Distributive Justice: The Right and Wrong of Our Present Distribution of WealthRyan, John A. (John Augustine)
PhilosophyChristian
Distributive Justice: The Right and Wrong of Our Present Distribution of Wealth
Ryan, John A. (John Augustine)
Economic history; Income distribution -- Moral and ethical aspects; Wealth -- Religious aspects
fair amount of confidence that the transfer of improvement and
personal property taxes to land would cause land taxes to be about
twice what they are at present.
To the second question, concerning the extent to which land values
would fall in consequence of the heavier taxes, the answer must be
somewhat less definite. The added land taxes would be about one-half
the present general property taxes, or $675,000,000. This is about one
per cent. the total land values of the country. One per cent. of land
values capitalised at five per cent. represents a depreciation of
twenty per cent. in the value of land; capitalised at four per cent.,
it represents a depreciation of twenty-five per cent. For example; if
land worth one hundred dollars an acre returns to its owner a net
income of five dollars annually, the appropriation of one dollar by a
new tax will leave a net revenue of only four dollars; capitalised at
the current rate of five per cent., this represents only eighty
dollars of land value, or a depreciation of twenty per cent. If the
land has the same value of one hundred dollars, and still yields only
four dollars revenue, a deduction of one dollar in new taxes will
leave only three dollars net; capitalised at the current rate of four
per cent., this represents only seventy-five dollars of land value, or
a depreciation of twenty-five per cent. Using the other method of
calculation, which estimated the present tax rate on the full value of
land at one per cent., we get exactly the same results; namely, the
new tax is one per cent., which is equivalent to a depreciation of
twenty per cent. or of twenty-five per cent., according as we assume
an interest rate of five per cent. or of four per cent. Suppose,
however, that the assessors do not undervalue land to the extent that
we have been assuming; suppose that the present rate of .0194 on
assessed valuation is equivalent to, not merely one per cent., but one
and one-half per cent. of the full value of land. In that hypothesis
the additional tax would likewise be one and one-half per cent., which
capitalised at five per cent, would represent a depreciation of thirty
per cent., and at four per cent. a depreciation of thirty-seven and
one-half per cent. Combining in one generalisation the various
suppositions made in this paragraph, we estimate the depreciation of
land values resulting from the proposed tax transfer as somewhere
between twenty and forty per cent.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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