Tag Archives: Issue #124

Land Is More Important than Money

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by Lindy Davies

The contention that “debt money” can only be paid back with money which has itself been loaned into existence, therefore creating an ever-expanding debt that can never be fully paid, is — despite its increasing popularity — fallacious. As Fred Foldvary explained (in GJ #122), the credit-worthiness of borrowers is carefully evaluated by lenders. Borrowers can pay back their loans either by producing more wealth than they have borrowed, or consuming less (or some combination of the two) — thus having enough left over to pay back the loan with interest. If every single borrower is capable of repaying his or her loan with interest, how then can the whole society be unable to repay its debts? Continue reading …

José Marti and Henry George

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by Bill Batt

An opportunity arose this past June to join an educational visit to Cuba under the sponsorship of The Nation magazine. For eight days some 24 subscribers and staff of this weekly had an extraordinary entrée to political insiders, academics and journalists. Cuba is experiencing a socio-political transformation, and there is good reason to believe that the veneration of José Martí can be linked with interest in Henry George. Continue reading …

Piketty’s Model of Inequality and Growth in Historical Context

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by Polly Cleveland

In Thomas Piketty’s doomsday model, slowing of growth in the twenty-first century will cause an inexorable increase in inequality. Piketty is not the first to propose a grand model of inequality and growth. To get some perspective on his model, let’s take a brief look at what the “classical” economists had to say, and how the “neoclassical” economists responded. Continue reading …

The Persistent Importance of Land in the Irish Psyche

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by John Engle

Land holds a special place in the national psyche of the Irish people. Henry George recognized this fact through his involvement in the Irish Land League movement in America, and during a period spent as a correspondent writing from Ireland. He recognized in the plight of the Irish the plight of all peoples kept from free access to land. Continue reading …

Rent — or Tax? Radical Land Reform by Its only Realistic Route

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by Shirley-Anne Hardy

The Editor’s comments in the Spring Issue on whether a movement or an organization best serves Georgists’ efforts brought to my mind a remarkable article written many decades ago. “Prisoners of the Organization or Servants of the Spirit” by W. J. Brown (an M.P., and so, knowing whereof he spoke) published in The Spectator in 1949. Brown unfolded how irremediably, simply on account of its hierarchical structure, an organization formed to promote the noblest of ideas comes eventually to betray it. The preservation of the organization itself, presenting the idea, becomes in time the ultimate priority. Continue reading …