Born in 1839 to a lower-middle class Philadelphia family, George left school at an early age, to make his way in the world. At age 16, he shipped out on a trading vessel on its way to Australia and India. In Australia, George saw a vibrant nation, with productive cities and prosperous peoples. In contrast, Calcutta was a decaying, overpopulated, miserably poor city. Although at the time George did not understand the reasons for the differences he saw, the images of both places remained in his memory, and later helped him to formulate his theories.
At 19, George found himself at sea again. This time, while in the port of San Francisco, he jumped ship, lured by the prospect of striking it rich in the California gold rush. Once there, he met and married Annie Fox, and they lived in poverty and misery for several years. George took on many jobs, just to survive. Among these were gold prospector, compositor, and eventually journalist.
He first became a writer for the San Francisco Times, then a reporter for the San Francisco Post. During this time, many immigrants were brought in from China to help with the building of the new railroads. Some of George's news articles were written about the treatment of these Chinese, as well as about the usurpation of land by the railroad barons.
California at that time was a new state, isolated on the west coast from the rest of the United States, and a perfect place to study economics. Over the next two decades, George observed and wrote about what he termed the ultimate paradox: that the advent of modern society, and the potential for greater and greater progress, came with a dark side - poverty. The more progress that was made, and the more wealth that was created, in turn seemed to cause more and more poverty. How could this happen? What were the causes? Was there a solution?
For answers to these questions, George sought out experts and came under the following influences:
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LEVITICUS XXV: |
"The land shall not be sold forever; for the land is Mine; for ye are strangers and sojourners with Me." |
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JOHN LOCKE: |
"God hath given the world to men in common... Yet every man has a property in his own person. The labor of his body and the work of his hands are properly his." (Civil Government) |
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WILLIAM BLACKSTONE: |
"The earth, therefore, and all things therein, are the general property of all mankind... from the immediate gift of the Creator." (Commentaries on the Laws of Engand) |
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THOMAS JEFFERSON: |
"The earth belongs in usufruct to the living... The earth is given as a common stock for men to labor and live on." (Letters to James Madison) |
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ABRAHAM |
"The land, the earth God gave to man for his home, sustenance and support should never be the possession of any man, corporation, society or unfriendly government, any more than the air or water, if as much. Any individual, or company, or enterprise requiring land should hold no more than is required for their home and sustenance..." (Lincoln and the Men of His Time by Robert H. Browne) |