Our Gardenbrain Economy - NYTimes.com.
Or take taxes. Under the efficient-market hypothesis, taxes are an extraction of resources from the jobs machine, or more literally, taking money out of the economy. It is not just separate from economic activity, but hostile to it. This is why most Americans believe that lower taxes will automatically lead to more prosperity. Yet if there were a shred of truth to this, then given our historically low tax rates we would today be drowning in jobs and general prosperity.
Gardenbrain, in contrast, allows us to recognize taxes as basic nutrients that sustain the garden. A well-designed tax system — in which everyone contributes and benefits — ensures that nutrients are circulated widely to fertilize and foster growth. Reducing taxes on the very wealthiest on the idea that they are “job creators” is folly. Jobs are the consequence of an organic feedback loop between consumers and businesses, and it’s the demand from a thriving middle class that truly creates jobs. The problem with today’s severe concentration of wealth, then, isn’t that it’s unfair, though it might be; it’s that it kills middle-class demand. Lasting growth doesn’t trickle down; it emerges from the middle out.
Gardenbrain, in contrast, allows us to recognize taxes as basic nutrients that sustain the garden. A well-designed tax system — in which everyone contributes and benefits — ensures that nutrients are circulated widely to fertilize and foster growth. Reducing taxes on the very wealthiest on the idea that they are “job creators” is folly. Jobs are the consequence of an organic feedback loop between consumers and businesses, and it’s the demand from a thriving middle class that truly creates jobs. The problem with today’s severe concentration of wealth, then, isn’t that it’s unfair, though it might be; it’s that it kills middle-class demand. Lasting growth doesn’t trickle down; it emerges from the middle out.
While well-intended, this doesn't begin to touch the surface of what seemed to me to be where this NYT Op-Ed piece could have been going.
What we need is a tax code which recycles for community use the value that nature provides and the value the community together creates, instead of permitting those values to be privatized and instead of taxing productive activity.
Some have described land rent as "mother's milk" for the community, and have pointed out that we permit the owners of our very best land -- be they individuals, corporations, trusts of long-dead people, universities or foreign entities -- to lap up that milk. Recall Leona Helmsley's statement: "WE don't pay taxes. The little people pay taxes." She was describing the structure of our tax system.
Few communities collect more than 40% of the annual rental value of the land within their borders (approximately 5% of the purchase value of the land, under the "20 years' purchase" capitalization guideline), and California collects no more than 20% of it under Prop 13 (and much less than that from long-time holders). And most communities collect an annual share of the rental value of the buildings and other improvements, which is unjust and counterproductive.
Look into the ideas associated with Henry George.
This can be heaven on earth, a garden in which all can prosper, or hell on earth.
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