Dr Gavin Putland published a research paper for Prosper Australia in 2019 entitled “Trickle-Up Economics: Assessing the impact of privatized land rent on economic growth.“

The paper noted the following: –

1. The economic rent of land (rental value plus smoothed realized “capital gains”) has increased from 2% of GDP in the early 1950s to more than 20% of GDP in 2017.
2. The “Global Financial Crisis” and the recession of the early 1990s were preceded by notable squeezes on the percentage of GDP accruing to labour and capital, as distinct from land.
3. An increase in land rent of 1% of GDP corresponds to a loss of 0.124% per annum in GDP growth.
4. According to these correlations, the gains of landowners do not “trickle down” to labour and capital. On the contrary, there is a “trickle-up” effect: when labour and capital get a greater fraction of GDP, growth is faster, and the cumulative effect of that growth will eventually make landowners better off in absolute terms, although not in relative terms.
5. Since 2003, the economic rent of land has consistently exceeded 15% of GDP. The extraction of this economic rent, no less than the extraction of taxes, is a drain on the capacity of workers and employers to invest in future growth.
6. Taxes that improve the competitive position of tenants and land buyers relative to landlords and sellers — such as land-value taxes, and vacancy taxes (applicable to both bare land and vacant accommodation) — have negative deadweight.
7. In order to maximize growth, we must minimize rent extraction by maximizing the bargaining power of labour and capital relative to land.

Therefore, if we examine the chart above, had we captured only the land rent (shown dark blue) publicly, extractive taxation (red) and capital gains (green) would then become available to both labour and capital (pale blue) as additional income, and unavailable to rent seeking interests only.

Surely, an admirable aim?