 – April 4, 1968) was an American Baptist minister, civil and political rights, civil rights activist and political philosopher who was a leader of the civil rights move ...
* Roger Babson
* Louis Brandeis
Louis Dembitz Brandeis ( ; November 13, 1856 – October 5, 1941) was an American lawyer who served as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, associate justice on the Supreme Court of the United States from 1916 to ...
* Rory Sutherland
* Clarence Darrow
Clarence Seward Darrow (; April 18, 1857 – March 13, 1938) was an American lawyer who became famous in the 19th century for high-profile representations of trade union causes, and in the 20th century for several criminal matters, including the ...
* Albert Einstein
Albert Einstein (14 March 187918 April 1955) was a German-born theoretical physicist who is best known for developing the theory of relativity. Einstein also made important contributions to quantum mechanics. His mass–energy equivalence f ...
* Henry Ford
Henry Ford (July 30, 1863 – April 7, 1947) was an American Technological and industrial history of the United States, industrialist and business magnate. As the founder of the Ford Motor Company, he is credited as a pioneer in making automob ...
* Spencer Heath
* Mumia Abu-Jamal
Mumia Abu-Jamal (born Wesley Cook; April 24, 1954) is an American political activist and journalist who was convicted of murder and sentenced to death in 1982 for the 1981 murder of Philadelphia Police Department, Philadelphia police officer C ...
* Margrit Kennedy
* John C. Lincoln
* Elizabeth Magie
* Edward McGlynn
* Buckey O'Neill
* George Foster Peabody
George Foster Peabody (; July 27, 1852 – March 4, 1938) was an American banker and philanthropist.
Early life
He was born to George Henry Peabody and Elvira Peabody (''née'' Canfield) as the first of four children. Both parents were New En ...
* Louis Freeland Post
* Walter Rauschenbusch
Walter Rauschenbusch (1861–1918) was an American theologian and Baptist pastor who taught at the Rochester Theological Seminary. Rauschenbusch was a key figure in the Social Gospel and single tax movements that flourished in the United States ...
* Raymond A. Spruance
* Silvanus P. Thompson
Silvanus Phillips Thompson (19 June 1851 – 12 June 1916) was an English professor of physics at the City and Guilds Technical College in Finsbury, England. He was elected to the Royal Society in 1891 and was known for his work as an electr ...
* Fiske Warren
* Alfred Russel Wallace
Alfred Russel Wallace (8 January 1823 – 7 November 1913) was an English naturalist, explorer, geographer, anthropologist, biologist and illustrator. He independently conceived the theory of evolution through natural selection; his 1858 pap ...
* Joseph Fels
* Vivienne Westwood
* Sam Altman
Samuel Harris Altman (born April 22, 1985) is an American technology entrepreneur, investor, and the chief executive officer of OpenAI since 2019 (he was Removal of Sam Altman from OpenAI, briefly dismissed and reinstated in November 2023). He ...
*Vitalik Buterin
Vitaly Dmitrievich Buterin (; born 31 January 1994), better known as Vitalik Buterin (), is a Canadian computer programmer and co-founder of Ethereum. Buterin became involved with cryptocurrency early in its inception, co-founding ''Bitcoin Ma ...
See also
* ''Agrarian Justice
''Agrarian Justice'' is the title of a pamphlet written by Thomas Paine and published in 1797, which proposed that those who possess cultivated land owe the community a ground rent, which justifies an estate tax to fund universal old-age and di ...
''
* Arden, Delaware
Arden is a village in New Castle County, Delaware, United States, founded in 1900 as a radical Georgist single-tax community by sculptor Frank Stephens and architect William Lightfoot Price. The village occupies approximately 160 acres, with ...
* Basic income
Universal basic income (UBI) is a social welfare proposal in which all citizens of a given population regularly receive a minimum income in the form of an unconditional transfer payment, i.e., without a means test or need to perform Work (hu ...
* Cap and Share
* Causes of poverty
The causes of poverty may vary with respect to nation, region, and in comparison with other countries at the global level. Philosophical perspectives and especially historical perspectives, including some factors at a micro and macro level can be ...
* Citizen's dividend
Citizen's dividend is a proposed policy based upon the Georgist principle that the natural world is the Commons, common property of all people. It is proposed that all citizens receive regular payments (dividends) from revenue raised by leasin ...
* Classical economics
Classical economics, also known as the classical school of economics, or classical political economy, is a school of thought in political economy that flourished, primarily in Britain, in the late 18th and early-to-mid 19th century. It includ ...
* Classical liberalism
Classical liberalism is a political tradition and a branch of liberalism that advocates free market and laissez-faire economics and civil liberties under the rule of law, with special emphasis on individual autonomy, limited governmen ...
* Community land trust
* Communism
Communism () is a political sociology, sociopolitical, political philosophy, philosophical, and economic ideology, economic ideology within the history of socialism, socialist movement, whose goal is the creation of a communist society, a ...
* Deadweight loss
In economics, deadweight loss is the loss of societal economic welfare due to production/consumption of a good at a quantity where marginal benefit (to society) does not equal marginal cost (to society). In other words, there are either goods ...
* Diggers
The Diggers were a group of religious and political dissidents in England, associated with a political ideology and programme resembling what would later be called agrarian socialism.; ; ; Gerrard Winstanley and William Everard (Digger), Will ...
* Economic rent
In economics, economic rent is any payment to the owner of a factor of production in excess of the costs needed to bring that factor into production. In classical economics, economic rent is any payment made (including imputed value) or bene ...
* Enclosure
Enclosure or inclosure is a term, used in English landownership, that refers to the appropriation of "waste" or "common land", enclosing it, and by doing so depriving commoners of their traditional rights of access and usage. Agreements to enc ...
* Excess burden of taxation
In economics, the excess burden of taxation is one of the economic losses that society suffers as the result of taxes or subsidies. Economic theory posits that distortions change the amount and type of economic behavior from that which would ...
* Externality
In economics, an externality is an Indirect costs, indirect cost (external cost) or indirect benefit (external benefit) to an uninvolved third party that arises as an effect of another party's (or parties') activity. Externalities can be conside ...
* Feudalism
Feudalism, also known as the feudal system, was a combination of legal, economic, military, cultural, and political customs that flourished in Middle Ages, medieval Europe from the 9th to 15th centuries. Broadly defined, it was a way of struc ...
* Free-market environmentalism
Free-market environmentalism is a type of environmentalism that argues that the free market, property rights, and tort law provide the best means of preserving the environment, internalizing pollution costs, and conserving resources. Free-ma ...
* Freiwirtschaft
(German for "free economy") is an economic theory and proposal founded by the German-Argentine economist Silvio Gesell in his 1916 book, ''The Natural Economic Order'' (). Some of the basic economic ideas of Freiwirtschaft were also independen ...
* Geolibertarianism
Geolibertarianism is a political and economic ideology that integrates libertarianism with Georgism. It favors a taxation system based (as in Georgism) on income derived from land and natural resources instead of on labor, coupled with a minimali ...
* Green economy
A green economy is an economy that aims at reducing environmental risks and ecological scarcities, and that aims for sustainable development without environmental degradation, degrading the environment. It is closely related with ecological econ ...
* Labor economics
Labour economics seeks to understand the functioning and dynamics of the markets for wage labour. Labour is a commodity that is supplied by labourers, usually in exchange for a wage paid by demanding firms. Because these labourers exist as pa ...
* ''Laissez-faire
''Laissez-faire'' ( , from , ) is a type of economic system in which transactions between private groups of people are free from any form of economic interventionism (such as subsidies or regulations). As a system of thought, ''laissez-faire'' ...
''
* Land (economics)
In economics, land comprises all naturally occurring resources as well as geographic land. Examples include particular geographical locations, mineral deposits, forests, fish stocks, atmospheric quality, geostationary orbits, and portions of ...
* Landed property
In real estate, a landed property or landed estate is a property that generates income for the owner (typically a member of the gentry) without the owner having to do the actual work of the estate.
In medieval Western Europe, there were two compe ...
* Land law
Land law is the form of law that deals with the rights to use, alienate, or exclude others from land. In many jurisdictions, these kinds of property are referred to as real estate or real property, as distinct from personal property. Land use ...
* Land monopoly
* Land registration
Land registration is any of various systems by which matters concerning ownership, Possession (law), possession, or other rights in Real estate, land are formally recorded (usually with a government agency or department) to provide evidence of ti ...
* Land tenure
In Common law#History, common law systems, land tenure, from the French verb "" means "to hold", is the legal regime in which land "owned" by an individual is possessed by someone else who is said to "hold" the land, based on an agreement betw ...
* Land value tax
A land value tax (LVT) is a levy on the value of land (economics), land without regard to buildings, personal property and other land improvement, improvements upon it. Some economists favor LVT, arguing it does not cause economic efficiency, ec ...
* Law of rent
* Lockean proviso
The Lockean proviso is a feature of John Locke
John Locke (; 29 August 1632 (Old Style and New Style dates, O.S.) – 28 October 1704 (Old Style and New Style dates, O.S.)) was an English philosopher and physician, widely regarded as on ...
* Manorialism
Manorialism, also known as seigneurialism, the manor system or manorial system, was the method of land ownership (or "Land tenure, tenure") in parts of Europe, notably France and later England, during the Middle Ages. Its defining features incl ...
* Natural and legal rights
Some philosophers distinguish two types of rights, natural rights and legal rights.
* Natural rights are those that are not dependent on the laws or customs of any particular culture or government, and so are ''universal'', ''fundamental rights ...
* Neoclassical liberalism
* Optimal tax
Optimal tax theory or the theory of optimal taxation is the study of designing and implementing a tax that maximises a social welfare function subject to economic constraints. The social welfare function used is typically a function of individuals ...
* Physiocracy
Physiocracy (; from the Greek for "government of nature") is an economic theory developed by a group of 18th-century Age of Enlightenment French economists. They believed that the wealth of nations derived solely from the value of "land agricult ...
* Pigovian tax
A Pigouvian tax (also spelled Pigovian tax) is a tax on any market activity that generates negative externalities (i.e., external costs incurred by third parties that are not included in the market price). It is a method that tries to internal ...
* Poverty reduction
Poverty reduction, poverty relief, or poverty alleviation is a set of measures, both economic and humanitarian, that are intended to permanently lift people out of poverty. Measures, like those promoted by Henry George in his economics classi ...
* ''Progress and Poverty
''Progress and Poverty: An Inquiry into the Cause of Industrial Depressions and of Increase of Want with Increase of Wealth: The Remedy'' is an 1879 book by social theorist and economist Henry George. It is a treatise on the questions of why pov ...
''
* Progressive Era
The Progressive Era (1890s–1920s) was a period in the United States characterized by multiple social and political reform efforts. Reformers during this era, known as progressivism in the United States, Progressives, sought to address iss ...
* Prosper Australia
* Radical centrism
Radical centrism, also called the radical center, the radical centre, and the radical middle, is a concept that arose in Western world, Western nations in the late 20th century. The ''Political radicalism, radical'' in the term refers to a willi ...
* Rent-seeking
Rent-seeking is the act of growing one's existing wealth by manipulating the social or political environment without creating new wealth.
Rent-seeking activities have negative effects on the rest of society. They result in reduced economic effi ...
* Tax reform
Tax reform is the process of changing the way taxes are collected or managed by the government and is usually undertaken to improve tax administration or to provide economic or social benefits. Tax reform can include reducing the level of taxati ...
* Tax shift
Tax shift or tax swap is a change in taxation that eliminates or reduces one or several taxes and establishes or increases others while keeping the overall revenue the same. Specifically, it is often used to refer to increases in indirect tax and ...
* Three Principles of the People
The Three Principles of the People (), also known as the Three People's Principles, San-min Doctrine, San Min Chu-i, or Tridemism is a political philosophy developed by Sun Yat-sen as part of a philosophy to improve China during the Republi ...
* Tragedy of the anticommons
* Value capture
Value capture is a type of public financing that recovers some or all of the value that public infrastructure generates for private landowners. In many countries, the public sector is responsible for the infrastructure required to support urban dev ...
* Wealth concentration
The distribution of wealth is a comparison of the wealth of various members or groups in a society. It shows one aspect of economic inequality or economic heterogeneity.
The distribution of wealth differs from the income distribution in that ...
* YIMBY
The YIMBY movement (short for "yes in my back yard") is a pro-housing social movement that focuses on encouraging new housing, opposing density limits (such as single-family zoning), and supporting public transportation. It stands in opposition ...
References
External links
*
{{schools of economic thought
Agrarianism
Economic ideologies
Eponymous economic ideologies
Eponymous political ideologies
Land value taxation
Left-libertarianism
History of liberalism
Property taxes
Schools of economic thought
Tax reform
Tax reform in the United States