Some Further Thoughts on Incremental Ownership

Today I find myself reflecting on yesterday's post regarding potential land use, which at first glance could seem confusing. Some might say "That's an awful lot of planning". There's no way of getting around what would be broad changes at the outset, to generate more inclusive economic pathways. Just the same, economic planning has been there all along at local levels - it simply existed in forms which reinforced finance and real estate interests, rather than community as a whole.

One of the reasons I've been slow to define legal specifics, is that I don't want land use details to detract from the basic message of knowledge use and services markets which would be a source of economic freedom for millions. For instance, many conservatives tend to promote the importance of families, before they promote economic freedom. But what is sometimes missed: individuals need economic access on a regular basis, before family dynamics have a chance to be normal, supportive and reciprocal through the course of a lifetime. This is why economic coordination in community is so vitally important.

There are also some core aspects of ownership which need to be reconsidered in the present. Familial wealth tends to be tied up in housing which is incapable of physical division, but also relatively illiquid as well. This invariably presents problems for lower income levels who need legal assistance when any change in housing ownership is under consideration.

Given the fact that legal assistance also cannot perform the impossible task of separating illiquid assets such as housing, there need to be substantial options for incremental and flexible ownership. The ability to buy and sell simple housing components as needed - in particular - could provide an immeasurable source of relief for anyone who has too little leverage in familial relationships. What's more, incremental ownership would allow most individuals to become responsible citizens on terms they can readily fulfill. By allowing housing components to become tradable goods, communities become better positioned to define services in tradable terms as well.

Housing components could be paired with flexible infrastructure and traded on local community markets. Done right, this could make most taxation unnecessary, because maintenance and infrastructure could be provided within profit generating aspects of community holdings. There simply needs to be better ways to arrive at local services and infrastructure needs, than needless confiscation of property and the blunt tool of taxation.

Taxation processes as they currently exist, have become far too inefficient and incapable of tending to the actual needs of the community. Already, poverty has begun to encroach on the suburbs which were built in recent decades. Rather than blindly building more of the same, it's better to reconsider what individuals and communities are actually capable of, and beginning anew from that perspective.