Henry George(1839 — 1897)
Henry George
États-Unis
5 min read
Henry George was an American economist and journalist. He is famous for his book Progress and Poverty (1879), in which he argues for a single tax on land value as a remedy for inequality.
Frequently asked questions
Key Facts
- Born on September 2, 1839, in Philadelphia
- Published Progress and Poverty in 1879, a worldwide success
- Advocated the single tax on the value of land
- Candidate for mayor of New York in 1886
- Died on October 29, 1897, in New York
Works & Achievements
His major work, which analyzes why poverty worsens despite progress and proposes a single tax on land value. A worldwide best-seller in economics.
An essay applying his ideas to the Irish agrarian crisis, which broadened his audience in Europe.
An accessible reflection on the inequalities of industrial society and their remedies.
A plea for free trade and a critique of customs tariffs, which left its mark on American economic debates.
A work of theoretical synthesis, published posthumously after his death in 1897.
Notable labor candidacies; in 1886 he finished ahead of the future president Theodore Roosevelt.
Anecdotes
Before becoming an economist, Henry George knew real hardship. As a young married man in San Francisco, he was one day so poor that he admitted to having stopped a stranger in the street to ask him for five dollars, ready, he said, to strike him if he refused — a memory that fed all his thinking about poverty.
The central idea of his life is said to have come to him in a flash. While riding on horseback through the hills near San Francisco, he asked a passerby the price of land: he was told an enormous sum per acre. He then understood that the value of land rose with the growth of cities, enriching landowners without any effort on their part.
*Progress and Poverty* (1879) was at first refused by publishers. George had to print it himself in an author's edition. The book ended up selling millions of copies and was, it is said, one of the most widely read works of economics of the 19th century, translated into many languages.
In 1886, Henry George ran for mayor of New York on the workers' ticket. He came in second, ahead of a young Republican candidate named Theodore Roosevelt, the future president of the United States.
George died in the middle of a campaign: in 1897, he was again running for mayor of New York despite his doctors' advice. Exhausted by the speeches, he suffered a stroke a few days before the election. Tens of thousands of people followed his funeral procession.
Primary Sources
The great fundamental question of our present time: why, despite the growth of productive power, do wages tend toward a minimum that leaves only a life of misery?
We must make land common property. The rent of land, created by society as a whole, must return to society through taxation.
In every civilized society there is a deep-seated cause of the unequal distribution of wealth: it is the private appropriation of the soil that belongs to all.
The deepest poverty exists precisely where wealth accumulates most: this is the great paradox we must solve.
Key Places
Birthplace of Henry George, where he was born in 1839 into a modest middle-class family.
The city where George experienced poverty and then became a journalist. It was there that he forged his ideas about land and wrote Progress and Poverty.
The city where George settled, ran his campaigns for mayor (1886 and 1897), and died.
George traveled there in 1881-1882 as a correspondent; the Irish land question gave a resounding echo to his theories on land ownership.
The neighborhood where George spent his final years; his death in 1897 there sparked an immense popular funeral procession.
