The Dog in the Manger
 The expression "dog in the manger" refers to one of Aesop's fables, in which a dog, who didn't want hay, nevertheless commandeered a manger, refusing to let the other animals eat. That's an apt description of the economic role of land speculators. Not ready, or willing, to use the land they hold, they deny its use to others, and the whole community suffers. Students who are eager to solve social problems might be inclined to seize on the land speculator as a villain to go after!
Who Are the Land Speculators?
Land speculation was an explicit "occupation" in the early days of the United States, and the vast North American continent was being emptied of native peoples and opened for settlement. Nowadays, though, land speculation so thoroughly pervades our economy that it's just about meaningless to try to identify "land speculators" as a group. Because land is necessary for all production, land's tendency to increase in value bears on many, many economic decisions. As Prof. Mason Gaffney asks, "How do investors react to a set of incentives where expected changes in land value are made part of the overall return on investment — and land price is part of the investment on which return is figured?"
Probably the largest overall set of participants in today's land speculation game are the roughly 65% of US families who own their homes. (Of course, when we say "own", we understand that to mean "hold some equity in" and "are making mortgage payments on".) Homeowners make interest payments far in excess of the selling price of their real estate. They are encouraged by Federal tax policy to do this, for mortgage interest is tax deductible, whereas rent payments are not. However, the only reason people are willing to take out a mortgage is that they expect their real estate value to increase over time. Most Americans do little or no saving (and have done progressively less saving in recent years). Some 65% of US households, then, are counting on land speculation for their retirement nest-egg.
Corporations are also major land speculators. Land makes up a significant portion of corporate assets, and land rent is a big part of corporate profits. Corporations own concentrations of pricey urban land, as well as vast acreages of farm, timber and mineral lands. This is not usually emphasized, but it is a huge part of doing business. It comes into clear focus in the case of corporate buyouts financed by high-interest "junk bonds". How could such deals be profitable? Easy — when the buyer liquidates the bought-out company's under-valued real estate, suddenly there's plenty of cash!
Corporate control of land is not just the province of the super-rich. Many citizens don't put all their retirement eggs in the real-estate basket; they invest, either singly or via pension funds, in stock markets (such investment, if used to save for retirement, also receives favorable tax treatment). Thus, the majority of people in the United States, and in other modern economies, have a personal stake in the economic status quo. Whether they realize it or not, they are all playing the land speculation game! (Undoubtedly this has something to do with why a widespread appreciation of Henry George's insight has been so hard to achieve.)
What Does Land Speculation Do?
Although the effects of land speculation on our economy and society are dramatic, they are so much a part of the normal state of affairs that they are sometimes hard to identify. Like the old "cat picture" that Georgists refer to, the economic role of land is profoundly obvious, if only one can see it at all. Examples abound. For now, it will suffice to mention the four main types of effect that land speculation has: 1) on economic efficiency; 2) on the environment; 3) on community; and 4) on poverty.
Economic Efficiency
The land speculator stands to benefit from long-term increase in land value — but during that time, labor and capital, that would have been willing to put that land to its best economic use, must go elsewhere, farther from the centers of population and exchange. This decreases overall production every single time it happens. An economy that got rid of land speculation could produce far more goods and services, with the same resources, and less pollution. Here's a chart showing how this process works.
The Environment
The most visible effect of land speculation is the epidemic of suburban sprawl. High rents and poor public services in urban centers lead to the syndrome of "urban blight, suburban flight". Public infrastructure decays in cities, while new tax revenues must be raised to provide it to ever-wider areas. The overall number of highways and vehicle-miles increase, along with all the concomitant pollution. Many people are concerned about the problem of climate change, and seek ways to reduce our overall consumption of fossil fuels — but there is little chance of doing so in an economy characterized by sprawl, and dependence on personal automobiles. Improved public transportation could greatly reduce overall pollution — but when cities are strapped for revenue, and taxpayers are fleeing to the suburbs, who is going to pay for it?
Community
The suburban sprawl/freeway commute lifestyle is also felt by many to be stultifying. People lament the loss of "community", of ways of living that seemed friendlier and more connected with neighbors, schools, hometowns, etc. Some move away from the megalopolis to rural areas that seem "unspoiled" — yet these migrations bring on sprawl pressures of their own, and soon new freeways, beltways and shopping malls spring up to serve the influx.
The apparent "inhumanity" and "dysfunction" of modern communities has led to a movement for "smart growth" and "new urbanism". Advocates seek to design communities for mixed uses, with homes located close to employers and shopping areas. Streets are designed to be pedestrian-friendly, green and welcoming; local services are provisioned to facilitate civic pride and involvement. When such places are established, they often become highly desirable places to live. When that happens, their land values skyrocket, and they become exclusive enclaves! It begins to seem as though our economy can only provide clean, sensible human-scale community to those who can pay premium prices.
Poverty
As we pointed out above, a large segment of the people in a modern economy have some stake in the economic status quo, and therefore, indirectly, participate in land speculation themselves. But, of course, a larger — and growing — segment of the people do not. It is, perhaps, part of the genius of modern "mixed" economies that the benefits of land and its rent have come to be enjoyed by many more than just a tiny elite (as is still the case in less-developed countries). Through the widespread availability of home mortgages, and participation in stock markets, the unearned income from land has been spread around among a large group in society. Their benefits, however, have come at the expense of the people who do not have access to land and its rent. In Progress and Poverty, Henry George wrote of "an immense wedge ...being forced, not underneath society, but through society. Those who are above the point of separation are elevated, but those who are below are crushed down."
Consider the widespread availability of home mortgages, which are actually subsidized in various ways by the Federal government. If more people are able to buy land, then land prices go up — raising the rent for people who cannot afford to buy real estate. When the market for individually-owned homes is strong, the market for rental housing is depressed, decreasing its supply and further increasing rents for those who have no other choice.
This example from housing markets is, of course, only a part of the overall tendency for private land-withholding to create poverty. Its most important effect is still to lower the margin of production, denying labor and capital an alternative place to produce wealth, forcing them to come to market for whatever they can get. In our next section, "Land Speculation and the Boom/Bust Cycle", we'll further explore the modern ramifications of land speculation — including its effect on society's chronic tug-of-war between inflation and unemployment.
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