Willmar tribune. [volume] (Willmar, Minn.) 1895-1931, 1922-01-04
FREY's ARTICLE
By Eugene Frey
Secretary, Farmers Federal Tax

League. Of America
Mr.. j. B. Bosch of Atwater, Mime
sofa, has told you, in the Nonpartisan
Leader of November %, why he is op-
posed to the Keller Land Value Tax
Bill. Some of the reasons he has Civ
en- seem plausible enough at first
glance; many of them however show
that he is not very well informed on
what he is talking about; while most
OF them are absolutely ridiculous
One Of Mr.. Bosch's objections to
the bill-and it appears to be big
one with him-is that a group of lib
eral minded business men are for it..
Funny why he should take this stand.
Might as we'll then, take stand in
favor of the bill because most of the
business men, especially the big ones,
such as the National Industrial Con-
ference Board and the U: S. Chamber
OF Commerce. are against it.!
Mr.. BOsch's argument that we "tax
the rainfall'' rather>than anything else,
however, leads one to suspect that he
IS not really sincere in what he says,
and that his purpose in writing the
article was more to confuse the read
ers Of the Non-partisan Leader on the
subject Of taxation than to enlighten
them.
That this was Mr.. Bosch's real OBJ
ject seems evident from his attempt
to show that the land value tax will
crush the farmer. To prove his point
he takes for example, the king" Of
agricultural states-Iowa. And here
is what he says:
1T is said that hardly any farmers
would be hit by the land value tax be-
cause of the $4,000 exemption. Let
us apply the tax to the state of Iowa,
an agricultural state According to
the federal census bureau there are in
Iowa 231,43e farms with an average
value of $31,292 exclusive of improve
ments. After deducting the $4,000 ex-
emptlon, an average of $21,292 on all
the farms would be subject to the one
per cent tax. The total from the state
would be $49,277 ,971" ..-
Fine. Let us now look at the figures
he has quoted us and just see what an
awful mess he has made of it.
In the first place the census report
which Mr. Bosch had in front of him
when ne wrote his article shows that
there are only 213,439 farms in Iowa
instead of 1,439. This is Mr.. Bosch: s
mistake and not the printers, because
otherwise he would have got as a re-
suit $45, 445,431 instead of $49,277,971
OF course this is only small error
really not worth mentioning, except to
snow how extremely careless he has
been in reaching his conclusion.;s =
A much greater error is this: he
says that the average value of the
Iowa farm is 1892, exclusive Of i'm
provements" -
This is not true. $31,292, as the cen
sus report plainly shows, EXCLUDES
only SOME improvements. namely. i'm
Dlements and machinery, buildings and
livestock, bat INCLUDES great
many OTHER Improvements, such as
fences, pens, wells, drains, thing, or
charos, vineyards, ground prepare
ton. growing crops and fertility of the
soll-the last of which alone frequent
ly constitutes half Of the value of the
whole farm. The bare land value
therefore is less by at least $4,000 OF
$4,000 than what MIR. Bosch says il
is-in other words, is not $31 1892, but
less, very much less, than 100000, pei
farm.
Now this land value, mind you've
II call it $4,000 to be safe-was the
value early in 1920 when the Census
figures which Mr.: Bosch quotes were
gathered. and when farm land values
as everybody knows were much higher
than they are today Mr.. Bosch him
self tells us in his article that "a mar
who bought land two years ago fol
5000 an acre, could not sell it today
\ for $780,"
We do not believe that farm values
have fallen as much, as all this, but
if they really have been cut in two
as our good friend tells us, the value
OF the bare land in Iowa today afte,
deducting all mprovements-get that!
after deducting ALL Improvement
cannot be more, On the average, thar
n $4,000 or $4,000 per farm. Since SO,
600 is exactly the amo unt Of pure LAND
value thattt the Keller bill ,exempts. Il
each farmer, it would seem then tina
& the government will get oft Of til tlle
Iowa farmers. not s49,277, 971 as Mr.
Z Bosch states, but nothing! sss
The fact is however, as al correct
analysis Of the Census report shows
that from 70 to IL nersscant ~ Tn