What are the ethics of: 

I. The single tax?  The single-tax idea is that all the public revenue should be raised by a land tax.  The push behind the movement comes from the sight of the unearned fortunes that have been made out of land.  The term is used loosely by some to mean merely the taking or taxing by the State, as we have already suggested, of all future unearned increments of land value, so far as they can be computed.  But, this would not now provide enough revenue for most communities, and so would not really make possible a single tax.  The real single tax would involve taking in taxation not only future increases in values, but all the rental value of land.  Even this would not always produce revenue enough, as the needs of public revenue bear no relation to the land values in a given area.  But it would in most places produce considerably more than enough revenue.  Land taxes in New York City, for example, if trebled, would supply all the revenue; they would have to be quintupled to absorb the entire rental value of the land the city stands on.  The simplicity of the scheme appeals to many-especially to those who own no land.  But it amounts to a confiscation of land values by the State, which would be unjust to land-owners, however advantageous to the rest of the community.  It means charging everybody rent for the land he now owns.  Present tenants would be no worse off, but present owners of the land they use, as well as landlords, would be hard hit.  Let us consider each in turn.

A considerable proportion of the land is owned by the users, the majority of whom are members of the middle class and but moderately well to do.  Upon them the burden of supporting our increasing public undertakings would largely fall.  But why?  They are not getting any unearned income.  They have, in most cases, paid pretty nearly full value for their land, even though that land was originally acquired for little or nothing.  They have put their earnings into land in good faith, when they might have put it into industry or enjoyed its use.  The single tax would work grave injustice to them.  It would also be practically inexpedient, in drawing the public revenue largely from a class that can less afford it, while leaving hardly touched most of the bigger fortunes, which consist seldom chiefly of land oldings.  But even as to that part of the land that is bringing unearned income to landlords is it fair to stop that income unless we stop all other forms of income on investment?  One man has put his fortune into stocks or bonds; he draws his five per cent in security with no further trouble than clipping coupons; another, having put an equal fortune into land, finds his five per cent income entirely confiscated.  Not by such class legislation can justice be served or equality produced.  The landlord class deserves no worse than the stockholder class or the investor in a savings bank.  It is fair, as we suggested above, to put an end to all incomes from investment, and make every man live on his earnings; it is not fair to pick out landlords for exploitation.