[seiji]

NGDP level targeting says during economic downturns, the government should fill the gap between the downturn and the previous economic output level (creating jobs, buying things, paying people to do things, etc). Basically, don't let an economic downturn interrupt people's lives—always give them something to do and opportunities to grow.

land value tax comes from the idea nobody should be able to "own" land, you should rent land. When there's a more profitable use for your land than you are current exploiting, you must give the land up. The UK enjoys things like 99 year leases on land instead of in the US where you "buy" land and own it until the heat death of the universe.

negative wage taxes is like basic income if you make the "negative wage limit" really high. The government pays you because you don't make enough (maybe for reasons outside your control, like all jobs you are qualified for are now done by robots).

Singapore has free computerized centralized healthcare that doesn't cost a million dollars a person-year like in the US.

Estonia lets you get something resembling a "mini passport" with no international recognition (perhaps some cross-EU identity recognition, but no residency benefits), but with legal ties to an Estonian "e-residency" so you can verify your identity online electronically (chipped smart cards verified by government records, etc).

[Eliezer]

> NGDP level targeting says during economic downturns, the government should fill the gap

NO. It says the central bank should fill the gap, and that there's absolutely no point in the government's fiscal policy trying to fill the gap when it can be filled by creating enough money to keep NGDP on a level path.

[greenrd]

For my (slightly outdated) sceptical take on this idea, see http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Market_monetarism

[LesZedCB]

> land value tax comes from the idea nobody should be able to "own" land, you should rent land. When there's a more profitable use for your land than you are current exploiting, you must give the land up. The UK enjoys things like 99 year leases on land instead of in the US where you "buy" land and own it until the heat death of the universe.

That sounds like the scariest solution to the problem of land ownership. There are plenty of cases where the government decides that somebody must give their land up to expropriate more value from it with Eminient Domain laws. Who gets to decide when land is not extracting enough value? Politicians who are bought out by private corporations controlled by a board of directors, none of whom live anywhere near the land being expropriated? Land should be collectively owned by the people living on it and producing from it.

[seiji]

It would fix a lot of things like e.g. San Francisco. Imagine if all those two story, single family homes were taxed at their land value (40 story condos! condos everywhere!) where 3,000 people could live in the space currently occupied by 2 to 6 people.

Living in a place shouldn't grant you the right to obstruct progress forever just because you got there first. In the same vein, just because you got somewhere first also shouldn't mean you get unlimited profit potential just because... you got there first.

[jjaredsimpson]

If you own land, you would owe land value tax, regardless of what you have done to the land. If you just hold the land and do nothing you still owe tax. No one forces you to sell the land.

This:

>When there's a more profitable use for your land than you are current exploiting, you must give the land up

is not accurate.

> Land should be collectively owned by the people living on it and producing from it.

Why should this be the case?

[jsprogrammer]

Land value tax sounds like a proposal to return directly to feudalism.

"Using land the most profitably" (ie. extracting the most tribute) will become de facto ownership for the controlling entity through tribute, while everyone else will be tenants of the few controllers.