26 
THE A B C OF TAXATION 
If eight hundred and fifty industrial combinations or 
trusts have a capital stock of nine billions, of which 
five billions are represented by common stock — and 
that common stock, water — it means that every i per 
cent (150,000,000) or every 5 per cent ($250,000,000) 
received in dividends on this common stock is, as an in 
come from rent, unearned by the people who receive it. 
An income from special privilege is usually part and 
parcel with an income from rent, and, as such, belongs 
to the class of unearned incomes. As ground rent 
is a social product, its private appropriation is a special 
privilege, which affords large private profit at public 
expense. Why not, then, at least tax such a privilege 
upon what it is worth? 
The gross income of the owners of the land of 
Boston in the form of ground rent is . . $55,000,000 
Or $90 per capita. 
And there is now taken in taxation only . . 10,300,000 
Hence the amount that is distributed annually 
in unearned incomes (if rent is an unearned 
income) is $44,700,000 
This amount is equivalent to $75 per capita for the 
600,000 population, or to $375 for each of the 120,000 
families of five persons each. 
Boston’s total taxes for the year 1907 amounted to 
$40 per capita. If all of this $40 had been taken from 
the above $90 there would still have been left to the 
landlords $500! ground rent per capita (equivalent to 
$250 for each of the 120,000 families), besides the 
exemption of $660,000,000 of buildings, personal 
property, and polls. 
Is it even apparently fair to let so much common 
wealth escape taxation at the expense of individual 
wealth?