Why do we tax earned incomes? Don’t we want people working?  

Yes we do!

Why do we tax our purchases? We want things to cost more than they should?  

No we don’t!

Why don’t we tax land prices more than we do, to keep a lid on them? Are escalating land prices which dispossess people from owing their own homes a good outcome?  

No they’re not!

But land prices which regularly develop into bubbles that burst into recession are just the natural business cycle, are they not?

No, not on you Nellie!

What’s wrong with our policymakers that such a pernicious system persists then?  Who does it favour?

What good questions! Maybe our tax regimes are designed to assist the practice of rent seeking, i.e. the grabbing of unearned incomes?

So, we’ve got it all backwards?

Yes.