Blog - Land Value Tax Campaign

The need for large-scale landscape management

Written on 19 March 2014. Posted in General.

Climate change is a topic on which the Campaign does not take a view. We hold to our self-imposed terms of reference, on the basis that our supporters have differing views on just about everything apart from LVT. This is as it should be. This winter’s weather, however, raises the issue of large-scale landscape management. It may turn out to be a one-off event or part of a new pattern, but...

Yet another re-launch of HS2

Written on 17 March 2014. Posted in Public Transport.

Yet another re-launch of the project to built a high speed railway from London to the north. More land value created at the taxpayers’ expense but which will end up in private pockets. Read report here.

Crap on stilts

Written on 26 January 2014. Posted in General.

I was recently asked if crap on stilts is wealth? It may be, but only if someone wants it. Putting the crap on stilts is a work of human labour, which is part of the qualification for falling into the category “wealth”, but the product must still satisfy someone’s desire. As crap is good fertiliser, this is the case, so yes, it probably is. Crap was at one time the subject of...

Pope Francis – whither Catholic Social Teaching?

Written on 15 January 2014. Posted in Religion.

Recent statements by Pope Francis have stirred up criticism and discussion of the attitudes of the Catholic church to poverty. In modern times, economic justice was first addressed in the Social Teaching documents Rerum Novarum, issued by Pope Leo XIII in 1891, Quadragesimo Anno of 1931, and subsequently. The trouble is the subject was addressed inadequately. To make matters worse, like most things...

Pope Francis sloppy on economics

Written on 5 December 2013. Posted in Religion.

Evangelii Gaudium, the Pope’s first major publication, is an “exhortation” rather than an encyclical, so it does not carry the same weight. Which is just as well. The economic analysis is sloppy. It contains nothing of interest and offers no direction. Even Leo XIII’s Rerum Novarum is better, for all its shortcomings. Why didn’t the Pope go back to the previous body...

Free is not free – Mark Wadsworth

Written on 4 December 2013. Posted in Home-Owner-Ism.

Well that’s not free, then is it? by Mark Wadsworth

How should we be campaigning?

Written on 18 November 2013. Posted in General.

Most LVT campaigners are at some time tempted to believe that the reform we support is only just over the horizon. One more push, and we shall be there. The temptation seems to hit hardest at two points. The first is when we have “seen the cat”. Having spotted the elusive feline lurking in the branches, we find it difficult to appreciate that anyone else could miss seeing it. The other...

House prices are spiralling at last

Written on 30 August 2013. Posted in Home-Owner-Ism.

House prices are spiralling upwards in what the Daily Telegraph describes as a “virtuous circle”. What a strange turn of phrase, because spirals are usually vicious. Nobody in their right mind would welcome spiralling food prices or spiralling petrol prices, so why is this good news? Read more in this Daily Telegraph article.

Pope Leo XIII’s error

Written on 25 August 2013. Posted in Religion.

I came across this in a blog recently. It is curious that the author should have chosen this passage from the 1891 encyclical Rerum Novarum, because it is precisely here that the document was in error, and it has set the tone of Catholic Social Teaching ever since.

York Railway Museum closure threat

Written on 21 June 2013. Posted in Public Transport.

There is a petition going the rounds against the proposed closure of the National Railway Museum at York. The local people are upset and argue that it an important part of the local economy. It is no doubt good for cafes and other retail businesses. That will be reflected in shop rents in the picturesque city centre, a benefit that could be clawed back if a land value taxation were in place.

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