What Owners of Land Owe to Government

Sun Yat-Sen

[An excerpt from an interview reprinted from The Independent, New York, 1912]

There is one point to which we ought to give the greatest attention. Formerly, people owning land paid taxes according to area. In the future taxes ought to be levied according to the value, not the area, of the land. The valuable land is mostly in the busy parts and is in the possession of wealthy men ; to tax them heavily would be no oppression. The poor land is mostly the possession of poor people in the far back districts; nothing but the lightest taxes should be levied on them. If the tax were levied on the value of the land then this injustice would be done away with. If you compare the value of land in Shanghai to-day with what it was 100 years ago, it has increased ten thousand fold. Now industry in China is about to be developed. Commerce will advance, and in 50 years time we shall see many Shanghais in China, Let us take time by the forelock and make sure the unearned increment of land shall belong to the people and not to private individuals who happen to be the owners of the soil.