To sum up the main conclusions of this very long chapter: Exceptionally valuable lands, as those containing timber, minerals, oil, gas, phosphate, and water power, which are still under public ownership should remain there. Through a judicious system of loans, deserving and efficient persons should be assisted to get possession of some land. Municipalities should lease rather than sell their lands, and should strive to increase their holdings. To take all the future increases in the value of land would be morally lawful, provided that compensation were given to owners who thereby suffered positive losses of interest or principal. To take a small part of the increase, and to transfer very gradually the taxes on improvements and on personal property to land, would probably be just, owing to the beneficial effects upon public welfare. A supertax on large holdings of exceptionally valuable and scarce land would likewise be beneficial and legitimate.[110]
ASHLEY: The Origin of Property in Land. London; 1892.
LAVELEYE: Primitive Property. London; 1878.
WHITTAKER: The Taxation, Tenure, and Ownership of Land. London; 1914.
PREUSS: The Fundamental Fallacy of Socialism. St. Louis; 1908.
GEORGE: Progress and Poverty; and A Perplexed Philosopher.
MARSH: Land Value Taxation in American Cities. N. Y.; 1911.
FILLEBROWN: A Single Tax Handbook for 1913. Boston; 1912.
YOUNG: The Single Tax Movement in the United States. Princeton; 1916.
MATHEWS: Taxation and the Distribution of Wealth. N. Y.; 1914.
CATHREIN: Das Privatgrundeigenthum und seine Gegner. Freiburg; 1909.
FALLON: Les Plus-Values et l'Impot. Paris; 1914.
HAIG: Final Report of the Committee on Taxation of the City of New York; 1916.
The exemption of Improvements from Taxation in Canada and U. S.; 1915.
Some Probable Effects of Exemption in City of New York; 1915.
KELLEHER: Private Ownership. Dublin; 1911.
Proceedings of the 1913 Meeting of the American Economic Association.
U. S. COMMISSIONER OF CORPORATIONS: Reports on the Lumber, Petroleum, Steel, and Water Power of the United States.
SELIGMAN: Essays in Taxation; Shifting and Incidence of Taxation; and Progressive Taxation in Theory and Practice.
Also the works of Taussig, Devas, Carver, Pesch, King, Vermeersch, Willoughby, and the Commission on Industrial Relations, all of which are cited at the end of the introductory chapter.