Exactly… no zoning is the best zoning! You wanna be low density, but out all the land and pay for it. If the market supports low density, so be it.

In terms of property tax, I thought there was some research that the best way to do that was actually irrespective of the development on top of it? I think the idea being that would encourage development because you’re not taxed on the improvements? Or maybe I’ve got it backwards.

Yes, that's the whole point of Land Value Tax, you tax only the value of the "unimproved land". This incentivizes density since the tax can be distributed among all the tenants.

Honestly CA should propose replacing the mess that is property taxes, prop 13, and it's follow ups, with a LVT that is a net neutral revenue for the state. For 90% of people that would be a tax cut, for those who wish to underuse valuable space, they can pay for it.

> Honestly CA should propose replacing the mess that is property taxes, prop 13, and it's follow ups, with a LVT that is a net neutral revenue for the state. For 90% of people that would be a tax cut

I think it's close to “for 90% of people who pay property tax that would be a tax increase”; the people it will be a tax cut for are the people with relatively high improvement value on their land compared to the bare land value, like corporate HQs and landlords of high density apartment complexes.

Prop 13 is very difficult to have an exit strategy for because people feel entitled to their feudal (and inheritable) tax rates. The idea that a $2 million home should be treated as a $100,000 one for taxes is laughably wrong, but the people who have enjoyed that benefit for years will be permanently against any politician who changes it.

I disagree with the 90% number for the LVT switch on multiple fronts: for starters all the people with historical discounts will pay more. Secondly, the typical SFH pays more and there is a lot of SFH in California.

LVT is still worth doing but making it actually happen is politically difficult in the best of states and California is the worst one due to Prop 13.

It is a tax cut for property owners and a tax raise for land owners, yes that is the entire point, to make housing cheaper by taxing it less and taxing the location monopoly more. Of course anyone who speculated on higher land prices gets screwed over, that is the point as well.

You seem to be ignoring that the presence of the corporate HQ raises land values across the entire city. Landlords of high density apartment complexes should be applauded for not wasting precious land in locations where many people want to live in, using land wastefully increases rental payments and causes homelessness.

> It is a tax cut for property owners and a tax raise for land owners, yes that is the entire point, to make housing cheaper by taxing it less and taxing the location monopoly more.

But...California has a tiny overall property tax rate. A revenue neutral change to an LVT (unless it's revenue neutral on the far side of the Laffer Curve) might better meet some abstract concept of fairness better, but isn't going to have a meaningul impact on price of... anything.

I don't know about the percentages, but I think the majority of people who would see a tax cut are those who bought property in the past 10 years at inflated prices. The people hurt the most will be those who've been living in the same home they purchased 40 years ago, and are clinging to their tax assessment that's orders of magnitudes behind what the current assessed value would be.

There are ways to fix that too with gradual phase-ins, not allowing people to pass their tax assessment on to their heirs, etc. But anyone who stands to inherit property will vote against such a move, and most people who will be passing along that property will vote the same way.

Is the idea of taxing land to discourage ownership or is it to fund local services to insure that the rich have the best schools, police, fire and utilities while maintaining an air of equality?

Why is regressive property tax better than the progressive income tax?

The idea is to encourage people to use land more efficiently. Sure, you can buy a 2-acre plot and put a single-family home on it, but you're going to pay handsomely for the privilege. If you put a duplex on that lot and sell the second unit, your tax burden gets cut in half. Or put a 10-unit condo building on it and each owner only has to pay a tenth of the total.

If you also tax the improvements to the land, you discourage people from building denser housing on it, because the tax itself goes up the more you build.

You can make land value taxes more progressive than income taxes by paying out a citizen's dividend.