John Maynard Keynes said: ‘The ideas of economists and political philosophers, both when they are right and when they are wrong, are more powerful than is commonly understood. Indeed, the world is ruled by little else. Practical men, who believe themselves to be quite exempt from any intellectual influences, are usually slaves of some defunct economist’ In South Africa one could say that there are three big issues facing built environment professionals and contractors. 1. The cyclical nature of conventional construction - its feast and famine. 2. The dynamite nature of rural depopulation coupled with informal settlements and joblessness. 3. And municipalities that are going broke. One can imagine what those in power might be thinking: ‘what do we do? we cant get enough taxes, we cant supply enough jobs, our economic theories are….. what?, and people are getting angry.’ The question arises: is there a way to stimulate and strengthen economic activity in an equitable way, which rewards hard work, and which does not have negative effects? There is a school of thought which says that the answers lie beneath our feet, in the way that we administer land, and that “rental collection in a magical way encourages production everywhere, as opposed to taxation, which is not only a burden to economic activity, but positively obliterates it in marginal locations such as in the poorer South African rural areas” (Stephen Meintjes. Our Land, Our Rent, Our Jobs)

Kevin McShannon, MBT Architects and Project Managers. HND Construction Management (1987) Worked in construction industry in SA for 20 years. Working in an architectural partnership since 2003. Economics with Justice tutor