Georgism
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- "Georgist" redirects here. For the Romanian political group, see National Liberal Party-Brătianu.
Georgism, named after Henry George (1839-1897), is a philosophy and economic ideology that follows from the belief that everyone owns what they create, but everything supplied by nature, most importantly land, belongs equally to all humanity.
Georgists argue that all of the economic rent (ie, unearned income) collected from land, broadcast spectrum, mineral extraction, tradable emission permits, fishing quotas, airway corridor use, seignorage, space orbits, etc. and extraordinary returns from "natural monopolies" should go to the community rather than the owner and that no other taxes or burdensome economic regulations should be levied. In practice that implies a high land value tax (LVT), although no change in land rental prices (other than those caused by reduction of other taxes and regulations) for reasons first explained by Adam Smith.
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[edit] Synonyms and variants
Most early advocacy groups described themselves as Single Taxers, and George endorsed this as being an accurate description of the movement's main political goal - the replacement of all taxes with a LVT. In the modern era, there are groups inspired by Henry George with more of an emphasis on environmentalism or monetary economics.
In today's more economically complex world, a quick and total change to LVT is very difficult to sell politically, so the term "Georgist" has come into vogue, being a more general term which encompasses even incremental changes towards the ideal of replacing unjust and economically destructive taxes on economic activity by recovery of the economic rent of land for the purposes and benefit of the public that creates land value.
Some Georgists are not entirely satisfied with the label. Henry George is now little known and the principle predates him. Some use the term "Geoism", with the meaning of "Geo" deliberately ambiguous. "Earth Sharing", "Geoism", "Geonomics" and "Geolibertarianism" (see libertarianism) are also preferred by some Georgists, "Geoanarchism" is another one. These terms reflect a difference of emphasis, and sometimes real differences about how land rent should be spent (citizen's dividend or just replacing other taxes); but all agree that land rent should be recovered from its private recipients.
[edit] Predecessors
Those who expressed similar thoughts before Henry George include: Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, John Locke, John Stuart Mill, William Ogilvie of Pittensear, Thomas Paine (notably in "Agrarian Justice", 1795), William Penn, Adam Smith, Patrick Edward Dove, Herbert Spencer and Jacques Turgot. Some anarchists have been near to Georgism on some points. Also, historical fiction novels typically portray the Native Americans as believing a similar philosophy.
George's ideas were also predated by traditional land taxes levied at various times in Japan, China, India, Egypt and other countries, such taxes often being accompanied by marked prosperity.
[edit] Famous Georgists
Winston Churchill, Clarence Darrow, David Lloyd George, George Grey, Walter Burley Griffin, Tom L. Johnson, Albert Jay Nock, Sun Yat Sen, Leo Tolstoy, Mark Twain, Herbert Simon, Francis Neilson, William F. Buckley, Jr., and William Morris Hughes.
In the 2004 Presidential campaign, Ralph Nader mentioned Henry George in his platform.[1]
[edit] Single-tax communities
- Arden, Delaware, founded 1900 by Frank Stephens and Will Price.
- Fairhope, Alabama, founded 1894 by Fairhope Single Tax Corporation
[edit] See also
- Tragedy of the anticommons
- Mutualism
- Geolibertarianism
- Democratic Freedom Caucus
- Excess burden of taxation
- Anthropocentrism
