Incidence of property taxes

I regularly get into arguments with people who think that property taxes are paid by tenants. Now it is true that tenants in the UK are nominally responsible for paying the property tax, be it Council Tax or business rate. But the tax cuts into the amount a landlord can charge in rent. In other words, the incidence of the tax is on the landlord. Yet so many people refuse to believe this and do not understand it. Thus we are constantly hearing about the need to “help business” by cutting the business rate. Now it may be that the business rate, on top of all other taxes, may mean that no business is viable in some locations, and this would help to explain why so many of the UK’s high streets are lined with charity shops and boarded-up windows, but cutting the business rate will not help business.

If there are any doubts on this point, this “study of studies” should dispel them once and for all.