Nobody is saying it's evil. But the value of your land is also not sacrosanct to the rest of society, nor should it be.

"I'm a highly paid sw eng in the bay area and want to buy a house, but it's very pricy. Let me present a scapegoat so we can all agree to force them to sell below market value. But don't touch my total comp because that's totally the market value of what I contribute to society!"

A consistent view please. Either society decides through laws who gets to have how much, or not, but stop selectively applying that to things you want versus things you already have. Such brain acrobatics is just dishonest.

Sorry, what is your actual objection here? I'm not saying anyone should be forced to sell below market price - I'm saying the market price is inflated by the the cost of land: Land that no one created, land that is not a product of any human market.

The point of a Georgist land-value tax is to separate the value of the land from the value of buildings on the land. Land itself is a public good and should be taxed as such.

I don't disagree that the market price is inflated. Lots of market prices are inflated. Many people here are paid in or own (or both) stocks of tech firms whose value is inflated by at least as much or higher. Have not heard anybody claim that they are earning too much money. Easy to punch others though.

It is, in fact, a common kind of economic policy approach, to disincentive rent seeking. This does not apply to labor income, generally.

I can't begin to understand what the quoted section you start your comment with has to do with the comment of mine that you replied to. I didn't say anything about any of that stuff...

Sorry, took some liberties to paraphrase how your comment sounded to me. You seem to have little respect for what others own, but I'm assuming you expect others to respect your private property. I was trying to illustrate that somewhat selfish inconsistency.

I still have no clue whatsoever how my comment could have sounded like that paraphrase to you.

I'm very confused what private property you think my comment suggests I do not respect.

The land somebody owns is private property, is it not?

Yes. But nobody is talking about taking anybody's land. What's your point?

If you bought a house for 50 grand in 1984 and now it's worth $3 million because you got lucky and happened to buy in the right spot, that's a jackpot in my book. You didn't do anything to create the value of that land: that's what Georgism recognizes.

If you bought it in California, say, in 1984 it was more like $100k, and would now be worth more like $900k[0]. Your outlier valuation is a terrible basis upon which to institute yet another tax.

[0] https://www.noradarealestate.com/blog/california-housing-mar...

The outlier valuation is exactly the point! That's why it's a lottery ticket. Some people get $900k, others get $3m, not because of anything they did, not because of improvements made to the property, but just because they picked the lucky patch of dirt.

As discussed in the article, LVT can be implemented in a revenue-neutral way where most homeowners would pay lower property taxes so your handwringing about "yet another tax" is unconvincing.

God forbid they lose some tiny fraction of their wealth to benefit society. The horror.

Fight for tech workers paying higher tax rates and investors making above X million a year paying an extra surcharge and we can talk again.

I do. Also a LVT would have that same effect since those people live on valuable land.

It was a jackpot because houses were cheap back when they bought and now due partially to nimbys it's not cheap anymore.