Henry George: The Economist as Moralist*

Abstract . Henry George derived his economic theory from his personal experience. He had the good fortune to be living in California during his formative years; there the economic events which transpired during the settlement of the North American continent—the passing of the frontier and its consequences—occurred within a time span of a few years and the telescoping of history gave him the framework for an original economic system, as well as a utopian vision of a free society. Much attention has properly been paid to George's economic ideas but he was also a moralist, one accepted by some philosophers as among the greatest. This aspect of his work, and particularly his value theory, have been neglected.     

Henry George on Property Rights: Reply to John Pullen

John Pullen argues that Henry George's proposal to make land common property is inconsistent with his proposal to tax rent. This reply argues that George's two formulations are consistent, and that Pullen has confused common property with state property. On the other hand, Pullen's conception of property as composed of a basket of rights focuses attention on the question of whether, as trustee of the common property, a Georgist regime should be understood to have certain rights (and obligations) to constrain private land use decisions.     

Henry George on Land Ownership: A Comment on Pullen

Did George alienate many by presenting his reform program as the institution of a new form of restricted land possession rather than as the retention of traditional ownership with a substantial land tax imposed? It seems doubtful, yet the distinction merits further exploration and the peculiar and hard‐to‐implement nature of the tax and the difficulty of reconciling it with George's distrust of government needs to be stressed. Ideally, George might have preferred complete government ownership of land but his policy proposals were pragmatically adapted to the realities of his own society. The extent of the egalitarianism and aid to the landless implied in his program is questioned.     

The Henry George Theorem and the Entrepreneurial Process: Turning Henry George on his Head

This chapter offers an interpretation of the Henry George Theorem (HGT) that brings it squarely into the study and analysis of entrepreneurship somewhat loosening its ties to the subfield of urban economics. I draw on the pioneering work of Spencer Heath whose insights about the viability of proprietary communities were developed further by his grandson, Spencer Heath MacCallum who, in 1970, recognized that private real estate developers sometimes make their capital gains (mostly) by creating useful public spaces that others enjoy. I also draw inspiration from Fred Foldvary's effort in 1994 to synthesize the pubic goods problem in economics with the Henry George Theorem in urban economics. While the real estate owner—developer does emerge on my pages in a somewhat more favourable light than as originally portrayed by Henry George in his Progress and Poverty in 1879, I offer a realistic appraisal of the duplicitous behaviours required of such entrepreneurs. in the context of the modern regulatory state. Real estate development remains a 'hot button' item in local politics, and real estate developers must become genuine 'political entrepreneurs' if they are to complete their projects in a timely way and capture business profits. It is a complicated story that the HGT helps make intelligible in terms of human action.     

Henry George and Europe:

A bstract Henry George played a tremendous role in the development and growth of the British Liberal party and of British Liberalism, one no less significant than his role in that of British non-Marxian socialism One of the Liberal leaders who gained a place in history, Joseph Chamberlain, had already been a land reformer before he learned about Georgism Chamberlain used the Georgist analysis, but he and the other 19th century Radical Liberals worked up a program for a broader distribution of landed property, not for the abolition of the private land monopoly. The same tactic in Ireland entrenched private land monopoly thereby making many renters small holders But George also supplied the analysis and the context of the Liberal campaign And later Liberal leaders–notably David Lloyd George, Winston Churchill (as well as Liberals in the Labour Party. Philip Snowden, Herbert Morrison, Ramsay MacDonald and Josiah Wedgwood) –came close to making the taxation of land values the law of the kingdom     

Henry George and Europe:

A bstract Henry George's Progress and Poverty was translated into German and published in Germany in 1881, a little more than a year after its publication in America But it was not through George's own words that his ideas first became known there Germany already had land reformers , organized in small societies They made his teachings known However, unlike the case in Britain, Germany's leftists did not welcome George's land reform ideas True, Karl Marx recognized and wrote about the role the land question played in the exploitation of labor and in his third volume of Capital took basic positions parallel to George's, it was published long after Progress and Poverty The hostility of Wilhelm Ltebknecbt toward land reform reflected the German public's disinterest in the land question and may explain why Marx concentrated on appealing to the urban industrial worker     

Henry George and the Shakers: Evolution of Communal Attitudes Towards Land Ownership

A bstract . The influence of Henry George on the Shakers has been misunderstood. The most prominent late nineteenth century Shaker elder was Frederick W. Evans , brother of George Henry Evans , the land reformer of the second quarter of the century. Similarities in the programs of G. H. Evans and Henry George have been recognized, but the two proposed different kinds of land reforms. Evans promoted quantitative restrictions on land ownership , while George was known for his advocacy of a single tax on land. The New York Shakers, as large land owners, successfully resisted early G. H. Evans type land reforms. Later, Shakers led by F. W. Evans embraced Henry George-type policy proposals and supported George for mayor of New York City. E. W. Evans himself, however, conflated Henry George's proposals with those of his brother, never realizing the contradiction between the two, much less resolving it. The consequences of Shaker ambivalence toward their large landholdings persisted well into the twentieth century.     

The Henry George Theorem in a second-best world

The Henry George Theorem (HGT) states that, in first-best economies, the fiscal surplus of a city government that finances the Pigouvian subsidies for agglomeration externalities and the costs of local public goods by a 100% tax on land is zero at optimal city sizes. We extend the HGT to distorted economies where product differentiation and increasing returns are the sources of agglomeration economies and city governments levy property taxes. Without relying on specific functional forms, we derive a second-best HGT that relates the fiscal surplus to the excess burden expressed as an extended Harberger formula.     

Henry George and Comparable Worth: Hypothetical Markets as a Stimulus for Reforming the Labor Market

Abstract . Despite significant improvements in the status of women, a significant gap between the wages of males and females persists. Women's work is not paid according to its comparable worth. Henry George, the 19th century economist and social philosopher, advocated payment according to contribution to production in a freely competitive labor market. The present is an exploitative one distorted by employers’market power, offering no free choice among alternative occupations. When women can prove, as they do, that sex discrimination has played some part in their historically lower compensation rate, the market is shown to be not fair and efficient. Hence non-market decision making is demanded through vigorous and unrelenting prosecution enforcing the equal pay statute of 1964.     

Henry George and Organized Labor:

A bstract . Henry George supported labor unions and was proud of his membership in the Printers' Union. But he did not regard them as the final solution of labor exploitation. He championed labor as one of the producing classes. His foray into politics as the candidate of organized labor's third party was characteristic; he had had much involvement in politics earlier. Although he supported labor's immediate demands, he sought mainly to use his candidacy to build a constituency for the single tax. Samuel Gompers , then head of the American Federation of Labor , at first worked for George's election but came to the belief that the unions alone should direct and control their political efforts. This view prevailed, though he and George remained good friends. But it is now a question whether Gompers' policy, at this time, serves labor's best interests.     

Sun Yat-sen and Henry George:

A bstract . Of Sun Yat-sen's "Three Principles of the People," the third principle, namely the People's Livelihood, forms the ultimate goal for social welfare. In this principle Dr. Sun tried to syncretize the economic theories of the West and adapt them within the Chinese context.
The equalization of land ownership through taxation of self-assessed land values, and the land value increment tax are the most essential ingredients of the third principle. Underlying Dr. Sun's concept of equalization of land ownership is the unearned increment theory of Henry George.
Dr. Sun conceived of agrarian reform as basic to the solution of the livelihood problem. Henry George also saw the cause of distress and destitution in the defective land tenure structure and the monopoly of land.     

Henry George and George Bernard Shaw: Comparison and Contrast

A bstract . Henry George , the American economist and social philosopher , and George Bernard Shaw , the British playwright and social reformer , were two famous personalities of the last quarter of the 19th century, each a prophet in his own way. The two men probably never met, though Shaw credited George's oratory as well as his classic. Progress and Poverty , with awakening his interest in economic issues, and to his last days acknowledged his debt to George. Both were deeply committed to ending poverty. But there the similarity ended—George was devoted to ethical democracy, Shaw to socialist dictatorship. George saw cooperative individualism as the goal of social reconstruction; Shaw dreamed of a Superman, and fancied himself a supporter of the Soviet dictator, Joseph Stalin, and of Soviet Russian'communism.'Shaw saw the purpose of life as "being used for a (mighty) purpose;" George saw it as blazing a trail for'progressive humanity,'cooperating with the Creator in creating a moral world.     

Henry George and The Reconstruction of Capitalism

A bstract . The moral basis for the recommendation of Henry George that land , not labor and capital, be taxed is explained. The justification is that the value of land is socially created by density of population and as a result of private and public improvements , such as roads and utilities. This policy is advocated on the basis of its very successful, if limited, use in many places. It is contended that the need for many forms of social intervention in the economic process, which have many side consequences, would be dramatically lessened.     

Henry George and Henry M. Hyndman, I:

Abstract . Henry George, an individualistic American reformer and economist, and Henry M. Hyndman, an English democratic Marxist, formed a tenuous alliance in 1882. It was based on their mutual advocacy of land nationalization and Irish land tenure reform. During the next few years, the tensions derived from differing weltanschauungen and from differing programmatic directions gradually weakened their mutual bond, despite a continual, but grudging, mutual personal regard.     

Henry George, Sun Yat-sen and China: More Than Land Policy Was Involved

A bstract . Sun Yat-sen repeatedly acknowledged the influence of Henry George , and this influence went beyond details of land policy. Significant parts of George's work involved his extensive references to China his diagnoses of China's ills, his vision of a possible better economic order , and his strong attack on the Malthusian theory. These too influenced Sun.     

The Economics of Henry George: A Review Essay

This is a welcome addition to the literature on Henry George. Bryson seeks to “rehabilitate” George—by highlighting his major achievements, by explaining why academic economists have rejected or neglected him, and by showing how nonetheless George has had a major but little‐acknowledged impact on economic thought.     

Value Capture as a Policy Tool in Transportation Economics: An Exploration in Public Finance in the Tradition of Henry George

Value capture is a means by which to finance capital infrastructure, particularly transportation services, in a way that allows for efficient economic performance, simple administration, financial justice, and social facility. Because American society needs to find new means to finance transportation capital investment, particularly public transit, value capture offers an essentially painless opportunity to achieve these goals. It has the ancillary benefit also of concentrating population densities in a way that makes public transit particularly viable. This study shows how value capture could have been used to finance a portion of the New York State Interstate Highway System, a nine-mile stretch of I-87 known as the Northway, from its southern terminus to the point where it crosses the Mohawk River in Albany County. This section is the most heavily traveled area of the Northway and has experienced the greatest contiguous development of any location along the Northway's 178 miles since its construction in the late 1950s. While the right of way and construction costs of this stretch were in the range of $128 million (current dollars), the additional land value that has been generated on its account within just two miles on either side has totaled $3.734 billion. This study shows that the capital finance of the Northway, at least in this area, could easily have been done by recapturing these windfall gains that fell to private landowners. One could argue that this added value, the direct result of public investment, should rightfully be returned to the public and should be recaptured to pay off the bonds that were issued to build the project, rather than left for opportunistic speculators to reap private gain. Value capture therefore offers a promising approach for funding future transportation development, leaving fees, that are presently used, to recover operating and environmental costs.