A plan for “untaxing” the working class

untax the poor, tax land

Letter to the Editor: Increased transfer payments are not the best way to address Toronto’s grotesque income disparity, as Wayne Roberts suggests (NOW, October 4-10).

Transfer payments are financed by taxing jobs, businesses and sales, which damages the economy by killing jobs, punishing successful businesses and raising the cost of products we all need.

Sales taxes are the main tax that the poor pay. It hurts them disproportionately. Instead, governments should narrow the gap between the 1 per cent and the rest of us by untaxing working people and the poor, and taxing wealth, not incomes.

Most wealth in Toronto is locked up in real estate. People who own land in this city are sitting on hundreds of thousands of dollars of unearned wealth.

In lieu of other taxes, governments (municipal, provincial and federal) should finance programs through a land value tax, collecting capital gains as they accrue.

Frank de Jong, President
Earthsharing Canada

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