THE  A  B  C  OF  TAXATION

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taxation  an  additional  2  per  cent  (55)  of  its
gross  ground  rent  each  year  for  ten  years,  amounting
in  that  period  to  a  total  of  20  per  cent,  coupled  with  a
corresponding  reduction  in  the  tax  upon  buildings  and
personal  property,  that  city  would  be  raising  to-day
from  its  land  more  revenue  than  now  by
Twenty  per  cent  of  $55,000,000  (p.  18)  or  .  .  $11,000,000
The  increase  in  the  gross  ground  rent  in  the
same  ten  years  has  been  ....  $20,000,000
So  that  Boston  would  be  taking  in  increased  taxation
to-day  little  more  than  one-half  of  its  “unearned  increment” ­
  for  the  same  period.
Under  this  supposition  the  $468,000,000  valuation
of  ten  years  ago  would  still  remain  untouched  by
taxation,  as  is  now  the  case  with  substantially  the  whole
$653,000,000  valuation  of  1907.
The  foregoing  Boston  figures  are  submitted  simply
for  purposes  of  illustration,  not  in  any  way  as  support
of  a  specific  recommendation.
Important  Conclusion
If  the  preceding  argument  is  valid,  it  establishes  the
fact  of  gross  inequality  in  the  incidence  of  taxation  as
between  land  values  and  improvement  values.  If
it  is  admittedly  wrong  that  present  land  values  should
be  untaxed,  how  can  such  fiscal  wrong  best  be  righted?
Begin  at  once  a  transfer  of  taxes  from  improvements  to
land,  so  gradual  that  two  old  injustices  will  cease  for
every  new  one  that  is  begun,  until  this  untaxed  value
is  made  to  bear  at  least  its  proportionate  burden  at  the
same  rate  with  other  things.
In  conclusion  I  wish  to  emphasise  this  basic  fact: