134 REPORT OF THE FORESTRY COMMITTEE 



to satisfy him now, while making sure that he does not escape eventually, at 

 positive expense to other tax payers of today and positive gain to tax payers 

 of the future. It is quite as logical to reverse the process and give him equal satis- 

 faction while also satisfying the other tax payers of today, and accord tax payers 

 at the time of cutting no subsidy beyond assurance that they may tax any values 

 added to the product without effort by the forest grower and upon which he has 

 not fully paid. This assurance is provided by the single tax on the crop and the 

 clause permitting reclassification after maturity. 



This system does not reduce present revenue as much as would exemption 

 or merely nominal taxation of the land, consequently does not add to other pioneer 

 tax payers of today a burden for which they receive no return. Leaving justice 

 to the forest grower out of consideration -for the moment, our chief object is to 

 provide the future with forest products, industries, and revenues. In other words, 

 future tax payers are to profit by the exploitation of the forests it is sought to 

 grow. When the present community is a pioneer one, with the heaviest burden of 

 up-building and the maximum dependance on land for tax revenue, as on the 

 Pacific coast, it is only fair that they should forego the majority of the tax in its 

 favor, for the many benefits they are to receive will fully compensate. 



There is certainly a strong practical advantage in having no percentages to 

 calculate upon uncertain premises. The annual land tax can be imposed with 

 current justice. The yield tax will take exactly its just proportion, compared with 

 the current taxation of other wealth, of any measure of value which future con- 

 ditions or speculation by the owner have added to the crop whenever cut. 



Under such a system the community would get no less tax revenue, but pre- 

 sumably more, than it does under the present system. In either case the owner 

 will really pay annually only upon the land value, not upon the growth; the 

 only difference being that under the proposed system he would not be asked to, 

 while under the present system either there will be no growth to tax, or, if there 

 is, he cannot afford to pay and the land will revert. 



It must be borne in mind that while much cut-over land on the Pacific 

 coast is being held under the present system, it has seldom grown anything yet. 

 No expense has been incurred to establish a crop, accidental growth is almost 

 always destroyed by fire because it does not pay to protect it, and if it is not so 

 destroyed it has not yet been accorded the expectation value which the assessor 

 will be obliged to recognize in the early future if he really observes the present 

 law. The inevitable tendency of the present system is continuance to pay on 

 the land with speculative value for purposes other than forestry but abandonment 

 of land valuable only for forestry, with destruction of the forest growth in either 

 case, by purpose or negligence, because it means added cost of holding with no 

 possibility of profit. Since the owner cannot be compelled to grow timber to be 

 taxed at his net loss, no timber tax at all will be received by the community and 

 its annual land tax will be confined to land worth holding without timber for 

 purposes other than timber growing. Under the proposed system, the latter 

 class would pay the same annual tax, the annual tax revenue from, strictly forest 

 land would be greater, and in addition to both would be the small yield tax upon 

 the crop. 



