Press Coverage of the CGO 2004 conference:
Health, Wealth and Land: Reclaiming our Common Heritage
Click here for KUNM radio interview
from New Mexico Business Weekly
Taxing the soil is linchpin issue for Georgists
by Megan Kamerick
NMBW Staff
Nineteenth century economist Henry George had a deceptively simple idea: Tax only land and abolish all other taxes.
The result?
An infinite era of prosperity and affordable housing.
Adherents of George's philosophy gathered in Albuquerque on July 23 and 24 for the annual convention of Georgist Organizations.
And while they might not necessarily advocate eliminating all those other taxes, they are actively working toward greater taxation of land values.
The sessions focused on urban design, funding infrastructure, housing and poverty.
New Mexico, conference speakers told attendees, could use a good dose of Georgism.
"The property tax system in New Mexico sends a message of waste," Josh Vincent, with the Center for the Study of Economics, an affiliate of the Henry George Foundation of America, told the group.
There is little impediment to continually expanding roads and water farther and farther from the city, he says.
Residential property values have been skyrocketing while commercial property values have been dropping.
"That's not how things work in the real world," he said.
New Mexico is 49th in the country at its level of property taxation, Vincent said, and the state's municipalities rely heavily on gross receipts taxes.
Land value taxation, which taxes land at a higher rate than improvements such as buildings, could work well for an area in redevelopment like East Downtown, he said, because it would encourage those holding underutilized land to do something with it.
New Mexico tax rates allocate one third to land and two thirds to improvements, said John Hooker, former mayor of Los Ranches and a candidate for the state senate, who
spoke on financing infrastructure.
Looking at land value taxation could be relevant as the city plans a new commuter rail system because it can increase land values.
"Does a developer capture all the value of new zoning and transit service funded by taxpayers?" he asked.
Cities such as Pittsburgh, Scranton, Pa. and Johannesburg, South Africa have implemented different versions of land value taxation, said Bill Batt, an attendee who sits on the board of The Center for the Study of Economics.
He said the group has done many studies for cities pondering changing taxing structures and Batt said it could do a similar one for Albuquerque.
One problem would be getting accurate assessments, he said. New Mexico did not have uniform disclosure of property sales until last year.
Health, Wealth and Land: Reclaiming our Common Heritage
Click here for KUNM radio interview
| from New Mexico Business Weekly
Taxing the soil is linchpin issue for Georgistsby Megan Kamerick
|