THE FARMER AND THE SIXOLE TAX. 



327 



much, but that tlie greater part of the public revenue would 

 be obtained from the taxes on town and city property, manu- 

 facturing sites, mines, monopolized fisheries, and the owners of 

 valuable franchises, whose owners would pay to the state the 

 entire rental value of the property devoted to such uses, which 

 would provide sufficient revenue for most or all purposes of 

 the state. While this extreme view is held by some it is 

 probable that a majority do not anticipate so much from city 

 property and special privileges, but expect agricultural lands 

 to bear some share of the fiscal burden. All single taxers 

 agree, however, in insisting that under the single tax the 

 farmer's burden would be much less than he now^ bears. 

 This chapter will be confined to a brief and necessarily super- 

 ficial inquiry into the probabilities in these respects. 



The inquiry must necessarily be superficial from the fact 

 that as to the United States, at least, there are, except in a 

 very few instances, no data from w^hich to compute the rental 

 value of land in either city or country. It is true that 

 we have "valuations," each year, of all tlie property in the 

 country, and every ten years the census authorities do their 

 best to reduce the conflicting state valuations to some common 

 denomination, and the result, whatever it is, is accepted as the 

 "true value" of the various classes of property. The "true 

 value" of property, however, is determined only by the net 

 income w^hich it produces, or is capable of producing under 

 proper management. The rental value of laud is the yearly 

 sum which, under conditions as they are, individuals will pay 

 for its exclusive use, and as a matter of fact do pay when they 

 have the opportunity. If income is known, a capital value 

 can be fixed according to the prevailing rate of interest. If 

 interest is six per cent, land is worth sixteen and two-thirds 

 times the yearly rental; if five per cent, twenty times the 

 yearly rental; and if four per cent, twenty-five times the 

 yearly rental. In estimates of this kind it is usual to reckon 

 interest at five per cent, and therefore to place the value of 

 land at twenty times its rental value for one year. We have, 

 in America, as to the most part of our land, no data on this 

 subject. There is a speculative taint upon all our land valua- 



