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Comment by pydry | Hacker News Reader

An LVT would need relatively few exceptions and rules in order to function well and is unavoidable by design. What we have right now for most taxes is the exact opposite of that - e.g. with sales, income taxes, etc.

Mostly there are just pearl clutchers complaining about how elderly cash poor people sitting in large old houses on expensive land they've lived in for 20 years would be financially nudged into downgrading.

The real roadblock for LVT is not in the slightest bit technical, but simply that it would undermine a lot of privately held oligarchic wealth.

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Land owners make up a plurality of voters. In some cases those land owners are retirees living in a house they bought 45 years ago others are people who own 500 houses.

The land value tax “equally” punishes them for their inefficient land usage. But at some point we need to pay our fair share on taxes and the later group hiding behind the former group is how you end up with California’s dumpster fire of a housing crisis.

I agree with this. I really do not know why in the hell one person or entity owning 500 houses wouldn't pay more in taxes for the 500th house than the 1st house. You pay more income tax on the 500,000th dollar than the first dollar. Land is taxed regressively in favor of oligarchs.

First house is claimed as homestead and gains on sale aren't taxed, but the yearly property tax should work similarly.

Where I live homestead status affects yearly taxes as well.

This is a negative for anyone who is renting since they now have to pay more rent to cover those taxes. (taxes set a floor on rent long term, though of course tax is only one factor in rental prices)

"Mostly there are just pearl clutchers complaining about how elderly cash poor people sitting in large old houses on expensive land they've lived in for 20 years would be financially nudged into downgrading"

I wonder if you wouldn't be clutching your pearls if you were being forced (sorry, "financially nudged") out of your home of 20 years?

These cash poor elderly folks aren't exactly "oligarchic".

They can move somewhere cheaper? And then the high value land can be used more productively (e.g. higher density occupancy).

“Beat it, grandma! We have better ideas on how to use the land and house you raised a family in!” is unlikely to be a winning campaign platform. (Thankfully.)

You may be happy running an economy on vibes, but it makes no sense for old people who have a house intended for them and kids close to their work to remain there when their kids have moved out and they've retired. The fact that you can't afford to live somewhere isn't some crime. They can go move somewhere nicer and more suitable for them, freeing up that land for densification (or just proper occupancy).

Why do you think it's up to you to decide what's more suitable for someone else? Where do you get that right?

The problem you're running into is that it doesn't matter if it makes sense to you what these people want to do with their private property. What you think is "proper occupancy" doesn't matter, because we have private property rights.

You advocating for policies that infringe on that right is an attempt to exercise power over these people that you have no right to, whether or not you hide behind some collective sense of what's best.

All my homies like to let perfect be the enemy of the good.

Is forcing grandma out of her house economically the perfect or the good in this story?

Currently renting retirees are forced out already if they dont pay their rent.

Can you confirm that you wish to see this practice completely banned (i.e. no payment of rent) to prove that you're not taking a two faced stance on this issue?

What we are talking about is different - a tax incentive to move to somebody who has benefitted from a large capital gain.

I’m fine with (and in support of) market forces to let grandma decide that it’s worth selling her home; I’m not okay with using government mechanisms with no market reference points to price her out of it. (Raise everyone’s property tax rate and reference appraisals to market sales? Fine. Determine that her specific piece of land is worth $X despite no comparison of open-market land-only transactions? Not fine.)

From that, it’s fair to conclude that I’m ok with renters having to pay market rent, regardless of their age or matriarchal status.

>I’m fine with (and in support of) market forces to let grandma decide that it’s worth selling her home

Ok. Sounds like you are in favor of market forces driving grandma on to the street when she rents but not in favor of market forces driving grandma to sell up and move to a smaller cheaper property.

Maybe the pearl clutching about poor grandmas was a little overstated.

>Determine that her specific piece of land is worth $X despite no comparison of open-market land-only transactions? Not fine.)

LVT is calculated and imputed using open market transactions. If unimproved property values all jump in an area thats coz the land value went up.

I’m in favor of market forces in both cases.

Show me a way that LVT can applied referencing open market transactions for unimproved land in a developed area and I’m interested to learn more about it.

Grandma can decide to sell her house on the market if the property taxes get too high. That’s good. She shouldn’t be able to be targeted by the city for her land value alone increasing despite no or weak supporting comps.

LVT is theoretically good. My problems with it are practical ones.

It would be the thing keeping a good system from being perfect, I believe. Are you not familiar with the idiom?

What a lot of jurisdiction do to deal with this situation is to allow elderly folks to accrue what is essentially a lien on their house for the property taxes going up more than a certain amount.

This way these folks don't have to pay much more than before, can stay in their house and the county gets its share when these people die or move out.

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