Absentee landlord is an economic term for a person who owns and rents out a profit-earning property, but does not live within the property's local economic region. This is a common corporate practice.

Absentee Landlords were a highly significant issue in the History of Ireland. In the 1640s, English forces under Oliver Cromwell invaded Ireland. Seized land was given to English nobles, who rented it out to Irishmen while themselves remaining residents of England. Over the centuries, resentment grew as not only were the absentee landlords Protestant (while most tenants were Catholic), but their existence meant that the wealth of the land was always exported. In the years following the Irish Potato Famine, the land issue became the most significant issue in Ireland. It was one of the historic factors which resulted in Ireland's troubled history until this day.

Critics of this practice argue that absentee landlords drain local wealth, particularly that of rural areas and the Third World.

See also: anti-globalization, capitalism, corporation, globalization, neo-colonialism, Wal-Mart