The Gem worker and the Idaho labor herald. (Boise, Idaho) 1914-1917, 1916-06-29
TAX ON LAND VALUES
Necessity Of System Which VIII Give Access
Of Land to the Unemployed

| nc departure OF enough BILL
Joneses and Tom Smiths did the
trick for all. 1t created a condition
in the cities wherein there were more
jobs than men. 1t automatically es-
tablished a minimum wage. That
minimum-for all workers-was the
amount any average man could make
for himself on the hitherto unused
land ir orr national back yard.
Alexander Hamilton saw all this
and tried to head it off. He tried
to have a law passed whereby the
rational domain would not be sold
except in such large tracts that no
one but the rich could buy. For
tunately he didn't succeed. And be-
cause he didn't succeed, the wages of
American labor were fxed-so long
as free land was available-at what
! average ability could produce employ
ing itself in agriculture.
That free land is now all, or prac-
tically all gone. There is no further
outlet for surplus labor. 1t it were
not for labor unions and other similar
inuuences, wages would soon fall to
the European level. They would thus
fall because in this country there are
now more men than jobs.
Very well, you may say, but what
are we going to do about it? | can
give you my notion of what we ought
to do. | said a moment ago that
practically all of this free land is
gone. I didn't mean that. 1t hasn't
gone away. 1t is still here. But it
isn't free.
The most valuable part of it-that
which lies in the cities-is largely
owned by the Astors, the McCor-
micks, and others of their ilIk. Look
about in your town or city. You will
soon discover that a relatively small
number own all the land. Then
in country districts there are the
Scullys in Illinois and Nebraska that
own vast tracts. There are Miller
and Lux in California who own whole
counties. There are the Farwells in
Texas who received three million
acres for building state capitol.
Now most of this land is held out
of use for speculative purposes. More
than half of the land in every town
and city is so held. 1t is the same
way in the country. Although the
land is not used, you can not get it.
AT least you can not get it on terms
you can accept. The landlords. other
wise called groundhogs, are too wise
to permit anything of the kind
They want to live without work.
They want to get big rentals for the
land they permit to be used, and then
to live on the income When they
have occasion to employ labor, they
want it to be cheap. 1t is beauti-
full scheme. And it works. When you
look at your pay envelope, you know
it works.
Now, let'sbeat them at their own
game. Let's get busy in politics and
work for a reformation in our tax
laws. We have a rule by which to
proceed. A tax discourages the thing
taxed. Let us then tax everything
we don't want, and untax everything
we do want That's simple, isn't it?
Now first of all, we don't want land
held out of use for speculative pur-
poses. That hurts all of us The
workers have to pay the drones for
every speculative advance in land
values. So let's tax land speculation.
But how1 Simply by placing a big
tax on the value of land-not the
acreage, but the value, mind you're
gardless of whether or not the land
is used.
Then the man who uses his land
will not be hurt. But the man who
only partially uses it will be soaked.
And he's the man we're after.
The beautiful thing about it is that
when land values are taxed the land
lord can not add the tax to his rent
The law of competition prevents that
Roughly speaking, the rent of any
site is its desirability measured by
the competition of those who want it
Now if by taxation we soaked land
spectators so hard that they could
no longer hold their land out of use
they would have to bring It into use
or let some one have it who would
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