[CodeToad]

With respect intended, do some more indepth thinking. Think of means for collecting taxes based on “No Taxation Without Representation” and without the need to violate the right to own property without confiscation. If you have to pay rent or else lose something you simply do not own it.

Look at road maintenance, gas taxes in most States pay for that. Use the roads then pay the gas tax. Perfectly fair.

[MrB]

Indeed, there should be no tax for merely existing or owning something. That undermines the basic freedoms of life, liberty, and property on which our society is based.

The usage tax is absolutely the way to go.
If you use something that is a “public” capital resource, like roads, there is a way to tax that through fuel taxes.

Fire and police protection, however, are less of a “per use” kind of concept. But even today, we have renters who live under the protection of police and fire control without directly paying for it in the form of property taxes. Sales tax would be the way to cover that. If implemented, the cost of the property tax for the owner of the property would not be passed on to the renter, and would make up for the increase in sales tax.

[SeekAndFind]

RE: Use the roads then pay the gas tax. Perfectly fair.

I just said Sales tax. How is that not thinking? A gas tax is essentially a sales tax on using gas.

[Atlas Sneezed]

“No Taxation Without Representation”

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Another injustice in levying property taxes to collect revenues for things that don’t directly benefit the property (like maintaining a network of roads that enable access to the property) is that property doesn’t vote. Or rather, it’s owners don’t necessarily reside in the area.

Property taxes should be at most a collective decision by property owners, whether or not they reside in the jurisdiction. And the representation should be proportional to the property value, or to the proposed assessment being voted on.