Property taxes

Are property taxes inherently regressive in nature, since they are not set according to a person's ability to pay but rather according to a propery's value?  Should property taxes be based upon income or a person's ability to pay?

Now although it is true that property taxes are based upon the value of the improvements that have been applied to a given piece of land there is no connection between what is determined to be the tax and the wealth of the individual property owner.  Property taxes reflect the costs that a jurisdiction has incurred or can anticipate incurring as it tries to serve its citizens.  As such property tax then is not a tax at all but rather a way for the jurisdiction to recoupe some of its coasts pertaining to the services which it provides.  Property tax then should be more correctly understood as the means whereby the town covers the expenses that it incurs as it tries to do its number one job, care for its citizens.

Property taxes are also the performance by the town of a task that all corporations must do and that is, recapitalization.  Private corporations can recapitalize by doing one of two things, selling bonds or selling stocks.  For a non profit corporate entity such as a town the only things that it can do in order to recapitalize, is to sell bonds or collect taxes or both.  The only stock that a town has is the property that it is composed of but which for the most part, is held in private hands.  In other words the citizens and businessmen of a town are the share holders of the town.  As the towns shareholders it is incumbent upon them that they, each year, provide the capital that the town needs in order to survive. 

We can see from this that when people and businesses pay their property taxes that they are really enriching themselves and that every dime in taxes that is paid is also returned to them in the form of services provided. 

Because of the close connection between the tax payer and local government property taxes are probably the most efficiently utilized form of taxation known to man.