Tag Archives: real-estate

Wealth taxes: On property or land?

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Economist Gary Stevenson points out that the wealth of the very rich has grown so much that they are buying assets, such as property, forcing up prices for everybody else: Fewer people can afford to buy their own homes. Stevenson”s advocates taxing wealth to stop the rich getting too rich.

For the present, he avoids being to specific about the exact nature of a wealth tax. Here, I propose two specific solutions. First: taxing property and returning the proceeds equally to each of UK’s 52 million adults. Second: Taxing land to do the same. I have developed these with the help of the chatbot, Claude AI.

A property tax

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The UK housing crisis – four million new homes needed.

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Introduction

Four million new homes are required by 2040 to meet demand in the UK.

This note proposes the construction of sufficient prefabricated homes to meet UK housing need. They would be sited near existing settlements or transportation routes. The proposal downplays the role of new towns, which take too long to build and will cause high carbon emissions in their construction.

Park Homes

Park homes are one form of prefabricated home delivered to site by specialist transport companies on modified lorries. They are mostly put on specially designed sites, referred to as parks. They are single storey. A typical park home has roughly the same floor area as a new 2 bedroomed house of traditional construction. Park homes are a tried and tested form of prefabricated homes, with over 100,000 park homes in the UK.

Prefabricated Homes – the advantages

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Cheaper housing

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Housing in York, A letter to York Council, 12 February 2025

Councillor,

Young people cannot afford to buy homes.

In England, the average house costs over eight times the average salary but, in the 1970’s, it was three and a half times. Now, young people cannot afford to buy homes.

In York, the Council have some affordable homes which are “an option for people who can’t afford to rent or buy a property on the open market”. Typical prices for these “range from £70,000 for a 1-bed flat to £125,000 for a 4-bed house, but prices can vary for individual sites.”

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