Land Tax v. Poverty.

Thames Star, Volume XIX, Issue 5824, 29 September 1887, Page 2

Land Tax v. Poverty.

Mr Henry George was a iked bow his proposed land tax would increase the demand for labor and diminish the supply _ to such an extent that it would abolish poverty. He replied that the reasons were fully shown in hii " Progress •ndPoverty," and proceeded as follows: " In brief, however, the reason is that when more work is required than there are men todo.it, wages rise to the point of earnings, and when every one can find work for which he gets.the value of his pro* i duce, there can be no involuntary poverty. One laborer too many in a community will bring the wages of that community down to the minimum. There would be one man out of work.' If it were the same man all the time, he-would starve and thus solve the problem; but as he would not want the problem solved in that way, he would underbid some one, who would un« derbid some one else, and he some one else, and so on until to bid lower would be impossible. But one laborer short in the same community would raise its wages to the earning point. One employer would always want another man, and the bidding for this man would go around and around the circle of employers until every man got' all he earned. After that point was reached some employer would work for wages rather than pay higher wages to others and thus balance supply and demand respecting workmen. Of course thisillus* tration supposes a community in which production neither increases nor diminishes ; in whiob there are neither births nor deaths, and where there is neither immigration nor emigration. It illustrates a principle, and nothing more; To apply that principle to the United States : There 'are 2,000,000 people seeking for opportunities to work, are not the same .people all the time; if they were they would speedily die off. But they and those with whom they change places continually bid against all who are employed, and thus press wages down. If vacant land were free, as it would be under a land value tax, there would be an outlet which neither births nor immigra* tion could choke. The unemployed need not go upon this land to produce this result. That would be produced by the putting of the best land to more prodoe* tive uses, which would create a demand for labor; by the withdrawal of men with small capital from the ranks of the unemployed into the ranks of employers, which would at once diminish the supply of sad increase, the demand for employes; and by the voluntary retirement of men with little or no capital, but with skill and energy, from the ranks of the employed to the ranks of independent laborers. Thus, no matter how great the increase of population, there would always be " one man short" in the labor market; for the land of this couutry is for all practical purposes, in an economic sense, boundless. And meantime with the increase of population, while there would be great areas of desirable land to be had for nothing, the more desirable land would increase in value, thus yielding to the community at large a steadily increasing revenue, which would equalize differ* ences in natural opportunities and enable the community to do practically without taxation all those things that require great capital and are in the nature of monopolies, such as building bridges and heigh ways, draining marshes, maintaining forests and so on.