LifeSystems
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Section 7

Land, scarcity, and taxation

The one resource robots can't make more of — and how it might fund the floor.

?New here? What LifeSystems is, in 30 seconds

LifeSystems is a proposal for how society could work once AI and robots do about 99% of the jobs, leaving most people without employment through no fault of their own.

  • A basic income for everyone. Every eligible adult gets a tax-free monthly payment (UBI), job or no job. You can turn it off and back on whenever you like.
  • Living packages from co-ops. Worker-owned cooperatives compete to offer affordable bundles of housing, food, healthcare and more, paid for with that income.
  • Freedom stays. You can keep your home, run a business, earn more, or skip the whole system. It's a floor, not a ceiling.
  • Funded by land. Mainly through a tax on land value, the one resource machines can't make more of.

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Your turn

This is flagged as the critical unresolved issue. Can you help run the numbers, or point to someone who has?

  1. The model identifies desirable land and unique locations as persistent sources of scarcity even in an otherwise highly automated economy. and rules are proposed to capture and discourage speculative withholding of developable land. , commercial landowners, and vacant speculative holdings form a potential tax base, while qualifying existing owner-occupied homes are .

    §7.1

  2. Policy must distinguish genuinely idle from parks, conservation land, agriculture, and legitimately reserved sites. Land value assessments, appeals, ownership transparency, and rules for transfers and inheritance are required.

    §7.2

  3. Critical unresolved issue

    The sustainable annual yield from the chosen land-tax base must be quantitatively compared with total obligations. Higher rates cannot be assumed to generate unlimited revenue. Other public revenues or a dividend from automated productive assets may be necessary; the preferred principal mechanism remains .

    Current proposed answer

    Partial answer
    • stays the main funding source, levied on , commercial landowners, and vacant (§7.1).
    • If land revenue falls short, it would be topped up by other public revenues or a dividend from automated productive assets.
    • The first phase of the roadmap is to model the taxable land base against total budgets (§14.1).

    Still missing: No revenue estimate exists yet, so we don't know whether land taxes can cover the bill.

    Based on§7.1§14.1§15.3

    §7.3