Taiwan
Taiwan implements a Land Value Increment Tax rooted in Sun Yat-sen's 'equalization of land rights' — one of the most explicit national applications of Georgist principles in Asia.
Overview
Taiwan operates one of Asia's most explicit applications of Georgist land policy, through its Land Value Increment Tax (LVIT) and broader land-value-capture system. The intellectual lineage runs directly to Sun Yat-sen, founder of the Republic of China, whose principle of "equalization of land rights" (one of his Three Principles of the People) was directly influenced by Henry George.
The System
Taiwan's LVIT taxes the increase in a parcel's assessed land value between transactions — capturing the unearned increment at the point it is realised. Combined with a recurrent land value tax, the system is designed to return socially created land value to the public and to discourage speculative land holding.
Significance
Taiwan demonstrates that Georgist land-value capture can be embedded in a national constitution and tax code at scale. Its experience is a key comparative case in the literature on land value capture, documented by the Lincoln Institute.
See Also
Sources
- Lincoln Institute (1998), "Policies and Mechanisms on Land Value Capture: Taiwan Case Study." PDF