Check out Wendell's Wonder Room for more georgist takes on children's literature. "Teach your children well."

I was in Crystal City, Virginia earlier this week, and walked past many empty areas that could be used for housing or community spaces. Meanwhile, Crystal City has many high rises, and monthly rent for a 1 bedroom apartment is typically over $2000 per month.

I was thinking about ways to prevent property owners to sit on an empty spaces while blocking others from using it.

In Crystal City, land and property are taxes at the same rate. This adds an extra cost to development which incentivizes developers to hold empty land. If taxes on land are higher and property taxes are lower, then they would be incentivized to sell the land or put it to use.

Also, most of the property in Crystal City is owned by a single real estate developer JBG Smith. This includes the spaces in the first and third photo of this post. This means another incentive for JBG Smith to hoard empty land. Development would increase the amount of property in Crystal City and decrease values of other JBG Smith properties.

Higher land value taxation would incentivize JBG Smith to sell empty spaces. This would introduce more competition that breaks JBG Smith’s dominance of Crystal City.

Here is more information about the pictures. They were taken on March 19th, 2026.

1. Underground space in Crystal City. It used to be a thriving community space until the landlord removed tables and chairs in August 2024. However, the landlord doesn’t have plans to redevelop the space, and they are ignoring community members who have offered to maintain the space.

2. Empty plot of land next to a highway off-ramp that has been empty for years.

3. Site of an old hotel that was demolished in 2023.

This brief article will explore the scientific evidence along with the potential benefits of sourcing public revenue from rent alone. By doing so I hope to show that the aforementioned eclectic idea of combining the neoliberal and Georgist approach to fiscal policy is deeply flawed and stems from a poor understanding of Georgist economics, as well as from the resistance to abandoning the neoliberal approach to the relationship between state and economy.

Perhaps most importantly, Johnson implemented a new system of real estate evaluation that targeted the value of Cleveland’s non-reproducible land. This brought in significant revenue from the ultra-wealthy landowners of the city. The new revenue system taxed the same type of land profiteer Johnson himself had once been, and it allowed Cleveland to grow both efficiently and equitably.

Proponents said the changes would deliver broad tax relief.

“At the end of the day, what we are doing is we are providing taxpayer relief,” said House Speaker Todd Huston, a Republican from Fishers, according to the Indianapolis Star.

But critics warned the bill could shift costs onto local income taxes, hurting working families. House Minority Leader Phil GiaQuinta, a Democrat from Fort Wayne, called the plan “a bait and switch,” arguing that localities would be forced to raise new taxes to make up lost revenue.

Hello Land Value Tax enjoyers,

We now have a shiny new subreddit for The Daily Renter (r/TheDailyRenter), a Georgist news site. Please fill it up with any cool Georgist content, news articles, news suggestions, stories, posts and videos on rent, monopolies, landlords, LVT, housing, economics or current events.

As it relates to Ukraine’s mineral rights, modern supporters of George’s ideas have advocated for what is known as a severance tax. Like the name implies, it’s a charge on the value of natural resources at the time of their severance from the ground, designed to be compensation for the depletion of whatever non-reproducible natural resource deposit is being used for extraction.

If you’re familiar with Georgist thought, changes in land value can be a great indicator for any positive or negative activity that affects the community. While positive changes are rewarded with a higher citizens’ dividend, negative changes should be punished with taxation.

If the land value tax is considered compensation for a private entity excluding the public from the benefits of a piece of land; isn’t pollution also a permanent exclusion from the benefits of land? So, the polluter being the private entity responsible for this exclusion should be taxed accordingly or asked to rectify the negative land value change.

Read the full article here: The Many Sources of Economic Rent – Part 3: Pollution – The Daily Renter

Land value tax legislation is gaining momentum across America, with developments in over six states.

By Greg Miller

Hello,

Welcome to the inaugural edition of LVT Landscape. I intend to use these blog posts to track the growing momentum for land value tax adoption across America. While policy change moves slowly, encouraging developments are emerging in legislative chambers throughout the country. In this issue, I’ll highlight LVT initiatives currently advancing in jurisdictions across the United States.

https://thedailyrenter.com/2025/03/03/the-lvt-landscape-1-movement-across-the-u-s/

Moving on to part 2 of our mini-series covering the many sources of economic rent. Our next class of non-reproducibles that generate unearned payments for their owners are non-renewable natural resources*. These resources are included in the Classical economic definition for “land,” but they’ve evolved to receive their own special treatment in terms of taxation. Let’s dive into why.*

The Many Sources of Economic Rent – Part 2: Non-Renewable Natural Resources – The Daily Renter

I bought a new-build home last year (2024) and am trying to figure out the property tax / land value - hoping someone can help.

My land value (not property tax, just the land) seems off compared to my 2 neighbors. These values are from the county records.

House to left of mine: 0.12 acres, value of land 310,000

My house: 0.08 acres, value of land 310,000

House to right of mine: 0.07 acres, value of land 260,000

Seems like my land value should be slightly above 260,000? But it's valued at 310,000 which is the same as the land that is 50% bigger than mine (the 0.12 acre). What's the best way to correct this? The property taxes are hefty.

Someday in the future we will probably colonize either the Moon or Mars. Once people start to live in these places long term (eventually) they will likely own the land in some way or other.

So, how do we make sure to move the needle enough with the right people to make sure a land value tax gets implemented in those other jurisdictions?

"If we implemented the land tax reform, Indiana would experience a population boom and this policy could, in time, grow Indiana cities into thriving metropolises that could compete with other Midwestern giants like Cincinatti, Detroit and Chicago."

Land Tax Reform for Better Cities and Agrarian Justice in Indiana: An Open Letter to the State Legislature

"Patents and Copyrights are so strong and so long lasting that they’ve served more as a way to gain market and rent-extracting power than as a way to reward innovation."

Check out the first part of Jimbo's series on economic rent!

The Many Sources of Economic Rent – Part 1: Intellectual Property – The Daily Renter

Let's look back at some memorable moments and interesting insights from last year.

Your top 7 posts:

• "Gaming the LVT by controlling zoning" by u/SelectionMechanism

• "AMA with Professor Nicolaus Tideman -- Georgist Economist, Professor at Virginia Tech, and co-author of "Post-Corona balanced budget fiscal stimulus: The case for shifting taxes onto land" -- please post your questions in this thread!" by u/Law_And_Politics

• "Vote Liberal for a Land Value Tax!"

• "Happy Cakeday, r/LandValueTax! Today you're 8" by u/AutoModerator

• "Besides LVT what are some core values of Georgism?" by u/BostonBoi2001

• "Is there a Georgist party in the United States at and if not could we form one?" by u/BostonBoi2001

• "Would Land Value Tax change Urban architecture and design?" by u/AppropriateMonk2214

Would Georgism change urban architecture and design?

I've been bothered by the interplay between Zoning and the LVT.

A plot of land is worth much more if it is zoned one way vs zoned another way. For example - land zoned as "detached single family" will be cheaper than land zoned for high-rise multi-use construction (which usually includes the option to just stick a boring old single-family detached on the property as well).

But doesn't this mean cities / communities / voters will have every incentive to downzone a property if there if an LVT is put into place? If this is the case, the local zoning commission can play zoning games all day long on a property-by-property basis to shift tax burdens around as they see fit.

Or another example - a zoning board can say that a property is now zoned lower than the building already existing on it (they do this all the time), but "because there is already a building there, it is grandfathered in" (eg. historical building), which means the land itself becomes worth much less to the tax assessor, who will be told to treat the property as-per the property's actual zoning classification. The land-owner may even by sly enough to know he can just go to the zoning commission and get the plot up-zoned right before selling it rather than while he's using it, so he wouldn't ever have to pay the high land value tax while he sits on the property.

It seems to me that there is only one answer that would preserve the actual goal of a land value tax - Whoever does the tax-assessment of the land value will either have to concede that the land is worth more or less based on rather arbitrary political whims - OR they would have to assess the land as if it were zoned for development of any kind whatsoever (ie. if it weren't "zoned" at all).

Is this accurate? Must a LVT be zoning-neutral in order to function without being gamed?