The New Zealand Times. MONDAY, MAY 31, 1920. PASSING IT ON

New Zealand Times, Volume XLVI, Issue 10603, 31 May 1920, Page 4

The New Zealand Times. MONDAY, MAY 31, 1920. PASSING IT ON

Tlio unimproved land value of New Zealand is shown by the cuiyent official “Monthly Abstract of Statistics” to be rather more than 1:27d,812,000.. In 1914 tho unimproved value of tho land was some £228,493,000, while in 1910 it was £173,239,000. Practically within the war period, therefore, our unimproved land values hate increased by over 47 millions sterling, while during tho past ten yearn they have risen hv upwards of 100 millions. In the past live years, that is to say, tho unimproved land values of this country have .increased sufficiently to cover practically one-half of New Zealand s share of the cost of tho war; and in the past nine years the increase that has taken place amounts to the sum total of the pre-war debt of the Dominion. It is well known, however, that in many districts tho land valuations are very out-of-date. In some districts, indeed, they date back as far as the ’nineties of last century; and it is very sure that if* the whole of tho valuations wore brought thoroughly up to date they would ho nearer 350 millions than 275 millions; if, indeed, they do not exceed the former sum. This means that the land monopolist? aro escaping taxation on something like £50,000,000 .to £!o,000,000. As a matter of fact, Sir Joseph Ward showed in tho House of Representatives last soniion that in the Hawke’s Bay district alone, the landholders had escaped taxation during the war period on an increased value of no lea? than £9,000,000. The seriousness of tho position, of course, lies in the fact that to whatever extent the big landholders escape paying what they ought to pay, those less well able to pay must necessarily pay in taxation more than they ought to pay.

It may, of course, bo objected that present land values are to a very largo extent speculative; and it must .at onco be admitted that that is undoubtedly the case. But tho objection provokes the very obvious rejoinder—Why, especially in view of the great need for settling returned soldiers and others on the land, have tho land monopolists, the land aggregators, and the land speculators been permitted to inflate so seriously tho price of land? It would be interesting indeed to sec Mr Massey, with hand on heart, not with tongue in cheek, endeavouring to honestly explain tho reason why. Such inflation could never have occurred if, in the first place, the primary producers had been debarred, as well they might, from pocketing so many tens of millions of war profits, and, if, in the second place, the big land monopolists had been called upon, by an*adcquate increase of the land tax, to pay their full, fair share of the cost of tho war. On this point a few comparative figures should prove at once interesting and instructive. In 1914 Customs and Excise duties raised £3,553,000, or 60.05 per cent, of the revenue; the land tax £707,000, or 12.97 per cent.; and the income tax £354,000, or 9.37 per cent.; whereas in 1919 Customs and Excise taxes realised £4,104,000, or 29.74 per cent, of 'tho revenue; tho land tax £1,512,000, or 10.96 per cent.; and the income tax £6,219,000, or 45.06 per cent. Thus, while the land tax was less than doubled, tho ; income tax was increased considerably more than elevenfold. The land tax has, indeed, sunk from 12.97 per cent.—(it was 15.13 per cent, in 1910) —to only 10.96 per cent, of tho revenue; whereas the income tax has risen from 9.37 per cent, to over 45 per cent, of the revenue. It will, of course, bo pointed out that in the same period Customs and Excise have fallen from over 60 per cent, of the revenue to rather loss than 30 pet cent.; but, as against this, three very important considerations must be taken into account—(l) that tho groat mass of the people, who pay the bulk of the Customs taxation, have been hardest hit by the huge war-increaso in rents and prices; (2) that wholesalers’ and retailors’ profits on Customs and Excise taxes’ will make tho actual burden of such taxation not £4,101,000, but at least £6,500,000, or some £300,000 a year more than the income tax; and (3) that, to the extent that it falls upon trade and industry, the income tax is passed, with profits added, on to the consumers, the great mass of whom are already overtaxed through Customs and Excise. Mr Massey himself has repeatedly stated that all taxes in the long run arc passed on to the consumer. This is true of Customs and Excise taxes, and true to a very- largo extent of the income tax. It may bo to a certain extent true also of the death duties, • which, by the way, fell during the war period from 10.37. per cent, of the revenue (£613,000) in 1914 to only 0.30 per cent. (£869,000) in 1910. But it most emphatically is not true of the land tax. The land tax is, in fact, tho one tax whigh undoubtedly “stays put,” and cannot bo passed on. Hence the consistent and vehement hostility of the big interests and of tho party of big interests, the Reform' party, to tho land tax. Hence, also, tho readiness of the Reform party to consent to tho increase of the income tax by more than elevenfold; hence reluctance to increase tho land tax from £767,000 to a paltry £1,512,000; and hence its desire, now that the war is over, to increase the Customs taxes and reduce the land tax. Hcwcc, too,

tho anxiety of the Reform party to conceal from the people of the Dominion tho very unequal manner in which tho unimproved land value of tho country—“the communal value,” ns Mr Asquith has called it—is distributed amongst the various classes of landholders. Can it he for this reason that the latest “Official Y'ear Book” contain** absolutely no information whatever upon a point of such vital interest to the whole, community ?