For Future Use
Joseph Thompson
[Reprinted from an undated pamphlet, Simple Talks
on Taxation, published by the author]
... Hey! I think I've got one to
stop you land-rental cranks.
You
have? Well, shoot.
A big factory knows it's
going to get bigger, so it takes on a big piece of land right
next to it.
A
prudent move.
Yeah. But the land has a
high value, so even if they've got no use for it, they gotter
pay just as big a tax as if they was using it.
You
say it has a high value?
Yeah. Even if it's vacant.
It
has a high value because it's in a desirable location?
Sure, but they're on'y
holdin' it for later on.
But
someone would like to use it, meanwhile, eh?
How could he use it if it
was theirs?
They
could lease it to him.
Then you people would tax
the rent.
Where
do you get that?
Why, you fellers are always
yellin' "Tax the rent".
Wrong
again, boy.
Why?
We
fellers are always yellin' for publicly collecting the full
rental value. It wouldn't make any difference to the public what
the big company did. They could re-rent it, sub-lease it.
Then they'd be landlords
like you're always kickin' about.
No.
You could call the renting out by the company, a stop-loss. As
long as the public was getting the full rental, it wouldn't care
what the company did with the land.
But they'd be landlords!
No.
They'd really only be a collecting agent for the public. They'd
just be trading dollars. There'd be nothing in it for them
except just a stop-loss.
How do you make that out?
Couldn't they hitch up the rent?
No.
Because if they were paying the full rental value, they couldn't
expect to get more than that, subletting it.
Oh.
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