My evidence is your evidence. If you're arguing that a parcel of land increases in value due to the existence of improvements on neighboring parcels, then so, too, would improvements on the parcel in question be more valuable (since they're already built in a desirable location). Hence: the impact for land tax + improvement tax would be worse under your premise than the impact for land tax alone.
In reality, the "niceness" of surrounding homes is hardly a factor; proximity to economic centers (be it directly or by proximity to rapid transit) is typically one of the two primary drivers of land values (the other being geography).
> In reality, the niceness of surrounding homes is hardly a factor; proximity to economic centers (be it directly or by proximity to rapid transit) ...
Homes can be valuable precisely because they're located away from economic centers. That too is geography in action. And if COVID telecommuting is an indication of market preferences, home-owning adults prefer small, out-of-the-way towns with plenty of space, low property taxes, and good internet connections. So I'd hardly think that proximity to economic centers (usually cities) is as relevant it used to be.
No, because that's already subtracted out of the total property value to produce the land value.
> And if COVID telecommuting is an indication of market preferences, home-owning adults prefer small, out-of-the-way towns with plenty of space, low property taxes, and good internet connections.
The exodus from city centers stems from farther-out places being cheaper - i.e. having lower land value.
On paper yes, but in practice there will be a de facto tax on improvement due to higher demand caused by what an physical improvement of one's own property signals.
> The exodus from city centers stems from farther-out places being cheaper - i.e. having lower land value.
Lower cost is not necessarily lower value. It's possible for areas out of the way to cost more, even if they start cheap, simply due to a short-term spurt of high demand. There are, for instance, empty parcels of land in Idaho that now go for more than whole apartment buildings in Detroit there despite the city being the automotive capital of the United States where one had historically seen the opposite trend.
...which is already subtracted out along with the rest of the improvements' contribution to land values. You could argue that it ain't a perfectly accurate subtraction - and that'd be a valid and reasonable argument - but that margin of error cuts both ways (i.e. overestimating improvement value instead of underestimating it).
> Lower cost is not necessarily lower value.
Land cost is land rental value times some amount of time (usually based on the expected cap rate).
> There are, for instance, empty parcels of land in Idaho that now go for more than whole apartment buildings in Detroit
Are the two parcels the same size? Are they representative of surrounding parcels and not outliers? Are they the same distance (in transit time/cost) as the nearest town/city center?
I did allude to that in a previous comment regarding the "propping up "and "weighing down" of values
> Lower cost is not necessarily lower value. Land cost is land rental value times some amount of time (usually based on the expected cap rate).
Cap rate/land rental value is difficult to assess on land
> There are, for instance, empty parcels of land in Idaho that now go for more than whole apartment buildings in Detroit Are the two parcels the same size? Are they representative of surrounding parcels and not outliers? Are they the same distance (in transit time/cost) as the nearest town/city center?
I'll admit that I don't have the exact values under the constraints you've listed. And given different geographies, that's going to be difficult to accomplish. However, there have been several reports of prices in Idaho increasing due to now-former residents of the Bay Area fleeing into state and buying up land and houses.
https://www.krem.com/amp/article/news/local/out-of-state-hom...
So your answer is to dismiss my position without evidence? Your point that property tax is worse than LVT isn't justified by your claim. If land values are determined by government assessment like property values are, then you're still paying property tax, albeit with an obfuscated input for improvement in the calculation which may be higher or lower or just the same as a regular property tax.