ABSTRACT
Building techniques are pre-given in neoclassical models of urban land rent; so the parameters of the productions function are exogenous, if they are ever examined at all. In the usual neoclassical approach to the topic of rent, land rent can at most have an indirect effect on the construction industry, by altering the intensity with which land is used and thus the type of buildings built. When looking at the effect of land rent on the construction process, it is important to start with the social relations associated with building rather than with categories of rent that are predicated on a prior knowledge of the social relations in question. Each possible intervention of land rent in production has to be examined through theoretical and empirical analysis to find out its effects. The theoretical ordering of well-known, if historically specific, social agents associated with building takes us a long way towards understanding the effect of land rent on the industry.
