of governmental costs, such adjustments are slow 
and difficult. Lags in adjustment have resulted 
in some high levies on real property. 
Among other unfortunate effects, high taxes have 
tended to discourage private-forest management 
for continuous production. Annual taxes on cut- 
over land, which will not yield merchantable 
forest products in less than 50 to 100 years, make 
private ownership of this kind of land unattrac- 
tive. The increase in tax burden when young 
second growth becomes merchantable and _ is 
recognized in the assessment tends to encourage 
premature cutting. Taxation, among other factors, 
hastens the liquidation of the remaining mature 
forests. 
It may be said that present levies, which a recent 
constitutional amendment limits to 15 mills for 
current expenses, are not generally very burden- 
some. However, this limit may be exceeded by 
levies for servicing debts contracted before Dec. 8, 
1932, and for current expenses by vote of the town- 
ship concerned. Accordingly, 7 out of the 150 
townships in the Upper Peninsula in 1938 still had 
rates of over 30 mills for current expenses, and 9 
had rates of over 30 mills for total expenses. These 
were mainly in the western part of the Peninsula, 
where the greater part of the taxes are paid by 
nonresident timber owners and mining companies. 
Michigan has a forest-tax law which provides, in 
lieu of the usual ad valorem tax, a specific tax of 5 
cents an acre on the land and a 10-percent yield 
tax on the value of the timber when cut. This is 
known as the Commercial Forest Reserve or Pearson 
Act. About 90,000 acres in the upper Peninsula 
had been classified up to April 1, 1938. The 1939 
Legislature changed the law to admit selectively 
logged lands and reduced penalties for withdrawal 
from listing. Previously any tract of mature forest 
growth was ineligible. 
Among the taxes other than on property and 
forest yield to which timber owners and operators 
are subject, inheritance and estate taxes may have 
some effect on the stability of forest ownership. 
Income, social security, and various business taxes 
involve few, if any, problems which are peculiar 
to forest operations. 
