Here is what I do not understand.

If they were negative, landowners wouldn't lobby for them and fund political campaigns to get them; and in any case, their sum, land value, is indisputably, astronomically positive.

Calling facts of economics "ideological rant" cannot change them, sorry. It is merely a fact of economics that government spending on services and infrastructure, to the extent that it isn't wasted or stolen and actually buys desirable benefits that people are willing to pay for, all goes to landowners in return for nothing, because landowners are privileged to charge everyone else full market value for access to those benefits.

Provision of public goods is "merely" paid for by taxing people's economic activity such as labor, adding value, and consumption. The productive individuals who must pay those taxes are then "merely" required to pay landowners full market value for access to the very same public goods their taxes just paid for. They are "merely" required to pay for government TWICE so that landowners can pocket one of the payments in return for exactly nothing.

A massive, institutionalized injustice that "merely" impoverishes billions and has "merely" destroyed dozens of societies throughout history is a "side issue," nothing more....?

Keep on chugging that Kool-Aid, Reiver. The dishonesty and greed of apologists for landowner privilege is destroying your country, as it has destroyed so many others before now. The ongoing Global Financial Crisis is just the latest installment. Economic Armageddon is happening right before your eyes, but you shut them resolutely and refuse to know how or why.

 

This is just continuation of theideological rant. That these effects can be either positive or negative is just a matter of fact. The impact of government intervention, despite the Georgist prattle, can either increase or descrease local prices.

Given the effects mentioned are ambiguous, we know that the original comment was nothing more than ideological splurge. Its the emotionalism that you fellows are prone to that informs me that you already know that. You soap box, rather than provide objective economic analysis that achieves a suitable score in the sense stakes.

Just more ideological rant. There is cerainly no welfare subsidy. There is only rational provision of product that leads to some localised spillover effects.

No, a mere side issue. The real concern is how underprovision of public goods is guaranteed. You won't refer to that though as it has naff all to do with Georgist rant

More emotionalism and empty grunt! The economic crisis reflects the consequences of neo-liberalism. And no, nothing to do with long dead henry!

 

The Henry George theorem dictates that to the degree that government spending is efficient, land values, as a whole, are positively affected.

The thing I find peculiar is that you seem, in your ignorance, to believe that because some land values might be negatively affected by government activities, that that is some type of score against taxing land rents. The fact that government activities can negatively affect some communities land values while enhancing the prospects of others, is all the more reason to support the taxation of land rent.

Taxing land rents would allow the government to collect the revenue generated from increased rents at the location where the effects were positive, while giving tax relief to locations where the effects were negative, which would contribute to a more level playing field. While you seem to insinuate that because one landowners gain might, possibly be offset by another’s loss, enriching one while bankrupting another, that this somehow turns the situation into a “side-issue”. I call that a load of crap.

 

I'm not interested in the origins of the Georgist rant. It is obvious that your 'its a welfare subsidy' makes naff all sense as the impact of those infrastructure investments are ambiguous. You've been caught out peddling guff

 

This is just continuous, self-blinding denial of the indisputable facts of economics that prove your ideological rant is false and irrational.

You sneer constantly, you dismiss consistently, you ignore habitually, and you misrepresent routinely because you can never, ever refute.

That their combined net effect is overwhelmingly positive, and is equal to land value, is just a matter of fact.

No. You have to refuse to know the fact that land value measures the net positive effect of all government interventions combined on each land parcel, because you have already realized that it proves your blinkered ideological rant is false. You can NEVER permit yourself to know such facts, as that would be to admit your ideological splurge has been disastrously wrong all along.

No, you just have to find some way of preventing yourself from knowing the facts that prove your ideology is objectively false. As we have already established that the expected net effect of all government interventions combined is equal to land value, it's clear that in all your comments related to the subject of land, your only motive is to prevent yourself from knowing the facts of objective physical reality that prove your irrational ideological rant is false.

ROTFL!! There is exactly one type of person that always has to dismiss any concern for justice as "emotionalism": the apologist for injustice.

That's clearly a flat-out lie. We have provided objective economic analysis, and you just sneer, dismiss, ignore and misrepresent it.

Just more sneers and dismissals, without any actual argument being offered.

It is certain that there is, because the land has value though its owner does nothing and contributes nothing.

The spillover effect is precisely that the landowner is privileged to charge everyone else full market value for the products -- services and infrastructure -- that government provides. That is self-evidently and indisputably a welfare subsidy giveaway.

??? What?? That has to be one of the most ignorant, willfully anti-logical comments you have ever made on the subject of land value taxation, and that is saying a lot.

LVT is ALL ABOUT efficient provision of public goods. Recovering the additional land value that government spending creates in order to pay for that spending, instead of giving it away to private landowners like you as a welfare subsidy, is self-evidently and indisputably the precise and only policy that will cure underprovision of public goods: if government gets back the value that its provision of public goods creates, there is no reason for it to underprovide them. They pay for themselves.

LVT is therefore the ONLY POSSIBLE WAY to align government's own financial incentives with the public's interest in efficient provision of public goods. It is only your preferred system of exorbitant welfare subsidy giveaways to landowners that guarantees underprovision of public goods. And you prefer that system only because you are a landowner, and in your greed you want -- indeed, you demand -- that welfare subsidy giveaway. Simple.

More sneers and dismissals lacking any actual content.

I see. And the South Sea Bubble reflected the consequences of neoliberalism, not the expectation of welfare subsidy giveaways to landowners? The Mississippi Bubble, too? How about the Japanese land bubble of the 1980s? That result from neoliberalism, too, and had nothing to do with any expectation of being able to make money just by owning land? And the US-UK-Spain-Ireland-etc. land bubble of the 2000s? Neoliberalism, I tell you! Nothing to do with anyone expecting the exorbitant welfare subsidy giveaway to landowners to keep increasing!

Funny how all the land bubbles that have been destroying economies for hundreds of years have all been due to neoliberalism, and have nothing to do with anyone trying to pocket a welfare subsidy by idly owning land...

 

I.e., you refuse to know all facts that prove your beliefs are false and destructive.

Nope. Land value reflects their net effect on each land parcel, as geofree already explained to you but you refused to know.

No, geofree already proved you wrong.

 

A childish attempt. Its always the same with Georgist drone:

Step 1: they say land a lot and doggedly refuse to make comment consistent with modern economic analysis

Step 2: they put their foot in it and make ludicrous claim

Step 3: spam, using 'its indisputable fact' religiously instead of reacting to their ideological-fed knowledge hole.


That other fellow made a ludicrous statement, ignoring the fact that government infrastructure investments have an ambiguous effect on land values. The honest reaction would be to put him right. Perhaps someone that makes ludicrous comments like homeowners are worse than thieves isn't up to the job?

I do something that Georgist rant won't tolerate: utilise various schools of political thought in order to understand empirical phenomena. With public good provision (demonstrating how side issues are used by the Georgist rant), for example, I've applied the retrenchment hypothesis.

I didn't bother to read the rest of your post. I've been rational and assumed its just a rehashing of your tired script. Given so far all you've managed to do is show that you support a ludicrous statement, answer me a simple question: why do you insist on using long dead george, given the said analysis is unable to understand economic agents (be it the firm or the worker)?

 

What you are ignorantly dismissing as a “localized spillover effect” is in reality a huge sum of money … enough to fund all vital government services and infrastructure. At least that is what real economists say:

So, given that all those economists who signed the letter above are smarter then you, and given the fact that they all agree that government can be funded out of the portion of land rent which government services create, your calling those same funds a “localized spillover effect” seems very retarded. When governments give away a huge value such as that, HUGE enough to fund governments very existence, what else is there better to describe that giveaway than that it is a “welfare subsidy” to the privileged.

 

'Real economics' confirms what I've said: these spillover effects, a side issue in public good analysis, are ambiguous. Can we refer to the worth of using land tax? Golly gosh, yes we can. Of course we can refer to the worth of many taxes. Even tariffs can be useful in the right conditions, such as a revenue raising device free from hindering bureaucracy costs.

The problem is that Long Dead George has encouraged a cultish approach based on one dimensional land rant. And you? You've made a ludicrous claim that you cannot support as its bleedin obvious that these effects are ambiguous

 

It's always the same with you: deny, sneer, ignore, dismiss, ridicule, but never offer any actual facts or logic.

geofree just got through proving that's a lie.

Content = 0, as usual.

His statement was objectively correct, and he proved you wrong.

That is not a fact, it is a fabrication by you. The net combined effect of government infrastructure investments is not ambiguous, as the Nobel laureates schooled you, and you ignored, dismissed, etc.

You wouldn't know an honest reaction -- or honest anything -- if it bit you on the goolies.

You already proved you are lying about that.

Yep: lie.

No, you dismiss one particular school of economic thought in order to prevent understanding of empirical phenomena.

In order to prevent yourself from knowing the fact that government spending on public goods goes to landowners, because they are privileged to charge everyone else full market value for access to them.

Because you have been refuted, you know it, and you have no answers.

Refusing to know the central facts is not rational.

It is you who are following a tired script, Reiver, and that is plain to everyone who reads anything you write on the subject of land.

geofree's statement was correct, and he prove you wrong. Deal with it.

I don't refer to Henry George. But you do, whenever I post any fact whatever about land economics or taxation economics, because that is your tired script, and you can't deviate from it.

 

Nope. The Nobel laureates already slam-dunked that silly claim. The positive externalities of public goods that show up as land value are not a side issue but THE CENTRAL issue in public policy, especially tax policy.

No, of course you can't. That is why you always have to sneer, deny, ignore, dismiss, ridicule, and misrepresent all facts of land and taxation economics.

No, you always have to dismiss, ignore, deny, and misrepresent the facts of economics that prove land value taxes are economically far superior to the commonly used taxes that burden production and exchange. As you have decided to oppose liberty, justice and truth, you have no choice.

You are the only one here who obsesses cultishly about Henry George, as readers can confirm. You have already tried to introduce his name into the thread half a dozen times, while we have not initiated a single mention of him. Not one.

He already proved it, and the Nobel laureates agreed with him.

Nope. Flat false. You cannot dispute the fact that the net combined effect on land value of government spending is massively, astronomically positive. You cannot dispute it, so you have to ignore, deny, dismiss, ridicule, misrepresent and sneer at it. Simple.

 

I didn't bother with the rest of your quote as, quite frankly, it was childish prattle. It amuses me that you try to hide from your Georgist position, whilst you try and defend cretinous comment from the Georgist cult. However, let's go with your blag. Which economist would you say has been integral to your position? We can of course scrap anyone who has been logical and referred to the theory of the firm or the labour market.

 

You don't seem to be very clear on the concept of empirical science. Economists don't CREATE economic laws and relationships, they only try to DISCOVER them (or in all too many cases, obscure them). So as individuals they are quite superfluous. My position is based on the laws of economics, especially the Law of Rent, and how they relate to the basic human rights to life, liberty, and property in the fruits of one's labor. You could say that as Ricardo discovered the Law of Rent, he is most "integral to my position"; other economists who discovered or explained facts important to my position would be Turgot, Smith, Jevons, Mises and Buchanan. But the laws of economics would be no different if any given economist had never existed, so obviously no given economist per se is integral to my position.

 

Now I assumed you would respond with something deliberately vague, with a general splattering of (mainly dead) names. So why did I bother? Even something deliberately vague with a splattering of (mainly dead) names can be jolly useful. 'How?' I hear you stutter. Let's illustrate it with one of my key positions: the support for free trade. Would I say its based on Ricardo? Of course not. Not because he wasn't actually the first person to come out with comparative advantage, but because of the vibrancy in theoretical and empirical analysis. That has shifted analysis from country to industry (new trade theory), from industry to firm (firm heterogeneity models). I would refer directly to these innovaters. You therefore only describe the stagnancy in your approach and in your reading.

There is no 'single truth' in economics. The multiple, and often competing political economic schools of thought, advertises that reality. Those suggesting otherwise are cultists. Its exceedingly rare to find a Georgist who isn't one

 

And were proved wrong.

As names were what you asked for.

Because you had no facts or logic to offer, obviously.

Actually, it is your refusal to know the basics, and your constant resort to whatever evasion of those basics happens to be fashionable in the journals, that guarantees stagnancy.

That is where we differ. I believe that only the facts of reality are true. You believe that any objectively false opinion that has been accepted for publication in a peer-reviewed economics journal (but only if cited using the Harvard system) is more true than actual facts of reality like the land value that government spending on services and infrastructure creates.

No, it advertises the fact that there are many ways to be wrong in empirical science, but only one way to be right.

No, that is simply your false opinion. Empirical science is not a cult. Rather it is all the ways of systematically evading empirical science, such as Marxism, that are cults.

<yawn> You again try, obsessively, by any means, to bring Henry George into the discussion, even as you accuse others of being "cultists." The irony no doubt escapes you.

 

Actually I asked you to put your foot in it, offering the names of the dead as you offer vague grunt that shows you're poorly read. You obliged.

The Ricardo example demonstrate how we differ and also why you're stuck in the Georgist script. I'm able to adapt according to innovation in economic analysis. You remain stuck in the past, offering argument that has long since been dismissed.

I expect the cultist to adopt anti-intellectualism. That you don't bother to read the academic journals doesn't interest me. That you deliberately hide from academic journals does. How can you refer to objectivity when you are so poorly read in modern economic analysis?

We differ as I embrace economics, with that necessarily meaning the consideration of all political economic schools of thought. That can involve more in-depth analysis (such as comparing and contrasting the alternative sources of trade gains and how that impacts on public choice) or saying the bleedin obvious: the effects of infrastructure investments are ambiguous, by definition.

I've never seen you refer to the wealth of available empirical analysis available. Perhaps you could refer to a published paper that shows infrastructure investments are always positive?

An ignorant comment. See Empirical Marxism. Its also a matter of fact to note that marxist analysis has been embedded within orthodox labour theory in order to understand empirical phenomena, such as trends in involuntary unemployment. Perhaps you'd know that if you had read some modern economic analysis?

Unlike you, I'm but honest. You give Georgism 101 religiously. Its a good idea for you to deny it though, given how irrelevant Long Dead George is.

 

Thanks for admitting you have never had any interest in actual discussion -- a fact the rest of your post confirms.

 

You didn't have to put your foot in it. You could have made valuable remark, demonstrate an awareness of modern economics that showed a keen appreciation for objectivity. Its a jolly shame that you couldn't. Perhaps next time?

 

And I didn't.

Wish I could say the same...

LOL! See Steve Keen, "Debunking Economics," for how much "objectivity" is to be found in "modern" economics.

<yawn> What a tiresome troll you are.

 

You left our one very important groiup. Congress. Remember that the POTUS can spend money, only congress can spend money and they do a great job. You won't find one congressman that is complaining about his financial conditition and not one will leave congress with less moeny than he showed up with. Congress is killing our country. They pass laws that they expempt themselves from and that is unconstitutional and we let the get away with it.

 

By advertising an anti-intellectual heart, it was a size 12 bovver boot!

And what's the purpose of Keen's stuff? Much the same as the post-autistic movement: to advertise the holes in the orthodox approach and to encourage a political economic debate. One you can't be part of because of your anti-intellectual approach, where you hide from modern economics (which encompasses orthodox and heterodox schools by definition) in order to peddle the same ole Georgist guff

 

Obscurantists always fall back on accusations of "anti-intellectual." Always.

To prevent your precious "modern" economics from creating more disasters like the GFC.

No, to show that the peer-reviewed mainstream economics journals you worship are nothing but propaganda organs for wealthy, privileged interests.

Only obscurantists and liars call clarity and honesty "anti-intellectual."

Lie. I just understand that Keen is perfectly correct in his criticisms -- which don't even address some of the biggest epistemological booby traps.

Everything but fact, logic and honesty.

You again prove that YOU are the one obsessed with Henry George, no one else.

 

Your sneer at academic journals ensures your anti-intellectual status. You'd only have a valid point if you attacked one specific resource (e.g. Some reference to something like the AER for being too technical, with a preference for more diverse offering offered by the likes of the Cambridge Journal of Economics. You haven't done that. You've given a blanket attack because you have to justify being poorly read.

You continue to make childish comment, only further describing that anti-intellectual core to your approach. It isn't 'my' modern economics. It is just a vibrant discipline, encompassing numerous political economic schools, that make your land rant look mindless. Neo-liberalism, and the economic crisis created, is understood within modern analysis. What we do have is an attack on the orthodoxx attempt to suggest simple truth. That was attacked before the crisis, such as the dismissal of the fake Keynesian-Monetarist debate. It also amuses me as your approach is as one dimensional as the Georgist cultism you religiously grunt.

Another anti-intellectual grunt! Academic journals are very much diverse in nature. This isn't surprising, given the diverse schools favoured by different institution. Those journals will also include offering symnpathetic to Georgism. But, given you only know of a few dead blokes, you wouldn't appreciate that.

You've come across Keen as he has a well advertised internet presence. You use him as you think it gives you a justification for knowing so little modern economics. In reality, it just advertises the foolishness of your position. It advertises the need to compare and contrast the different schools. It advertises the need to embrace modern economic debate.

George isn't a particularly significant figure in economics. Would you agree?

 

You may be paying more but the uber rich are paying less. Federal tax revenues, relative to GDP, are not higher, but are the lowest they've been in 60 years.

 

Funny then that the privileged go to such great lengths to lie about what Henry George wrote.

If lying and diversions by the opposition were the measure of significance &#8230; then Henry George would have to be considered one of the most significant writers of all time.