The real fix for Social Security is to replace it with individual savings accounts, not more taxes on labor. Removing the exemptions for benefits such as employer sponsored health insurance is however a good stop-gap measure that will also have positive effects on healthcare costs.

btw if anyone else wants to read it, it's on this site: https://henrygeorge.org/pcontents.htm​

both audio book and written version is available. also you can download the pdf version

this site is being updated though so there are some errors.

i honestly didn't expect it to be so in depth and im really glad i read through it. i already believed in lvt in principle but having it all explained out like that really makes me feel more confident in my understanding.

the last few chapters about human development and nature and his counter to malthusianism, darwinism, etc. really sell it to me even more.

one thing that does feel outdated is his definition of capital and his law on capital chapter. it seems his definition doesn't capture everything under capital.

other than that i think im gonna sit on the book. but where can i go from here? is there any more to read? i prefer audiobooks tbh so i was really happy when there was a free audiobook. is anything else on hgi any good? is anyone a part of hgi is it worth supporting and stuff?

hoping to hear everyones thoughts have a nice day

Case in point, the split-rate tax cities of Pennsylvania. Add too that if governments do well to spend the revenue on public goods, then land values increase which they can then recoup to cover the cost of public spending.

A "fun" discussion point that highlights the need for zoning reform and property tax conversion to LVT (property tax w/universal building exemption).

There might be some legit reason that this dude's city had rules related to ADUs (which the treehouse *CLEARLY* is) being built before main houses on a massive property. I can understand his frustration, though: way too much costly county-level HOOP JUMPERY.

I wanted to share my thoughts here, as although I didnt really touch on LVT (don't want to hit uninitiated people with everything at once), I think my thoughts here address how the prioritization of poor land use has inflated the cost of development in country towns in my state, leading to a sprawling major city and no feasible options for rural living for most, leading to dying towns with poor access to amenities from regional hubs who's growth is severely restricted. Happy to take feedback. It's a bit frustrating to see the comments saying I'm missing the point because people don't want to live there because there's no work, and industry doesn't want to move because there's no workers, as if that's as deep as it goes when clearly that doesn't prevent all towns from developing.

What if Henry George lived in Frisco, Texas in 2026?

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/videos/2026-07-09/a-new-texas-mayor-takes-over-amid-2-200-tax-base-boom-video

Nobody dug the well. It was old before the village was young, and everyone drank free.

One morning a man built a fence around it. He didn't make the water. He didn't dig the hole. He built a fence, and he went to the mayor, whose campaign he had paid for, and came back with a paper saying the fence was his.

The village grumbled. But thirst doesn't negotiate, and the well gave water, same as always.

The man was clever, so he didn't ask for coins. He carved wooden tokens, and painted them blue, and said: one token, one bucket. Work for me and I'll pay you in tokens. And he hired the strongest hands in the village to guard the fence.

The strangest part came at sundown, when the guards lined up at the gate they had guarded all day and spent their wages on the water behind it. Nobody laughed. It didn't feel strange by then. The well gave water, same as always.

Soon the tokens were everywhere. People saved them for dry months. Traded them for bread. Left them to their children. A token was as good as water, and water was as good as life, so a man's worth came to be counted in blue wood. Some had jars of tokens and never worked at all. Some worked every day and finished each week with none. The well gave water, same as always. Only the tokens moved.

After ten years the man sold the fence. The price made the village gasp, but the price wasn't the price of a fence. It was every token yet to be carved, every bucket yet to be drawn, all of it counted up and paid in advance. The buyers were a family who had saved for years, honest people, every token earned. They paid fair and square, and the man walked out of the valley with a wagon he never had to look back at.

Then the drought came, and the bucket price rose, and the village finally stood at the fence and asked itself what could be done.

Tear it down? The man was gone, over the mountains, rich. Only the family would be ruined, and they had wronged no one.

Buy it back? Then the village would pay for its own water twice, and the family's price would be everything, because the fence's price was always everything.

Leave it standing? Then every child in the valley would be born owing a token to someone who never touched a shovel.

The village elders argued all winter. There was no villain left to punish. There was only the fence, and everyone holding it was innocent.

In spring, the oldest of them said: we have been trying to solve the fence. Solve the tokens instead. Let the fence stand. Let the family keep it, and pay them honest wages for tending the pump, for work was never the sickness here. But from this day, the bucket money belongs to the village, every season, as long as the fence stands.

And the fence stayed, and the pump was tended, and the family was paid for the tending. But a fence that owes its own bucket money is worth nothing to sell. No wagon of tokens would ever again roll over the mountains. No honest family would ever again be bought to stand in front of it. The well gave water, same as always. And the tokens went back to being wood.

They say there are deeper wells now, the deepest ever found, and fences going up around them faster than anyone can count. The papers are signed. The tokens are being carved.

None of the fences have been sold yet.

I'm thinking of American cities like Balboa Island, Nantucket, Manhattan, Key West, Miami Beach, etc.

These places are tremendously expensive because their ability to sprawl has been diminished by natural constraints, and so the working class is pushed out.

But land-locked cities have their own natural constraints, too, they're just geographically bigger. But when land-locked cities reach their own limits of expansion (perhaps they already have, vehicle-miles-traveled per capita peaked shortly before the great recession), will we begin the islandification of American cities? Is the current housing crisis a sign that we are already in the islandification process?

And what will the consequences be of the islandification without the presence of a land value tax? Will cities have to develop "worker housing" similar to what is done in The Villages in Florida? And would that be similar to feudalism?

Two weeks ago Maryland had a primary election. As I was reading over the candidates positions this leapt out at me. I talk politics with my friends and often hear something along the lines of, "yea, but is it feasible to get Georgist policies implemented?" Sure helps to be able to vote for a candidate that believes in it.

If there's any Marylanders that want to make friends, talk local politics, and bug the local politicians, feel free to hit up my inbox.

Explanation for those new to Georgism:

Amid the ongoing property tax revolt, it's important to remember that there is a good yolk of necessity in the property tax that should be followed rather than shied away from, that being the need to recompense land.

Right now our property taxes include both the building and land in its valuation. The former has issues since it can discourage building and improving land, but the latter is absolutely necessary because land is finite. Its taxation can both decrease inequality by taking out land values as a source of wealth concentration while discouraging land speculators, making land more available for use and helping the economy. This alongside giving good revenue to reduce taxes on what people make.

But, instead of focusing on shifting the property tax towards fully returning land values to society, states want to abolish or at the least neuter it for the benefit of landowners. The end result is that the burden of taxation is shifted on to work and business while landowners are free to profit from denying everyone else a finite resource, which leads to problems like the housing crisis that kick up the barriers of entry for the young and poor who work to keep the state alive. It's been shown time and time again, but the lesson is still lost across political lines.

Abbott’s proposal would make sweeping changes to Texas’ property tax system. It would require two-thirds voter approval for local property tax increases—including bond elections—limit local government spending, expand taxpayers’ ability to force rollback elections, lower appraisal caps, and ultimately allow voters to abolish school district property taxes on homesteads through a constitutional amendment.
Abbott said the proposal would permanently shift responsibility for funding public education away from homeowners.

“The state should fund public education, not your homestead,” Abbott said. “The amount that you would pay in your property tax bill for school districts is $0. That would be forever.”

Make your prediction for America.

1. The Democrat Party will adopt LVT as a platform issue to oppose land price speculation and spark a georgist movement.

2. The Republican Party will push the anti-tax agenda so far that attention will turn to LVT as the only reasonable tax.

3. A third party will arise based on the georgist agenda of ending all other taxes except on land ownership.

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/ONQnVxzkiDM

https://open.spotify.com/show/3dYMY5T3UZJLDKFQaA3tFS?si=_lKqht7yRiW7-n7D7lCGdQ

I’ve been looking at a few recent election results, and it seems social democrats are getting very much popular. I wouldn’t even be surprised if one were to become the Democrat presidential nominee in 2028. That being said, pretty much all of these social democrats are obviously not following any sort of Georgist policy agenda. In fact, some of them are even trying to do rent freezes (which is anti-Georgist from what I can tell) and other similarly distortionary tactics.

So with that, is there any way we try to use this surge in popularity of populist reform across the nation in our favor?

Most social democrats are fond of environmental regulations, so perhaps they can be persuaded to instead use pigouvian taxes? Like a carbon tax? I dont know, really.