Professor Roger Sandilands (Letters, October 7) proposes that the UK reduces its taxes on high “earned” incomes and instead increases taxes on urban and rural land. His argument that land is inanimate and cannot be “demotivated” by taxation is obviously true, however the owners of the land are clearly animate economic beings who will have to work out how to pay the tax, forcing them to increase rents charged to tenants — businesses, farmers and residents.

UK tax rates are already lower than European peers, so if UK high income earners are demotivated then I am not sure that reducing their tax rates will help.

My experience of high income earning in Singapore (low tax) and Sweden (high tax) was it was equally motivating — the deciding factor was work satisfaction and how compatible work colleagues were.

Philip Winckle
Stockholm, Sweden