TAXING ON UNIMPROVED VALUES.

Waikato Argus, Volume XI, Issue 1048, 14 September 1901, Page 4

TAXING ON UNIMPROVED VALUES.

TO THE EDITOR. Sir,--Mr Webb states that he is well satisfied with the report of the Royal Commission on local taxation, and he quotes the following ‘We hold that the primary principles to be aimed at are; (1) ‘That persons should contribute, as far as it is reasonably practicable, to ‘ onerous ’ expenditure, according to their ability to pay. 1 How docs this square with the proposal of the Single Taxers to confiscate the farms of hardworking dairy farmers near Auckland (who are working 14 and 15 hours a day) by imposing a tax of £250 a year upon them, while professional men, earning ten times their income, would not be called, on to pay a tithe of that amount? Under the Single Tax some of the Maugere dairy farmers would bo called upon to pay over £270 a year, which would absorb the whole of their profits and leave them nothing whatever to live upon; while, if the present syste n of periodically raising the unimproved values continues, they might look forward to having this annual tax of £270 increased every few years. How the farmer is to pay this crushing tax (ranging in Mangere up to £3 per acre) and provide for his family, is a matter cf detail, while the Single Taxer does not condescend to explain.—lam, etc., A Small Land Owner. Mangere, September 12, 1901.