Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1892-06-02
SINGLE TAX DEPARTMENT.
The Michigan Labor Report.


To Michigan belongs the honor, and
to Henry A. Robinson, her commits
sioner of labor, the credit, of having
first statistically investigated the rela-
tons of labor to .the land. The ninth
annual report of the Michigan bureau
of labor, while a model in all the de-
partments that constitute the ordinary
reports of such bureaus, includes
totally new department, in which this
subject is illustrated with statistics.
Part " Of the report, entitled Land
Values'-the department in question
contains tables showing the value of
bare lands; the value of improvements;
the value of personal property; the as
sessed value of real estate in sixty-two
cities, including the value of bare land
in Detroit, the only city in which land
values could be automatically obtained;
the growth of the state in sections, and
its unoccupied territory; its growth OF
separate industries, and their compare
tive growth: the phenomenal growth of
real estate values by sections; and prof
its by separate industries, with their
influence upon concentration of wealth
and the corresponding decline in farm
industry. These tables are very vol
luminous, and to bring their data more
forcibly to the mind of the reader, the
bureau has with great care prepared
circular diagrams, in which the degrees
Of the circle are used in exact proper
ton with the figures of the tables.
The first of these diagrams shows
that the farming population is more
than half of the whole. From the sec
ond it appears that the tax assessments
of real and personal values among
farmers and in cities is each about one
third of the whole assessment, and in
villages about one-sixth, while the real
estate assessment of mines is only about
one-twelfth. In the next diagram these
assessment values are apportioned ac-
cording to area, the farming values APP
pearing to cover more than one-quarter
of the area, village values considerably
less than one-eighth and city values
only about one-sixtieth. Another dia-
gram shows that in 1890 the proportion
of farm profits to mine profits was about
as one to two, though the proportion of
mines to area was only about one
sixtieth, and the proportion of mine
owners to farming population less than
one-one hundred and twentieth. This
condition is compared in the next dia-
gram with the condition in 1880, when
the proportion of farm profits to mine
profits was more than two to one, while
the area of mines, and the proportion Of
mine owners to farmers, was about the
same as in 1890. The sixth diagram
shows that the proportion of farm
values to city real estate values is near
ly equal, farm values being a, little the
larger, and the two together somewhat
more that one-half of the whole. The
remaining values are about one-sixth of
the whole in villages, about one-sixth of
the whole in timber, and about one
twelfth in mines
The most important diagrams are two
showing how few people, in proportion
to the whole population, own all the
wealth, and how this condition comes
about From the first of these it ap-
pears that about one-fortieth of the
population own all the timber lands,
mineral lands, railroad lands. city
mortgages, manufacturers, railroad and
farm mortgages; and from the other,
that farm profits are considerably less
than an eighth, while city profits are
nearly quarter, mining profits about
quarter, timber profits almost half,
and village profits about the same as
farming.
The final diagram shows that of
Michigan's share of national taxation
the farms pay more than half and cities
about three-tenths, villages paying the
remainder; while under a system that
substituted real estate for the present
Of to-
What less than before farms very much
.ess-only little more than a quarter,
villages slightly more than before, and
mining and timber land their re-
mainder.
Referring to the tables and diagrams
the commissioner says: ut appears that
the preponderance of land values is in
cities and towns, mining and forest re-
gions; and that the agricultural popu-
lation is comparatively poor in respect
Of these values. A tax therefore, lev
led directly upon real estate, and espec-
tally that portion of it which consists
Of the land irrespective of improvement,
/. e., bare land values, would fall with
comparative lightness upon the agricul-
tural classes, and the burden of the
same would in the main be transferred
10 the classes who own the very valua-
BILE lands of cities, the great CONNER
:ial centers, and the owners of the
counties of nature in the form of valua-
ole forests and the rich mineral depos-
u.s.
In summarizing, the labor commits
sioner says that land and labor are the
source of all wealth. and that there
are those who assert, not without
reason, that to deprive labor of free ac-
cess to land is to deprive the laborer of
The opportunity to employ himself"
Those who assert this, he proceeds, go
so far as TO say that most, if not all,
of the inequalities in the distribution of
labor's products is due to the enormous
power that the owners of the natural
opportunities, or the gifts of nature, as
they term the land, have over laborers
by reason of their control over the very
sources of employment" He adds:
They say further that this equal right
may be effectually secured and made
practical by the substitution of the
principle of possessory titles in place of
the fee simple, and that under such a
system every man may have as much of
land as he can make the best use of, by
simply paying to society for the advan-
tages of superior location, tenure
which would divert to the public cof-
fers enormous sums, that under the
present system goes to the enrichment