Single tax is a type of property tax. The term is usually applied to a system of land taxation that was supported in the late 1800’s by Henry George, an American social reformer. The single tax system was never put into general use.
Henry George said that a tax on land should be the only source of money for the government. He believed that landowners receive all the wealth from the use of their land, but do nothing to earn the wealth. A small plot of rocky soil on the point of New York City’s Manhattan Island is worth a fortune solely because millions of people live there. This increased value of land is due not to the owner’s effort but to population growth and other factors beyond the owner’s control. It is called unearned increment.
Single taxers argue that since the whole population gives the land its value, the whole population should share it. They urge that the government should, by taxation, take the entire unearned increment from land and use it for the public good. However, most economists doubt that a single tax would provide enough funds to pay all the government’s expenses.
