[extropy-chat] Redistribution of wealth

[Mike Lorrey]

--- Trend Ologist <trendologist at yahoo.co.uk> wrote:

> 
> Very good, Mike, you made your point. As a semi-hick myself I don't
> know precisely what you mean, but you did make a point. Am interested
> in knowing more about the economics of farming today. It is a vast
> subject, but as one knowledgeable concerning red states can you give
> us a few pointers on agricultural subsidies and the utility of
> farming regulations, if you can do so?

Okay, here goes: the US has such vast agricultural capacity that were
it all let loose, food would be grown at such little profit that nobody
would make any money at it, and consequently the government would earn
no tax revinues from the activity.

 Since the 30's, in the interests of keeping the 'American family
farm', a cultural icon, intact, the government established a system of
land banking whereby farmers got paid to put their land in the land
bank and not farm it. The money they were paid was supposedly paid by
taxes paid on agricultural commerce that did actually take place at
higher prices thanks to reduced supply of produce. This artificial
scarcity helps create an artificial tax base that keeps the government
supplied with revinues by which it can pay out subsidies. Confused yet?

It is a rather cynical Georgist plot, is all. Henry George, a 19th
century socialist economist and philosopher pioneered the idea of
lifeboat rules as socio-economic policy, particularly in the area of
land ownership, use, and taxation. A firm believer in zero sum
economics and agrarian mysticism, George did accept the concept of
Natural Rights, but tried to claim the absurd notion that to be
naturally free, you had to have some place of your own to be free at,
otherwise you were on someone else's property and therefore unfree as
you were subject to their rules. The idea of earning and saving one's
earnings to buy a place to be free apparently never occured to him as a
natural consequence, but he did acknowledge that while people, if they
are free, should be able to invest their earnings in private property,
but should also pay rent to the un-landed population for fencing that
land off from everyone else (especially those too unproductive and
parasitical to save money). This 'economic scarcity rent' has come to
be known as 'property taxes'.

With agriculture, though, a totally free market experiences no
scarcity, at least not within the bounds of the utility value of the
collective population. This reduction to commodity and even fire-sale
pricing makes for low value (i.e. peasant) economic activity and little
government revinue to pay economic scarcity rent to those who are not
dumb enough to get stuck working on a farm their entire lives. So,
therefore, artificial scarcity and subsequently artificial prices, need
to be established to enhance government revinue. Still with me?

Once this artificial scarcity is established, via land banking, land
trusts, current use property tax rates, and other mechanisms, then the
lumpen proletariat in the cities who can no longer afford expensive
rural land can complain and elect politicians who will perpetuate the
system while extracting more money from the remaining middle class to
pay danegeld to the city peasant.

In a similar way, communities pass zoning, planning, and building
ordinances in order to reduce the amount of acrage in a community which
can be developed for specific uses. Again, this is artificially created
scarcity that raises prices and thus inflates (er, 'enhances') tax
revinues.

So, tell me something: why is it that city dwellers are so enamored of
supporting environmental groups that drive people off the land (and
into the cities) while rural people just believe in
self-responsibility, i.e. stewardship, in taking care of the land they own?

=====
Mike Lorrey
Chairman, Free Town Land Development
"Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom.
It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves."
                                         -William Pitt (1759-1806) 
Blog: http://www.xanga.com/home.aspx?user=Sadomikeyism


		
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