Henry George School of Social Science

About Us

ABOUT US

Financial collapse. Economic inequality. Global disruptions. Skyrocketing unemployment and poverty. Sound familiar?

This wasn’t 2008. This was seven decades before. In the aftermath of the Great Depression, the Henry George School of Social Sciences was born. The Henry George School was founded in 1932 as part of a reform movement that sought to establish fundamental economic justice and sustainable prosperity for all. The movement’s primary goal was to bring about the land value tax or single tax advocated by George in his classic work, Progress and Poverty. This book, spurred by an even earlier period of economic and social upheaval, remains the all-time bestselling book on political economy. Winston Churchill, Leo Tolstoy, John Dewey and Albert Einstein were among the influentials who endorsed George’s proposals.

Since the school’s founding, tens of thousands of students have taken courses and attended seminars in economics and social philosophy. The Henry George School remains dedicated to its founding principles:

  • Educate people about the philosophies of visionary economist Henry George
  • Explain the importance of these philosophies in the global landscape of the 21st century
  • Explore the economic issues of today’s world
  • Encourage and promote economic and social justice

MISSION STATEMENT

The primary directive of our school is to communicate and educate the public on the political and economic writingsof Henry George, a 19th century progressive and social reformer,with the ultimate objective of influencing policy and behaviorsfor the betterment of today’s society:

“Social reform is not to be secured by noise and shouting; by complaints and denunciation; by the formation of (political) parties or the making of revolutions; but by the awaking of thought and the progress of ideas. Until there be correct thought there cannot be right action; and when there is correct thought right action will follow.” Henry George, Social Problems, New York, 1883

BOARD OF TRUSTEES

  • Susan Schuyler, President
  • Mary Hardin, 1st Vice President
  • Edward Nell, 2nd Vice President
  • Denise Favorule, Secretary
  • Gilbert Herman, Treasurer
  • Nibaldo Aguilera
  • Edward Harrison
  • Jeffrey Previdi
  • Marty Rowland
  • Willi Semmler
  • Irving Starer
  • Maria Temple
  • Alan Tonelson
  • Peter Palmer
  • Anwar Shaikh
  • Aleksandr V. Gevorkyan

BOARD OF ADVISORS

  • Ron Reis
  • Colleen Woodell

Who Was Henry George?
And why does he have a school named after him?

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In the aftermath of the economically disastrous long depression of the 1870s, a California journalist named Henry George studied a distinctive dilemma of modern capitalism: the fact that progress seemed to deepen social inequality and economic instability. The result was Progress and Poverty (1879), a book that challenged widely accepted doctrines of property rights and laissez-faire. This surprising bestseller changed the way many people thought about and understood political economy.

Henry George proposed a simple solution to the problems of economic inequality and industrial depression. In contrast to others of his era, George singled out one of the most cherished institutions of liberal capitalist societies: private property in land. He called for replacing all federal, state, and local taxes with one tax on the full value of land—the “Single Tax”.

Neither a property tax nor a land tax, the single tax only applied to the socially created value of land. George understood that land values increase as a result of the location of land near schools, hospitals, businesses, and the like. Taxing only land values, he believed, would generate all the revenue needed to operate government and produce greater levels of opportunity.

His proposal became known as “the Single Tax” and those who supported it were called “Single Taxers”. The Henry George School of Social Science was founded to educate people about this visionary philosophy and how it continues to resonate from 1879 to the economics of today.

Read Progress and Poverty.
Visit the Birthplace and Archives of Henry George to learn more.

Henry George’s principles. Our society. Your life. Discover it all, free.