My first instinct is “yes” but then I thought about it and I think it’s just going to exacerbate the short-stay problem unless combined with other measures.
My first instinct is “yes” but then I thought about it and I think it’s just going to exacerbate the short-stay problem unless combined with other measures.
So what is your argument here, that people who got asset rich through no effort of their own should have that wealth protected so their kids can inherit as much as possible? Is it ok to tax someone if they worked hard to earn the money to buy a $1 million dollar home today, but if you got lucky in the past you should be tax exempt? Tying up your assets in your home already has some major tax benefits - it is exempt from capital gains tax, and barely counts towards the age pension.
Yes there need to be corresponding changes to allow for things like putting off the tax until the home is sold, but I don’t think we should rule out changes to the tax system because your hypothetical home owner didn’t intend to earn 970,000 profit when they bought their home. Perhaps we could also make a change so that this hypothetical pensioner could sell their quarter acre block and move into somewhere smaller that they can more easily maintain, freeing up some of that money so they can actually spend it, without losing most/all of their pension because the same wealth is now “liquid wealth”.
My argument is merely that a flat land tax is not as fair as it sounds on the face of it. There are issues with it - and if the intent is to replace stamp duty with a land tax, that’s a total non-starter for most of the country: since stamp duty has been privatised.
I’m certainly not qualified to produce a solution to the problem.