Rent, agglomeration, and the economy of London

Michael Edwards

Chapter 3 in The Value of Place, 2025, pp 40-49 from Edward Elgar Publishing

Abstract: London, like many cities, faces extremely high housing costs, which are even more burdensome for low-income residents due to rising inequality – inequality that housing costs themselves help to fuel. But London is distinctive in that it has some of the largest increases in house prices in Europe, coupled with the most significant income disparities between the city and other regions. It is a city increasingly dominated by land and property interests and this domination is implemented partly through the new Greater London Authority (GLA) metropolitan planning system, now twenty-five years old. This chapter argues that land and development interests are the dynamo of London's growth, though their legitimacy tends to be framed through a discourse of agglomeration: London is seen as the key hub for high ‘productivity’ activity and value generation. The escalating social, health, and environmental costs of this form of growth and its continuation in the future highlight the need for more critical analysis of the agglomeration story and its production of inequality between Londoners and between regions.

Keywords: Rent; Agglomeration; Growth; London; Greater London Authority (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
ISBN: 9781035347919
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