POV-RED: The Geonomist

[Jeffery J SMITH <geonomist@juno.com>]

Hello, everyone;

The McKeever Essay Contest (out of Berkeley, California) chose my entry
on sustainable development of cities and nations. The ideas therein
constitute a new approach dubbed "geonomics". Several global conferences
have over the years invited me to deliver the paper. Copies are
available.

Here in Portland, Oregon we're organizing a unique eco-city conference
for 2006 (making ecology and economy sustainable). If you have ideas for
making conferences unique, don't hesitate to get in touch.

Broad ownership of capital (physical, not fiscal) rests upon broad
ownership of land. Look at the UN or World Bank GINI quotients ranking
nations by land ownership, then look at the list of countries ranked by
poverty/development (and human rights abuses); you see them running in
opposite directions, negatively correlated, to drop into economese.

Look at the best examples of development - Taiwan and Costa Rica - and
find wide distribution of land (they're not paradise; they still have
serious problems). The overlooked key in Taiwan was a land tax, which
Madero recommended in Mexico, and got himself assassinated for. Four
other times and places, using a land-value tax to recover more natural
rents broke up huge plantations into family farms without bloodshed,
providing the groundwork for eradicating poverty.

Education helps. In Denmark a century and a half ago, the people
promoting a tax on land value to break up huge fiefdoms allied with the
"Folk School Movement", the forerunner to public education. Upon
graduation, they gave their adult students tracts to read on the reform
of land and taxes. Adopting a land-value tax around 1840, Denmark went on
to enjoy the highest rate of owner-occupied farms in Europe and a
thriving dairy industry for which they're still famous.

We need to articulate clearly and forcefully the right to a fair share of
land and to a fair share of "rent", all the money we spend on the nature
we use plus the enormous economic value of government-granted privileges
like corporate charters, broadcast licenses, utilty franchises, etc.
Winning public acceptance of this right leads to the reform of taxes and
subsidies which leads to an end of poverty everywhere.

I attended the first World Social Forum. What a pleasant blend of chaos
and enthusiasm. There I gave a talk on the above. Ciao.

SMITH, Jeffery J.
President, Geonomy Society, www.progress.org/geonomy
Share Earth's worth to prosper and conserve.

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