Henry George or Thomas Piketty - Who is your Favorite Egalitarian Economist?

by Hank Pellissier

Henry George and Thomas Piketty are hugely similar in two important ways:

1) Both George’s treatise Progress and Poverty (1879) and Piketty’s Capital in the 21st Century (2014) were international best-selling economics books in their era.

2) Both thinkers were primarily interested in reducing inequality via egalitarian access to finances; they both wanted to narrow the wealth gap with their progressive reforms.

George and Piketty desired the same result, but their proposals to achieve this differed. Interest in Piketty’s solutions, delineated recently in his Capital and Ideology (2019), have renewed consideration of George’s ideas.

Below I have presented ten policies of each reformer:

GEORGISM

George viewed land as “common property.” To distribute land fairly, he wanted a single tax on land value (LVT); he regarded the capture of ‘ground rent’ as justified because land value should be shared with all citizens. He believed LVT would encourage development, end land speculation, and raise wages.

George believed a “single tax” on land value would eliminate the need to tax labor (productive activity) and all other taxes.

George supported right-of-way land privileges in the transport of water, electricity, sewage systems, telecommunications, travelers, and goods - he believed this transport should be provided to the public for free or at low cost.

George wanted to abolish or limit intellectual property privileges and limit copyright.

George supported free trade; he was opposed to tariffs.

George wanted campaign finance reform.

George wanted the government to eliminate corporate monopolies, with nationalization as an option.

George wanted to reduce the military budget.

George wanted free public transportation.

George wanted surplus funds from the LVT to provide a “citizen’s dividend” - universal basic income (UBI).

PIKETTISM

Piketty focuses on taxing the wealthy elite via a very sharp rise in progressive income tax and a tax on inherited wealth.

Piketty wants corporate bosses to share power with workers, for near equal footing and “true social ownership of capital.”

Piketty wants tax revenue should support a universal basic income (UBI) that would be 60% of average adult’s net worth.

Piketty wants tax revenue to give a “capital endowment” of $231,000 to every citizen when they turn twenty-five years old.

Piketty wants universal health care, and free higher education.

Piketty wants international cooperation to end offshore tax havens. (He claims 10% of global monetary assets are presently hidden).

Piketty wants to replace nation-states with “vast transnational democracy” that results in “free circulation of people, and de facto abolition of borders.”

Piketty wants to raise minimum wages and expand rent control.

Pikettism makes it almost impossible to own more than $38 million in the USA (this is 100X average individual wealth).

Pikettism would collect 50% of the national income annually, an estimated $10 trillion (3X higher than present)

Dear Reader - do you prefer Henry George’s ideas, or Thomas Piketty’s? Are you a Georgist, a Pikettist, both, or neither? Do you prefer some ideas of both egalitarians, but not the whole packages?