PROGRESS AND POVERTY. 735 



Land can not be hid ; its rent at any time is readily ascertainable, so 

 that the Government would get a considerably larger percentage of 

 taxation than now. 



Mr. George tests his proposition by the accepted canons of taxa- 

 tion, and finds that the tax on land is the only tax which can not be 

 distributed — which those taxed can not throw off on to others. It is, 

 therefore, the only tax which does not bear upon production. This 

 also follows from the law of rent, as the relation between the most 

 productive and least productive land in use is not altered by such a 

 tax, and therefore the share of labor and capital can not be affected 

 by it. Under such tenure of land the burden of taxation will be 

 raised from production, and, while it still pays rent, though a greatly 

 reduced one, this goes to the state, to be used for the benefit of those 

 who have created the fund. 



Under such an arrangement, land would be improved as fast as 

 there was a demand for it. No one, as now, could afford to hold laud 

 unless he proposed to use it. There would be no prospect of parting 

 with it at a future time for more than now, while the holder would 

 have to pay an increasing rent without any advantage accruing to 

 him. This tax, therefore, would have the effect of forcing improve- 

 ment instead of acting, as present taxation does, as a fine upon im- 

 px'ovement. Nor need any fears be entertained that such a holding of 

 land would deter men from improving it because they did not own it. 

 Ownership is not necessary, as is shown by the many costly buildings 

 in every city built upon leased land. All that is necessary is that 

 there be security for the improvement. 



Mr. George holds that, though the proposal to place all taxes on 

 land is, at first sight, to increase the burdens of the farmer, it is not in 

 reality so. At present he is taxed on all his improvements, houses, 

 barns, fences, stock, and crops, while, through the action of the tariff, 

 he pays enormous taxes on everything he consumes. Under the ar- 

 rangement proposed all these taxes would be removed, and there would 

 remain only the tax on the bare land. As speculative land-values 

 would be abolished, and large tracts of land now held thro^vn open to 

 improvement, the value of his land would decrease, with the result 

 that, in sparsely settled districts, he would have little or no taxes to 

 pay. The tendency of this measure would be to distribute population 

 more equitably — to take from the overcrowded city and add to the 

 thinly settled country. With the continued application of machinery 

 to agriculture, farming life would tend to assume the form of the vil- 

 lage community, whence the great gain to the farmer in the increased 

 advantage of social intercourse. He would lose little or nothing in a 

 pecuniary way, and gain much in an improved social life. And so 

 with the owners of homesteads, and all land-owners whose interests as 

 such do not greatly predominate over their interests as laborers and 

 capitalists. 



