Perverse Taxation in California

There was an article in Slate recently by Henry Graber, on how California is deteriorating into a feudal society of inherited wealth. Proposition 13 nearly froze property tax assessments so long as the property remained in the same hands, and then Proposition 58 required the assessments to increase only slowly when the property was inherited. In other words, the Smith family and the Jones family can pay enormously different tax bills for similar houses on similar tracts of land, if the Joneses bought their home last year, and Mr. Smith inherited the property from his father, who owned it when Proposition 13 passed in 1978.

My only quarrel with the article is a matter of terminology: In Georgist political economy, wealth refers to things of human production, but does not include land, and property ownership in California may be highly unequal, but it isn’t literally feudal; the landowners don’t have to perform military service or other obligations as a condition of holding their estates. I have no disagreement with the term “deteriorating.”

On the Feast Day of Saint Maximilian Kolbe

Back on Tuesday, a devoutly Catholic friend of mine at the Patent Office, who would no doubt be delighted if I were to convert, said that I should look up Saint Maximilian Kolbe, and spelled the last name.

“I’ve read about him,” I said. “He was incredible.”

After a moment, I asked, “Is this his feast day or something?”

My friend confirmed that it was (August 14).

And then, in the few days after August 14, the news was full of reports and opinion columns about what has come to light in Pennsylvania; not only did some priests molest children, but the Catholic hierarchy covered up for them, and made it possible for appalling evildoers to continue their careers and molest more children. Again.

Sigh.

Georgist Conference in O’Fallon, Part Forty-Five

To continue with the morning of Sunday, July 30, 2017, Dan Sullivan presented a discussion of Ralph Nader’s It’s Easier Than You Think. Showing up matters. The men who signed the Declaration of Independence were signing their own death warrants. The Internet is great, but we also need to get people out into the village square. There was discussion.

Mr. Sullivan said that in the Ming Dynasty, someone said, “To know and not to do is the same as not to know.” This describes academia today. We’re bored with solutions to injustice. (Example: prison conditions and how to change them.). Blood and guts get ratings; solutions are dull. Further discussion.

He referred to Unstoppable: The Left-Right Alliance to Dismantle the Corporate State, by Nader. The left and the right disagree about some things, but agree on far more. Realities push aside ideologies.

Divide and rule, manipulation by the powers that be.

Nader again. Rationalizing our futility.

The Internet. Young people spend 10 hours per day (girls) or 7 hours per day (boys) on smartphones. Ralph Nader just read about that.

To be continued.