Today there is great concern over the environment -- pollution of land, air and water, industrial wastes, over-development, destruction of nature. With the advent of global environmental problems, environmentalism is no longer a local concern. "NIMBY" (not in my back yard) is no longer possible in many cases. There is widespread fear that the earth couldn't stand the strain, if the developing nations were to create a comparable level of pollution, per capita, to that of the Northern industrial nations.

Much environmental devastation is caused by our system of land tenure. As a community grows, large areas are held for speculation. This results in "leap-frog" development, with people moving further out to find affordable land. Thus all the facilities needed for a growing population are stretched out and made more expensive -- transportation, utilities, water supply, garbage disposal, markets and other requirements.

If this condition were corrected, people and industries could move out from the centers of population at a more normal pace, making unnecessary the waste and expense, and a premature invasion of nature. The transportation sector now accounts for about 70% of the oil use in the United States. Tremendous amounts of energy conservation that would result from "infill development," reversing the march of suburban sprawl. Efficient public transportation could be funded by the very land rents that it would help to create.

Land value taxation would make this condition possible, as people could then acquire sites closer to the centers more cheaply. Furthermore, people could enjoy both the advantages of urban culture as well as proximity to nature, instead of, as now, either being crowded in the city or settled so far away that urban amenities are not conveniently available.

Environmental problems are exacerbated where land monopoly is at its worst. In Brazil, the destruction of the rain forest is deplored. People crowded in urban slums go to farm these areas, not well suited for agriculture, because prime agricultural land is owned by a few latifundistas. An application of land value taxation would improve this situation. Better land would become available without having to resort to the rain forest.

The "Dover Jail Single Tax Club", part of a group of "depraved and irrepressible vagabonds" who traveled up and down the state of Delaware in the 1890s trying to convince the citizens to adopt the Single Tax statewide. Although these "pests of society" failed in their great goal, they did, apparently, have a great time. And one part of their legacy -- Delaware's "single tax colony" of Arden, thrives to this day.

We also find that in African countries whole communities of people are forced onto poor land not suitable for habitation by the dominant ruling cliques. The plight of the disinherited people is often attributed to overpopulation or overuse of land, but the real cause is land monopoly.

Often, measures advanced by environmentalists to improve the situation would require much regulation and restriction of individual liberty, along with a degree of monitoring that would become increasingly difficult to attain. Under land value taxation, and relief from other taxes, good environmental standards would be easier to attain. A greater sense of community and voluntary observance could be relied on, instead of increasing regulations imposed by government.

People are deeply concerned about the consequences of reliance upon fossil fuels, and hope to shift to renewable, less-polluting energy sources. Land value taxation would provide a significant incentive in this direction. At the current state of technology, resources such as solar power are not yet cost-competitive with fossil fuels. However, the energy industries receive various indirect subsidies, and the techniques for utilizing coal and oil have been refined for over a hundred years. A major cause of this has been the capacity to own the potential energy resources themselves, in the ground. It is not possible to own the sun! Profits from oil and coal come largely from land, whereas profits from various forms of solar energy come almost exclusively from capital. An economic system that collected ground rent, and removed the tax burden from labor and capital, would put solar energy on a more equal footing with entrenched -- but environmentally destructive -- fossil fuels.

A public revenue system which captures resource rents and does not penalize capital equipment would provide incentives for the development of "micropower" -- equpiment which would allow individual households to utilize the most appropriate renewable energy sources in their particular location.

Environmentalists need to learn the remedy of the collection of land rent for public revenue as a way to create the economic incentives that will allow us to tackle our environmental problems.