SOME QUESTIONS AXSWERED. 21 



timber now subject to assessment is meagre. " It is stated that much prop- 

 erty of this kind had escaped taxation, that the commission employed experts 

 and has " helped supervisors to learn the quantity and value of timber, " etc., 

 and that by this extra effort the assessment of the counties in which the larger 

 part of our denuded pinery lands are located has been increased by over 

 $5,000,000, and that since the tax rate in "these towns is not les.s than three 

 per cent. " Additional taxes to the value of over 1166,000 were obtained. 



TIMBER REGARDED AS CROPS. 



That this was squeezing the proverbial turnips for blood evidently did not 

 occur to these certaily ^vell meaifing and fair minded men. And yet it is 

 quite evident that under these conditions any man possessing a wood lot 

 or patch of forest is bound to cut it clean, to denude the land in order to avoid 

 serious loss. The standing timber on a piece of land is a crop and differs from 

 a crop of sugar beets chiefly in the fact that it stands many years instead of 

 only a few months. And yet it would be just as fair to assess farm land used 

 to raise sugar beets at the time the sugar beets are just about ready to har\'est 

 and assess crop and land together, as it is to assess the forest crop and land 

 together, as is actually done. In case of the farm, we assess the land and 

 perhaps high. Since it can raise a special crop we assess it on the assumption 

 of its being able to produce a valuable income. Why not assess it at some 

 value commensurate with the income it can produce if kept as a forest and in 

 that way make it possible and even desirable to the owner to keep it as wood- 

 land? Where the forest is stocked on good farm land, of course, there would 

 be no just reason for shirking. 



JUDGMENT REQUIRED ON TAXATION. 



But it must be assessed at its cash value, says the law. But the experi- 

 ence of our tax commission, of every assessor, has long demonstrated that 

 the three forms of value, the cost of replacing the property, the sale or mar- 

 ket value and the value as based on the earning capacity are forever mixing up 

 in these considerations. Generally the market or sale value has been taken as 

 the measure, but when applied to railway and kindred property this basis 

 fails. And it is to rigid adherence to this basis which makes farm assess- 

 ment so high. For it is well known that while the factory, store, or railway 

 line, is bought and sold on its earning capacity, the farm is normally bought 

 to build a home, and sentiment, often far more than cash net income, is the 

 deciding factor. And yet, would it not be well for the state to take a broad 

 view of the matter and demand that while the farm may have been bought 

 chiefly for the sentimental reasons of having a home, that in the assessment 

 the value based on sentiment shoidd be modified by a consideration of income, 

 and therebj" bring the assessment of this farm on the same basis as that of 

 other property? 



EARNING CAPACITY TO BE CONSIDERED. 



The same reasoning applies to the forest, except that sentiment is left out 

 and all that is asked is that the cash value of the forest should be considered 

 chiefly from the standpoint of its earning capacity when kept as a forest. To 

 be sure, many a piece of forest will be cut off, and the value, based on an earn- 

 ing capacity, will be changed suddenly into a simple market value of timber 

 land. But is the loss of a few dollars of taxes so serious that the state must 

 resort to a system which completely forbids one of the most essential industries 

 one of the principal forms of agriculture? Suppose the state should suddenly 



