THE  SINGLE  TAX

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Question  is  under  all  these.  Where  it  leaves  off,  these
begin.  A  single  taxer  may  be  any  of  these.  All  these
should  be  single  taxers.
The  Argument
The  argument  in  the  case  may  be  put  briefly  as
follows;
The  three  economic  legs  necessary  and  sufficient
whereupon  the  single  tax  stool  may  firmly  stand  are
found  in  three  generic  peculiarities  quite  exceptional  in
their  nature,  which  distinguish  land  from  houses  or
other  man-made  products.  The  failure  to  recognise
this  distinction  is,  we  believe,  sufficient  to  account  for
the  crookedness  of  present  systems  of  taxation.  Such
a  recognition  must  lie  at  the  very  foundation  of  any
just  system  of  the  future.
These  three  attributes,  firmly  grounded  in  orthodox
economics,  are,  in  economic  language,  as  follows:
a  The  site  value  of  land  is  a  social  product.
b  A  land  tax  cannot  be  “shifted.”
c  The  selling  value  of  land  is  an  untaxed  value.
These  three  fundamentals  are  worthy  of  brief
separate  consideration.
a  First  in  order  is  the  fact  that  land  value  is  a
social  product,  i.  e.,  it  is  created  principally  by  the
community  through  its  activities,  industries,  and
expenditures.  The  value  of  land  is  based  primarily
upon  economic  rent,  defined  as  “what  land  is  worth
for  use,”  what  it  would  command  in  the  open  market.
Strictly  speaking  this  “worth  for  use”  usually
attaches  not  to  the  land  itself,  not  to  the  earth’s  surface,
not  to  the  inherent  capabilities  of  the  soil,  not  to  light
and  air  or  other  bounties  of  nature  resident  in  the  land,