Implementation Scorecard: The Real-World Record at a Glance
Every jurisdiction that has actually captured land or resource rent, in one scannable table: what they did, what was measured, and the honest caveat a staffer has to be able to defend. The evidence companion to the Policymaker's Brief — outcomes, not advocacy, each row cited.
How to use this
You're writing a memo and someone will ask "where has this actually been done, and what happened?" This is that table — the real record, outcomes not aspirations, every row linked to the jurisdiction profile and the study behind it. The caveat column is the point: a staffer who can't state the honest limitation of a case gets caught out with it. Nothing here is stronger than its source; where the evidence is mixed or the case is a partial precedent, the table says so.
For how to design the policy, see the Policymaker's Brief; for the graded state of the underlying claims, the Evidence Dashboard.
Split-rate & land value taxation
| Jurisdiction | What was done | Measured result | The honest caveat |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pittsburgh, PA | Two-rate tax (land taxed ~5× buildings), 1913–2001 | A 1979–80 building-permit surge that Oates & Schwab isolated from the regional boom | The split rate was one factor among several; the city dropped it in 2001 after an assessment scandal, not an economic failure |
| Pennsylvania (≈15+ cities) | Municipal two-rate taxation | Cross-city evidence of higher construction where the land rate is higher | Effects vary by city and are entangled with local conditions; not a clean single experiment |
| Estonia | Nationwide pure land tax since 1993 | Runs at national scale, administratively cheap; Tomson links it to higher density/construction vs. Latvia | Rates are low, so it's a proof of administrability more than of a high-rate tax's full effects |
| Denmark | Long-standing grundskyld land tax | Danish Economic Councils find land-tax changes capitalize into lower land prices (quasi-experimental) | A counterpart study finds a precise zero short-run price effect — the capitalization magnitude is genuinely contested |
| Australia | Decades of municipal site-value rating | Long SVR record; the Victoria SVR/NAV comparison reads land-vs-property bases against each other | Municipal scale and gradual; not a national single-tax test |
Resource-rent capture & dividends
| Jurisdiction | What was done | Measured result | The honest caveat |
|---|---|---|---|
| Norway | 78% petroleum rent tax + sovereign fund | A $2-trillion fund built without deterring extraction — the flagship capture success | The escape was institutional (a sterilising fund + a binding spending rule), not automatic from the tax |
| Alaska | Oil-rent citizen's dividend since 1982 | Jones & Marinescu: the universal dividend had no negative employment effect | One econometric study finds it worsened measured inequality; direct poverty evidence is descriptive |
| Botswana | Public capture of diamond rent (Debswana) | Decades of top-tier growth with Dutch disease avoided — capture working in a poor country | The decisive variable was institutions, not the rent; success was in growth/finance, not across the board |
| Maricá, Brazil | Municipal oil-royalty basic income | Household income ≈+9%, consumption ≈+5% (NBER evaluation) | Modest effects, quasi-experimental; a middle-income municipal case, not a national program |
The honest limits (cases that cut against the easy story)
| Jurisdiction | What it shows | Why a staffer needs it |
|---|---|---|
| Singapore & Hong Kong | Maximal land-rent capture alongside severe housing costs | Shows capture raises revenue but does not by itself make housing cheap — affordability needs supply. Concede this before it's used against you. |
| DRC | A randomized property-tax rollout in a low-capacity state | Real-world evidence that collection is buildable where capacity is thin — but also that state-capacity ceilings bind |
| Loja, Ecuador | A municipal land-value tax evaluated in the field | Developing-world implementation is feasible at the city level, with field-measured effects |
The one-line version for the memo
The revenue-and-efficiency case is well-evidenced and has been run at scale (Estonia, the Nordic land taxes, Norway's fund). The affordability case runs through housing supply, and the flagship capture cities prove capture alone isn't enough. The dividend case has decades of operation (Alaska) and a spreading modern record (Maricá). Everywhere, the decisive variable is institutional design, not the mere fact of taxing rent — which is exactly what a good memo should say.
Guides: Start Here · Policymaker's Brief · Evidence Dashboard · How We Verify Portals: Case Studies · Tax Design · Climate & Commons