![Thomas Paine rev1](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/aa/Thomas_Paine_rev1.jpg)
''Agrarian Justice'' is the title of a
pamphlet
A pamphlet is an unbound book (that is, without a hard cover or binding). Pamphlets may consist of a single sheet of paper that is printed on both sides and folded in half, in thirds, or in fourths, called a ''leaflet'' or it may consist of a ...
written by
Thomas Paine
Thomas Paine (born Thomas Pain; – In the contemporary record as noted by Conway, Paine's birth date is given as January 29, 1736–37. Common practice was to use a dash or a slash to separate the old-style year from the new-style year. In th ...
and published in 1797, which proposed that those who possess cultivated land owe the community a ground rent, which justifies an
estate tax
An inheritance tax is a tax paid by a person who inherits money or property of a person who has died, whereas an estate tax is a levy on the estate (money and property) of a person who has died.
International tax law distinguishes between an es ...
to fund universal old-age and disability pensions and a fixed sum to be paid to all citizens upon reaching maturity.
It was written in the winter of 1795–96 but remained unpublished for a year. Paine was undecided whether to wait until the end of the
ongoing war with France before publishing, however, having read a sermon by
Richard Watson, the
Bishop of Llandaff
The Bishop of Llandaff is the ordinary of the Church in Wales Diocese of Llandaff.
Area of authority
The diocese covers most of the County of Glamorgan. The bishop's seat is in the Cathedral Church of Saint Peter and Saint Paul (the site of a ...
, which discussed the "Wisdom... of God, in having made both Rich and Poor," he felt the need to publish under the argument that "rich" and "poor" were arbitrary divisions, not divinely created ones.
Proposed system
In response to the private sale of royal (or common) lands, Paine proposed a detailed plan to
tax land owners once per generation to pay for the needs of those who have no land. Some consider this a precursor to the modern idea of
citizen's dividend or
basic income
Universal basic income (UBI) is a social welfare proposal in which all citizens of a given population regularly receive an unconditional transfer payment, that is, without a means test or need to work. It would be received independently of a ...
. The money would be raised by taxing all direct inheritances at 10%, and "indirect" inheritances, those not going to close relations, at a somewhat higher rate. He estimated that to raise around £5,700,000 per year.
Around two-thirds of the fund would be spent on pension payments of £10 per year to every person over the age of 50, which Paine had taken as his average adult life expectancy.
Most of the remainder would be used to make fixed payments of £15 to every man and woman on reaching the age of 21, then the age of
legal majority
The age of majority is the threshold of legal adulthood as recognized or declared in law. It is the moment when minors cease to be considered such and assume legal control over their persons, actions, and decisions, thus terminating the contro ...
.
The small remainder of the money raised that was still unused would be used for paying pensions to "the lame and blind."
For context, the average weekly wage of an agricultural labourer was around 9 shillings, which would mean an annual income of about £23 for an able-bodied man working throughout the year.
[Figures are an annual average for 1795 taken from tables in Bowley (1898), p. 706]
Paine's proposal presaged the
social safety net
The social safety net (SSN) consists of non-contributory assistance existing to improve lives of vulnerable families and individuals experiencing poverty and destitution. Examples of SSNs are previously-contributory social pensions, in-kind and fo ...
of later eras and governments, proposing seven entitlements to protect the poorest citizens from the ravages of
market capitalism
Capitalism is an economic system based on the private ownership of the means of production and their operation for profit. Central characteristics of capitalism include capital accumulation, competitive markets, price system, private pr ...
:
# Grants to subsidize schooling of 4 pounds per annum
# One-time payments to adults on reaching maturity
# One-time payments to newly married couples and new parents
# Eliminate taxes on working poor
# Back-to-work schemes
# Pensions for seniors
# Burial benefits to surviving spouses
and also provided a scheme of how to pay for them.
Philosophical background
The work is based on the contention that in the state of nature, "the earth, in its natural uncultivated state ... was the common property of the human race." The concept of private ownership arose as a necessary result of the development of agriculture since it was impossible to distinguish the possession of improvements to the land from the possession of the land itself. Thus, Paine viewed private property as necessary while at the same time asserting that the basic needs of all humanity must be provided for by those with property, who have originally taken it from the general public. In some sense, that is their "payment" to non-property holders for the right to hold private property.
Critiques
Historian Richard Bell described ''Agrarian Justice'' as "an extraordinary social justice manifesto", that is "not proto-Marxism" but rather "a non-Marxist critique of the free market that lays no plans to nationalize ... or limit property or ... acquisition".
See also
* ''
Common Sense
''Common Sense'' is a 47-page pamphlet written by Thomas Paine in 1775–1776 advocating independence from Great Britain to people in the Thirteen Colonies. Writing in clear and persuasive prose, Paine collected various moral and political argu ...
''
*
Georgism
Georgism, also called in modern times Geoism, and known historically as the single tax movement, is an economic ideology holding that, although people should own the value they produce themselves, the economic rent derived from land—including ...
*
Geolibertarianism
Geolibertarianism is a political and economic ideology that integrates libertarianism with Georgism. It favors a taxation system based (as in Georgism) on income derived from land and natural resources instead of on labor, coupled with a mini ...
*
Citizen's dividend
Notes
References
*
*
External links
*
''Agrarian Justice''in Collected Writings of Thomas Paine, on
Google Books
Google Books (previously known as Google Book Search, Google Print, and by its code-name Project Ocean) is a service from Google Inc. that searches the full text of books and magazines that Google has scanned, converted to text using optical c ...
.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Agrarian Justice
1797 non-fiction books
Agrarian politics
Universal basic income
Pamphlets
Political books
Works by Thomas Paine