ARGUMENT FOR THE SINGLE TAX 395 



this " unearned increment" as they term it, would be taken by 

 society that creates it. Neither could he buy a farm and expect 

 to sublet it at a profit, while he retired and lives in ease and luxury 

 off his tenants, because the economic rent would go to the state, 

 not to him. Of course, the farmer who had put improvements on 

 his farm of great value could and w^ould retire, if he pleased, and 

 "rent" this farm, but the land value rent or tax would go to the 

 state, while his "rent" would be merely the interest on his outlay 

 for improvements, equipment, tile, stock, etc. Speculative funds 

 diverted from land speculation into productive capital would 

 actually raise wages and bring general prosperity, say the single 

 taxers, and, indeed, abolish poverty from the earth. 



More fundamental yet, is the argument advanced by Henry 

 George in his work "Progress and Poverty," his chief contention 

 being that our boasted increase in population is accompanied with 

 an iron law of wages, interest, and rent, namely, wages must fall; 

 interest must fall; rent must increase. In short, progress means 

 poverty poverty for the many, wealth for the few who appro- 

 priate ground rent. His logic is very simple. As population in- 

 creases, there are more mouths to feed. More food is needed. It 

 must come from the land. The supply of land is fixed. It cannot 

 be increased. As this demand on the land steadily grows greater 

 and greater and more food must be wrung from the soil, food prices 

 must rise; land values must rise; rents must rise. The landlords 

 will be able to receive a larger and larger share of the products, 

 leaving less and less for labor and capital. To make the illustration 

 concrete. Here is a ten-acre field of wheat and the country is 

 new and sparsely settled. This field must furnish bread for the 

 man and his wife and two children. A generation later (and our 

 population has doubled); this field must now feed eight people. 

 The relative scar city of this food makes it dearer than it was before. 

 This is equivalent to saying that the value of the land is more 

 that its economic rent has increased. These eight people must be 

 fed from this land, and the owner of the land can and does demand 

 a higher rent for the use of his land because population has 

 increased, not because he has improved the land. Let this ten 

 acre field stand for the whole United States. The area of the 

 continental United States is, in round numbers three and a half 

 million square miles. It was this size one hundred years ago, and 

 will be this size a hundred years hence. But the population to 

 occupy this area was but 4,000,000 in 1790. This population was 

 nearly doubled by 1810, reaching iy millions. Thirty years later 



