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RandomLensman • today at 6:56 AM • 2 replies • view on HN

So the idea is to make cities denser? Is maximum density use what we really want? What about industry, data centers, etc., that could be built in rural areas - wouldn't that push land value up there a lot?


Replies

crooked-v • today at 7:19 AM

The effect on taxes depends on the specific rules. But, with the easiest answer of basing it on market rate of land sales, industry in rural areas only increases taxes if that industry's paying significantly above existing market rate for some reason.

And if they are doing that, the taxes should go up, since there's some previously unrecognized value to the land that's driving industry to need to build there specifically and not somewhere else they can buy at preexisting market rate.

Of course, the same also applies in the other direction: if an active mine shuts down and sells for pennies, taxes for the surrounding land should go down based on that.

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knowaveragejoe • today at 7:11 AM

The idea is to encourage more efficient use of land. In urban areas of the US that usually means more density since they aren't actually all that dense(the oft cited example being surface parking lots in downtown areas, this isn't a very efficient use). There's a lot of other baggage to make that work well, imk - better infrastructure and transit come to mind.

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