Property tax is an emerging issue. There are movement to end property taxes or limit them across the US.
There is some opposite momentum toward the land value tax, which is a good thing, but these are less visible and likely weaker than a tax revolt by landowners.
Eventually, if the current trend continue for property taxes, we will see a disruption in government funding for basic service, and the contraction of the economy through increased taxation of economic activity to compensate for lost revenue from property taxes. It will be a disaster.
This is the endgame of the expansion of land ownership in the post WW2 era. Exemption from property taxes worsen this crisis.
> There is some opposite momentum toward the land value tax, which is a good thing, but these are less visible and likely weaker than a tax revolt by landowners.
You're breaking my heart here. A land value tax is embraced by anti-tax advocates like Milton Friedman as the "least bad tax" as well as by actual Marxists. However, it does seem like in the current moment a land-owner tax revolt is the likeliest end game.
And if there is a big push towards eliminating property tax, those states will rush towards California-like real estate disasters.
I just wish that all the people who had a hard time purchasing a home or paying rent would act on their own self-interest in reducing the share of our economy that flows to the rentierism of the land owner. Rentierism is bad in all economies, yet we have enabled an overclass to exploit young people and the poor. We live in an asset economy, where there's a big class divide between those who must work to survive, and those who own real estate (especially if it's their own home) and those who own financial assets like stocks. Making capitalism work better requires more class mobility and less inequality than we currently have.
Taxes going up for shittier and shittier return is unfortunately something we are seeing across the US. Regardless of ideological viewpoint, the relative advantages of just buying the services you need on your own rather than playing into a broken system will appeal to larger and larger subsets. I was in the majority "subset" until I was tired of being squeezed dry by a system that always squandered my tax money.
Maybe the government can be fixed, or even "must" be fixed for the sake of the poors that we always pretend we're thinking about (no doubt some are, but most are just using them as a prop for political persuasion), but in the meanwhile contingency plans must be made.
It'll get worse. The US has lived above its means for a while, and it would need a big tax increase to only maintain the current level of service, no fancy extras.
kiba|12 days ago
There is some opposite momentum toward the land value tax, which is a good thing, but these are less visible and likely weaker than a tax revolt by landowners.
Eventually, if the current trend continue for property taxes, we will see a disruption in government funding for basic service, and the contraction of the economy through increased taxation of economic activity to compensate for lost revenue from property taxes. It will be a disaster.
This is the endgame of the expansion of land ownership in the post WW2 era. Exemption from property taxes worsen this crisis.
epistasis|12 days ago
You're breaking my heart here. A land value tax is embraced by anti-tax advocates like Milton Friedman as the "least bad tax" as well as by actual Marxists. However, it does seem like in the current moment a land-owner tax revolt is the likeliest end game.
And if there is a big push towards eliminating property tax, those states will rush towards California-like real estate disasters.
I just wish that all the people who had a hard time purchasing a home or paying rent would act on their own self-interest in reducing the share of our economy that flows to the rentierism of the land owner. Rentierism is bad in all economies, yet we have enabled an overclass to exploit young people and the poor. We live in an asset economy, where there's a big class divide between those who must work to survive, and those who own real estate (especially if it's their own home) and those who own financial assets like stocks. Making capitalism work better requires more class mobility and less inequality than we currently have.
mothballed|12 days ago
Maybe the government can be fixed, or even "must" be fixed for the sake of the poors that we always pretend we're thinking about (no doubt some are, but most are just using them as a prop for political persuasion), but in the meanwhile contingency plans must be made.
concinds|12 days ago