Some Recent Academic Criticisms of Land Value Taxation: Are They Intellectually Respectable?
A YOUNG ECONOMIST FRIEND who had become interested in Henry George and the proposal to appropriate the rent of land by taxation, once told me that when, as a graduate student, he had commented on the matter to one of his teachers, he received a friendly warning. He was informed that the land-value tax idea was not generally favored by economists and the suggestion was made to him that, as a young economist, he would do better not to give it too hasty support. Another professional economist, of somewhat greater years and experience, and joint author of a book in which a high land-value tax was favored, confided to me that, on that account, he had taken considerable "razzing" from colleagues. But the question can certainly be raised-and I think it is high time for it to be raised among professional economistswhether it is really the advocates of a land-rent-taxation system who are properly to be considered beyond the pale of intellectual respectability. An unbiased scrutiny of the evidence may indicate that this distinction should be reserved rather for various professors of economics who argue sophistically against such a system. Some of the evidence on this matter I have presented in my book on "The Economic Basis of Tax Reform,"' where what may fittingly be called the malapropisms of these professors are analyzed. Conservative economists who respect unduly the views and arguments of these professors are invited to examine this evidence.