Milton Friedman, (1976)

"I share your view that taxes would best be placed on the land, and not on improvements."

Andrew Jackson

veto of the Bank Bill 10 July 1832 Every man is equally entitled to protection by law; but when the laws undertake to add... artificial distinctions, to grant titles, gratuities, and exclusive privileges, to make the rich richer and the potent more powerful, the humble members of society - the farmers, mechanics, and labourers - who have neither the time nor the means of securing like favours to themselves, have a right to complain of the injustice of their government.

Philadelphia's first tax law 30/1/1693

"Put to the vote: as many are of the opinion that a public tax upon the land ought to be raised to defray the public charge, say 'yea'. - Carried in the affirmative, none dissenting."

Paul Samuelson, (1970)

Pure land rent is in the nature of a "surplus" which can be taxed heavily without distorting production incentives or efficiency. A land value tax can be called "the useful tax on measured land surplus".

Commentaries

The earth, therefore, and all things therein, are the general property of all mankind, from the immediate gift of the creator. ...there is no foundation in nature or in natural law why a set of words upon parchment should convey the dominion of land. William Blackstone, (1723-1780)

Differentials Debate

Concerned at the expense of the power granted to local govt under clause 161 (2), which reads A differential rate which is higher or lower for some land in the municipal district than for other land may be declared on the basis of any criterea specified by the Council in the rate. That is carte blanche, open sesame. There can be differential rates on any criteria, and it was in that basis that the National Party objected most strenously to the powers contained in clause 161. We did so on the grounds that no one was in a position to protect ratepayers against potential abuse. It is clear that, in relation to minimum rates- which will, incidentally, de deleted by the Bill-some municipalities have been obtaining more than half of their entire rate revenue under the guise of minimum rates. The National Party wants to ensure that we at least restrain the potential for that power to be abused.....the MAV and the municipalities should be invited to define the classes or basis upon which the rates were levied, and explain the differentiation. It seemed a fair enough compromise, that they should be defined and put into the Bill, enabling everybody to know where we stand in relation to those defined categories.....yet under section 161 it was being advocated that the door be opened to the creation of additional minority groups. It was in that basis that we objected to the provision most strenously I place on the record now the fact that the National Party would profer that the definition of rates under which differentials are to be struck should be declared and identified in the legislation. ...I anticipate that enormous problems will surface if the Bill is passed and that open-ended differential rates will come back to haunt us. Roger Hallam Min. Local Government Western Province., Aug 3 1988

Winston Churchill 1874-1965

It is quite true that the land monopoly is not the only monopoly which exists, but it is by far the greatest of monopolies - it is a perpetual monopoly, and it is the mother of all other forms of monopoly. Nothing is more amusing than to watch the efforts of our monopolist opponents to prove that other forms of property and increment are exactly the same, and are similar in all respects to the unearned increment in land. I have made speeches by the yard on the subject of land value taxation, and you know what a supporter I am of that policy.

Henry George (1839-1897): Protection or Free Trade

Introduction: A tax on land values is of all taxes that which best fulfils every requirement of a perfect tax. As land cannot be hidden or carried off, a tax on land values can be assessed with more certainty and can be collected with greater ease and less expense than any other tax, while it does not in the slightest degree check production or lessen its incentive. It is, in fact, a tax only in form, being in nature a rent - a taking for the use of the community of a value that arises not from individual exertion but from the growth of the community. For it is not anything that the individual owner or user does that gives value to land. The value that he creates is a value that attaches to improvements. This, being the the result of individual exertion, properly belongs to the individual, and cannot be taxed without lessening the incentive to production. But the value that attaches to land itself is a value arising from the growth of the community and increasing with social growth. It therefore properly belongs to the community, and can be taken to the last penny without in the slightest degree lessening the incentive to production. For justice to be done between men it is not necessary for the State to take the land; it is only necessary to take its rent. Our primary social adjustment is a denial of justice. In allowing one man to own the land on which and from which other men must live, we have made them his bondsmen in a degree which increases as material progress goes on.

Franco Modigliani (1985):

It is important that rent of land be retained as a source of government revenue. Some persons who could make excellent use of land would be unable to raise money for the purchase price. Collecting rent annually provides access to land for persons with limited access to credit.