Conversation

Jesse Powell
@jespow
If you had a load of land and the opportunity to create a new city with it, who would you give votes to? Land owners = shareholders Tax payers = paying customers Residents = users Should it be any different than a corporation? Users can vote with their feet. LO/SH hold the bag.
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Wayne Vaughan
@WayneVaughan
Replying to
@jespow
and
@lightcoin
Playing Devil’s advocate. Conventional wisdom among many progressives is as follows: Residents are systematically oppressed by land owners and business owners. Taxing them and providing residents with benefits/services is the moral way to ensure a fair society.
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Jesse Powell
@jespow
This assumes that land owners have a monopoly or people are locked in to their residence and can't shop around for a better fit (product, service, price, terms, etc). Isn't the whole argument blown up just by offering every person a one-way bus ticket to wherever they'd prefer?
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lightcoin.btc
@lightcoin
Replying to
@jespow
a tax paid indirectly is still a tax, right? but I've also seen a theory that the franchise was extended not because of some notion of justice but rather due to political incentives. the more voters there are, the more promises career politicians can extend to lock-in votes.
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lightcoin.btc
@lightcoin
imo, residents are taxpayers, even if only indirectly e.g. property taxes priced into rent, gasoline taxes priced into bus or cab fares, sales taxes priced into goods and services, etc. so while they're not as invested as land/biz owners, still deserve a seat at the gov table.
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