48 
THE ABCOF TAXATION 
value of the land by the amount of the capitalised value of the 
tax. The future owner will, therefore, be able to buy it so much 
cheaper that he will realise as large a percentage on his invest 
ment as though the tax had never been levied.”—Thomas N. 
Carver, Tale Review, Nov. l8g6. 
A recent College and University text book* makes 
reference to the argument of this illustration, as re 
stated in Chapter XII., in the following comment; 
Many present-day followers of Henry George find in this 
principle of amortisation at once a justification and a method of 
securing for society all economic rent. Under present condi 
tions, they say, a man who buys land wholly escapes taxation 
upon it. Consequently, in order to make landowners pay as 
much as other people we should have to increase the tax upon 
land by a rate equal to that paid by the average tax payer as 
often— say every thirty years— as the land of the community 
changes holders. In this way the State could gradually and with 
justice absorb all economic rent. 
But this whole chain of reasoning is fallacious for three 
reasons: 
(a) This capitalisation takes place only to the extent 
that the tax on land is exclusive and unequal, and modern 
taxes upon land are not of this nature. 
(h) In so far as this programme of the single taxers were 
anticipated and understood, it would visit the whole burden 
of the “reform” upon present owners, instead of being dis 
tributed over several generations. Subsequent purchasers 
would discount these periodic increases of the tax and pay to 
owners for their land only the present value of the rapidly 
vanishing income from land. Land would be valued simply as 
a terminable annuity. 
♦ “Outlines of Economics,” Revised Edition, by Richard T. Ely. The 
Macmillan Company, 1908, pp. 621, 621.