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Comment by gr__or | Hacker News Reader

Implementation is also the only aspect that makes me question LVT, otherwise I'm pretty much sold (not an unimportant aspect it is).

Wrt "even ones in which the tenants built the house": For me the baseline of implementing LVT is that ppl don't have to pay it for their primary housing (or a much lowered version of it). Is that controversial?

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That addresses one issue, but I think you end up with similar (or worse) problems we have now w.r.t. housing density, where someone keeps their dingy old single story house in a valuable up and coming downtown neighborhood because they gain nothing by leaving it. At least in our current system, they can sell the property for a big profit if they aren't stubborn. This might even slow down densification more, since the only way rational people will leave land of increasing value is dying.

Overall, I think there are so many impracticalities and second-order problems with implementing LVT that it seems like nothing more than a fantasy mental exercise.

I think that would be the way to start an implementation - have a generous enough homestead allowance that it really only affects investors and commercial interests.

Of course, remember that apartment buildings are commercial businesses…

Also excluding homesteads destroys the public schools, because they’re often in areas that really only have houses and a Walmart or two, and if the entire property tax burden is transferred to the Walmart it’ll just close.

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