THE OCCUPATION OF PROPERTY
[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.] SIR,—At the present time civilized communities collect public revenues by means of rates and taxes levied on (1) occupation of property, (2) incomes, (8) production and exchange of commodities, (4) estates at the death of their owner. Under these fiscal laws producers are, at times, driven to destroy their coffee, their sugar, their corn and other useful commodi- ties, even in the midst of hungry populations.
A new tax imposed on the price or rent obtainable for vacant land, regulated to ensure that the proprietors occupy, rent or sell, all such unproductive areas, would reduce the rates and taxes now levied on occupied property and productive enterprises, and thus very greatly increase the numbers of prosperous occupying owners and tenants, to the benefit of the community as a whole.—I am, Sir, &c.,
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