Henry George

Compiled Truth

Henry George (1839–1897) was a 19th-century American political economist, journalist, and author of Progress and Poverty (1879) — one of the best-selling non-fiction books of the late 19th century. His central thesis: economic rent from land ownership is the root cause of poverty amid plenty in industrialized economies, and a single tax on land value (the Land Value Tax / LVT) could replace all other taxes while eliminating speculative landholding. This thesis (“Georgism”) is the intellectual foundation of Commonwealth Canada’s Land Value Tax advocacy, the Henry George Foundation of Canada (Frank Peddle, Secretary-Treasurer), and the global Georgist movement (Schalkenbach Foundation, Council of Georgist Organizations). [Source: compiled from concepts/georgism, people/frank-peddle, scrumban LVT research tasks]

Key Works

• Progress and Poverty (1879) — defining text of Georgism; argues poverty persists because land rent absorbs productivity gains
• The Annotated Works of Henry George (six volumes) — co-edited by Frank Peddle; modern scholarly edition

Legacy & Modern Relevance

• The single-tax movement (late 19th / early 20th century) directly derived from George’s writings
• Modern Georgism informs LVT policy advocacy globally — Singapore, Estonia, Pittsburgh’s split-rate tax, Pennsylvania municipalities, and (proposed) BC and Bhutan
• The Henry George Foundation of Canada and Robert Schalkenbach Foundation (NYC) carry forward the policy and educational agenda
• The Philadelphia Wage Tax / LVT Harvard study (2026) cited in Hugh’s progress.org article draft directly tests Georgist replacement-of-distortionary-taxes claims [Source: 2026-05-27-philadelphia-wage-tax-lvt-harvard-article]

Timeline

• 1879 | Progress and Poverty published
• 1886 | Ran for Mayor of New York City as the United Labor candidate (placed 2nd, ahead of Theodore Roosevelt)
• 1897 | Died during second NYC mayoral campaign
• 2026 | Intellectual foundation cited in Commonwealth Canada’s LVT advocacy, Frank Peddle’s academic outreach, Martin Adams’ Bhutan / GMC land-governance work, and Hugh’s Philadelphia LVT progress.org article

See Also

• georgism — the school of thought he founded
• land-value-tax — the policy mechanism
• henry-george-foundation — modern Canadian institutional inheritor
• frank-peddle — Secretary-Treasurer, HGF Canada; co-editor of Annotated Works
• martin-adams — modern Georgist applying ideas to Bhutan
• 2026-05-27-philadelphia-wage-tax-lvt-harvard-article — empirical test of Georgist claims

Sources

• Original scrumban references: Schedule ALL CW IG posts; John Pasalis Podcast Move Smartly; RESEARCH: Determine history of LVT + Split rate in Canada