Interaction Of Land Policy And Land†Based Tax Policy: The Vermont Land Gains Tax

In 1973, the State of Vermont became the first jurisdiction in the United States to enact a land gains tax. The tax had two purposes: raising revenue and deterrring land speculation and subdivision, which were changing the rural, village character of the state's landscape. The land gains tax derived from many of the same forces as Act 250, Vermont's 1970 land use planning and environmental control legislation. Both measures had many positive effects during the 1970s and 1980s, but, following continued growth, land speculation and subdivision, and loss of farmland in the state in the mid†1980s, both the land gains tax and land use planning and regulation were readdressed by the legislature in 1987 and 1988.