I can see this is going nowhere fast!
ok children, let's try a different angle with some role playing...
Quote:
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Georgists...claim to be classic liberalists (libertarians)
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question:Now Radar let's start with you - who are the original classical liberals?
answer: why - The French Physiocrats in response to that awful mercantile system...
question: And why do you say that Radar?
answer: because they were the first to use the word laissez-faire which in english means "leave alone"
laissez-faire
Very good Radar you may have a cookie now!
question: and what does Physiocrat actually mean in English?
answer: “rule of nature” because they believed the inherent natural order governing society was based on land and its natural products as the only true form of wealth.
Physiocrat
Oui Oui, another right answer Radar - my you have been reading your homework - good boy...now, one last question before you run off to the bathroom to stop all that wiggling around in your seat.
question: Here is the 64 million dollar question mon petit garcon. If you get it right you then achieve the privilege of calling yourself a "geo-libertarian"and the kids will no longer tease you out in the schoolyard by calling you a "neo-libertarian"...ready?
answer: Oh boy I can't wait but I hope I don't piss in my pants trying to figure out a way to remain ignorant like the rest of my "neo-libertarian" pals on the playground.
question:Radar, what is the significance of the term "l'impot unique"
answer:hmmm...let me think (as he looks outside to his pals in the schoolyard) and then yells out "the theory that ALL TAXATION IS THEFT - long live the Neo-Libs!" (as he runs out of the room with a huge wet stain on the front of his pants)
Teacher to the rest of the class: I am afraid that you have just witnessed another case of "Rothbarditis" where someone's dogma overcomes their reason.
The real answer is The Physiocrats advocated the impot unique to make the landowners of France pay for the expenses of the sovereign thus avoiding the onerous taxation of the peasants, workers, and cultivators of land. It was to be a levy on the value of land exclusive of improvements such as crops, houses, barns, fertilization- as well as the wealth produced by labor and capital utilizing land, the source of all wealth.
There is a paradox in the concept of the "single tax." In form, it may appear as another type of tax but, in substance, it is a taking by the community of that value exclusively created by the community since the genesis of ground rent is a) population combined with b)production. Thus, the landowner qua landowner is a parasite on production.
L'Impot Unique
Poor Radar has choosen the false comfort of his neo-libertarian "schoolyard pals" rather than standing with historical facts - the original classical liberal Geo-libertarians...
End of class - dismissed!