THE TITHE COMMUTATION ACT OF 1836: MEASURING THE EFFICIENCY GAINS OF AGRICULTURAL LAND TAX REFORMS IN ENGLAND 1842-1855 (original) (raw)

The efficiency gains from site value taxes: the Tithe Commutation Act of 1836

Explorations in Economic History, 2005

The theoretical efficiency advantages of land site value taxation have been known since at least the writings of Adam Smith. However, the practical gains from switching land taxes to this basis have never, to our knowledge, been measured. The Tithe Commutation Act of 1836 in England switched taxation of large areas of farmland from a percentage of gross output to an equivalent lump sum tax on site values. We estimate the rent gains from this reform between 1842 and 1855 using data from 5108 English parishes. We show that converting the tithe to a lump sum raised rents, net of the tithe, by an average of £0.43 for every £1 of tithe collected. Some of these rent gains may have stemmed from increased investment by landlords in fixed capital rented with the land, so that we can only give a range for the possible excess burden of the tithe of 17-43%. Interestingly with a Cobb-Douglass production function the predicted excess burden would be 17%.

Anglican Clergymen and the Tithe Question in the Early Nineteenth Century

Journal of Religious History, 1980

has references to the relevant literature. Although I have dissented from Professor Evans's conclusions, it is incumbent on me to add that I have learned much from his volume. The.present article is part of a longer study of Anglican cler~meneconomist~. The asserhons made m the next paragraphs are justified in detail m my unpubhshed survey 'Anglican clergymeneconomists 1750-1850'. It is possible that, having studied them so long, I have come to identify partially with their cause. Salim Rashid is in the Department of Economics, Dartmouth College, New Hampshire. 2. Very little is known of the life of the Rev. Edward Edwards. Accounts of Howlett, Jones, and Whately may be found in the Dictionary of National Biography. Howlett's contribution to this debate was An Enquiry concerning rhe Influence of Tithes upon Agriculture . . ., London 1801. There is an able review of it in the British Critic, 1802, pp. 454-69. Edwards contributed an article to each of the Quarterly Review, 1823, pp. 524-60 and Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, 1830, pp. 213-81, and wrote a pamphlet, The Revenues of the Church of England not a burden upon the public, London 1830. Edwards reviewed his own pamphlet in Blackwood's. In correspondence .with William Blackwood (National Library of Scotland, Blackwood Mss) Edwards cIrumed that Bishop Blomfield of London had urged him to publish. Whately's views upon Titpes are contained in his evidence before the House of Lords, reprinted in the 2nd edihon of his Zntroducfory Lectures, London 1832.

Land rental values and the agrarian economy: England and Wales, 1500-1914

European Review of Economic History, 2002

I use the rents and prices of land held by charities in England and Wales to estimate statistically the nominal and real rental value of farmland from 1500 to 1912. Real land rental values increased fourfold between 1500 and 1912. Combining these estimates with farm wages and rates of return I calculate agricultural output from factor payments, as well as output per worker, from 1500 to 1912. Finally the productivity of agriculture is calculated. These new series suggest that measured agricultural productivity doubled between 1500-39 and 1860-69. But the productivity growth was fairly evenly spread over this long period, and was much less in the years 1760 to 1860 than standard accounts of the Industrial Revolution such as Crafts (1985) assume. Thus these estimates imply a substantial reduction in estimates of output growth in England in the Industrial Revolution era. Further the rate of productivity growth in England in the years 1500-1789 is no greater than the growth rates Philip Hoffman finds for the Paris Basin. Finally, contrary to expectation, the source of productivity growth before 1869 is overwhelmingly growing yields as opposed to growth of labor productivity.

Land Taxes, Output Taxes, and Sharecropping Was Henry George Right?

The World Bank Economic Review, 1991

Economists have generally argued that if a land tax is administratively feasible, then to increase efficiency it should be used to the exclusion of output taxes. This article shows that underlying this policy prescription is the assumption that institutions for pooling and spreading production risks are perfect. When account is taken of the imperfections in those institutions, some use of output taxes will be Pareto superior to a pure land tax regime and may induce higher output, as well. Henry George was wrong! These results generally apply even when the land tax is indexed to regional output, and when land is farmed under sharecropping. Even in these cases, a move from a pure land tax to a mix of land and low output taxes will reduce preexisting distortions in both consumption and production arising from the imperfection in risk markets. Economists have long argued that a tax on unimproved land is, on efficiency grounds, an ideal tax. In developing countries where land rents are an important source of rural income, a standard recommendation for increasing efficiency is thus to use a land tax to the exclusion of agricultural output taxes. 1 This article will show that lying behind this policy prescription is an assumption that landowners have sufficient access to market or nonmarket institutions for the exchange of risks that they maximize their expected profits from production, independent of risk aversion. For most developing countries this is an extraordinary assumption. Rural financial markets generally provide only limited spreading and pooling of production risks (see, for example, Udry 1990, and Siamwalla and others 1990), whereas these risks represent a large fraction of landowners' wealth. Many studies attest to the role of nonmarket institutions-marriage, remittances, patron-client relationships and tenancy-in spreading and reducing risk; but despite such arrangements, farmer's production decisions reflect risk aversion (see Rosenzweig 1988 and citations therein). The main finding of this article (proposition 1; see below) is that some use of output taxes will be Pareto superior to a pure land tax regime if institutions for The author is at the

Urban Population in Late Medieval England: The Evidence of the Lay Subsidies

Economic History Review, 2010

The taxation returns of 1377 and 1524 have previously been cited to show that towns made up a growing proportion of England's population in the later middle ages or, alternatively, that this proportion was stable or even declined. Such calculations have often relied on debatable estimates of national population and on controversial multipliers with which to turn numbers of taxpayers into town populations. This paper used a more straightforward approach and calculates the number of taxpayers in 100 English provincial towns for which we have evidence in 1377 and 1524 as a proportion of the number of taxpayers for all of the communities for which we have figures at both of these dates. It concludes that there was a slight decline in the proportion of people living in England's provincial towns, that smaller towns fared better than large ones and that the growth of London was partly at the expense of other towns.

Figuresinearly19thcenturyBantryandWestCarberyPoliticsIreland.pdf

Tithes Tithes were a medieval tax of one tenth of crops. The benefits went to the clergy who were expected to provide civil services out of it. In Cork Richard Boyle (ancestor the the Dukes of devonshire and numerous other lines) managed by underhand methods in the early 17th century to acquire most of the Diocesan tithes. A large part was 'impropriate' and in time were traded as any form of property. Much of the later trouble with tithes came from the vigorous enforcement to entitlement sby tithe proctors who sometime acquired the tithes or received a significant proportion of money collected.