2. Give examples you have seen of a rise of rent; the cause. Of a fall of rent; the cause.
3. Does the existence of the land of California have any effect on rents in New York city? On agricultural rents in New York state?
4. If all the land on an island were equally fertile and equally convenient of access, would any of it pay a rent?
5. If you owned the Golden Gate, or the harbor of New York, could you rent it?
6. How does the hire of a team of horses resemble the rent of land?
7. How do livery charges in a college town in commencement week illustrate the subject of rent?
8. Show how a change of circumstances may raise the rent of machinery.
Note.—Although most texts still present the older, narrow conception of land rent, its defects have been revealed by many critics. J. B. Clark has been the chief champion of the broader conception; American Economic Association, 1st ser., Vol. III, No. 2, Capital and Its Earnings (1888); and Distribution of Wealth, ch. IX and ch. XIII. See our summary of the present situation, American Economic Association, 3d ser., Vol. II, p. 241 (1900). Alfred Marshall's effort to save the older conception by compromise on a "quasi-rent" doctrine has many supporters, but this doctrine is examined in detail and criticized adversely by the writer in an article entitled "The Passing of the Old Rent Concept," Quarterly Journal of Economics, Vol. XV, pp. 416-455 (1901). For both negative and positive reasons for a change in the concept, see The Relations between Rent and Interest, before cited (in note to ch. 8).
Chapter 11. Repair, Depreciation, and Destruction of Wealth
1. What is the difficulty in the definition: Rent is the payment for the original and indestructible powers of the soil?