# land: you can't own land, you can only lease it from the government

there's a thing bothering me about private property ownership. what do you do if the owner doesn't do good caretaking and this is causing a net drag for the environment around it? you could own an old house in the middle of the city centre and refuse to make better use of it such as a shop or a condo. but i also like the idea that if something belongs to you, you should have the freedom to do whatever you want within some reasonable boundaries.

# expiring ownership

i think there's a solution to this! you never fully own a land but you simply lease it from the government.

government would lease each land piece for 20 years. after 20 years the owner would need to renew the lease. usually such renewals would be granted. but during such renewal the government would have the chance to review whether the current usage still makes sense. if it doesn't, it could repossess it and put the property to a better use.

that old house you own in the city center? the city government could take that away and have a condo built there to improve the housing market. hopefully you took this into consideration when you acquired the lease 20 years ago.

however not granting the renewal would need lots of process to ensure the government doesn't abuse its power. perhaps even public approval for not renewing could be a requirement. typical reasons for not renewing a lease could be:

• abandoned property,
• underutilized condo due to high prices,
• antisocial gathering place,
• dead space such as parking space.

# pricing

the owners of these leased properties would need to pay tax on the land. to make administration and the expectation very simple, i'd require the tax to be paid daily. no need to fill out complex documents once every year. it would be a continuous process so if something is wrong, the government can notice and fix it right away. and if the owner stops paying, the government can intervene quickly rather than spending lot of resources on trying to collect debts.

the increase of tax would be limited. but during the renewals the government can assign the land to a different zone. such a zone assignment change could cause a significant tax increase. owners would be encouraged to give the lease to someone else who can make better use of the land.

the government shouldn't gorge on this though. a bagel shop in the city center is more useful than another bank branch. if you make the tax too high, all you get is banks who can print their rent money (at least in a society that doesn't ban money-printing).

# land tax is fair

land is an exclusive resource so i think taxing its ownership is fair. but i wouldn't expect a lot of tax income from this. my current ideal system is @/autotax and in that i'd expect most tax coming from money hoarders.

one advantage of land tax is that it's one of the primary ways to legitimize government currency. in @/autotax i talk about a new currency. but what would motivate people to use it? well, if you live somewhere, then that place must pay land tax in government currency. so you need to pay your rent in government currency. which means you will need to acquire government currency. thus people trade in government currency.

btw, interesting side note. what made the crypto currencies popular? what motivated people to acquire these? well, speculation and some ease of use, sure. but also ransomware! if ransomware asks for cryptomoney then suddenly you will need to start acquiring it and thus its trading volume increases. at least this is a neat theory put forward in https://locusmag.com/2022/09/cory-doctorow-moneylike/.

# long-term use

anyway, back to leasing land. such setup might discourage building large, complex buildings that might take 10-20 years to complete. such long building durations are very rare though. often the slowness comes from inefficient planning. the short terms would encourage leasers to build quickly otherwise they might be enjoying the hassle-free ownership only for a short term. and they would also discourage building expensive high-rise condos. i think that's fine. those are very brittle and antisocial anyway.

however, if needed, maybe there could be an exceptional process for 50 year long leases. but then the government would be more involved in the process. it would ensure solid plans, long lasting materials, etc.

# compromise

i don't know, maybe this is a dumb idea. but it can be really frustrating that some rich people keep inheriting vast estates and then let them rot. while poor people can't find housing anywhere and the government can't do anything because it can't touch private properties. so this would be a compromise. people could have their own place but not forever.

published on 2023-03-04

to the frontpage