The Georgists

[Pat McCotter]

Do these folks really NEED to move here?

According to Hankster, everybody NEEDS to live SOMEWHERE so everyone has the RIGHT to live ANYWHERE.

[Lex]

Not me! I want to decrease all taxes!

Sorry, my mistake. I was thinking of Hankster! 

[Pat McCotter]

I'm hearing it, Pat.? Just worrying about it, that's all. ???

Richard Feynman is able to make physics understandable to the average person. Georgists cannot talk so people understand - or maybe they do and that is the problem. We are trying to understand them from a "private property, leave me alone" frame of mind and they want to keep us from enjoying the fruits of our labor by private individuals charging us taxes for the property we are sitting on.

Hankster?
FIND YOUR OWN PROPERTY AND LEAVE MINE ALONE!!!!

[BillG]

I'm hearing it, Pat.? Just worrying about it, that's all. ???

Richard Feynman is able to make physics understandable to the average person. Georgists cannot talk so people understand - or maybe they do and that is the problem. We are trying to understand them from a "private property, leave me alone" frame of mind and they want to keep us from enjoying the fruits of our labor by private individuals charging us taxes for the property we are sitting on.

Hankster?
FIND YOUR OWN PROPERTY AND LEAVE MINE ALONE!!!!

libertarians get this wrong over and over...

property rights are based on LABOR because they are the LOGICAL extension of the ABSOLUTE right of self-ownership.

land - not being the product of the fruit of anyone's labor - is based on PRIVILEGE* and therefore subordinate to the ABSOLUTE right of self-ownership.

definition:
PRIVI - private
LEGES - laws

one is born with a right as it does not need to be purchased or gifted.

beyond a certain point the ABSOLUTE right of self-ownership comes into conflict with the PRIVILEGE of enforcing the title for exclusive use of a specific location as two people can not occupy the same spot at the same time and locations differ in quality.

the point beyond which the INFRINGEMENT of the ABSOLUTE right of self-ownership was defined by classical liberals as John Locke's Proviso...it  was his CONDITION for when exclusive use of a specific location is UNJUST as it places a legal and monetary OBLIGATION that can only be satisfied by sacrificing the FRUITS of one's labor (expressed as wages) of all those being excluded by the enforcement of a title.

since economic rent attaches to all locations today (the point at which Locke's Proviso kicks in) as they are all legally occupied and therefore scarce, there is no debate about whether or not to HAVE a "land tax" which is the collection of economic rent...the ONLY question we have to answer is - WHO is going to PAY and therefore who is going to COLLECT the economic rent?

if those being excluded pay and the landowner collects, it can only come at the expense of the ABSOLUTE LABOR-based property rights to the fruits of one's labor...in other words their self-ownership.

whereas the same can not be said if the landowner pay and the excluded collect...

1. the landowner does NOT physically produce the land itself via labor
2. the unimproved land values expressed as economic rent are the result of the landowner's neighbors' labor improving their land not the landowner.
3. in a pure economic rent sharing (owned in common) scheme there would be no upfront purchase price of land as this is just uncollected economic rent capitalized at the time of purchase.

[Dreepa]

I'm hearing it, Pat.? Just worrying about it, that's all. ???

Richard Feynman is able to make physics understandable to the average person. Georgists cannot talk so people understand - or maybe they do and that is the problem. We are trying to understand them from a "private property, leave me alone" frame of mind and they want to keep us from enjoying the fruits of our labor by private individuals charging us taxes for the property we are sitting on.

Hankster?
FIND YOUR OWN PROPERTY AND LEAVE MINE ALONE!!!!

EXACTLY!

[Lex]

not being the product of the fruit of anyone's labor

Absolutely it is. If you sit outside on your porch with a shot gun and put a sign up "Will Shoot Trespassers" at the front of your property you are basically laboring to protect the land and thus the complete ownership of the land becames the fruit of your labor.

Your theory is utterly flawed because you cannot give people the right to own their property and at the same time demand that they pay taxes unless you do nothing if they don't pay taxes at which point why even bother to require them to pay the tax? If you go after the people who pay taxes than you are contradicting your own belief that people own their land.

It's like giving a child a present for christmas and telling them it's theirs and they can do anything they want with it and then adding that if they get bad grades in school the toy will be taken away. At that point the toy is not really theirs since there is a lien on it dependent on getting good grades.

[BillG]

If you sit outside on your porch with a shot gun and put a sign up "Will Shoot Trespassers" at the front of your property you are basically laboring to protect the land and thus the complete ownership of the land becames the fruit of your labor.

and if you don't?

you cannot give people the right to own their property and at the same time demand that they pay taxes

as I have said ownership is a bundle of rights (use, possession, exclusion, transferability, economic rent) any of which can be alienated.

the very act of exclusion creates a legal and monetary obligation (economic rent) on those being excluded beyond Locke's Proviso.

therefore there are only two parties that the "taxes" can be demanded from...

if the excluded pay it can only come out of their wages violating their absolute labor-based property rights.
if the landowner pays then we have created a system that affords the greatest amount of equal liberty for the greatest number of people.

At that point the toy is not really theirs since there is a lien on it dependent on getting good grades.

wrong analogy...first of all I didn't say they could do anything that want with it but rather there was a condition (Locke's Proviso).

you can labor on your land and the fruits of your labor are 100% yours to keep as labor-based private property.

the lien is dependent on them not using the toy to harm another children's ABSOLUTE right to the use of their toys.

[Lex]

If you sit outside on your porch with a shot gun and put a sign up "Will Shoot Trespassers" at the front of your property you are basically laboring to protect the land and thus the complete ownership of the land becames the fruit of your labor.

and if you don't?

Someone will come on your property, build a house, start farming the land and eventually sit on their porch with a shot gun and shoot you for trespassing on their property.

you cannot give people the right to own their property and at the same time demand that they pay taxes

as I have said ownership is a bundle of rights (use, possession, exclusion, transferability, economic rent) any of which can be alienated.

the very act of exclusion creates a legal and monetary obligation (economic rent) on those being excluded beyond Locke's Proviso.

What makes you think I have an obligation to anyone? I'm not obligated to anyone for anything unless I have signed a contract with that person or I choose to cooperate voluntarily.

you can labor on your land and the fruits of your labor are 100% yours to keep as labor-based private property.

the lien is dependent on them not using the toy to harm another children's ABSOLUTE right to the use of their toys.

Basically your argument has the same premise as the socialist argument that everyone has a right to an education, food and shelter. You believe that everyone also has a right to land, correct? If that is what you believe than I don't think you will ever convince anyone on here of your beliefs. Might as well give up now.

[BillG]

Someone will come on your property, build a house, start farming the land and eventually sit on their porch with a shot gun and shoot you for trespassing on their property.

as I have said elsewhere - there are no documented case of human civilization that did not use force to establish dominion over a territory.

What makes you think I have an obligation to anyone?

where exactly can you go today that you can stand for free (that is not gifted to you) to claim your ABSOLUTE right of self-ownership?

your argument has the same premise as the socialist argument that everyone has a right to an education, food and shelter

strawman - all of those goods are the product of human labor.

You believe that everyone also has a right to land, correct?

no - everyone has an ABSOLUTE right to self-ownership and by logical extension the fruits of their labor.

if you were actually interested in the truth, the simply application of further logic would only lead you to the conclusion that there is no way to have an absolute right of self-ownership without making the ownership rights of the return on land (economic rent) conditional as Locke did.

but I understand why someone who has made an emotional decision for what they BELIEVE is a logical reason can't be logically convinced they are wrong.

because to admit what they have been shown to be logically true would threaten the very paradigm they emotionally believe in which would cause a great amount of fear and anxiety.

I understand perfectly well - definitely not for the faint of heart.

no sweat though I appreciate the encounter...

[Lex]

no - everyone has an ABSOLUTE right to self-ownership and by logical extension the fruits of their labor.

if you were actually interested in the truth, the simply application of further logic would only lead you to the conclusion that there is no way to have an absolute right of self-ownership without making the ownership rights of the return on land (economic rent) conditional as Locke did.

but I understand why someone who has made an emotional decision for what they BELIEVE is a logical reason can't be logically convinced they are wrong.

because to admit what they have been shown to be logically true would threaten the very paradigm they emotionally believe in which would cause a great amount of fear and anxiety.

I understand perfectly well - definitely not for the faint of heart.

no sweat though I appreciate the encounter...

Your argument is logical only when you ignore reality and human nature to be territorial. Our society is after all a glamorized version of survival of the fittest. No matter how much you will try to make the world a fair place it will never work out that way (you should watch Serenity, they tried to make a utopia and ended up killing everyone). You may say that I am "emotional" towards my thoughts about land but I have felt this since I was a little boy and I consider it to be a natural human desire to utilize and protect that land which you made your home.

You can come up with all sorts of logically coherent systems on land and rights and governments but if you ignore reality and human behavior you are doomed to fail.

[BillG]

Our society is after all a glamorized version of survival of the fittest

yes and what is suppose to set us apart from the beasts is reason which I attempted to appeal to and as I said I understand why you would be fearful as politicians manipulate fear inorder to get us to act towards base instincts.

No matter how much you will try to make the world a fair place it will never work out that way

for those who are driven by fear and not reason which they use to then justify their unjust actions.

the right of self-ownership is the fundamental principle of classical liberalism and by logical extension the right to labor-based property.

law-based property are privileges (private laws) that are conditional on absolute rights.
they are conditional because in the state granting privileges costs are ALWAYS shifted from the entitled to society of which is made up of individual with absolute rights but the stated purpose is because it serves the greater common good.

The classical liberal philosopher Locke identified both the definition of labor-based property (mixing one's labor) and the condition at which absolute labor-based property rights are threatened by conditional law-based property privileges when costs are shifted onto society (enough and as good left for others).

Later classical liberals - the laissez-faire, French Physiocrats understood how to equitably resolve the situation to create a society based on the greatest amount of equal liberty for the greatest number of people in proposing "l'impot unique" or single tax on the social surplus (economic rent).

I would kindly suggest some further reading and contemplation on your part before suggesting that I am ignoring reality and human behavior.

http://members.aol.com/_ht_a/tma68/geolib.htm

[Lex]

http://members.aol.com/_ht_a/tma68/geolib.htm

Thank you for the link, I have read it careful and it does a much better job of explaining geolibertarianism. Having read it and several opposing views I am now pretty confident that I do not agree with the Georgist point of view. Thanks for playing.

For anyone still undecided:
http://blog.mises.org/blog/archives/001610.asp
http://www.mises.org/rothbard/georgism.pdf
http://forum.freestateproject.org/index.php?board=46;action=display;threadid=5808&start=0

[Michael Fisher]

Oh no. Mike. You've just got sucked into the BillG sinkhole universe.

Come back to us.

I'm just giving Hankster the time of day because of Ron Helwig.  Ron has never tried to force his geo-libertarian views on us like other geo-libs have done for YEARS on the FSP forums, and I think Ron's respectful attitude deserves some recognition and thus consideration of his views.

If Hankster starts rampantly hijacking threads like some claim he has done on the FSP forum, then I'll go back to my original position of ignoring him and asking him to leave.

In the meantime, I'm having a very difficult time translating Hankster's posts into English.     Ron, however, writes like a normal human being. 

[BillG]

In the meantime, I'm having a very difficult time translating Hankster's posts into English.   Ron, however, writes like a normal human being.

that's good because Ron and I agree on the basic philosophy and he appears to be one that follows reason to it's logical conclusion unlike alot of othes within the FSP.

my sole goal within the FSP was to show that a broader understanding of the conditional privilege of law-based property in land being subordinate to the absolute rights of labor-based property would allow the 20K goal to be easily met.

[Ron Helwig]

I guess a few things I'd like people to think about are:

* Does property become non-property just because you don't defend it 24/7? (do you really need to sit on your porch with a shotgun to defend your ownership of some land?)

* What gave you the right to claim that particular piece of land you claim to own? (I mean how did the original owner of a piece get it. You probably bought it legitimately from a previous owner. How do you justify the first owner's claim?)

I don't believe that something becomes non-property just because you don't actively defend it.

I also don't believe that if something is genuinely non-property, that the first person to come along and make a claim has any legitimacy. (How do you prove that you were the first? How do you prove that no one else made a prior claim (prove a negative)?)

I know some pure anarchists would argue against this, but from a minarchist point of view, one of the major purposes of government is to allow you to NOT spend all your time defending your property.