But for a certain piece of land, its a complete monopoly. And unlike with goods or services, you can't go somewhere else to get that exact piece of land.
In my opinion there are two issues:
#1: Land owners are not taxed for the un-earned value of their land. Making lots of money for just owning a piece of land is absurd. Normally this doesn't matter due to how large the USA is, but you can see its ugly result when land is very constricted like in major cities.
#2: Land owners are very limited by what they can build on their land by local laws and such, which prevents development of high density buildings, which would lower rents due to the increased number of units and efficiency at which these can be built. A land tax would even necessitate this sort of construction so that it would be profitable for the landlord to even keep the land.
In my opinion there are two issues: #1: Land owners are not taxed for the un-earned value of their land. Making lots of money for just owning a piece of land is absurd. Normally this doesn't matter due to how large the USA is, but you can see its ugly result when land is very constricted like in major cities.
#2: Land owners are very limited by what they can build on their land by local laws and such, which prevents development of high density buildings, which would lower rents due to the increased number of units and efficiency at which these can be built. A land tax would even necessitate this sort of construction so that it would be profitable for the landlord to even keep the land.