The Modern Georgism of Respected Economists
Documents how a roster of mainstream and Nobel-laureate economists have endorsed conclusions central to Georgism.
Summary
This essay from the Progress and Poverty Substack compiles the surprising breadth of mainstream economic support for Georgist conclusions — useful for countering the perception that land value taxation is a fringe idea.
What It Shows
It assembles endorsements and supporting work from across the spectrum: Joseph Stiglitz (Henry George Theorem), William Vickrey, Milton Friedman ("least bad tax"), and others, alongside the modern empirical literature (Rognlie, Bonnet et al., IMF work). The cumulative point: the core Georgist claims about land's efficiency and equity as a tax base are not heterodox — they are quietly held across mainstream economics.
Blogger-economist Noah Smith's essays make a related but distinct case: not just that respected economists agree, but how to sell the idea to a broader, non-academic audience.
See Also
- Léon Walras — the founder of general equilibrium theory who advocated state ownership of land and a rent-funded social dividend, reaching Georgist conclusions from the marginalist side
- Noah Smith on Georgism — the popularisation and political-economy counterpart to this survey
- LVT research priorities for 2025 and beyond — the same publisher's map of what remains to be established
Sources
- "The Modern Georgism of Respected Economists," Progress and Poverty Substack. Article — used for the roll-call of mainstream economists (Friedman, Stiglitz, Krugman, and others) on record endorsing land value taxation, the compilation this page summarises.