On 15th Sept. a colloquium on land value tax (LVT), held at the Westminster HQ of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS), was presented with economic analysis suggesting that a single annual tax based on land values would be capable of producing potential revenue flows of £82 billion: sufficient to replace all existing property taxes.
Scotland votes no
The Campaign as such never had a view on whether Scotland should be independent. Scotland suffers from the disadvantage of being distant both from the main centres of population in Great Britain, and also from the ports in the South-East that provide easy connections to mainland Europe. Thus, since the decline of the heavy industry which was the mainstay of the Scottish economy, the country has...
LVT in the wider context
It is nearly two months since anything new has been added to the Campaign website. There has been little in the news that it would have been appropriate to respond to. Bigger events have moved onto centre stage, including the takeover of large areas of Iraq by Islamists, the associated massacres that have accompanied that, the war in Gaza and unfolding events in Ukraine. Our supporters will have...
The living wage
The issue of the “living wage” inevitably crops up from time to time and has done so again recently. The notion can be traced back to at least St Thomas Aquinas and has long featured in Catholic moral teaching. The Anglican Archbishop of York recently called for a ‘living wage’ to be paid to all government workers. In a recent newspaper article, he said, “what workers...
Mansion tax resurfacing
We note that discussion of the wretched mansion tax is re-surfacing, having been adopted as a policy by the Labour Party. When a tax is based on some round-number threshold, it must be concluded that it is based on no sound principle. It will also lead to endless disputes from property owners who find themselves caught through being just above that threshold. At a time when property prices are volatile,...
Latest “Land & Liberty” goes to the roots
The latest (Spring 2014) edition of Land & Liberty has a collection of penetrating articles which go to the root of our current problems with the economy.
The Idea of Property by Joseph Milne, an enquiry into the nature of property, traces the notion to its origins in the early seventeenth century. It demonstrates how the flawed analsyis of John Locke underpins contemporary ideas on property...
Barlow tax avoidance humbug
By Robin Smith
Today has brought another frenzy of anti-tax-avoidance hypocrisy. Even the top British newspaper, The Times, is now co-opted into the lie.
We admire Mr. Barlow for the best of reasons. He is exposing how bad the entire system of taxation really is by revealing how easy it is to avoid tax.
For that alone he deserves his celebrity status and all his wealth. By this act he is doing far...
Economics is a science
One point of view that has surfaced widely since the boom-bust of 2008-2010 is the assertion that economics is is not a science. In the light of the failure of mainstream economists to predict the course of events, it is understandable that a lot of people should come to this conclusion. The view was summed up by a commentator thus: It is not a science because of the steps of the “Scientific...
The great mail robbery
The accusation that Royal Mail was flogged-off cheap rumbles on. There was certainly something fishy about the floatation – this was no “Tell Sid” operation with the aim of getting the wider public interested in buying the shares. The old Royal Mail was, amongst other things, a large property portfolio.
EU taxation not a problem
We are constantly astonished by the number of people in general, and the experts, professors, social campaigners, journalists and the rest of this priesthood in particular, who are blind to simple reality. A financial transaction tax is a classic example of the height of ignorance. When a transaction is taxed, less transactions of that class will take place as a direct result. And the capital will...