The Urban Dilemma!
“I cannot play upon any stringed instrument, but I can tell you how of a little village to make a great and glorious city” —Themistocles
For thousands of years cities have been the most valuable places to live and work. Why are so many old American cities now unable to make the transition from manufacturing to hightech and the service industries? Why are they unable to generate enough revenue to support their infrastructure, police, education and all public services?Why are they losing business, jobs, and affordable housing in a sea of empty buildings, and violent trash strewn slums?
Speaker: Mike Curtis
Buzz Ware Village Center
Wed. April 21, @ 7:30 P.M
Come and explore the idea of Incentive Taxation. How to make self supporting cities with an orderly development and ample revenue —- a model of efficiency that encourages people to invest in buildings, job creating enterprise, and affordable housing? How do we maximize the use, and therefore, minimize the cost of the infrastructure and public services?
Geonomics: Tuesday, May 11, 7:30 p.m.
Georgist Gild and G-3 will present a talk via Skype by Jeff Smith, President of the Forum for Geonomics on Tuesday, May 11 at 7:30 p.m. at the Buzz Ware Village Center The topic of his lecture is sharing earth’s worth to prosper and conserve. The world did not come without a way for people to prosper, and the planet to heal and stay well. That way is geonomics.
Economies are part of the ecosystem. Both generate surpluses and follow self-regulating feedback loops. A cycle like the Law of Supply and Demand is one of the economy’s on/off loops. Our spending for land and resources – things that nobody made and everybody needs – constitutes our society’s surplus. Those profits without production (remember, nobody produced Earth) can become our commonwealth. Refreshments will be served. Call Sadie for more information, 302 475-1745.
Meetings
The Georgist Gild meets the second Tuesday of each month at 7:30 p.m. at the Buzz Ware Village Center. Call 475-1745 to confirm or for more information.
What's New With The Georgists?
See the latest issue of the Arden Club Calendar.
The Causes of Economic Collapse
Are your jobs, wages, savings, and retirement
going down the drain? What caused it? You are invited to join a free seminar-style course. Learn how our social institutions have caused the economic crisis, the recession, and the underlining inequities in the distribution of wealth and opportunity. Consider the proposal of Henry George for a just and prosperous society. Based on Progress & Poverty by Henry George.
Introduction
to Henry George
and the Single Tax
Bob DeNigris, long-time trustee of Ardentown, has put together a few pages that succinctly recount the biography of Henry George and explain the simple idea behind the Single Tax. Click here to see those pages. Bob's recently published book, Henry George and the Single Tax, is available in the Arden Club Library.
Visit Birthplace of Henry George
You are also invited to visit the Birthplace of Henry George which is also the Henry George School of Philadelphia at 413 South 10th St, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania for their ongoing Saturday topical programs. Call Dan Sullivan (215) 922-4278 for 2004 schedule of topics. Free with free parking! Some great topics: How to fund transportation, untaxing the elderly, Free-trade fraud and more.
Click here to read a much-shortened version of Henry George's celebrated book, Progress and Poverty.
THE LANDLORD GAME
Click here to see a photo of the Georgist predecessor of the Monopoly(R) game. This board was hand-painted by Robert "Uncle Bob" Wollery back in 1903 or so and designed by a Mrs. Elizabeth Magie. Use your BACK key to return to this page. To learn more about the Landlord Game, visit http://www.historychannel.com/exhibits/toys/monopoly.html. or visit http://tt.tf/gamehist/articles/berks2boardwalk.html..
The Georgist Gild
We organize classes, seminars, and social events to encourage understanding and discussion of the economic theories of Henry George and their impact on the life and history of the three Ardens -- Arden, Ardentown, and Ardencroft. All are welcome to participate. Rollicking introductory classes to the social philosophy of Henry George is offered each fall.
LINKS
- The Henry George School of Social Science in Philadelphia:
www.geocities.com/henrygeorgeschool - The Robert Schalkenbach Foundation, New York, publisher of Henry George books and related works: www.schalkenbach.org
QUOTES AND BITS ABOUT HENRY GEORGE AND THE SINGLE TAX
Henry George and the Single Tax
Henry George believed that taxes should be levied only on the value of land, not on labor or capital. The SINGLE TAX, he asserted in his book "Progress and Poverty" would end unemployment, poverty, inflation and inequality.
From the Arden Leaves 1910:
1899- An idea that a community owning its land in common and exacting from the occupants thereof the full rental value, instead of the usual taxes upon industy and thrift, would offer to the individual, as tenant, a better hope for a successful pusuit of liberty and happiness than the present system, and to all individuals, as landlords, a better, healthier, saner, community life.
1900- The idea plus 162 acres of neglected and all but abandoned land, six miles north of Wilmington, in a region where progress was marching no more.
1910- The same land transformed by the idea into a thriving village of more than 70 homes. Every plot of land leased to a prospective homebuilder, a village without debt, with upward of one thousand dollars to spend for public improvements in 1911, and with no landlords except themselves as a community.
Between 1894-1950, seventeen land trusts were started by Georgists and referred to as Enclaves of Economic Rent. Fairhope, Alabama was the first; Arden was second and Ardencroft was number seventeen.
“The tax upon land values is the most just and equal of all taxes. It falls only upon those who receive from society a peculiar and valuable benefit, and upon them in proportion to the benefit they receive.It is the taking by the community for the use of the community of that value which is the creation of the community. It is the application of the common property to common uses. When all rent is taken by taxation for the needs of the community, then will the equality ordained by nature be attained.” --Henry George, Progress and Poverty.
“To those who, seeing the vice and misery that spring from the unequal distribution of wealth and privilege, feel the possibility of a higher social state and would strive for its attainment.” --Quote from Henry George from the front page of his book, Progress and Poverty, San Francisco, California, 1879.