Ireland is unusual among industrialised countries in that it has no property tax. But that is about to change – and the type of property tax that is brought in will be crucial to Ireland’s future. This new book from the Smart Taxes Network and Feasta explains how a poorly-designed property tax could bring about a second massive transfer of wealth from the 99% to the 1%. A Site Value Tax would be vastly preferable, and the book convincingly shows how easy it would be to assess and implement.

Professor Frank Convery believes that Irish people will never accept land value taxation even though it is the best kind of property tax:  and he knows it is because he participated in the EEA conference of environmental taxation in Dublin 2010, which showcased site value tax as an ‘environmental tax’.  Maybe he thinks Irish people are too thick to get the message of what is in their interest.  It might help if they were actually given the information and offered the choice, don’t you think?

Smart Taxes made the submission to the special Expert Group set up to deliver a Property Tax for Ireland. It is by no means a done deal that we will get a Site Value Tax for Ireland, but it is looking more and more likely. Lets allow ourselves to hope that one lasting and transformative ‘good thing’ comes out of the financial and fiscal debacle.

Ronan Lyons’s report on Site Value Tax in Ireland is available for download. The report assesses the obstacles to implementing SVT in Ireland and how these can be overcome. It also assesses the revenue potential of the tax and the distribution of land values in Ireland.

The Irish economy needs stimulus and the most effective way to do this is to implement an immediate jobs program backed by newly issued, low-yield tax-backed Jobs Bonds. This will provide the financing necessary for such a program without adding to Ireland’s already substantial interest burden. [...]

Site Value Tax is a tax policy proposed by Smart Taxes Network. It would be an annual charge on zoned land, based on its market value, which would fund government expenditure and encourage productive and sustainable investment. Smart Taxes have created this brochure to offer a clear and simple explanation of what the tax is, how it works and the benefits it offers.

What would happen if, instead of the European Central Bank providing liquidity to private banks in order to ward off financial collapse, it provided funding to mobilise a green workforce to tackle urgent environmental challenges? The salaries would effectively transfuse local economies and the scheme has precedence in the Common Agricutural Policy which already pays farmers to protect the environment. This Irish adaptation of the Job Guarantee developed by Modern Monetary theorists in the US is proposed by Emer O’Siochru in an article on the Smart Taxes Network website.