Common Ground USA is an all-volunteer organization that promotes land value tax shifts, rent-sharing land trusts, and other commons-based approaches to social, environmental and economic issues.
From the Common Ground USA Blog
Member of California Assembly introduces LVT study legislation
We are excited to announce that Assemblymember Alex Lee (D-San José) has recently introduced legislation to study the potential shift from antiquated property tax to land value taxation in California.
Land value taxation is a system where taxes are levied based on the value of land, rather than the value of buildings or improvements on the land. This system has been successful in cities around the world and has been shown to encourage economic growth, reduce poverty, and improve public services.
My Interview with Henry George (sort of)
Fans of Henry George will be happy to know that the virtual Henry George is as sure and confident in his answers as the human version was.
I couldn’t capture the voice option here (to my knowledge, there are no recordings of George actually speaking), but you can judge for yourself how close to human Henry George was in the text answers below:
No Silver Bullets to the Werewolf Crisis
Mark Coopersmith gaveled the town meeting to order. “Ladies and Gentlemen, what are we going to do about the werewolf crisis? Every full moon, this town is attacked by invincible supernatural werewolves that murder people and then eat them.” A few hands went up. “Yes,...
CGUSA Member Lars Doucet Interviewed About His Book on Land Value Taxation, Georgism
Watch CGUSA member Lars Doucet speak about his book, land value taxation, how land is valued, and more!
Detroit effort to shift taxation onto land value highlights a national movement
Detroit has been branded as a lost city. Once an urban jewel of the Great Lakes region, the city’s reign as the Motor Capital has gone the way of MoTown Records, a relic of the past. But that might not remain the case for long.
Our Warm Future
Georgism is named for Henry George who was a newspaper editor in San Francisco in the 1870s and wondered how can California be so rich and yet have so many poor people? Why is wealth being concentrated in so few? George came to realize that land owners had a monopoly: they owned land and the poor stayed poor because they had to rent from the land owners. And since there is a limited supply of land, the price of land rises and the land owners get rich. George published his ideas in a top selling book “Progress and Poverty”, ran for President and died in New York in 1897.
Recent
Research
Setting up a Rent-sharing Farm Trust in Minnesota
A report prepared on behalf of Common Ground USA
The Power of Land Value Taxation to Spur “Missing Middle” Housing