Title Owners Are Not Residents

Often, models that seem like solutions are just continuations of the status quo.  Here is an article discussing developer profit-sharing among "residents" ...

As Detroit is Revitalized ...

And my response to the author:

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Dear Ms. Peters,

I'm writing in response to your article about developers' profit-sharing in Detroit.  Since you seem interested in the topic of urban housing, I should inform you that the model you described is at its core simply a Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT), an entity whose private shareholders own equity in a bundle of land titles.  This model is very much the status quo and represents the fundamental error in our economic system as a whole.

At the end, you mention how the model "could be adapted" to include other residents.  First, it should be noted that a parcel's title owner should never be assumed to be a resident at all -- an assumption your article seems to hold; a community's residents are simply its residents.  Second, I applaud you because by saying it could be adapted to include all residents, you have touched upon the beginnings of economic justice and the concept of equal land rights.

Please keep researching and writing about this issue, and I highly recommend you try to understand the concept of "geoism," a.k.a. "georgism" (which is anti-monopolism, and as a result anti-feudalism) and the following related concepts:

• Citizens' Dividend.  The equal distribution of land rent.  The literal economic implementation of equal land rights.  First requires the public collection of land rent.  Possible methods include the following.
• Location Value Covenants (LVC's). Ideally, these would be implemented alongside 100% income tax exemptions for the owners and occupants of LVC sites.  Best large-scale option, in my opinion.
• Land Value Taxation (LVT).

Community Land Trusts (CLT's) also represent a potential path toward land rights on a smaller scale, although they must be set up the right way.

For practical purposes, "land" most relevantly means "real estate location."  FYI.  Whenever we discuss "housing" affordability, it is actually land affordability and land rights that are at the core of the issue.

Thank you for your time,
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A Letter to the Government of Ontario

To Ontario's Public Servants,

It has come to my attention that you want to provide your citizens affordable housing and are entertaining the idea of a basic income. I have good news: a basic income can make "housing" (land) affordable if it is funded the right way.

It is in Ontario's best interest to implement a basic income and fund it with the market rental value of land titles ("land rent"). To occupy land (that is, to exist) is an equal human right, and Ontario is currently on par with the rest of the world in failing to grant that right equally to its citizens, creating poverty and unemployment, artificially reducing wages and destroying its economy. You can choose the path of continued economic failure, like the rest of the world -- a situation that any other funding mechanism for a basic income will NOT fix in the long run -- or you can serve as a shining example to the rest of the world, making it impossible for anyone to compete with you unless they adopt your model, known as geoism.

The few times this model has been attempted -- making land rent common property, or public property in place of taxation -- it has worked economic wonders exactly to the extent it has been attempted; think of the post-WWII "Asian Tiger" economies, for example.

The quickest top-down way to achieve this is through land value "taxation" (LVT), but this is politically almost impossible because of vested interests and a general lack of education. You may want to consider slower, more politically feasible approaches like location value covenants (link below) or the establishment of community land trusts (CLT's) that operate on geoist principles, which not all do.

http://www.sfrgroup.org/Home/location-value-covenants

However you decide to collect land rent, it should be either (1) distributed as a Citizens' Dividend, or (2) used for the public purse in place of income, payroll and sales taxes. I hope you'll do the right thing.

Regards,
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A Dirge for LaVoy Finicum

A Dirge for LaVoy Finicum

A working man took some marginal land;
People shrieked, their fury aglow,
Then paid rent to an idle rich man with a title
Who took better land longer ago.



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=itO7OoKtNUc