This video has a lot more views than I anticipated, so thank you everyone (and to the algorithm)! I’m glad most people seemed to like it. I’m reading the comments even when I don’t get the chance to reply. And yes, the next one on nationalisation vs privatisation is coming. Quite a few people have commented on whether the apple market truly ‘works’ and I think this is fair. The comparison was largely intended as a pedagogical device to show why the housing market is quite as bad as it is rather than a statement about why the apple market is fine. The apple (or food) market does have clear problems including distribution, environmental issues, and exploitation of workers. But I’d say that these problems are general to capitalism, whereas the problems with the housing market are unique and worth exploring on their own. That’s the main thing I wanted to communicate with the comparison. To put it another way, while I'd say redistribution would mean everyone was able to afford an apple, I don't think redistribution would mean everyone was able to afford a house. The sector just has that many more problems.
@@unlearningeconomics9021 If you're interested in Breadtubers who deal more with the details of policy, Donoteat01 (a civil engineer) has a fantastic series on public housing, and has a lot of material on urban development in general. Not quite as big a name as Ollie of course but got a lot of attention after being shouted out by hbomberguy a while back and has a lot of overlap with "dirtbag left." Loved your video, by the way! I really appreciate political content with more of a material/educational angle.
If "redistribution isn't enough to fix housing" is your point, then you should be fully on board with abolishing the market entirely. You should wanna go to the next steps of making housing a basic right, imposing building regulations so everyone can afford their space, guaranteed jobs in construction or maintenance for the unemployed, etc.. And yet, somehow, your "solution" is to keep the market as it is, raise taxes, make the state buy land back, sympathize with landlords, and rely on philanthropists for housing. Solid plan for accomplishing little to nothing.
ok if capitalist are so great distribution, they are in charge of food distribution in the united states, why are there still food deserts? if self interests and profit seeking lead to the best out come of society and the best out come of society is that everyone has access to affordable and nutritious food, why are there still food deserts? When I've asked capitalists this they're response is well the majority doesn't want to eat fresh foods, then what about the minority that still live there, are they just supposed to move? what if they can't move out of a food deserts? Also if your a capitalist shouldn't you want your product in everywhere? I can buy a coke almost in every neighborhood in the country, but not with a tomato or a head of lettuce. Also why should we put vital parts of the function of society such as food distribution and access to affordable and nutritious food in the hands of people who 1st priority is to make money? Milton freedman said a companies sole purpose is to generate profit for shareholders.
You see, this is what debate is suppose to be. People criticizing other people's ideas, with the intent of seeing the best possible outcome, not a petty game of one upping and crowd pleasing.
I'd argue (lol) this isn't a debate, but a discussion or at least looking at an issue with a different goal in mind. Ollie is there to educate you on theory and start questioning reality, open your mind to new ideas, etc. Sounds like UE is here to try to fill some of those holes that opening your mind leaves, and I honestly think we DO need that in leftist discussions. I think the video is set up oppositionally, but mainly as a narrative device rather than a bare window into what Unlearning Economics is actually trying to convince you of. I feel like it is not just possible, but quite easy to "agree" with both videos. PhillyTube said it himself: "I'm no economist". In the end, it sounds like he agrees with Ollie's main concern being valid... How do we improve things for the human experience, broadly? Isn't that what being "on the left" is all about, really? Everything else is semantics and different focuses. (And in contrast, "the right" is either all about "how do we increase stability?"... if you take their idealogy at face value and leave off the "for some/most" since ecological, perfect stability simply isn't an aspect of nature at the scale of human experience. Oooor "How do we enrich ourselves?" if you read their behaviour since the 70's materially. And I definitly think the latter is more realistic in the western world, at least.)
@@vazzaroth - "this isn't a debate, but a discussion" It _is_ a debate - or at least what a debate is supposed to be - because a debate simply _is_ a discussion. The Shapiro-esque charade of yelling over your opponent and not addressing points is not really what used to qualify as "debate", and real debate shouldn't be a bad thing.
I disagree. Debating for points is a great way to combat fascists since their ideas are based in a cult of strength. Creating a cognitive dissonance in the audience of fascist leaders by making them look weak is the wedge we can use to get them out. Therefore as long as fascists exist we need people to dunk on them.
I’m LIVING for this. Breadtube has been strong on social issues but relatively weak on economic ones, and it’s great to see some critique accompanied by specific, accomplishable, socialist-progressing solutions. This is how we improve. Your critique is excellent, btw - addressing the ideas without insulting Olly.
@@romanski5811 Though I will say I'm not a big fan of Richard Wolf. I've tried listening to him, but he's more rhetoric than anything from what I've heard. I've heard very little discussion of economic theory from him.
Well the fundamental argument of all Breadtube arguments come from wanting an outcome without acknowledging the sacrifices and changes that would be necessary to make these outcomes happen.
As an economics idiot, this is fascinating and incredibly useful. Love philosophytube and the like, but I always suspected *specifically these videos* were far too simplistic of a take on the issues even with my very limited understanding of economics. Absolutely excellent and much appreciated.
They're all simplified, introductory videos. Including UEs. Knowing Better does some good deep dives but again, just deeper introductions. It's interesting rewatching older vids after studying subjects and finding deeper agreement or disagreement with some of the opinions.
@@unlearningeconomics9021 Guess what? WE GOT SOME GREAT NEWS THIS YEAR!!! 🦀🦀🦀🦀🦀 Orange man gone! 🦀🦀🦀🦀🦀 🦀🦀🦀🦀🦀 Orange man gone! 🦀🦀🦀🦀🦀 🦀🦀🦀🦀🦀 Orange man gone! 🦀🦀🦀🦀🦀
Theres a lot of talk about "the left eating itself through critique" which is actually real, and bad. I sometimes wish we could just be more cohesive like the right is, but stuff like this video reminds me that you CAN critique effectively
@@JohnDoe-mj6cc the Right can be "cohesive" because the vast majority do not possess independent critical thought. Someone begins a line and others repeat it over and over, perhaps adding more sensational rhetoric and conspiracy theory and then that just gets repeated. Because...duh duh duhhhhhh...they don't know how to be individuals. The right are socially conditioned for group think.
@@georgearnold841 i would argur that the right is more cohesive because their ideas are more simple to explain and follow because they are the status quo
@@Mayonaisa502 their ideas are "simple"? Do you actually ever watch how the right jump through so many logic holes to present their ideas that are anything but simple? But they get repeated over and over. At first their faces look confused then this confused look turns to elaborate righteous indignation with further repeating because they refuse to be beaten and stopped by the absurdity of their views. The Right is not merely all just Guns, God and immigrants.
@@georgearnold841 Remember that it might seem like that from our position (just like the "the left is npcs" meme is a thing on the right, even though it contradicts the "eating itself" thing), but there's also a lot of debate happening between right wingers, try not to put everyone on the other side in one group
This perception is what brought me here. I hope I won't be disapointed. I lean left economically, but feel the breadtube ideas are just too simplistic.
@@Competitive_Antagonist I think Breadtube does a good job overall of introducing people to more leftist ideas and theories that people (including myself) probably haven't been exposed to before. I do agree, however, that they do simplify concepts a lot and are more focused on introducing concepts than talking about what real-world policy should look like. I will preface by saying that I am 19, and I've only recently this past year shifted from progressive liberal to a more leftist viewpoint. For me, these channels are great since I am new to all of this and I'm not familiar with a lot of the terminology or the many differing sections of leftist circles. I do think we should continue to promote leftist channels like this one that dive even further into what change may actually look like.
It seems global warming is threatening the land market. Hopefully the global market will respond and work towards a net-zero carbon reality. /s Poor regulations for the environment will kill people. Thanks billionaires, your arrogance has blessed my aching lungs.
I am liking the rise in deadpan specific-career style "Breadtubers" such as yourself and DoNotEat (who does urban planning). I am pursuing my masters in public administration, and while I love breadtube, more policy/academic oriented lefty channels such as yourself are greatly appreciated, as I continue my studies. Wishing your channel success!
I would argue that a good deal of Breatube is already pretty academic. They just tend to be more focused on philosophy and critical theory than policy/econ stuff.
@@brogansmith1342 Yeah, sometimes I wished there were more bredtubers who do physics or maths, studying maths myself I've realized many of my partners are also really left wing, but we are probably too shy to do a YT channel
Great to see someone who is bringing a more economics focused analysis to leftube circles. I plan on making a channel focused on political economy, a topic which rarely gets discussed by those on the online left. It's important that we present these topics that may be difficult, but critical to the online discourse, as there are thousands of videos dicussion right-wing neoclassical or austrian economics, but little about Marxist or post-Keynsian models in 2020. Amazing video and keep up the great work!
I'm training in public health so thinking of making a leftist channel about that area. Seeing these other professionals do the same is really inspiring me! We need to share our skills ❤️✊
This is exactly the hole in the leftist online space that needs to be filled. And you're doing a fantastic job with it. Very informative but just as important, really funny, engaging and entertaining. Rare to find such a polished video this early on in a TH-cam career so kudos my friends, subbed
@Diogenes Rex Well no, it doesn't. And people on the left are plenty critical of Contrapoints. She literally just made a video where she sourced some of the views she argued against from a twitter thread where she asked people what makes someone a "lib" in their eyes, then spent the whole video essentially implying people left of her didn't have any real strategy. There are tons of "breadtubers" who are considerably left of her that don't do anything like that.
I live in Denmark. Social housing is very popular here - In most towns there are plenty of houses and apartments which are rented at price which is about 20%-50% from the market price - so those are very affordable. The houses are generally nice and cozy, often located in the very center of a town. IMO, it is a prefect solution. The only disadvantage is that you have to wait in que from 1 to 20 years for a specific apartment/house to become available for you (Though you are able to be in multiple ques simultaneously)
@@user-gz4ve8mw9l I intentionally lived in a car for half a year when I made more than enough to not do that, I still actually make exactly the same amount years later, which is barely anything. Why are you in a car?
@@slaydon3 Long story short relatives of mine stole $350k from me. Just before the onset of the Covid 19 pandemic in early 2020. I then ended up losing all 3 of my jobs. Ended up between a choice of the street homeless, or my car. I chose my car obviously.
i’ve been reluctant to click this video because I thought it would just be someone screaming at breadtube but thankfully it’s a pretty nuanced and thought-out video so far! Thank you for making this
Was expecting right wing trash, very pleasantly surprised by the content of this video. Thanks for introducing me to alternative solutions. Subscribed.
Also the title's framing "breadtube vs economics" already implies an antagonistic situation which sets up a monolithic "breadtube" that is antithetical to objective and empirical "economics", which is a popular way of setting any debate off with affectively loaded baggage, so I get why people are only tentatively clicking on the video.
Congrats on being sold on right wing trash. This video falsely conflates an atrocious number of things and is clearly tailor made to come off as a smaller creator.
I honestly agree with a lot of what you said but the 1 thing that sticks out as somewhat contradictory is the point about some landlords only making as much as the tenants. By doing so you equate the financial situation of the tenant and the landlord but the landlord is inherently in a much better situation by virtue of ownership. They may have equivalent incomes but the renter has to work for that income while the landlord doesn't.
I agree, but when you put the difference between your income and that of your landlord in perspective with the gap between rich and poor, you realise you're both fairly close together. we've got to address the big inequalities first, those who hoard half the money despite being a tiny percentage.
@@GeraintDafis that sounds like a problem with social security programs, not housing. Also, renting summer cottages/hotel rooms aren't the same as renting a house to live in Expropiating houses should be to get rid of those people who own entire apartment buildings or neighborhoods, not your local middle class dad who has his own house, a summer house, and his parent's house that he recently recieved after they passed away. Three properties might be a little too much, but isn't a problem
@@GeraintDafis even if we go full anarchist. Your friend would still go have her home. Society would provide for her needs and she would contribute to the extend of her capacity! To each according to their need, from each according to their ability! With that principle in mind your friend would not need to rent the extra properties and therefore they can be given to other people in need!
@@miss1of2 except that’s extremely idealistic and fragile, is only feasible through totalitarianism, and has basically never been implemented on a scale larger than a Hunter gatherer tribe in human history.
I know this is a meme but I wished people would stop using "virgin" as some kind of synonym for "loser". The "virgins are losers" nonsense causes rapes, plain and simple.
@@camelopardalis84 sounds like something an incel rape-apologist would say. If you can't stand being seen as a loser for not getting laid: Improve yourself and find a willing partner. Don't rape. Also it is not like rapists are held in higher regard than virgins.
@@Baalur You'll get a more actual reply once I have time to write it but for now, let me just tell you this: I am about as far from a rape apologist as one can be. Maybe just *try* for more than three seconds to come up with a better explanation for why I wrote what I wrote. Instead of just labelling me as a rape apologist. Some time ago I threatened to call the police on some man who lives in my neighbourhood who felt it would be a good idea or something to sexually harass me out of his window on my way home. I wouldn't be surprised at all if what he did and said were something you'd refer to as "being friendly, nothing more". But, unlike you, I won't just make assumptions.
Dude. Omfg. This is the first of your vids I've seen and I have been waiting for exactly this kind of content for years. I am a massive econ-nerd and breadtube has indeed been sorely lacking in this area. Thank you thaaank you for this. So excited to dive into your existing vids and highly anticipating the content you put out in the future!!
@@donaldhysa4836Money and Markets are a human invention. Capitalism has only existed for a few hundred years. Humans have been around for 200 thousand years. So like hmmmm maybe there's more to life than the markets!
Land value taxes are super interesting in that they cut across existing political coalitions a little bit. While Marx liked them, so did William F Buckley! On fairness, land taxes tax the things the landlord did not create or make. On market efficiency, it's a property tax minus improvements. When you replace the roof on your house, your home value increases so your property taxes go up. Higher taxes discourage improvement. But land value taxes, improve away! Good stuff.
@DJ Coin Laundry isn't the point that the after the improvement the tax is higher indefinitely. So you can claim against the cost up to a point but would have to pay the tax for ever. This would discourage maintenance that risked raising the houses (or building/what ever) value. Where as is the lands value hasn't changed then maintenance is still worth doing?
@@Tasmantor Does maintenance apply here? Wouldn't a house requiring maintenance lower the property tax, since the value of the house is decreasing? Thus doing maintenance would only sustain property tax, nor raise it? The point seems to stand when it comes to improvement though! And I might just be misunderstanding the specifics of property tax
@@dig8634 the point is that the value of the house isn't a factor in the tax. The land is, so if you want a nice place that's fine it won't increase your tax burden to improve it. Like wise it won't increase your tax burden to maintain (or improve) a rental property. If the land increases in value you pay more not the house/building.
I'm only five minutes in, but: "Nobody speaks about the 'apple crisis'" Isn't that what concerns about food deserts are about? America has places where access to things like fresh produce is actually an issue, and something like 7% of Americans live in those food deserts.
@@KubaRootz Actually, searching up Food Desert with the UK, Canada and Australia all turn up results from either major news outlets or government sources, and each of them shows a number between 5 and 10% living with food insecurity.
Y'all are all correct, but somehow you're not bringing up that there are also plenty of countries where it's not just food scarcity, it's straight up starvation due to extraction of resources. The idea in the vid that everyone who wants apples can have them is trash.
@@JamMastaJeremy that's absolutely an issue, but the point about apples seemed to be that in places with well functioning markets, apples were easy to get. I focused on English speaking countries to cover the places that I expected Unlearning Economics was referring to. If a system results in more than 1 in 20 having issues getting the resource that everyone can afford, there may be underlying issues relying on that system for something that everyone needs.
That point about the apple crisis is basically a perfect encapsulation of the precise piece of the puzzle that you’re missing (to be fair, Ollie never touches on it either) - the things that basically everyone can afford in this economy are ---- heavily subsidised. The reason we don’t talk about the apple crisis is because agribusiness is one of the most subsidised sectors of the economy and YES it can and does equally apply to every other sector. Which is just one of the many ways that “actually existing capitalism” is a repackaging of socialism for the rich, hard market competition for everyone else.
Here in New Zealand agricultural products aren't subsidised at all, though the banks that provides finance to farmers get their loans underwritten by the New Zealand central bank, during an economic crisis like the one the world is currently enduring.. So I guess that's an indirect temporary public subsidy. Ironically thanks to Covid19, the horticulture sector is suffering a crisis at the moment, because with our border closed there will not be enough labour to harvest the produce, including apples. We have traditionally relied on temporary migrant labour and young backpackers, because there aren't sufficient local people willing to endure the low wages and poor working conditions. This fills me with glee, since I have done a lot of work in the sector and seen how they exploit working people from countries where our low wages seem positively generous.
Great point but we shouldn't popularise those phrase socialism for the rich.. Its misleading and implies socialism is essentially subsidization or govt intervention which is not the case
Every "Breadtube debunked!" video I've seen dodges points that are made or straight up lie to try and discredit them. You actually gave constructive criticism and added ways to change the housing system instead of trying to defend its current state. Great video!
@@kevinwillems8720 Economics isn't bullshit. It's based on money which we invented and I think we'd be better off without, but we can't make the concept of money disappear just like that. It's a very real thing with real world consequences and we have to operate within this system until society gets to a place where we can abolish it.
I can see a glearing problem with the tax he proposed, the tax will cause the 1% to be quick with their houses but will make 100% of people their houses more costier, that includes homeless and poor people buying said houses, house owners will put the cost of the tax in the cost of the house Not only that but it would be hard to make fair, if you make everyone pay a tax for the few mf that do the bullshit, you are being unfair to the majority, and if you just make it so uninhabitaded terrain/houses get taxed, people with money are the firsts to build shitty houses and get friends of theirs living there, leaving again in a worse position only those in the mid, with just one house If you make it so every house after the second is taxed, they will change owners in the snap of a finger, etc Also, rich people are the ones with economic assistants that help the elude taxed, a legal way of evasion, making again the middle class people paying the most and translating that extra cost to the poor when they want to buy
Love the way you tackled this. You're the living proof it's possible to disagree with and correct others' ideas by working with instead of against them :)
Hey there! As an economics and finance student at university, I'm already loving this series. Economics is a serious lack of understanding amongst the modern left and definitely an issue that needs to be tackled. If you ever need support in the future in regards to stock markets (I'm well versed in American, Chinese, Hong konger, German, and London exchanges), or corporate finance (all the way to mergers/acquisitions and private equity, as well as corporate and personal financial planning) I'd love to provide some great reading and information.
Any blogs or sites you may recommend? I subscribed to the Financial Times, because if these guys sells to the global invester class they had to provide the most accurate news without the spins other news do. But I am not part of that class and want to look at econ/finance from other perspectives than managers' personal experiences. Most of other econ sites I found are either in the academic orthodoxy (which I mostly do not believed in) and counter (which focused more on debunking theories I never firmly held in the first place).
@@Account.for.Comment yeah man, absolutely. I’d recommend keeping up with mainstream financial publications anyways, keep tabs on how the market is organized. Good things for that are the typical you’d expect: the Dow Jones-owned big 3 (wall street journal, market watch, Barron’s - specifically Alexandra scaggs, she’s a Barron’s journo) The problem with heterodox economics is outlined well in Unlearning Economics’ other videos. By the simple nature of the dismal science, it encourages orthodoxy. It’s almost impossible to build heterodox theory (Marxist, market socialist, Modern Monetary, you name it) because there’s not exactly a lot of empirical evidence to base it on. For basic introductions to heterodox economics, I’d recommend the perennial Richard Wolff (many free lectures available on TH-cam) and The Deficit Myth by Stephanie Kelton. Obviously, these are extremely well known examples and only serve as a good baseline. As a finance student, my studies are based on underlying neo-Keynesian assumptions, so there really isn’t any heterodox “finance theory” if you catch my drift. Obviously the most authoritative sources for heterodox economic theory are Marx & Engels (Kapital, to start) and build from there.
You do realise the reason that the LEFT don't speak to the Market Class is because the fundamental philosophy of the left is to operate outside of market forces. That corporations do not hold any of the answers.
@@georgearnold841 I think that it is an outright misconception or maybe a result of recent polarization. Amongst the best economists I've read regarding themselves as in the left and promote the free market in many issues. Warren Buffet, Jim Chanos and George Soros are big donors to leftwing party and as capitalist as any traders. Albert Hirschman (left-leaning economist) wrote " Exit, Voice and Loyalty" provided great explanations of the contrasting ways of how markets and governments improve their products or services. Corporations hold all the answers are clear bullshit to almost everybody, yet somehow, there are public intellectuals who sprout these bullshits without empirical evidences and had followings entrenched in them.
I want to add the Singaporean Housing Model. The government owns around 70% of housing. And in Austria’s Capital Vienna the city government owns around 40 % of the housing. Both cases might be worth looking into. The video is still very interesting and I think that a land value tax would be a good idea to implement.
@ It has some extremely strict laws and punishments in some cases (like I think the death penalty can be used for drug offense if I'm not mistaken), but I believe there's actually a cultural consensus that desires this. I think polymatter did a good video on exactly this: th-cam.com/video/3dBaEo4QplQ/w-d-xo.html
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@@Bisquick thanks! Granted its so weird when the entire culture is kinda fascist lol
@ it isn't fascist. But it is authoritarian. With some attempts at eugenics thrown inn. The founder of the current political regime, Lee Kwan Yu is very popular among neoliberals. As for their "public housing", let's just say the government does give you housing provided that you are not critical of them. It is basically a form of "clientelism". Not something that is democratically controlled.
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@@frrascon So it is actually quite comparable to modern CCP?
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@arcangelkrlos I know, i also live in such a banana Republic myself. I mean as shit as China, America, Singapore, and other repressive regimes are, its still way better than living in a fucking mafia state
Austrian here: we definitly also have a housing crisis. A higher percentage (as compaired to anglo-saxon countries) of our population pays rent rather than owns housing. High-rent payment even in state-owned social housing makes it much harder for low income people to safe, build and sustain wealth. Yrs property prices in Vienn arent as high as in London, but high rental payment, finacial indtitutions that are often unwilling to give out loans to lower-income people and high livikg costs, make it impssoible for most people to ever own their own flat. just looking at property prices to deduce if there is a housing crisis feels much too sinplistic to me.
This implies that social housing must also take account of rent as a percentage of income in order to produce the sorts of social benefits (safety, stability, equality) we desire.
@@nathansgreen I think social housing should only charge rent in order to cover repairs and utilities. Unfortunatly the Viennese Government treats social housing as a profit-making machine on the backs of the poor, that allows them to lower taxes for everyone else.
@@stefankotz2242 Just to complement what you're saying, even Adam Smith agreed. Really all the classical economists had a (I would say justified) throughline of contempt for the rentier class as they were transparently a vestige from feudal society and presented an obvious contradiction to the justifying logic of capitalism, ie value extracted without value produced, . Ch.11 of Wealth of Nations basically insinuates too that the idea of a ¨free market¨ as discussed in its historical context was a market free of the possibility for rent extraction as opposed to the conservative distortion it has come to mean today of...basically the opposite. _"Kelp was never augmented by human industry. The landlord, however, whose estate is bounded by a kelp shore of this kind, demands a rent for it."_
Hi Stefan! British guy who lives in Wien here. Yes, the Austrian housing market has some problems, und die Miete steigt immer weiter und des ist oasch, but there is not a housing crisis in the sense of mass homelessness. The housing crisis in the UK isn't about owning your home or not, it's about being able to afford shelter. Homelessness all over the UK is horrendous, you cannot walk down the street without seeing people who really are sleeping rough (we don't even have Bahnhofsmissionen or other Notschlafstellen for the most part). That's how bad things have gotten in the UK where housing policy is almost entirely focused on the perspective of landlords who just want their house price to rise forever (not to mention that pretty much everything else is much less affordable than even in Vienna). The few rich people n Austria who really can afford to buy properties to rent out do of course experience the same perverse incentives to just live off the rent of the land, sure. But they're not so great in number that their perspective completely dominates politics and does not allow the renter's position to ever be considered. Thankfully, the needs of renters are actually addressed in politics here, even with the last two coalition governments. Little things like the strange start-up companies they have here that give people the legal advice to claim back overpaid rent are the norm here, but they don't exist anywhere near to the same extent in the UK as they do here. Housing, or at the very least, shelter, is a fundamental need without which people cannot develop their lives further and ought to be provided as free and affordable to all in the same way as water and education. What I like about this video is that it does state the case that there can be a housing market, but it ought to be something that allows people to move house, not to hoard land as rentier capitalists do, and does not necessarily mean absolutely depriving people of housing altogether (though sadly I do think UK economic policy is honestly this vindictive in the aim to drive up rent and keep pay low). Alles gute! Verzeih mir für den langen Kommentar.
I didn't even start following Abi's channel until _after_ she came out, so all of her videos prior to that may forever remain a mystery to me - even the thought of watching them is uncomfortable. It feels like I'd be ... prying into her pre-transition self, or something? Yikes 😅
@@AndrewGillard I think she'd agree that her past videos hold a lot of importance and something tells me she'd rather you engage with that content even though it's pre-transition. If she wanted to hide it, it wouldn't still be up. She could, if she wanted, remake all those videos if she really cared all that much about it.
I'm happy I found your channel and this video. I immensely appreciate Abigail's videos for laying some of the ground ideas after my leftist awakening, but videos like these help me learn and understand the nuance to make those goals more realistic and achievable
I've felt this is my blindspot for a long time as an anthropology student, I'm glad we have a channel like yours to encourage more people, including myself, to learn and get more in-depth knowledge on economics.
I mean if you’re as durable as a red delicious, of course you’ll get around. Before other, better apples come around. Which they have. Maybe we need something durable, actually delicious, and resource efficient? Seriously, why haven’t millennials killed those red mealy balls yet?
Isn't that always true though? The Housing Market is the Housing Market. If you change the reality of the Housing Market, you have changed what we are talking about. Markets aren't magical, they are descriptive, not prescriptive (and this is a big issue with Right Economics, they pretend it's prescriptive). A Market where there is no money and we use oranges to buy houses is still a Housing Market system, but it's nothing like what we would call the Housing Market. Likewise, when you remove the scarcity issue of money and housing, you have drastically changed what a Housing Market is. Frankly that's my issue with this video as well. He isn't arguing with Ollie, he has accepted Mr. Thorns entire premise before discussing the situation further, which means he CANT be arguing with Mr.Thorn even if it's framed that way. EDIT: To be clear, I dislike how it's framed, not the material in it. It feels like there is a lot more work on trying to "distance" from the original work, instead of explain it in more detail. Something I note because around 14 minutes in he specifically says he wanted Mr. Thorn and Mexie to do this exact same thing I am saying I would have liked him to do.
@@Robert-qq9em The current conditions of the housing market that are critiqued are not inherent to being a market though. As is pointed out in the video, the “housing crisis” mostly exists in the housing markets of Anglophone nations.
@@OjoRojo40 What, does “mostly” mean “only”? And does it imply there is no abusive housing policy outside the specific cycle of debt, speculation, and over-commoditization of housing in anglophone nations?
I was talking with my wife about the lack of leftist econ content the other day and even joked about starting my own channel. Good to know someone more credible beat me to it.
Stop thinking of economics as leftist or rightist. Economics is just economics regardless of politics, even if it informs policy. Especially because it informs policy. Economics is just like physics: we have to understand how things work based on observation and evidence, not based or influenced by our political leanings. Left and Right is just ideological separatist nonsense, anyway. Ideologies blind people to observation and evidence.
Re: the apple point - artificial scarcity of abundant, replaceable goods is very very commong under capitalism. Compare childhood hunger and malnutrition rates in the US to the amount of fresh produce which is thrown away (~50% by some accounts). Yes housing markets are particularly bad, but Ollie is correct that there are no markets under capitalism that do not rely on 1.) the existence or manufacture of scarcity in order to increase profit margins, and 2.) the exclusion of people who do not have money from the market.
Exactly.... it's also funny because there are hundreds of different types of apples, and we only get like 5 of them on the shelves. Any time folks go apple picking for other types, they're like "OMG I never knew apples could taste so good!" What we eat isn't the result of "good market feedback" at all.
In the USA the effect of artificial scarcity of food has been directly opposed by artificial abundance. Childhood malnourishment in the USA is not due to "capitalism", as the food supply is far from a free market. The US government provides farming subsidies which artificially deflate the price of food. Then the SNAP, WIC, & National School Lunch & School Breakfast programs all subsidize food purchases for the children of low income households. I'm on SNAP myself at the moment and the only reason that doesn't cover all my food purchases all by itself is because I prefer spending some of my limited luxuries budget on premade food instead of cooking. And that's on the per person subsidy for an adult. The WIC program provides even more for pregnant women and children, and the school meals programs are on top of that. The only reason any american child is malnourished is parental negligence or incompetence.
@@Kieselmeister the rest of the developed world also has similar programs - if it truly comes down to individual competence, why are there different childhood malnutrition rates between countries? Are American parents just choosing to starve their kids more than, say, Swiss parents? Or perhaps the marketization of school lunch in the US, and wider domination by fast food corporations who create food deserts, is to blame.
@@mboop127 Only 60% of those eligible for food assistance in the USA actually apply for it. That's the largest factor by far. Half of the remaining 40% are children, and if they are going hungry it's because their parents valued their pride more than their children's health. there are also a lot of flaws in the entire food desert concept, at least when it comes to urban ones. There are rural areas where physical access to cheap nutritious food is actually difficult due to distance rather than just inconvenient, but the current concept of the urban food desert is based on a fetishization of "fresh food" which is unscientific, and ignores the fact that one CAN obtain a balanced diet from crappy gas station food if they have to. You just have to actually know what vitamins and minerals you need, and actually read the packaging to find them. You also have to accept that you are going to need to exercise more to burn off a the extra empty calories. I can and have done so myself at various points. I definitely gained weight, but at no point was I actually malnourished. It's entirely possible to survive indefinitely on frozen pizza, ramen noodles, and multivitamins. One of the big problems in the USA is a lack of dietary education, exacerbated by people not paying attention to what education there is. To be frank, the society of Switzerland probably produces better parents on average than America does these days. Setting aside the cases where parents value their pride over letting the government pay to feed their children, majority of cases of malnutrition are due to parents stuffing their kids full, but not bothering to make sure they are getting a balanced diet. vitamin deficiencies are the biggest culprit, followed by protein deficiencies. (All plant protein is incomplete for animal nutrition, and different sources need to be mixed.) There is also the occasional edge cases where the parents are on some fad diet and force their children to do it with them without understanding the damage it could cause. There have been deaths due to parents being on Vegan diets and giving infants vegan milk substitutes instead of formula. (Or even just trying to breastfeed while on an imbalanced vegan diet.)
@@Kieselmeister you didn't reply to the question. Do American parents just independently choose to be more prideful than those in other countries? The only way to explain such big gaps between countries is to look at the differences in their systems. Trying to explain those divides by criticizing personal choices is an utterly childish view.
I'm glad you brought up traveling businessmen. My first thought on watching Philosophy Tube and Mexie's video was that it didn't sound like he was considering the need to travel, which is the main concern I have with the eventual communes he mentions. I think it'd be hard if not impossible to set up any of the ideal societies the left proposes without maintaining tolerance the whole way through, and as far as I know tolerance in a society tends to rely on the ability to travel. That said, do you have any comments and/or videos analyzing the maintenance of homes? That part seems to be left out of most discussions I've seen.
My people, the Maori (indigenous people of New Zealand) traveled freely in a pre-capitalist society and were damn sight more tolerant than the European colonist who arrived in the 18th Century and imposed capitalism and the nation-state on us.
I wasn't quite sure about the video of Olly's at the time either. Happy to see content like this too. I like the fun styles of contrapoints and philosophy tube but a dryer style works just as well for me
Having studied economics in university, it’s something that I noticed too within breadtube which I also watch a lot. So I’m happy to see you working on this. Edit: I imagine the same principles can be applied to financial groups and rich folk who own multiple properties who use them for income through Airbnb
The lights dim and flicker. You begin feeling a growing sense of unease build up deep inside of you. You hear the floor boards creak down the hallway, but you dare not turn around. The room gets progressively colder and colder, yet you still break out into a nervous sweat. He's now right behind you; you want to run but can't muster the strength. He whispers in your ear: "Those people can just sell their houses" BEN SHAPIRO
And insurers in California are already exiting the fire home insurance market because the risk pooling is becoming more unstable. Like if you're an insurer and someone is asking to buy insurance from you but the data says their house is in an area that only gets worse and worse in terms of fire likelihood, why would you sell them that insurance? Not only that, but the alternative would be to raise premiums extremely and to unfeasible heights. And you're right, I haven't looked into it, but I'd imagine similar situations in Hurricane areas of the U.S., and flooding regions. Tbh, Climate Change and the Housing Market is a massive fucking topic so I'm not surprised Unlearning Econ didn't touch on it since this was mainly a response video.
Not necessarily. It seems with decent costal protection systems we can avoid the majority of the predicted land loss and property damage well into the next century. Obviously we will also need to take serious measures to reduce carbon emissions, promoting readiness for storms, implementing no wake zones etc. It's an ongoing battle and action needs to be taken. There's a lot of doomerism around this subject, but there does seem to be scientifically sound methods to overcome this. Also, most of the articles and studies I've read on this subject (I'm a sad fuck that got in to a massive debate on facebook about this) include major cities in their stats in regards to homes lost due to rising sea levels and don't take in to account that there is a large economic value in focusing coastal protections in these areas. It seems pretty certain that the majority of spending will go towards protecting these cities. While, unfortunately, small seaside towns will take the brunt of rising sea levels. But dense population centres will be safe i.e. the majority of expected (from what I've seen) homes lost. London isn't going to be atlantis in 2200. I do feel for those pacific islanders though.
yeah but why do I have to get a real job while these guys can live off other people's need to a roof just because their families happend to have properties
@@photogenicBlur Because life isn’t fair. Deal with it. You’re complaining about having to work while there are people paralyzed from the neck down. Be grateful ffs.
@@photogenicBlur some of them may not have it so great but it seemed weird to me that he acted like getting rid of landlords means somehow impoverishing this tiny portion of people who do some work and maybe add a little value and make an honest dollar with those VAST MAJORITY of often foreigners dumping scads of cash into NY and LA and other places, or giant real estate companies like Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway that got bailed ou th after the bank sdcc predatory lent to especially minorities and women but poor whites too. And Obama bailed out the people who cheated the predatory real estate loan market victims. They created a financial disaster and then had their losses covered. This is like a casino paying back all its biggest losers. Except we pay. It's really weird how this supposed economist would defend the small percentage of small property holders who are forced to rent to.other poors keeping them in poverty. And we can see the incredible increases in wealth since covid for the likes of E Musk. Who went from $30 to $90 billion in a few months. This is the same supposed " market " tha th is somehow supposed to fix the housing crisis. It makes no sense
Thank you so much. I really want to understand economics, I'm sick of being told that I hold radical ideas because I'm ignorant of it. But at the same time my learning disability generally prevents me from getting through academic texts on the matter, and simple online content that isnt completely concervative is few and far between. I actually understood this for once, so thank you
The statistic at 14:08 is completely useless. It show "Average" income and as you surely know "Median" income would be the useful statistic here. So that statistic is very biased.
It looks like the word "average" here is referring to long-term average of the underlying statistic, with the statistic being the house price to income ratio. As in, average (ratio y1 + ratio y2 +.... ratio yN)/N. I bet you're right though, in that the underlying statistic is probably the average, it just doesn't say that specifically. Although richer people will tend to have more expensive homes which will blunt the distortion from income inequality.
A big part of my leftist niche that's often forgotten about is land reform. I'm a big proponent of breaking up large agricultural firms as well as corporate held lands and distrube then directly to people.
Greetings from Germany! I have to add that while our housing Market is probably better than the one in the UK and US, we do still have problems in the desirable cities. Property in these cities is mostly unaffordable (actually more and more is being concentrated in the hands of investment firms) and rent is climbing steadily. In Munich, where I live, almost half of the mean income is spent just for rent on average, and in Berlin, in response to very sharply rising rent prices in the last decade (Berlin used to be considered affordable), a controversial rent cap was issued by the berlin state government, banning rise of rents for 5 years (with a few exceptions such as for newly built housing).
Yeah, I agree. I am economically illiterate, but at the point in the video where he said that Germany has a functioning housing sector, it did make me go "hmmm". Austria (specifically Vienna is what I know of) seems to have it figured out a bit more from what I heard, also because so much of the housing is in the hands of the city. Really cool video in any case!
Also in Berlin there is a movement now stalled out by the neoliberal "Social Democratic party of Germany" to actually disown some of these big investment firms (albeit with reimbursement) The cap could have also been partially a concession to take some wind out of this movements sails
Former real estate agent and current-day leftist here. I appreciate your channel and focus on economics, I agree we need a better understanding of the systems we want to dismantle; but I have to disagree with most of your solutions. The problem is one of political will. The housing market is not a singular monolith, and when you get involved in real estate sales one of the first things you learn about is the scale of number of adjacent industries. Insurance companies of all flavors (homeowner, renters, title), inspectors, appraisers, marketers, the list goes on and on and stretches further than you could imagine (even when I used to clean residential windows 70% of our business was for RE agents). When you say "will this be the end of the housing market" you leave out all these adjacent industries that WILL be ended if home prices are lowered because they exist off the debt created by mortgages. A "reasonable" market with low housing prices may be able to support real estate companies and agents and some landlords, but it cannot support the network of adjacent businesses that cling parasitically to the money-fountain that is the mortgage market. So not only do you have the lobbying power of multi-billion dollar real estate companies, but you also have all these lesser corporate entities that will resist and lobby against any threats to the market (such as mutualist institutions) and defend against those threats using legislation. If it is government run, it will be defunded to the point of being non-functional, then lambasted as ineffective ("the Republican strategy"), and finally dissolved. If it is privately run it will be regulated to the point that it cannot function, and dissolve due to financial constraints. The situation we have with real estate in the US can only be relieved through revolutionary political will, the real estate industry is too big to be "chipped away at"; any attempts to do so will be squashed. We need something more akin to the Sherman Anti-Trust act, but in a way that breaks down the "decentralized monopoly" of land ownership rather than the centralized monopolies that existed in 1890. The only thing that would work is forcible seizure of assets. I can not imagine a "painless" way to wean ourselves off of an exploitative housing industry. The RE industry may not need housing to be unaffordable to exist, but they need it to be unaffordable in order to be able to exist on any scale comparable to what they are today. And capital never relinquishes profits voluntarily.
Could you make a video on rent control? I have heard so many variations all over the internet. Some saying its good, I heard that it will be horrible for the market, and some who say it will do very little to help. As someone who is not very economical literate I don't know what to think. Also a video that has a reading list would be very helpful. Ps this was a good video.
I’ve got one planned on ‘econ101’ in general, and being against rent control is a particular argument you get from econ101 types. Long story short - the evidence doesn’t suggest it’s as bad as they say, though of course it has downsides.
The most commom critique of rent control is that it will eventually end up hurting the people you would like it to help. Obviously climbing rent prices is a problem, but it seems like a better way to solve that through a market is to provide more supply (public housing). Or even take a further step back and fiddle with the incentives of taxes like doing a land value tax system, where you tax the land at a vastly higher rate than the property improvements (prioritizing vertical lots instead of high value sprawl.)
In circumstances such as rent control, and other socially focused market regulations, you have to account for the non-economic rationale for and against the regulations.. Rent control is meant to prevent homelessness, the people who argue so vociferously against it are usually more interested in appealing to an ideal that inherently pursues other policies that don't help renter-class people.. That being said, economists tend to obsess with making exclusively economic arguments, so as not to be corrupted by elements of more social sciences.. You have to make your own choices
Price controls in general act as an artificial way to restrict the push that high demand and low supply does to prices. If you keep a price frozen, the demand for it will stay the same, even increase because of speculation and the rest of the economy's growth. On the flipside, it will not create a subsequent hike in supply (In this case, investment in housing) because the price hasn't changed. It may be profitable, but not AS profitable as doing something else with the money (Like developing in a city/country with less regulations, or developing commercial buildings instead). Also, as a rental owner, you're less interested in re-investing in the property, so you won't fix it up as often, or use the nicest materials, etc. If there's less money to be made, then the properties might not be worth buying for people looking to rent the place. So in that regard, the price of the lots might go down. However, there will still be people wanting to live in those places. Remember, the housing market has demand because people want to live there; otherwise it's a dead market. So, there will still be competition for the places, where the wealthy will still have the advantage. My guess is that rent control might slowly but surely kill the rental market in an area, and only people with the capital to straight up buy a property might be able to move in. Maybe the rental market might start to transition into informality to avoid regulations (for instance, you don't rent a place but a bed, or you make a sort of hotel of the extra rooms in the place you live in; isn't that what Airbnb is?). I dunno. I live in Argentina, btw. We have a LOOONG history with price controls, and it has never worked. People and businesses are pushed into informality where possible, which makes the situation more precarious for everyone. We're doing bad in every metric possible, though, so we shouldn't be used as an example tbh. Cheers
@@unlearningeconomics9021 The main priority of rent control is to make housing more afforadable/lessen the burden of policy. Empiral literature suggests it's basically a failure at doing these goals: www.urban.org/sites/default/files/publication/99646/rent_control._what_does_the_research_tell_us_about_the_effectiveness_of_local_action_1.pdf Even if the downsides are small (though still existant) that's pretty damning no?
Great work! Henry George and land taxes are always left of of housing debates. The textbook for A level economics doesn't even mention land when explaining rent, but instead has an example of a famous actor, which is a spurious example probably more appropriate for marginal revenue product theory. Well done for exposing people to successful policies that are "overlooked" in textbooks!
Good video. I think, in regards to the UK, the major problems have been the terrible regulations, broken definitions, and the Londoncentric nature of the country. Housing associations that were created as nonprofits to fill the housing gap for low income households have deviated so far from the original goal, that they're now responsible for the creation of unaffordable complexes built with four walls of plasterboard. Arguably, it's not the existence of the market itself, but the market itself that is the issue
After hearing you, I find Ollie and you talking different languages, both of you with good points, though. At the end you have a good video, but it is actually not a good critique of Ollie, rather a great complement.
Right, it's a response and opening to discussion. It's pretty clear he's acknowledging that the core issue is real - being that the current housing market is not functional for society at large - but looking from a more functional perspective. Ollie's video in whole is really good at covering what the problems are, but is brief on solutions, and filling in that gap and making corrections isn't a bad thing.
Definitely different languages lol, I know for myself I tend to have a hard time following philosophytube... Possibly because I'm quite far removed from the philosophy mindset.
This is a great video. Though the framing seems a bit off, but I get for exposure reasons why it was done this way (gotta play to the algorithm). Still feels like there's a discussion to be had between "markets" as a concept and "the market" as a thing that currently exists. Philosophy Tube's video doesn't strike me as being particularly concerned with the former as much as the latter, especially given the comic book metaphor and literally using "Housing Market" as the title for a character. It's not that it's being said that housing markets necessarily create housing crises, but that The Housing Market is creating The Housing Crisis. Watching this I couldn't help but feel like the critique aspect of the video had shifted the original video's target.
@@brendanmccabe8373 She said smth like "I'm not gonna explain UBI further because if I do then people think the video is about a certain policy and then a bunch of youtubers make replay videos to me where they presumably own me with facts and logic, and which I sadly don't watch" She has a rule of not watching replay videos because most of the time they're not made in good faith
The best economic-related breadtube channel these days is Folding Ideas. His recent NFTs, Decentraland, Gamestop trilogy are incredible and so well researched.
Calling Folding Ideas breadtube seems rather inaccurate. He doesn't come off as an anti-capitalist, or anti-state. He mostly comes off as a rational speaker on a topic that's rife with populist insanity. Coffeezilla is in kind of the same boat, with him having a focus on the grifting/snake oil salesmanship that riddles the pro web3 crowd.
@@Ornithopter470it depends on what you mean by leftist. Olson directly supports a UBI and in line goes up directly points out how the concept of ownership leads to some pretty terrible shit via the discussion of children growing up in a crypto based economy with extremely slow inflation or deflation built into it.
Currently, in many places where the housing crisis is most acute, planning restrictions prevent or greatly increase the cost of building social housing.
I'm ambivalent on this point and I didn't cover it partly for reasons of space and partly because it's the main thing the video I'm responding to discussed in-depth. What would you recommend reading about planning?
yeh funny that. you would think that there's some conspiracy between existing landowners and local authorities to restrict land supply and to increase housing prices. Nah that couldn't possibly be true.
"functioning housing markets in germany" as someone who lives in germany I was really quite surprised by that notion. Might be, it's way worse elsewhere but the housing markets in pretty much all bigger cities in germany is quite the opposite of functioning. Berlin, Munich, Hamburg just to name some of the worst examples.
its so refreshing to see things i agree with be critiqued in a constructive way where everybody actually learns something. usually debating things on the internet is such a nightmare but this video did everything right.
14:07 - Interesting graph. I had no idea how bad this housing crisis was in the anglo-saxon countries. Even in Germany we've been talking about our housing crisis for years now. Especially in my area where basically every dullsville with a train connection to munich is counted as part of the "Munich Metropiltan Area" - great argument to push up prices :P
The problem with calling much of 'house' value 'land' value is that it ignores the existence of leaseholds. In urban areas, where much of housing is flats, it can be impossible to get anything other than leasehold properties. If a flat increases in price, that isn't the value of the land increasing, because the land does not change ownership when the flat does. Plus there's the conflation of value with price - the land hasn't changed, so hasn't gained (or lost) any value, and the house built on it may have gained or lost value (or neither) depending on its condition (e.g. building an extension versus letting the roof cave in). However, prices inexorably increase. Price may not be entirely orthogonal to value, but it is also clearly not dependent upon it.
"If a flat increases in price, that isn't the value of the land increasing, because the land does not change ownership when the flat does. " except it is, just divided x numbers of ways. The reason the flat has value above and beyond the basic cost of building it, is the location, ie land it is on. The irony of the lease underneath a leasehold is it is comparatively undervalued (to pay lease or buy the freehold rights) compared to full-on leasing (renting), of the leasehold flat above it. Why? Because the contract rights over the lease and freehold land the leaseholder has. Effectively the leasehold system is a response to actual market pressures and mechanism to create a for developer profit but for the leaseholder co-op type arrangement where pure freehold is to impractical because of land value. Developer gets freehold land, builds flats, sells individual flats as leaseholds but needs to have contracts that make it close to freehold as possible to be attractive to customers (see part-rent part buy systems for another example), so setups leasehold system. Freeholder owner rights are severely curtailed by the long leases terms that are signed to originally.
Great video, wanted something like this after watching Olly's. That said, my take on the problem and on the Olly's video is different from yours. I would say "Yes there is a problem with the current system. I didn't hear any practical solution though". I don't disagree with what Olly says, because his points to me are more of a "how far are we willing to go in breaking social norms to solve housing problem" statements, rather than practical economic solutions. I don't mind those statements, they are interesting to consider. I just don't think they can be acted on. As a side note, historically famous failures of communism are often related to mistaking manifestos/statements/ideological directions with practical economical steps (see early Soviet Union for a variety of examples, such as collectivization leading to massive hunger in the high-producing agricultural areas of the country). We really need to learn from those failures, especially since most good arguments against left wing economics are based on historic evidence. That said, I am a big fan of Philosophy Tube, Olly is awesome
I love this video. I wish you had elaborated on georgism more, it's a really good idea. It also would have been good to elaborate the over regulation of housing in terms of zoning laws, and how countries with lax zoning laws like Japan don't have problems getting housing supply to necessary levels.
Okay SO. First thing, this is a good video, I like what you’re doing and I think having a breadtube look at economics is good...however. I really do take issue with the idea that a housing market doesn’t inherently lead to a crisis, for one very simple reason: the rich, as you said, often seek to monopolize land and buy up more and more property for themselves, and will always have more money to do so than an average person on the street thanks in part to SOME land being an economic investment (cough cough landlords, not that every landlord is rich). Leaving housing, something that is essential for life in this society and every other, up to market dynamics leads to, as Marx predicted, the eventual failing of market systems as the very top of society amasses more and more property for themselves, leaving the rest of us in...well, crisis. Scrambling to take what housing there is at whatever price we’re given, because we have no other option. Genuinely I really like this video, just that conclusion is a bit rough to me. Keep going though!!!
I agree with what youre saying but i think OP was trying to give alternate solutions instead of forcibly take rich peoples property. I completely agree that the ultra wealthy and likely the wealthy too necessarily must exploit the poor to aquire and maintain that wealth, but i also think we need to think about how we reconcile that. Would it be productive to strip wealthy people of their weath all at once or would doing so create problems greater than what we sought to solve in the first place? In other words is there a way to bring the wealthy to our point of view or are our worldviews just too irreconcilable for that to happen?
I think this misses the point a bit. He's saying that having a housing market of some sort does not require a housing crisis. There are ways to regulate the market much differently than our current system. A different system would allow for the private ownership and sale of land/housing while ensuring that it is accessible to all. One of the biggest flaws with Ollie's video is that it exists in a bit of a leftist bubble. The government seizing all privately held residential land is literally a revolutionary idea. People would literally fight you to the death over that idea. The land seizing mechanisms he mentioned that we use to build malls do often result in violent encounters with the displaced homeowners, at least in America (where I live). Practically speaking, Ollie's video is a nice thought experiment, but there's nothing realistically actionable there.
@@Ben-qv7zj There's lots of things in Breadtube that seem like nice thought experiments, but often ignore or make overreaching assumptions about human nature.
@@TribuneAquila "instead of forcibly take rich peoples property" You realise that the current system is to use force to ensure that rich people retain property, right? The primary reason for the birth of modern policing was to protect the property rights of the rich. In that case it was more about their control of factories and whatnot rather than their houses, but that certainly is part of it too. Just ask any homeless person that has been thrown by cops out of an empty house owned by a real estate speculator.
@@TribuneAquila Considering a few rich men invited a guy to their secret island resort to explain what options they have when rampant climate change is destroying the world, no, they're not going to be convinced that giving the rest of us so no one has to go without is in their best interest. Because they're already speaking of guards with electric collars extorted with limited access to food vaults they have and/or the possibility to have robots protect them when the world goes to hell.
Germany's housing ain't that great. The cities are getting way too expensive. And even state-owned housing is often not too great or affordable since they just do the bare minimum when it comes to social housing. Also any existing social housing will 'expire' after some time and again become more expensive
@@killerskiely100 You say that as if he is obligated to have a complete grasp of the system in another country. He seems to understand economics just fine, but he might have oversimplified or been wrong when citing references from other countries. Consider most sources about the German housing market is most likely in German, I don't blame him, but I do appreciate people correcting when they are better informed
@@dig8634 calling out people for not being good on econ, while failing to understand econ and citing countries you don't understand doesn't seem very well educated. I'd recommend Richard Wolf to you if you'd like to see some great econ or maybe Piketty
@@killerskiely100 Well, both he and the people he called out were being US centric. The Germany example was just related. You can't go from misunderstanding something about another country to not understanding the subject at hand, when the two are just partially related. Everything he said about economy in general could be absolutely correct and he could still be wrong about the specifics of Germany. So before saying he isn't educated or that he doesn't understand economics, maybe actually prove those things first?
hearing abigail referred to as her deadname is so odd now but this is a rly cool video thank u i actually have thought a lot about the lack of economics in breadtube
The apple metaphor is bizarre. Nobody needs *apples specifically* to live, but they do need food, and there is in fact a huge problem of people in the UK having to rely on food banks. Not because there isn't enough, but because the means to access it is only available to those with wealth. So...that maps pretty well to the housing crisis, actually.
im so grateful for this video ive been really torn on this subject because my mum is a landlord and theres not really another option for her because my brother is severely disabled, he needs round the clock care and theres no way my mum would be able to have a job whilst caring for him, and the benefits from the government just arent enough to keep him living a dignified life (for example they are constantly trying to downgrade the nappies he uses even though the lower quality ones make him leak out onto his clothes) but my mum agrees with my criticisms on being a landlord so she tries to be the kindest landlord possible, I still disagree with the institution of landlording but this video has given me a way more nuanced view than all landlords are bad :s
Here it's hard for private individuals to become landlords. It's a field that gives a huge disadvantage to larger owners who can centralize the maintenance services and standardize properties. It happens when people have a spare room in their private home or a building. Or simply, it is much cheaper to have your own maintenance staff that service an entire town than to own a single property and constantly hire contractors. It spreads the risk a bit, in case an individual property is left unused, defaults or requires a lot of emergency maintenance.
Landlords are not inherently bad or exploitative. The idea that they are implies that all renters are exploited and should therefore not be renters. This is not true. Renting is a valid choice that makes sense for lots of people: students, travelers, or others who simply don't want to be financially tied down to one place for a long time; people uninterested or unable to commit to the responsibilities of home ownership and maintenance, including disabled people. Your mother should not feel bad about being a landlord so long as she is doing the job fairly. Presumably she has a basement or garden suite that she rents out, in which case she is providing someone a home that would not exist otherwise. That is commendable.
I work with homeless people. Anything that can help is something I support. Ultimately I want a communist utopia but right now that isn't going to happen, so I'm all in for videos like this where we can learn actual economics and realistic proposals. Thank you!
Your seperation of housing and apples is elasticity right? You could apply the same logic to medicine except instead of "mostly land/location" it's "necessary for survival".
@DJ Coin Laundry Just a heads up, this isn't right. Housing is quite elastic - both in terms of income elasticity of demand, and in terms of price elasticity of demand. It's like the example he uses in the video: the home in London is more expensive, because there's more demand for it.
I think you might be missing the point of what Abbey's trying to say with, "If everyone is housed, you can't sell them housing". Sure, on a pure logistical level people would still want to move, but that doesn't change the fact that sellers are incentivized to create artificial demand by under-meeting the needs of the consumer since that creates a higher yield in profits. Sure, there will still "technically" be a market for houses even if everyone had one, but it would still have a much lower average demand than it does now because people wouldn't *_need them to survive._* The soul of what Abbey's saying still rings true. She just flubbed up on the specifics.
Sometimes the algorithm is good! Glad to have found you. Amazing content and really helps fill the gap in economics that plague so much of the left, including myself. Thank you!
It is nice to see some level headed criticism, I would still argue that Olly's video has its benefits it is well produced and approachable even if somewhat simplistic and the main point of the capitalist exploitation expands into the housing market and the housing crisis. Finally being a little pedantic but you do realise that there are poor people in "rich countries" right, so arguably there is an apple crisis. Keep on the good work see ya in the backlog. Lets feed the algorithm.
I'm glad to see "breadtube" (as much as I hate the term) expanding. Someone already mentioned donoteat as a valuable companion channel focusing on more hands-on issues. Way too much content on youtube relies on needlessly sensationalist "take-down" videos that really aren't worth anyone's time. PS: please don't shy away from including reading lists in your videos.
Whilst I would see Ollie's proposals as being the end goal, you make a strong and convincing argument for what can be done right now. Really informative video - I've subscribed!
Solid video. My solutions are: 1) hard rent control on all but narrowly- qualified luxury units 2) Tenant Rights policies (details to follow) and Tenant Unions by law 3) land taxes as suggested 4) sharply increase public housing supply in every zip code 5) limits on numbers of units and complexes any business or landlord can own 6) severe penalties for bad landlords, both businesses or individuals 7) absolutely NO HOUSING USED AS "INVESTMENT" GENERATORS!! Ie by private equity firms. this is disgusting and gross. 8) upgrading some low-density zoning to mixed use and higher-density zoning. 9) retaking some wide streets in urban areas from car use to building housing and small business use
I’m currently reading The Economics of Feasible Socialism by Alec Nove, and finding it really interesting. I wonder if you’ve come across it. I have pretty much zero formal background in economics, so I don’t know how obscure/common/respected his ideas are among more thoroughly trained economists. That said, I think his insights on the value of markets, coupled with his strong critique of capitalist markets, might appeal to you. Love your videos, keep up the good work!
"Many landlords require that income to survive" But the argument is that the relationship of the landlord to tenant is parasitic, regardless of whether or not they need it to survive.
Labeling entire groups as “parasitic” is a form of demonizing and scapegoating. It’s usually done when a person has no workable solution to offer and just needs a popular talking point to rile up their base. It’s also a slippery slope to authoritarianism. I say all this as an anarchist
@m0ckingB1rd42 and in this case it is an accurate and even scientific way of describing a situation. A situation where one person profits from someone else without this person getting anything back is called like that. However in our society this word has bad optics and should therefore not get used.
I actually really like the bell feature on youtube because I subscribe to channels I want to see more of only when I'm on youtube and I look at my subscription feed, but there are some channels I want to be alerted about right when I get on or from my phone when I'm not even on it. If there wasn't a bell icon my notifications would be flooded with stuff that I didn't want to be in there.
Even after 4 years i still appreciate this video It actually gives constructive criticism towards breadtube instead of misinterpreting the point those videos make!
I know this was 2 years ago but in my opinion the solution to the housing crisis is to make land common property by confiscating rent and in doing so provide incentives to improve land by means of an unimproved land value tax or the single tax, ideologically known as Georgism 🔰. This is a Centrist solution because for the EconRight it will improve market efficiency (no vacant lots if landowners have to pay a tax for it) and do away with other bad taxes which causes prices to rise, deadweight loss, corruption and incentives to evade taxes while being a tax that avoids the negative characteristics of other taxes, and for the EconLeft it will do away with land monopoly, land speculation and landlords while also being a progressive tax that reduces economic inequality. If there is any source to be called upon for public revenues by the community it should be a value which is maintained by the community as a whole like land value rather than the private forms of wealth taken from individuals for public uses currently like the taxes on the earned wages of labor.
5:00 Aren't the reasons people move primarily economic forces like better jobs, more favorable rent conditions, better opportunity for you and your kids, etc? Moving is hard, it's not usually an aesthetic based decision unless you're uber rich.
Also here in New Zealand many people move so that they live within the catchment of the best schools in the community. If you live outside the defined catchment then you can't send your kids to that school. Lot's of parents get into bidding wars with other parents in order to buy houses within that catchment, because having their kids at that school grants them benefits, not just related to superior education, but also the social connections that they can gain from being in the same social networks of people who may be able to help with professional advancement or business opportunities. Don't you just love capitalism?
(WARNING: JUNGIAN LANGUAGE AHEAD, lol) Honestly, as a pretty die-hard leftist.... I think we need more of this. I agree with the first premise: Breadtube and leftism as a whole is lacking in concrete details. We need to start attracting the concrete, sensor-types along with the feelers and intuitives that we have plenty of now. Sensors are basically "the people" at large in most societies, it seems, so it's REALLY interesting and hope-building for me that we're getting there. The existance of this video is proof. MOST people just want to know "what works" and what they get out of it/why they should change what they want. This is the tone and type of video I could see my Dad sharing (he's almost 60, ISTP, pretty typical "California centrist" who seems to barely even knows what politics is) and I don't think I can say that about any of my other political subs! I oscillated between thinking this was great and this was making dumb oversights, but by the end, I think I see what this channel/vid is going for. Answers. The theory is what gets SOME people (like me, INTP) on board with something that makes logical sense... way more than unregulated markets... but the majority of the population is answer-focused rather than idea focused. So it makes sense UE would sort of gloss over or throw out that justification. THIS is the "Leftism works logically" argument I try to make online, but have trouble moving that internally consistent logic that brings me to leftism OUT of my own thought language into something others would buy-in on, even if they don't have the same foundational background and knowledge I do. So I will gladly be subbing and watching where this goes. I think this channel and approach has big potential to both do a lot of good, educate and expand the minds of people, and become popular as well.
"Breadtube and leftism as a whole is lacking in concrete details" As well as too allergic to the dreaded "compromise". Anything short of revolution often gets shot down, but if we're going to have any meaningful change enacted it unfortunately needs to take into account the systems we currently live in. Not all compromises are capitulations to fascism.
@@KingBobXVI We can work to improve the material conditions for the working class but revolution is still the eventual goal as it is the only way to achieve a socialist mode of production
Thing is: _BreadTube_ does not always equate to Leftists/Left(ism?). To my knowledge, _BreadTube_ is a collection of progressive-friendly TH-camrs; not necessarily having to deal with Socialist economics/politics (which is what Left Wing means). So of course these "big 3" aren't good at explaining economics *because that's not what they're about* - they explore topics _through their own unique perspective/in certain angles/on a particular lense_
This in interesting but doesn't say much about homeless people stuck in poverty anf unenployement, as well as middle class rent burdened people. I think you rightly focused on economics and not ethics, but I'd love to hear sustainable alternative on the economic side that guarantee housing rights, maybe even the benefits of bettering the living standards (healthcare, productivity, etc.)
So happy to see both some realism from someone economically minded and also some criticism from someone who agrees on principle, but wishes to argue about the details and the implementation of ideas. When people disagree on principle it’s just a debate of emotionally based bias vs emotionally based bias which I’m tired of. Debate’s purpose is the advancement of ideas, not for a dopamine rush from the social acceptance of one’s peers for having quick wit and charisma.
I thought that this video was overall very good, though at the end, the point about disrupting landowners who use their land to make a living seems like it needs to be talked about. From my perspective, thinking of the labour theory of value, owning land and making a profit off of it seems more akin to stealing value from labourers. While we do need to find ways to fulfil everyone's needs, letting people continue to profit off of their land seems to me like it would perpetuate an unequal system. However, I may have misunderstood something if anyone wants to enlighten me
Great job! This was sorly needed on this platform imo. I hope you'll consider responding to or at least incorporating responses to some of Destinys crtitiques of breadtubers/leftist in future videos. He has probably stood for the most significant backlash against them on this platform and his arguments have often hinged on mainstream/neoclassical garbage. Maybe a friendly chat with Vaush would be nice? Anyway I'll stick around for more critiques of leftist- and mainsream/liberal econ hot takes!
The issue with this argument is that, while thorough, it misses the key grasp which is that we *should not want* a housing market. Because even if a ideal housing market is, academically or hypothetically possible, it's not possible in reality. You will never get the housing market into this state where everyone has a near ideal home, because a house is fundamentally not something that *should* be a commodity, and more than that, the market is not incentivised to give everyone a good home, its incentivised to maximise profits, and those are not necessarily the same interest. Olly's comments were simplistic but not incorrect, provided you understand the housing market *as it is* and you understand why it is how it is, and vitally, you understand *the only place it can go*.
Ok, but what about wanting and working towards better houses, or multiple houses? I don't think any system should be put in place to actually restrict that, only to help those who have trouble even getting to own a house at all in the first place.
@@kevinwillems8720 What about them? They should be housed, that's obvious. Allowing people to still have the possibility of owning multiple houses or getting/building better ones doesn't conflict with that.
19:37 Because over the years I've subscribed to many channels, so many, in fact, that my subscription page is really crowded, and it's not uncommon anymore to miss several videos because they got buried under the wave of content that all those channels produce every day. So that's what the bell is for. So we get notified of your videos in particular and don't miss them. Which is a separate feature because if I was notified of every channel, my inbox would just be a second subscription page... but in my inbox.
This video has a lot more views than I anticipated, so thank you everyone (and to the algorithm)! I’m glad most people seemed to like it. I’m reading the comments even when I don’t get the chance to reply. And yes, the next one on nationalisation vs privatisation is coming.
Quite a few people have commented on whether the apple market truly ‘works’ and I think this is fair. The comparison was largely intended as a pedagogical device to show why the housing market is quite as bad as it is rather than a statement about why the apple market is fine. The apple (or food) market does have clear problems including distribution, environmental issues, and exploitation of workers. But I’d say that these problems are general to capitalism, whereas the problems with the housing market are unique and worth exploring on their own. That’s the main thing I wanted to communicate with the comparison.
To put it another way, while I'd say redistribution would mean everyone was able to afford an apple, I don't think redistribution would mean everyone was able to afford a house. The sector just has that many more problems.
A good idea for part 2 would be Ollie’s video on the video game industry
@@KBogomil that's part 3, will also reference contra on capitalism and maybe others
@@unlearningeconomics9021 If you're interested in Breadtubers who deal more with the details of policy, Donoteat01 (a civil engineer) has a fantastic series on public housing, and has a lot of material on urban development in general. Not quite as big a name as Ollie of course but got a lot of attention after being shouted out by hbomberguy a while back and has a lot of overlap with "dirtbag left." Loved your video, by the way! I really appreciate political content with more of a material/educational angle.
If "redistribution isn't enough to fix housing" is your point, then you should be fully on board with abolishing the market entirely. You should wanna go to the next steps of making housing a basic right, imposing building regulations so everyone can afford their space, guaranteed jobs in construction or maintenance for the unemployed, etc.. And yet, somehow, your "solution" is to keep the market as it is, raise taxes, make the state buy land back, sympathize with landlords, and rely on philanthropists for housing. Solid plan for accomplishing little to nothing.
ok if capitalist are so great distribution, they are in charge of food distribution in the united states, why are there still food deserts? if self interests and profit seeking lead to the best out come of society and the best out come of society is that everyone has access to affordable and nutritious food, why are there still food deserts? When I've asked capitalists this they're response is well the majority doesn't want to eat fresh foods, then what about the minority that still live there, are they just supposed to move? what if they can't move out of a food deserts? Also if your a capitalist shouldn't you want your product in everywhere? I can buy a coke almost in every neighborhood in the country, but not with a tomato or a head of lettuce. Also why should we put vital parts of the function of society such as food distribution and access to affordable and nutritious food in the hands of people who 1st priority is to make money? Milton freedman said a companies sole purpose is to generate profit for shareholders.
You see, this is what debate is suppose to be. People criticizing other people's ideas, with the intent of seeing the best possible outcome, not a petty game of one upping and crowd pleasing.
I'd argue (lol) this isn't a debate, but a discussion or at least looking at an issue with a different goal in mind. Ollie is there to educate you on theory and start questioning reality, open your mind to new ideas, etc. Sounds like UE is here to try to fill some of those holes that opening your mind leaves, and I honestly think we DO need that in leftist discussions. I think the video is set up oppositionally, but mainly as a narrative device rather than a bare window into what Unlearning Economics is actually trying to convince you of. I feel like it is not just possible, but quite easy to "agree" with both videos. PhillyTube said it himself: "I'm no economist".
In the end, it sounds like he agrees with Ollie's main concern being valid... How do we improve things for the human experience, broadly? Isn't that what being "on the left" is all about, really? Everything else is semantics and different focuses.
(And in contrast, "the right" is either all about "how do we increase stability?"... if you take their idealogy at face value and leave off the "for some/most" since ecological, perfect stability simply isn't an aspect of nature at the scale of human experience. Oooor "How do we enrich ourselves?" if you read their behaviour since the 70's materially. And I definitly think the latter is more realistic in the western world, at least.)
@@vazzaroth - "this isn't a debate, but a discussion"
It _is_ a debate - or at least what a debate is supposed to be - because a debate simply _is_ a discussion. The Shapiro-esque charade of yelling over your opponent and not addressing points is not really what used to qualify as "debate", and real debate shouldn't be a bad thing.
@@KingBobXVI if a debate is only a discussion, they wouldn't be separate words. Connotation is important.
I disagree. Debating for points is a great way to combat fascists since their ideas are based in a cult of strength. Creating a cognitive dissonance in the audience of fascist leaders by making them look weak is the wedge we can use to get them out. Therefore as long as fascists exist we need people to dunk on them.
Debate? Philtubes points _are_ garbage. The best thing for the left would be to cover his video under the carpet and pretend it never existed.
"Apples are bought and sold quite regularly, there are readily available substitutes like oranges and bananas"
Did you just compare apples and oranges
There is a sense in which oranges are apples
@@cobblebrick bananas are berries
Just a random fact
@@mallardofmodernia8092 banana berries are the most popular berry
@@mallardofmodernia8092 And an eggplant is a fruit but also a vegetable
this is why this saying has always pissed me off. Apples and Oranges re readily comparable! Extremely similar objects
I’m LIVING for this. Breadtube has been strong on social issues but relatively weak on economic ones, and it’s great to see some critique accompanied by specific, accomplishable, socialist-progressing solutions. This is how we improve. Your critique is excellent, btw - addressing the ideas without insulting Olly.
Well, he does take the piss out of Olly, but in a friendly way.
Aidan, what do you think about workplace democracy as Richard Wolff talks about it for example?
@@romanski5811 All for it my guy
@@romanski5811 Though I will say I'm not a big fan of Richard Wolf. I've tried listening to him, but he's more rhetoric than anything from what I've heard. I've heard very little discussion of economic theory from him.
Well the fundamental argument of all Breadtube arguments come from wanting an outcome without acknowledging the sacrifices and changes that would be necessary to make these outcomes happen.
As a georgist... the attention is very much appreciated. All 20 of us are happy to just be mentioned.
Make that 21.
22 and counting considering I shill it every time I get into an economic discussion.
23!
There are nearly dozens of us!
@@matthewgoodman7588Georgist #24 reporting for duty!
25. My bday in December. :D
As an economics idiot, this is fascinating and incredibly useful. Love philosophytube and the like, but I always suspected *specifically these videos* were far too simplistic of a take on the issues even with my very limited understanding of economics. Absolutely excellent and much appreciated.
I assure you their philosophy is no better than their brain dead economics takes
They're all simplified, introductory videos. Including UEs. Knowing Better does some good deep dives but again, just deeper introductions. It's interesting rewatching older vids after studying subjects and finding deeper agreement or disagreement with some of the opinions.
Lol I created that /r/breadtube thread. Glad you took up the mantle!
Love this!
@@unlearningeconomics9021 Guess what? WE GOT SOME GREAT NEWS THIS YEAR!!!
🦀🦀🦀🦀🦀 Orange man gone! 🦀🦀🦀🦀🦀
🦀🦀🦀🦀🦀 Orange man gone! 🦀🦀🦀🦀🦀
🦀🦀🦀🦀🦀 Orange man gone! 🦀🦀🦀🦀🦀
@lol sure if you believe donalds made up claims instead of international voting observation committees.
@lol There's entire mega threads debunking everything you just typed.
Its already false before it was even made xD
@lol You've yet to cite a single source buddy, Do you have Sub-Zero I.Q levels?
Careful dude you might overdose on Copium xD Stay mad!
This is how the left can critique its self constructively! Well done!
Theres a lot of talk about "the left eating itself through critique" which is actually real, and bad. I sometimes wish we could just be more cohesive like the right is, but stuff like this video reminds me that you CAN critique effectively
@@JohnDoe-mj6cc the Right can be "cohesive" because the vast majority do not possess independent critical thought. Someone begins a line and others repeat it over and over, perhaps adding more sensational rhetoric and conspiracy theory and then that just gets repeated. Because...duh duh duhhhhhh...they don't know how to be individuals. The right are socially conditioned for group think.
@@georgearnold841 i would argur that the right is more cohesive because their ideas are more simple to explain and follow because they are the status quo
@@Mayonaisa502 their ideas are "simple"? Do you actually ever watch how the right jump through so many logic holes to present their ideas that are anything but simple? But they get repeated over and over. At first their faces look confused then this confused look turns to elaborate righteous indignation with further repeating because they refuse to be beaten and stopped by the absurdity of their views.
The Right is not merely all just Guns, God and immigrants.
@@georgearnold841 Remember that it might seem like that from our position (just like the "the left is npcs" meme is a thing on the right, even though it contradicts the "eating itself" thing), but there's also a lot of debate happening between right wingers, try not to put everyone on the other side in one group
Being critical but keeping the point. I like this. Keep up the good work.
Exactly. This wasn't a "dunking" or "owning" but just constructive criticism.
A wild dialectic has appeared!
This perception is what brought me here. I hope I won't be disapointed. I lean left economically, but feel the breadtube ideas are just too simplistic.
@@Competitive_Antagonist I think Breadtube does a good job overall of introducing people to more leftist ideas and theories that people (including myself) probably haven't been exposed to before. I do agree, however, that they do simplify concepts a lot and are more focused on introducing concepts than talking about what real-world policy should look like.
I will preface by saying that I am 19, and I've only recently this past year shifted from progressive liberal to a more leftist viewpoint. For me, these channels are great since I am new to all of this and I'm not familiar with a lot of the terminology or the many differing sections of leftist circles. I do think we should continue to promote leftist channels like this one that dive even further into what change may actually look like.
“Land is permanent.”
Coastal Florida looking at rising sea levels: 👀😐
lol it really do be like that
can't wait until the street across from me starts getting flooded
look at how Key Biscayne used to look like 10 years ago and how it does now. There used to be a beach
It seems global warming is threatening the land market. Hopefully the global market will respond and work towards a net-zero carbon reality. /s
Poor regulations for the environment will kill people. Thanks billionaires, your arrogance has blessed my aching lungs.
Just sell it to Ben Shapiro and move inwards.
I am liking the rise in deadpan specific-career style "Breadtubers" such as yourself and DoNotEat (who does urban planning). I am pursuing my masters in public administration, and while I love breadtube, more policy/academic oriented lefty channels such as yourself are greatly appreciated, as I continue my studies.
Wishing your channel success!
I would argue that a good deal of Breatube is already pretty academic. They just tend to be more focused on philosophy and critical theory than policy/econ stuff.
I need to see unlearning economics and donoteat do a collab! Maybe a well there's your problem episode
I agree. It's good to have media critics and artists but it's also great to have people who bring the professionalism to the mix as well.
@@brogansmith1342 Yeah, sometimes I wished there were more bredtubers who do physics or maths, studying maths myself I've realized many of my partners are also really left wing, but we are probably too shy to do a YT channel
confession time I always read his channel's name as Dono Teat
Great to see someone who is bringing a more economics focused analysis to leftube circles. I plan on making a channel focused on political economy, a topic which rarely gets discussed by those on the online left. It's important that we present these topics that may be difficult, but critical to the online discourse, as there are thousands of videos dicussion right-wing neoclassical or austrian economics, but little about Marxist or post-Keynsian models in 2020. Amazing video and keep up the great work!
Good luck
Do it!
Make sure to post on breadtube, we need more econ in breadtube!
@@hemantkarasala5767 certainly will! I am just finishing my semester and already have plenty of ideas!
I'm training in public health so thinking of making a leftist channel about that area. Seeing these other professionals do the same is really inspiring me! We need to share our skills ❤️✊
This is exactly the hole in the leftist online space that needs to be filled. And you're doing a fantastic job with it. Very informative but just as important, really funny, engaging and entertaining. Rare to find such a polished video this early on in a TH-cam career so kudos my friends, subbed
No, it isn't. The video is arguably not even leftist. At minimum, it's counter-revolutionary and largely reformist.
@Diogenes Rex Well no, it doesn't. And people on the left are plenty critical of Contrapoints. She literally just made a video where she sourced some of the views she argued against from a twitter thread where she asked people what makes someone a "lib" in their eyes, then spent the whole video essentially implying people left of her didn't have any real strategy. There are tons of "breadtubers" who are considerably left of her that don't do anything like that.
@Diogenes Rex What is "social control of housing"?
Breadtube is terrible on economics
Economics Explained is good too
"we all have blind spots and I'm hoping I can add to our understanding"
Earned a like just for that
wow how generous of you!
I live in Denmark. Social housing is very popular here - In most towns there are plenty of houses and apartments which are rented at price which is about 20%-50% from the market price - so those are very affordable. The houses are generally nice and cozy, often located in the very center of a town. IMO, it is a prefect solution. The only disadvantage is that you have to wait in que from 1 to 20 years for a specific apartment/house to become available for you (Though you are able to be in multiple ques simultaneously)
I'd actually be able to stop living out of my car if only...
@@user-gz4ve8mw9l I intentionally lived in a car for half a year when I made more than enough to not do that, I still actually make exactly the same amount years later, which is barely anything.
Why are you in a car?
@@slaydon3 Long story short relatives of mine stole $350k from me. Just before the onset of the Covid 19 pandemic in early 2020. I then ended up losing all 3 of my jobs. Ended up between a choice of the street homeless, or my car. I chose my car obviously.
If Denmark had an LVT, that wouldn't be an issue.
@@darthutah6649
Denmark does have a Land Value Tax of 2.627%.
i’ve been reluctant to click this video because I thought it would just be someone screaming at breadtube but thankfully it’s a pretty nuanced and thought-out video so far! Thank you for making this
Was expecting right wing trash, very pleasantly surprised by the content of this video. Thanks for introducing me to alternative solutions. Subscribed.
I think it's because the word 'economics' has been co-opted by right libertarians and is pretty much a dogwhistle for right wing trash. It's sad.
Also the title's framing "breadtube vs economics" already implies an antagonistic situation which sets up a monolithic "breadtube" that is antithetical to objective and empirical "economics", which is a popular way of setting any debate off with affectively loaded baggage, so I get why people are only tentatively clicking on the video.
Congrats on being sold on right wing trash. This video falsely conflates an atrocious number of things and is clearly tailor made to come off as a smaller creator.
@@ihaps1117 Come on, at least tell us which things are being conflated. I am done with internet tribalism. Give me specifics. Post some articles.
@@ihaps1117 Please, I'd like to know specifics as well.
I honestly agree with a lot of what you said but the 1 thing that sticks out as somewhat contradictory is the point about some landlords only making as much as the tenants. By doing so you equate the financial situation of the tenant and the landlord but the landlord is inherently in a much better situation by virtue of ownership. They may have equivalent incomes but the renter has to work for that income while the landlord doesn't.
@@GeraintDafis Personal property is so far from corporation control of large percentages of city rentals though.
I agree, but when you put the difference between your income and that of your landlord in perspective with the gap between rich and poor, you realise you're both fairly close together. we've got to address the big inequalities first, those who hoard half the money despite being a tiny percentage.
@@GeraintDafis that sounds like a problem with social security programs, not housing. Also, renting summer cottages/hotel rooms aren't the same as renting a house to live in
Expropiating houses should be to get rid of those people who own entire apartment buildings or neighborhoods, not your local middle class dad who has his own house, a summer house, and his parent's house that he recently recieved after they passed away. Three properties might be a little too much, but isn't a problem
@@GeraintDafis even if we go full anarchist. Your friend would still go have her home. Society would provide for her needs and she would contribute to the extend of her capacity!
To each according to their need, from each according to their ability! With that principle in mind your friend would not need to rent the extra properties and therefore they can be given to other people in need!
@@miss1of2 except that’s extremely idealistic and fragile, is only feasible through totalitarianism, and has basically never been implemented on a scale larger than a Hunter gatherer tribe in human history.
The virgin Response Video versus the Chad Constructive Criticism.
This IS a response video, too, technically.
@@gelatinocyte6270 shhhhhh
I know this is a meme but I wished people would stop using "virgin" as some kind of synonym for "loser". The "virgins are losers" nonsense causes rapes, plain and simple.
@@camelopardalis84 sounds like something an incel rape-apologist would say. If you can't stand being seen as a loser for not getting laid: Improve yourself and find a willing partner. Don't rape.
Also it is not like rapists are held in higher regard than virgins.
@@Baalur You'll get a more actual reply once I have time to write it but for now, let me just tell you this: I am about as far from a rape apologist as one can be. Maybe just *try* for more than three seconds to come up with a better explanation for why I wrote what I wrote. Instead of just labelling me as a rape apologist.
Some time ago I threatened to call the police on some man who lives in my neighbourhood who felt it would be a good idea or something to sexually harass me out of his window on my way home. I wouldn't be surprised at all if what he did and said were something you'd refer to as "being friendly, nothing more". But, unlike you, I won't just make assumptions.
Dude. Omfg. This is the first of your vids I've seen and I have been waiting for exactly this kind of content for years. I am a massive econ-nerd and breadtube has indeed been sorely lacking in this area. Thank you thaaank you for this. So excited to dive into your existing vids and highly anticipating the content you put out in the future!!
If breadtubers knew economics they wouldn't be breadtubers
@@donaldhysa4836Money and Markets are a human invention. Capitalism has only existed for a few hundred years. Humans have been around for 200 thousand years. So like hmmmm maybe there's more to life than the markets!
@@redrainer Your socialist drivel is a human invention. A very bad one. So maybe there is more to life than "Everything is a social construct bruh!"
Land value taxes are super interesting in that they cut across existing political coalitions a little bit. While Marx liked them, so did William F Buckley!
On fairness, land taxes tax the things the landlord did not create or make.
On market efficiency, it's a property tax minus improvements. When you replace the roof on your house, your home value increases so your property taxes go up. Higher taxes discourage improvement. But land value taxes, improve away!
Good stuff.
Henry George was the main proponent of LVT.
A great evolution of this that solves many of the problems is a Common Ownership Self-assessed Tax
@DJ Coin Laundry isn't the point that the after the improvement the tax is higher indefinitely. So you can claim against the cost up to a point but would have to pay the tax for ever. This would discourage maintenance that risked raising the houses (or building/what ever) value. Where as is the lands value hasn't changed then maintenance is still worth doing?
@@Tasmantor Does maintenance apply here? Wouldn't a house requiring maintenance lower the property tax, since the value of the house is decreasing?
Thus doing maintenance would only sustain property tax, nor raise it?
The point seems to stand when it comes to improvement though! And I might just be misunderstanding the specifics of property tax
@@dig8634 the point is that the value of the house isn't a factor in the tax. The land is, so if you want a nice place that's fine it won't increase your tax burden to improve it. Like wise it won't increase your tax burden to maintain (or improve) a rental property. If the land increases in value you pay more not the house/building.
I'm only five minutes in, but: "Nobody speaks about the 'apple crisis'" Isn't that what concerns about food deserts are about? America has places where access to things like fresh produce is actually an issue, and something like 7% of Americans live in those food deserts.
Yeah but that’s an issue VERY specific to America, and its less about access and more about quality.
@@KubaRootz Actually, searching up Food Desert with the UK, Canada and Australia all turn up results from either major news outlets or government sources, and each of them shows a number between 5 and 10% living with food insecurity.
@@DouglasWibby I meant America as in North America*
Y'all are all correct, but somehow you're not bringing up that there are also plenty of countries where it's not just food scarcity, it's straight up starvation due to extraction of resources. The idea in the vid that everyone who wants apples can have them is trash.
@@JamMastaJeremy that's absolutely an issue, but the point about apples seemed to be that in places with well functioning markets, apples were easy to get. I focused on English speaking countries to cover the places that I expected Unlearning Economics was referring to. If a system results in more than 1 in 20 having issues getting the resource that everyone can afford, there may be underlying issues relying on that system for something that everyone needs.
That point about the apple crisis is basically a perfect encapsulation of the precise piece of the puzzle that you’re missing (to be fair, Ollie never touches on it either) - the things that basically everyone can afford in this economy are ---- heavily subsidised. The reason we don’t talk about the apple crisis is because agribusiness is one of the most subsidised sectors of the economy and YES it can and does equally apply to every other sector. Which is just one of the many ways that “actually existing capitalism” is a repackaging of socialism for the rich, hard market competition for everyone else.
Here in New Zealand agricultural products aren't subsidised at all, though the banks that provides finance to farmers get their loans underwritten by the New Zealand central bank, during an economic crisis like the one the world is currently enduring.. So I guess that's an indirect temporary public subsidy.
Ironically thanks to Covid19, the horticulture sector is suffering a crisis at the moment, because with our border closed there will not be enough labour to harvest the produce, including apples. We have traditionally relied on temporary migrant labour and young backpackers, because there aren't sufficient local people willing to endure the low wages and poor working conditions. This fills me with glee, since I have done a lot of work in the sector and seen how they exploit working people from countries where our low wages seem positively generous.
Great point but we shouldn't popularise those phrase socialism for the rich.. Its misleading and implies socialism is essentially subsidization or govt intervention which is not the case
@@distortiontildeafness true true
@@distortiontildeafness you mean less of the SoCiAlIiSm Is WhEn GoBeRmEnT DoEs StUfF screeching right?
But isn't that subsidising to the benefit of everyone in this example?
Every "Breadtube debunked!" video I've seen dodges points that are made or straight up lie to try and discredit them. You actually gave constructive criticism and added ways to change the housing system instead of trying to defend its current state. Great video!
Granted it's still bullshit, but it's more genuine bullshit based on the bullshit study of economics.
@@kevinwillems8720 Economics isn't bullshit. It's based on money which we invented and I think we'd be better off without, but we can't make the concept of money disappear just like that. It's a very real thing with real world consequences and we have to operate within this system until society gets to a place where we can abolish it.
@@RogueAstro85 See it's that kind of lib shit thinking that holds us back
@@kevinwillems8720 it's this kind of total lack of thinking that holds things back actually.
I can see a glearing problem with the tax he proposed, the tax will cause the 1% to be quick with their houses but will make 100% of people their houses more costier, that includes homeless and poor people buying said houses, house owners will put the cost of the tax in the cost of the house
Not only that but it would be hard to make fair, if you make everyone pay a tax for the few mf that do the bullshit, you are being unfair to the majority, and if you just make it so uninhabitaded terrain/houses get taxed, people with money are the firsts to build shitty houses and get friends of theirs living there, leaving again in a worse position only those in the mid, with just one house
If you make it so every house after the second is taxed, they will change owners in the snap of a finger, etc
Also, rich people are the ones with economic assistants that help the elude taxed, a legal way of evasion, making again the middle class people paying the most and translating that extra cost to the poor when they want to buy
Love the way you tackled this. You're the living proof it's possible to disagree with and correct others' ideas by working with instead of against them :)
Hey there! As an economics and finance student at university, I'm already loving this series. Economics is a serious lack of understanding amongst the modern left and definitely an issue that needs to be tackled. If you ever need support in the future in regards to stock markets (I'm well versed in American, Chinese, Hong konger, German, and London exchanges), or corporate finance (all the way to mergers/acquisitions and private equity, as well as corporate and personal financial planning) I'd love to provide some great reading and information.
Any blogs or sites you may recommend? I subscribed to the Financial Times, because if these guys sells to the global invester class they had to provide the most accurate news without the spins other news do. But I am not part of that class and want to look at econ/finance from other perspectives than managers' personal experiences. Most of other econ sites I found are either in the academic orthodoxy (which I mostly do not believed in) and counter (which focused more on debunking theories I never firmly held in the first place).
@@Account.for.Comment yeah man, absolutely. I’d recommend keeping up with mainstream financial publications anyways, keep tabs on how the market is organized. Good things for that are the typical you’d expect: the Dow Jones-owned big 3 (wall street journal, market watch, Barron’s - specifically Alexandra scaggs, she’s a Barron’s journo)
The problem with heterodox economics is outlined well in Unlearning Economics’ other videos. By the simple nature of the dismal science, it encourages orthodoxy. It’s almost impossible to build heterodox theory (Marxist, market socialist, Modern Monetary, you name it) because there’s not exactly a lot of empirical evidence to base it on. For basic introductions to heterodox economics, I’d recommend the perennial Richard Wolff (many free lectures available on TH-cam) and The Deficit Myth by Stephanie Kelton.
Obviously, these are extremely well known examples and only serve as a good baseline. As a finance student, my studies are based on underlying neo-Keynesian assumptions, so there really isn’t any heterodox “finance theory” if you catch my drift.
Obviously the most authoritative sources for heterodox economic theory are Marx & Engels (Kapital, to start) and build from there.
@@Account.for.Comment as for websites. I recomnend Naked Capitalism. Yves Smith does a great job on finance reporting you don't see elsewhere.
You do realise the reason that the LEFT don't speak to the Market Class is because the fundamental philosophy of the left is to operate outside of market forces. That corporations do not hold any of the answers.
@@georgearnold841 I think that it is an outright misconception or maybe a result of recent polarization. Amongst the best economists I've read regarding themselves as in the left and promote the free market in many issues. Warren Buffet, Jim Chanos and George Soros are big donors to leftwing party and as capitalist as any traders. Albert Hirschman (left-leaning economist) wrote " Exit, Voice and Loyalty" provided great explanations of the contrasting ways of how markets and governments improve their products or services. Corporations hold all the answers are clear bullshit to almost everybody, yet somehow, there are public intellectuals who sprout these bullshits without empirical evidences and had followings entrenched in them.
I want to add the Singaporean Housing Model. The government owns around 70% of housing.
And in Austria’s Capital Vienna the city government owns around 40 % of the housing.
Both cases might be worth looking into. The video is still very interesting and I think that a land value tax would be a good idea to implement.
@ It has some extremely strict laws and punishments in some cases (like I think the death penalty can be used for drug offense if I'm not mistaken), but I believe there's actually a cultural consensus that desires this. I think polymatter did a good video on exactly this:
th-cam.com/video/3dBaEo4QplQ/w-d-xo.html
@@Bisquick thanks! Granted its so weird when the entire culture is kinda fascist lol
@ it isn't fascist. But it is authoritarian. With some attempts at eugenics thrown inn. The founder of the current political regime, Lee Kwan Yu is very popular among neoliberals.
As for their "public housing", let's just say the government does give you housing provided that you are not critical of them. It is basically a form of "clientelism". Not something that is democratically controlled.
@@frrascon So it is actually quite comparable to modern CCP?
@arcangelkrlos I know, i also live in such a banana Republic myself. I mean as shit as China, America, Singapore, and other repressive regimes are, its still way better than living in a fucking mafia state
Austrian here: we definitly also have a housing crisis. A higher percentage (as compaired to anglo-saxon countries) of our population pays rent rather than owns housing. High-rent payment even in state-owned social housing makes it much harder for low income people to safe, build and sustain wealth. Yrs property prices in Vienn arent as high as in London, but high rental payment, finacial indtitutions that are often unwilling to give out loans to lower-income people and high livikg costs, make it impssoible for most people to ever own their own flat.
just looking at property prices to deduce if there is a housing crisis feels much too sinplistic to me.
This implies that social housing must also take account of rent as a percentage of income in order to produce the sorts of social benefits (safety, stability, equality) we desire.
@@nathansgreen I think social housing should only charge rent in order to cover repairs and utilities. Unfortunatly the Viennese Government treats social housing as a profit-making machine on the backs of the poor, that allows them to lower taxes for everyone else.
@@stefankotz2242 Just to complement what you're saying, even Adam Smith agreed. Really all the classical economists had a (I would say justified) throughline of contempt for the rentier class as they were transparently a vestige from feudal society and presented an obvious contradiction to the justifying logic of capitalism, ie value extracted without value produced, . Ch.11 of Wealth of Nations basically insinuates too that the idea of a ¨free market¨ as discussed in its historical context was a market free of the possibility for rent extraction as opposed to the conservative distortion it has come to mean today of...basically the opposite.
_"Kelp was never augmented by human industry. The landlord, however, whose estate is bounded by a kelp shore of this kind, demands a rent for it."_
Hi Stefan! British guy who lives in Wien here. Yes, the Austrian housing market has some problems, und die Miete steigt immer weiter und des ist oasch, but there is not a housing crisis in the sense of mass homelessness. The housing crisis in the UK isn't about owning your home or not, it's about being able to afford shelter. Homelessness all over the UK is horrendous, you cannot walk down the street without seeing people who really are sleeping rough (we don't even have Bahnhofsmissionen or other Notschlafstellen for the most part). That's how bad things have gotten in the UK where housing policy is almost entirely focused on the perspective of landlords who just want their house price to rise forever (not to mention that pretty much everything else is much less affordable than even in Vienna). The few rich people n Austria who really can afford to buy properties to rent out do of course experience the same perverse incentives to just live off the rent of the land, sure. But they're not so great in number that their perspective completely dominates politics and does not allow the renter's position to ever be considered. Thankfully, the needs of renters are actually addressed in politics here, even with the last two coalition governments. Little things like the strange start-up companies they have here that give people the legal advice to claim back overpaid rent are the norm here, but they don't exist anywhere near to the same extent in the UK as they do here.
Housing, or at the very least, shelter, is a fundamental need without which people cannot develop their lives further and ought to be provided as free and affordable to all in the same way as water and education. What I like about this video is that it does state the case that there can be a housing market, but it ought to be something that allows people to move house, not to hoard land as rentier capitalists do, and does not necessarily mean absolutely depriving people of housing altogether (though sadly I do think UK economic policy is honestly this vindictive in the aim to drive up rent and keep pay low).
Alles gute! Verzeih mir für den langen Kommentar.
@@stefankotz2242 true social housing would have repairs and utilities worked into the funding metrics.
I know this is a 2 year old video about a 4 year old video, but I'm so not used to seeing Abigail as Ollie.
I didn't even start following Abi's channel until _after_ she came out, so all of her videos prior to that may forever remain a mystery to me - even the thought of watching them is uncomfortable.
It feels like I'd be ... prying into her pre-transition self, or something? Yikes 😅
@@AndrewGillardIf they didn’t want you watching them they’d take them down. I don’t think they mind. They’ve not made a secret about their transition.
It’s been very interesting because I’ve been watching her on and off since 2016 so it feels kind of normal to me.
@@AndrewGillard I think she'd agree that her past videos hold a lot of importance and something tells me she'd rather you engage with that content even though it's pre-transition. If she wanted to hide it, it wouldn't still be up. She could, if she wanted, remake all those videos if she really cared all that much about it.
@@AndrewGillard I like to imagine her old videos are just really excellent method acting featuring the character “Oliver”
I'm happy I found your channel and this video. I immensely appreciate Abigail's videos for laying some of the ground ideas after my leftist awakening, but videos like these help me learn and understand the nuance to make those goals more realistic and achievable
I've felt this is my blindspot for a long time as an anthropology student, I'm glad we have a channel like yours to encourage more people, including myself, to learn and get more in-depth knowledge on economics.
If apples had good market feedback red delicious apples wouldn't exist
I feel attacked
My father actually likes red delicious apples. He is wrong.
How dare you
I mean if you’re as durable as a red delicious, of course you’ll get around. Before other, better apples come around. Which they have. Maybe we need something durable, actually delicious, and resource efficient? Seriously, why haven’t millennials killed those red mealy balls yet?
I missed this lol
It seems like Olly’s point about the housing market is valid so long as the caveat *as it exists* is added to it.
Isn't that always true though? The Housing Market is the Housing Market. If you change the reality of the Housing Market, you have changed what we are talking about. Markets aren't magical, they are descriptive, not prescriptive (and this is a big issue with Right Economics, they pretend it's prescriptive). A Market where there is no money and we use oranges to buy houses is still a Housing Market system, but it's nothing like what we would call the Housing Market. Likewise, when you remove the scarcity issue of money and housing, you have drastically changed what a Housing Market is. Frankly that's my issue with this video as well. He isn't arguing with Ollie, he has accepted Mr. Thorns entire premise before discussing the situation further, which means he CANT be arguing with Mr.Thorn even if it's framed that way.
EDIT: To be clear, I dislike how it's framed, not the material in it. It feels like there is a lot more work on trying to "distance" from the original work, instead of explain it in more detail. Something I note because around 14 minutes in he specifically says he wanted Mr. Thorn and Mexie to do this exact same thing I am saying I would have liked him to do.
@@Robert-qq9em The current conditions of the housing market that are critiqued are not inherent to being a market though. As is pointed out in the video, the “housing crisis” mostly exists in the housing markets of Anglophone nations.
@@johnkronz7562 Lol what? mostly mostly in anglophone nations??? I need to remind that to my government.
@@OjoRojo40 What, does “mostly” mean “only”? And does it imply there is no abusive housing policy outside the specific cycle of debt, speculation, and over-commoditization of housing in anglophone nations?
@@johnkronz7562
1- When did I say mostly=only uh?
2- No.
I was talking with my wife about the lack of leftist econ content the other day and even joked about starting my own channel. Good to know someone more credible beat me to it.
But please do start your channel too.
You having started yet? Mannnnnnnn
Heyy, it's not like it's getting crowded :)
Stop thinking of economics as leftist or rightist. Economics is just economics regardless of politics, even if it informs policy. Especially because it informs policy. Economics is just like physics: we have to understand how things work based on observation and evidence, not based or influenced by our political leanings.
Left and Right is just ideological separatist nonsense, anyway. Ideologies blind people to observation and evidence.
Re: the apple point - artificial scarcity of abundant, replaceable goods is very very commong under capitalism. Compare childhood hunger and malnutrition rates in the US to the amount of fresh produce which is thrown away (~50% by some accounts). Yes housing markets are particularly bad, but Ollie is correct that there are no markets under capitalism that do not rely on 1.) the existence or manufacture of scarcity in order to increase profit margins, and 2.) the exclusion of people who do not have money from the market.
Exactly.... it's also funny because there are hundreds of different types of apples, and we only get like 5 of them on the shelves. Any time folks go apple picking for other types, they're like "OMG I never knew apples could taste so good!" What we eat isn't the result of "good market feedback" at all.
In the USA the effect of artificial scarcity of food has been directly opposed by artificial abundance.
Childhood malnourishment in the USA is not due to "capitalism", as the food supply is far from a free market.
The US government provides farming subsidies which artificially deflate the price of food.
Then the SNAP, WIC, & National School Lunch & School Breakfast programs all subsidize food purchases for the children of low income households.
I'm on SNAP myself at the moment and the only reason that doesn't cover all my food purchases all by itself is because I prefer spending some of my limited luxuries budget on premade food instead of cooking.
And that's on the per person subsidy for an adult. The WIC program provides even more for pregnant women and children, and the school meals programs are on top of that.
The only reason any american child is malnourished is parental negligence or incompetence.
@@Kieselmeister the rest of the developed world also has similar programs - if it truly comes down to individual competence, why are there different childhood malnutrition rates between countries? Are American parents just choosing to starve their kids more than, say, Swiss parents?
Or perhaps the marketization of school lunch in the US, and wider domination by fast food corporations who create food deserts, is to blame.
@@mboop127 Only 60% of those eligible for food assistance in the USA actually apply for it. That's the largest factor by far.
Half of the remaining 40% are children, and if they are going hungry it's because their parents valued their pride more than their children's health.
there are also a lot of flaws in the entire food desert concept, at least when it comes to urban ones. There are rural areas where physical access to cheap nutritious food is actually difficult due to distance rather than just inconvenient, but the current concept of the urban food desert is based on a fetishization of "fresh food" which is unscientific, and ignores the fact that one CAN obtain a balanced diet from crappy gas station food if they have to.
You just have to actually know what vitamins and minerals you need, and actually read the packaging to find them. You also have to accept that you are going to need to exercise more to burn off a the extra empty calories.
I can and have done so myself at various points. I definitely gained weight, but at no point was I actually malnourished.
It's entirely possible to survive indefinitely on frozen pizza, ramen noodles, and multivitamins.
One of the big problems in the USA is a lack of dietary education, exacerbated by people not paying attention to what education there is. To be frank, the society of Switzerland probably produces better parents on average than America does these days.
Setting aside the cases where parents value their pride over letting the government pay to feed their children, majority of cases of malnutrition are due to parents stuffing their kids full, but not bothering to make sure they are getting a balanced diet. vitamin deficiencies are the biggest culprit, followed by protein deficiencies. (All plant protein is incomplete for animal nutrition, and different sources need to be mixed.)
There is also the occasional edge cases where the parents are on some fad diet and force their children to do it with them without understanding the damage it could cause.
There have been deaths due to parents being on Vegan diets and giving infants vegan milk substitutes instead of formula. (Or even just trying to breastfeed while on an imbalanced vegan diet.)
@@Kieselmeister you didn't reply to the question. Do American parents just independently choose to be more prideful than those in other countries?
The only way to explain such big gaps between countries is to look at the differences in their systems.
Trying to explain those divides by criticizing personal choices is an utterly childish view.
You said this video wouldn't be as fun as Ollie's, and then made the bad apples joke. You lied to me!
I'm glad you brought up traveling businessmen. My first thought on watching Philosophy Tube and Mexie's video was that it didn't sound like he was considering the need to travel, which is the main concern I have with the eventual communes he mentions. I think it'd be hard if not impossible to set up any of the ideal societies the left proposes without maintaining tolerance the whole way through, and as far as I know tolerance in a society tends to rely on the ability to travel.
That said, do you have any comments and/or videos analyzing the maintenance of homes? That part seems to be left out of most discussions I've seen.
My people, the Maori (indigenous people of New Zealand) traveled freely in a pre-capitalist society and were damn sight more tolerant than the European colonist who arrived in the 18th Century and imposed capitalism and the nation-state on us.
Thought this was going to be a gotcha video, turned out to be super interesting, thanks for providing so many references, great work man!
I wasn't quite sure about the video of Olly's at the time either. Happy to see content like this too. I like the fun styles of contrapoints and philosophy tube but a dryer style works just as well for me
*drier
Having studied economics in university, it’s something that I noticed too within breadtube which I also watch a lot. So I’m happy to see you working on this.
Edit: I imagine the same principles can be applied to financial groups and rich folk who own multiple properties who use them for income through Airbnb
one nitpick, land isn't permanent. there will be quite a shift in land use in coastal areas due to rising sea levels.
The lights dim and flicker. You begin feeling a growing sense of unease build up deep inside of you. You hear the floor boards creak down the hallway, but you dare not turn around. The room gets progressively colder and colder, yet you still break out into a nervous sweat. He's now right behind you; you want to run but can't muster the strength. He whispers in your ear:
"Those people can just sell their houses"
BEN SHAPIRO
@@MrBoatsrule Best time to invest if you’re a fish
And insurers in California are already exiting the fire home insurance market because the risk pooling is becoming more unstable. Like if you're an insurer and someone is asking to buy insurance from you but the data says their house is in an area that only gets worse and worse in terms of fire likelihood, why would you sell them that insurance? Not only that, but the alternative would be to raise premiums extremely and to unfeasible heights. And you're right, I haven't looked into it, but I'd imagine similar situations in Hurricane areas of the U.S., and flooding regions. Tbh, Climate Change and the Housing Market is a massive fucking topic so I'm not surprised Unlearning Econ didn't touch on it since this was mainly a response video.
Not necessarily. It seems with decent costal protection systems we can avoid the majority of the predicted land loss and property damage well into the next century. Obviously we will also need to take serious measures to reduce carbon emissions, promoting readiness for storms, implementing no wake zones etc. It's an ongoing battle and action needs to be taken. There's a lot of doomerism around this subject, but there does seem to be scientifically sound methods to overcome this. Also, most of the articles and studies I've read on this subject (I'm a sad fuck that got in to a massive debate on facebook about this) include major cities in their stats in regards to homes lost due to rising sea levels and don't take in to account that there is a large economic value in focusing coastal protections in these areas. It seems pretty certain that the majority of spending will go towards protecting these cities. While, unfortunately, small seaside towns will take the brunt of rising sea levels. But dense population centres will be safe i.e. the majority of expected (from what I've seen) homes lost. London isn't going to be atlantis in 2200. I do feel for those pacific islanders though.
@@MrBoatsrule omg the end of that was actually really scary.
"You can still believe the role of landlords is bad, but still acknowledge that some people depend on it."
Blame the game, not the players.
yeah but why do I have to get a real job while these guys can live off other people's need to a roof just because their families happend to have properties
@@photogenicBlur Because life isn’t fair. Deal with it. You’re complaining about having to work while there are people paralyzed from the neck down. Be grateful ffs.
@@lllLoko ah the good old "someone has it worse than me let's not call atention to this shitty thing then"
"life isn't fair" not with that attitude
@@photogenicBlur some of them may not have it so great but it seemed weird to me that he acted like getting rid of landlords means somehow impoverishing this tiny portion of people who do some work and maybe add a little value and make an honest dollar with those VAST MAJORITY of often foreigners dumping scads of cash into NY and LA and other places, or giant real estate companies like Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway that got bailed ou th after the bank sdcc predatory lent to especially minorities and women but poor whites too.
And Obama bailed out the people who cheated the predatory real estate loan market victims.
They created a financial disaster and then had their losses covered.
This is like a casino paying back all its biggest losers.
Except we pay.
It's really weird how this supposed economist would defend the small percentage of small property holders who are forced to rent to.other poors keeping them in poverty.
And we can see the incredible increases in wealth since covid for the likes of E Musk.
Who went from $30 to $90 billion in a few months.
This is the same supposed " market " tha th is somehow supposed to fix the housing crisis.
It makes no sense
@@garydeforve5055 ok
Thank you so much. I really want to understand economics, I'm sick of being told that I hold radical ideas because I'm ignorant of it. But at the same time my learning disability generally prevents me from getting through academic texts on the matter, and simple online content that isnt completely concervative is few and far between. I actually understood this for once, so thank you
The statistic at 14:08 is completely useless. It show "Average" income and as you surely know "Median" income would be the useful statistic here. So that statistic is very biased.
It looks like the word "average" here is referring to long-term average of the underlying statistic, with the statistic being the house price to income ratio. As in, average (ratio y1 + ratio y2 +.... ratio yN)/N. I bet you're right though, in that the underlying statistic is probably the average, it just doesn't say that specifically. Although richer people will tend to have more expensive homes which will blunt the distortion from income inequality.
A big part of my leftist niche that's often forgotten about is land reform. I'm a big proponent of breaking up large agricultural firms as well as corporate held lands and distrube then directly to people.
Greetings from Germany! I have to add that while our housing Market is probably better than the one in the UK and US, we do still have problems in the desirable cities. Property in these cities is mostly unaffordable (actually more and more is being concentrated in the hands of investment firms) and rent is climbing steadily. In Munich, where I live, almost half of the mean income is spent just for rent on average, and in Berlin, in response to very sharply rising rent prices in the last decade (Berlin used to be considered affordable), a controversial rent cap was issued by the berlin state government, banning rise of rents for 5 years (with a few exceptions such as for newly built housing).
Yeah, I agree. I am economically illiterate, but at the point in the video where he said that Germany has a functioning housing sector, it did make me go "hmmm". Austria (specifically Vienna is what I know of) seems to have it figured out a bit more from what I heard, also because so much of the housing is in the hands of the city. Really cool video in any case!
Also in Berlin there is a movement now stalled out by the neoliberal "Social Democratic party of Germany" to actually disown some of these big investment firms (albeit with reimbursement)
The cap could have also been partially a concession to take some wind out of this movements sails
I have an idea: Don't do anything. Allow cities to become less desirable. Give rural areas a chance.
@@MrCmon113 So it's the fault of the people who just don't like villages!
Methodological individualism is like the worst scourge in our society.
@@WarpDoomer Ignore him/her. Just a troll.
Former real estate agent and current-day leftist here.
I appreciate your channel and focus on economics, I agree we need a better understanding of the systems we want to dismantle; but I have to disagree with most of your solutions.
The problem is one of political will.
The housing market is not a singular monolith, and when you get involved in real estate sales one of the first things you learn about is the scale of number of adjacent industries. Insurance companies of all flavors (homeowner, renters, title), inspectors, appraisers, marketers, the list goes on and on and stretches further than you could imagine (even when I used to clean residential windows 70% of our business was for RE agents). When you say "will this be the end of the housing market" you leave out all these adjacent industries that WILL be ended if home prices are lowered because they exist off the debt created by mortgages. A "reasonable" market with low housing prices may be able to support real estate companies and agents and some landlords, but it cannot support the network of adjacent businesses that cling parasitically to the money-fountain that is the mortgage market.
So not only do you have the lobbying power of multi-billion dollar real estate companies, but you also have all these lesser corporate entities that will resist and lobby against any threats to the market (such as mutualist institutions) and defend against those threats using legislation. If it is government run, it will be defunded to the point of being non-functional, then lambasted as ineffective ("the Republican strategy"), and finally dissolved. If it is privately run it will be regulated to the point that it cannot function, and dissolve due to financial constraints.
The situation we have with real estate in the US can only be relieved through revolutionary political will, the real estate industry is too big to be "chipped away at"; any attempts to do so will be squashed. We need something more akin to the Sherman Anti-Trust act, but in a way that breaks down the "decentralized monopoly" of land ownership rather than the centralized monopolies that existed in 1890.
The only thing that would work is forcible seizure of assets. I can not imagine a "painless" way to wean ourselves off of an exploitative housing industry. The RE industry may not need housing to be unaffordable to exist, but they need it to be unaffordable in order to be able to exist on any scale comparable to what they are today. And capital never relinquishes profits voluntarily.
Appreciate you sharing this my man definitely some valuable analysis
When watching the video I felt that it was missing something. Thank you Justin for this information.
This is great background context, thank you
Could you make a video on rent control? I have heard so many variations all over the internet. Some saying its good, I heard that it will be horrible for the market, and some who say it will do very little to help. As someone who is not very economical literate I don't know what to think. Also a video that has a reading list would be very helpful. Ps this was a good video.
I’ve got one planned on ‘econ101’ in general, and being against rent control is a particular argument you get from econ101 types. Long story short - the evidence doesn’t suggest it’s as bad as they say, though of course it has downsides.
The most commom critique of rent control is that it will eventually end up hurting the people you would like it to help. Obviously climbing rent prices is a problem, but it seems like a better way to solve that through a market is to provide more supply (public housing). Or even take a further step back and fiddle with the incentives of taxes like doing a land value tax system, where you tax the land at a vastly higher rate than the property improvements (prioritizing vertical lots instead of high value sprawl.)
In circumstances such as rent control, and other socially focused market regulations, you have to account for the non-economic rationale for and against the regulations..
Rent control is meant to prevent homelessness, the people who argue so vociferously against it are usually more interested in appealing to an ideal that inherently pursues other policies that don't help renter-class people..
That being said, economists tend to obsess with making exclusively economic arguments, so as not to be corrupted by elements of more social sciences..
You have to make your own choices
Price controls in general act as an artificial way to restrict the push that high demand and low supply does to prices.
If you keep a price frozen, the demand for it will stay the same, even increase because of speculation and the rest of the economy's growth. On the flipside, it will not create a subsequent hike in supply (In this case, investment in housing) because the price hasn't changed. It may be profitable, but not AS profitable as doing something else with the money (Like developing in a city/country with less regulations, or developing commercial buildings instead). Also, as a rental owner, you're less interested in re-investing in the property, so you won't fix it up as often, or use the nicest materials, etc.
If there's less money to be made, then the properties might not be worth buying for people looking to rent the place. So in that regard, the price of the lots might go down. However, there will still be people wanting to live in those places. Remember, the housing market has demand because people want to live there; otherwise it's a dead market. So, there will still be competition for the places, where the wealthy will still have the advantage.
My guess is that rent control might slowly but surely kill the rental market in an area, and only people with the capital to straight up buy a property might be able to move in. Maybe the rental market might start to transition into informality to avoid regulations (for instance, you don't rent a place but a bed, or you make a sort of hotel of the extra rooms in the place you live in; isn't that what Airbnb is?). I dunno.
I live in Argentina, btw. We have a LOOONG history with price controls, and it has never worked. People and businesses are pushed into informality where possible, which makes the situation more precarious for everyone. We're doing bad in every metric possible, though, so we shouldn't be used as an example tbh. Cheers
@@unlearningeconomics9021 The main priority of rent control is to make housing more afforadable/lessen the burden of policy. Empiral literature suggests it's basically a failure at doing these goals: www.urban.org/sites/default/files/publication/99646/rent_control._what_does_the_research_tell_us_about_the_effectiveness_of_local_action_1.pdf Even if the downsides are small (though still existant) that's pretty damning no?
Great work! Henry George and land taxes are always left of of housing debates. The textbook for A level economics doesn't even mention land when explaining rent, but instead has an example of a famous actor, which is a spurious example probably more appropriate for marginal revenue product theory. Well done for exposing people to successful policies that are "overlooked" in textbooks!
Good video.
I think, in regards to the UK, the major problems have been the terrible regulations, broken definitions, and the Londoncentric nature of the country. Housing associations that were created as nonprofits to fill the housing gap for low income households have deviated so far from the original goal, that they're now responsible for the creation of unaffordable complexes built with four walls of plasterboard. Arguably, it's not the existence of the market itself, but the market itself that is the issue
After hearing you, I find Ollie and you talking different languages, both of you with good points, though. At the end you have a good video, but it is actually not a good critique of Ollie, rather a great complement.
Sure
Right, it's a response and opening to discussion. It's pretty clear he's acknowledging that the core issue is real - being that the current housing market is not functional for society at large - but looking from a more functional perspective. Ollie's video in whole is really good at covering what the problems are, but is brief on solutions, and filling in that gap and making corrections isn't a bad thing.
Definitely different languages lol, I know for myself I tend to have a hard time following philosophytube... Possibly because I'm quite far removed from the philosophy mindset.
@kevin willems that is actually another debate in economics: should we use the same language or not.
This is a great video. Though the framing seems a bit off, but I get for exposure reasons why it was done this way (gotta play to the algorithm). Still feels like there's a discussion to be had between "markets" as a concept and "the market" as a thing that currently exists. Philosophy Tube's video doesn't strike me as being particularly concerned with the former as much as the latter, especially given the comic book metaphor and literally using "Housing Market" as the title for a character. It's not that it's being said that housing markets necessarily create housing crises, but that The Housing Market is creating The Housing Crisis. Watching this I couldn't help but feel like the critique aspect of the video had shifted the original video's target.
16:07 maybe landlords should get a job instead of leeching my money, if its so unprofitable
Abigail low-key called you out in her last video 😆 I'm a fan of you both, but clearly this can only be resolved by deathmatch.
What did she say
@@brendanmccabe8373 I'm gonna need to ret-con that comment now haven't I 😆
@@Chris_Tinacan nah I was actually asking what she said lol
@@brendanmccabe8373 Can't even remember now 🤔 I was probably high at the time 🙄
@@brendanmccabe8373 She said smth like "I'm not gonna explain UBI further because if I do then people think the video is about a certain policy and then a bunch of youtubers make replay videos to me where they presumably own me with facts and logic, and which I sadly don't watch"
She has a rule of not watching replay videos because most of the time they're not made in good faith
The best economic-related breadtube channel these days is Folding Ideas. His recent NFTs, Decentraland, Gamestop trilogy are incredible and so well researched.
Calling Folding Ideas breadtube seems rather inaccurate. He doesn't come off as an anti-capitalist, or anti-state. He mostly comes off as a rational speaker on a topic that's rife with populist insanity. Coffeezilla is in kind of the same boat, with him having a focus on the grifting/snake oil salesmanship that riddles the pro web3 crowd.
@@Ornithopter470it depends on what you mean by leftist. Olson directly supports a UBI and in line goes up directly points out how the concept of ownership leads to some pretty terrible shit via the discussion of children growing up in a crypto based economy with extremely slow inflation or deflation built into it.
thank you for this. breadtube leans towards the abstract/ideal. nice to see someone doing straightforward economics with a clear head.
You mean using bullshit ideas meant to keep us from just helping people
Lefttube cares more about empty social justice and identity politics than the core economic ideas behind leftism and that's honestly pathetic.
Currently, in many places where the housing crisis is most acute, planning restrictions prevent or greatly increase the cost of building social housing.
I'm ambivalent on this point and I didn't cover it partly for reasons of space and partly because it's the main thing the video I'm responding to discussed in-depth. What would you recommend reading about planning?
yeh funny that. you would think that there's some conspiracy between existing landowners and local authorities to restrict land supply and to increase housing prices. Nah that couldn't possibly be true.
"functioning housing markets in germany" as someone who lives in germany I was really quite surprised by that notion. Might be, it's way worse elsewhere but the housing markets in pretty much all bigger cities in germany is quite the opposite of functioning. Berlin, Munich, Hamburg just to name some of the worst examples.
Saw your videos for the first time today and I have already seen them all, your content is well informed and quite insightful, please continue.
its so refreshing to see things i agree with be critiqued in a constructive way where everybody actually learns something. usually debating things on the internet is such a nightmare but this video did everything right.
14:07 - Interesting graph. I had no idea how bad this housing crisis was in the anglo-saxon countries. Even in Germany we've been talking about our housing crisis for years now. Especially in my area where basically every dullsville with a train connection to munich is counted as part of the "Munich Metropiltan Area" - great argument to push up prices :P
Yeah it was weird to see him bring up Germany as a positive example lmao
The problem with calling much of 'house' value 'land' value is that it ignores the existence of leaseholds. In urban areas, where much of housing is flats, it can be impossible to get anything other than leasehold properties. If a flat increases in price, that isn't the value of the land increasing, because the land does not change ownership when the flat does.
Plus there's the conflation of value with price - the land hasn't changed, so hasn't gained (or lost) any value, and the house built on it may have gained or lost value (or neither) depending on its condition (e.g. building an extension versus letting the roof cave in). However, prices inexorably increase. Price may not be entirely orthogonal to value, but it is also clearly not dependent upon it.
"If a flat increases in price, that isn't the value of the land increasing, because the land does not change ownership when the flat does.
" except it is, just divided x numbers of ways. The reason the flat has value above and beyond the basic cost of building it, is the location, ie land it is on. The irony of the lease underneath a leasehold is it is comparatively undervalued (to pay lease or buy the freehold rights) compared to full-on leasing (renting), of the leasehold flat above it. Why? Because the contract rights over the lease and freehold land the leaseholder has.
Effectively the leasehold system is a response to actual market pressures and mechanism to create a for developer profit but for the leaseholder co-op type arrangement where pure freehold is to impractical because of land value. Developer gets freehold land, builds flats, sells individual flats as leaseholds but needs to have contracts that make it close to freehold as possible to be attractive to customers (see part-rent part buy systems for another example), so setups leasehold system. Freeholder owner rights are severely curtailed by the long leases terms that are signed to originally.
Great video, wanted something like this after watching Olly's. That said, my take on the problem and on the Olly's video is different from yours. I would say "Yes there is a problem with the current system. I didn't hear any practical solution though". I don't disagree with what Olly says, because his points to me are more of a "how far are we willing to go in breaking social norms to solve housing problem" statements, rather than practical economic solutions. I don't mind those statements, they are interesting to consider. I just don't think they can be acted on. As a side note, historically famous failures of communism are often related to mistaking manifestos/statements/ideological directions with practical economical steps (see early Soviet Union for a variety of examples, such as collectivization leading to massive hunger in the high-producing agricultural areas of the country). We really need to learn from those failures, especially since most good arguments against left wing economics are based on historic evidence.
That said, I am a big fan of Philosophy Tube, Olly is awesome
So glad I’ve discovered you! I’ve been wanting to learn more about economics but didn’t know where to start
I love this video. I wish you had elaborated on georgism more, it's a really good idea. It also would have been good to elaborate the over regulation of housing in terms of zoning laws, and how countries with lax zoning laws like Japan don't have problems getting housing supply to necessary levels.
Okay SO. First thing, this is a good video, I like what you’re doing and I think having a breadtube look at economics is good...however. I really do take issue with the idea that a housing market doesn’t inherently lead to a crisis, for one very simple reason: the rich, as you said, often seek to monopolize land and buy up more and more property for themselves, and will always have more money to do so than an average person on the street thanks in part to SOME land being an economic investment (cough cough landlords, not that every landlord is rich). Leaving housing, something that is essential for life in this society and every other, up to market dynamics leads to, as Marx predicted, the eventual failing of market systems as the very top of society amasses more and more property for themselves, leaving the rest of us in...well, crisis. Scrambling to take what housing there is at whatever price we’re given, because we have no other option. Genuinely I really like this video, just that conclusion is a bit rough to me. Keep going though!!!
I agree with what youre saying but i think OP was trying to give alternate solutions instead of forcibly take rich peoples property. I completely agree that the ultra wealthy and likely the wealthy too necessarily must exploit the poor to aquire and maintain that wealth, but i also think we need to think about how we reconcile that. Would it be productive to strip wealthy people of their weath all at once or would doing so create problems greater than what we sought to solve in the first place? In other words is there a way to bring the wealthy to our point of view or are our worldviews just too irreconcilable for that to happen?
I think this misses the point a bit. He's saying that having a housing market of some sort does not require a housing crisis. There are ways to regulate the market much differently than our current system. A different system would allow for the private ownership and sale of land/housing while ensuring that it is accessible to all. One of the biggest flaws with Ollie's video is that it exists in a bit of a leftist bubble. The government seizing all privately held residential land is literally a revolutionary idea. People would literally fight you to the death over that idea. The land seizing mechanisms he mentioned that we use to build malls do often result in violent encounters with the displaced homeowners, at least in America (where I live). Practically speaking, Ollie's video is a nice thought experiment, but there's nothing realistically actionable there.
@@Ben-qv7zj There's lots of things in Breadtube that seem like nice thought experiments, but often ignore or make overreaching assumptions about human nature.
@@TribuneAquila "instead of forcibly take rich peoples property" You realise that the current system is to use force to ensure that rich people retain property, right? The primary reason for the birth of modern policing was to protect the property rights of the rich. In that case it was more about their control of factories and whatnot rather than their houses, but that certainly is part of it too. Just ask any homeless person that has been thrown by cops out of an empty house owned by a real estate speculator.
@@TribuneAquila Considering a few rich men invited a guy to their secret island resort to explain what options they have when rampant climate change is destroying the world, no, they're not going to be convinced that giving the rest of us so no one has to go without is in their best interest. Because they're already speaking of guards with electric collars extorted with limited access to food vaults they have and/or the possibility to have robots protect them when the world goes to hell.
Germany's housing ain't that great. The cities are getting way too expensive. And even state-owned housing is often not too great or affordable since they just do the bare minimum when it comes to social housing. Also any existing social housing will 'expire' after some time and again become more expensive
Yeah you're right. This guy dosen't understand Economics very well.
@@killerskiely100 You say that as if he is obligated to have a complete grasp of the system in another country.
He seems to understand economics just fine, but he might have oversimplified or been wrong when citing references from other countries.
Consider most sources about the German housing market is most likely in German, I don't blame him, but I do appreciate people correcting when they are better informed
@@dig8634 calling out people for not being good on econ, while failing to understand econ and citing countries you don't understand doesn't seem very well educated. I'd recommend Richard Wolf to you if you'd like to see some great econ or maybe Piketty
@@killerskiely100 Well, both he and the people he called out were being US centric. The Germany example was just related.
You can't go from misunderstanding something about another country to not understanding the subject at hand, when the two are just partially related.
Everything he said about economy in general could be absolutely correct and he could still be wrong about the specifics of Germany.
So before saying he isn't educated or that he doesn't understand economics, maybe actually prove those things first?
@@dig8634 Proof: choosing a bad exapmle on econ on a video he made.
hearing abigail referred to as her deadname is so odd now but this is a rly cool video thank u i actually have thought a lot about the lack of economics in breadtube
?
@@meshzzizk Abigail (Oliver in the vid) is a trans woman
The apple metaphor is bizarre. Nobody needs *apples specifically* to live, but they do need food, and there is in fact a huge problem of people in the UK having to rely on food banks. Not because there isn't enough, but because the means to access it is only available to those with wealth.
So...that maps pretty well to the housing crisis, actually.
Teach the landlords how to code after we take their property
lmao
ahaha
*landlords start coding digital houses*
Economists: outstanding move
That doesn't hit nearly as hard when followed by theft and violent actions to cause a need to code
im so grateful for this video ive been really torn on this subject because my mum is a landlord and theres not really another option for her because my brother is severely disabled, he needs round the clock care and theres no way my mum would be able to have a job whilst caring for him, and the benefits from the government just arent enough to keep him living a dignified life (for example they are constantly trying to downgrade the nappies he uses even though the lower quality ones make him leak out onto his clothes) but my mum agrees with my criticisms on being a landlord so she tries to be the kindest landlord possible, I still disagree with the institution of landlording but this video has given me a way more nuanced view than all landlords are bad :s
Here it's hard for private individuals to become landlords. It's a field that gives a huge disadvantage to larger owners who can centralize the maintenance services and standardize properties. It happens when people have a spare room in their private home or a building.
Or simply, it is much cheaper to have your own maintenance staff that service an entire town than to own a single property and constantly hire contractors.
It spreads the risk a bit, in case an individual property is left unused, defaults or requires a lot of emergency maintenance.
Landlords are not inherently bad or exploitative. The idea that they are implies that all renters are exploited and should therefore not be renters. This is not true. Renting is a valid choice that makes sense for lots of people: students, travelers, or others who simply don't want to be financially tied down to one place for a long time; people uninterested or unable to commit to the responsibilities of home ownership and maintenance, including disabled people.
Your mother should not feel bad about being a landlord so long as she is doing the job fairly. Presumably she has a basement or garden suite that she rents out, in which case she is providing someone a home that would not exist otherwise. That is commendable.
I work with homeless people. Anything that can help is something I support. Ultimately I want a communist utopia but right now that isn't going to happen, so I'm all in for videos like this where we can learn actual economics and realistic proposals. Thank you!
your work is essential, I really appreciate that
Your seperation of housing and apples is elasticity right? You could apply the same logic to medicine except instead of "mostly land/location" it's "necessary for survival".
That's definitely a big component, but there's other important ones as well: Barrier to entry, fungibility, transparency, etc.
@DJ Coin Laundry Just a heads up, this isn't right. Housing is quite elastic - both in terms of income elasticity of demand, and in terms of price elasticity of demand. It's like the example he uses in the video: the home in London is more expensive, because there's more demand for it.
@DJ Coin Laundry Just because housing is inelastic for the individual dosent mean the entire market is inelastic.
Not to mention that both are highly regulated market segments.
@@brooms4460 Conveniently ignoring the supply aspect lol. Nice try.
I think you might be missing the point of what Abbey's trying to say with, "If everyone is housed, you can't sell them housing". Sure, on a pure logistical level people would still want to move, but that doesn't change the fact that sellers are incentivized to create artificial demand by under-meeting the needs of the consumer since that creates a higher yield in profits. Sure, there will still "technically" be a market for houses even if everyone had one, but it would still have a much lower average demand than it does now because people wouldn't *_need them to survive._*
The soul of what Abbey's saying still rings true. She just flubbed up on the specifics.
Sometimes the algorithm is good! Glad to have found you. Amazing content and really helps fill the gap in economics that plague so much of the left, including myself. Thank you!
It is nice to see some level headed criticism, I would still argue that Olly's video has its benefits it is well produced and approachable even if somewhat simplistic and the main point of the capitalist exploitation expands into the housing market and the housing crisis.
Finally being a little pedantic but you do realise that there are poor people in "rich countries" right, so arguably there is an apple crisis.
Keep on the good work see ya in the backlog.
Lets feed the algorithm.
User Engagement Comment
I'm glad to see "breadtube" (as much as I hate the term) expanding. Someone already mentioned donoteat as a valuable companion channel focusing on more hands-on issues. Way too much content on youtube relies on needlessly sensationalist "take-down" videos that really aren't worth anyone's time.
PS: please don't shy away from including reading lists in your videos.
Socdem here (I KNOW), but new subscriber. Cool stuff
Whilst I would see Ollie's proposals as being the end goal, you make a strong and convincing argument for what can be done right now. Really informative video - I've subscribed!
Solid video.
My solutions are:
1) hard rent control on all but narrowly- qualified luxury units
2) Tenant Rights policies (details to follow) and Tenant Unions by law
3) land taxes as suggested
4) sharply increase public housing supply in every zip code
5) limits on numbers of units and complexes any business or landlord can own
6) severe penalties for bad landlords, both businesses or individuals
7) absolutely NO HOUSING USED AS "INVESTMENT" GENERATORS!! Ie by private equity firms.
this is disgusting and gross.
8) upgrading some low-density zoning to mixed use and higher-density zoning.
9) retaking some wide streets in urban areas from car use to building housing and small business use
"I see no indication that Olly has changed his thinking" Boy did this age well
who is this Olly he is talking about ?
How did he changed ?
@@marvin2678 No clue with regards to the content, but she came out in January
I’m currently reading The Economics of Feasible Socialism by Alec Nove, and finding it really interesting. I wonder if you’ve come across it. I have pretty much zero formal background in economics, so I don’t know how obscure/common/respected his ideas are among more thoroughly trained economists. That said, I think his insights on the value of markets, coupled with his strong critique of capitalist markets, might appeal to you. Love your videos, keep up the good work!
9:43
I don't know about rent control. Most economists seem to agree that it doesn't really help like it should.
It can work in certain cases when combined with other policies
this is a very healthy way to promote being critical amongst ourselves on the left. props.
love that this wasnt an annoying debate lord arguements from the center
Homeless person: if I only gotten a better realtor
Fr though
This is a well meaning lib just not getting the point.
"Many landlords require that income to survive"
But the argument is that the relationship of the landlord to tenant is parasitic, regardless of whether or not they need it to survive.
Labeling entire groups as “parasitic” is a form of demonizing and scapegoating. It’s usually done when a person has no workable solution to offer and just needs a popular talking point to rile up their base. It’s also a slippery slope to authoritarianism. I say all this as an anarchist
@m0ckingB1rd42 and in this case it is an accurate and even scientific way of describing a situation. A situation where one person profits from someone else without this person getting anything back is called like that.
However in our society this word has bad optics and should therefore not get used.
I actually really like the bell feature on youtube because I subscribe to channels I want to see more of only when I'm on youtube and I look at my subscription feed, but there are some channels I want to be alerted about right when I get on or from my phone when I'm not even on it. If there wasn't a bell icon my notifications would be flooded with stuff that I didn't want to be in there.
The one thing I didn’t expect disagreement on
Even after 4 years i still appreciate this video
It actually gives constructive criticism towards breadtube instead of misinterpreting the point those videos make!
I know this was 2 years ago but in my opinion the solution to the housing crisis is to make land common property by confiscating rent and in doing so provide incentives to improve land by means of an unimproved land value tax or the single tax, ideologically known as Georgism 🔰. This is a Centrist solution because for the EconRight it will improve market efficiency (no vacant lots if landowners have to pay a tax for it) and do away with other bad taxes which causes prices to rise, deadweight loss, corruption and incentives to evade taxes while being a tax that avoids the negative characteristics of other taxes, and for the EconLeft it will do away with land monopoly, land speculation and landlords while also being a progressive tax that reduces economic inequality. If there is any source to be called upon for public revenues by the community it should be a value which is maintained by the community as a whole like land value rather than the private forms of wealth taken from individuals for public uses currently like the taxes on the earned wages of labor.
5:00 Aren't the reasons people move primarily economic forces like better jobs, more favorable rent conditions, better opportunity for you and your kids, etc? Moving is hard, it's not usually an aesthetic based decision unless you're uber rich.
Also here in New Zealand many people move so that they live within the catchment of the best schools in the community. If you live outside the defined catchment then you can't send your kids to that school. Lot's of parents get into bidding wars with other parents in order to buy houses within that catchment, because having their kids at that school grants them benefits, not just related to superior education, but also the social connections that they can gain from being in the same social networks of people who may be able to help with professional advancement or business opportunities. Don't you just love capitalism?
(WARNING: JUNGIAN LANGUAGE AHEAD, lol)
Honestly, as a pretty die-hard leftist.... I think we need more of this. I agree with the first premise: Breadtube and leftism as a whole is lacking in concrete details. We need to start attracting the concrete, sensor-types along with the feelers and intuitives that we have plenty of now. Sensors are basically "the people" at large in most societies, it seems, so it's REALLY interesting and hope-building for me that we're getting there. The existance of this video is proof. MOST people just want to know "what works" and what they get out of it/why they should change what they want. This is the tone and type of video I could see my Dad sharing (he's almost 60, ISTP, pretty typical "California centrist" who seems to barely even knows what politics is) and I don't think I can say that about any of my other political subs!
I oscillated between thinking this was great and this was making dumb oversights, but by the end, I think I see what this channel/vid is going for. Answers. The theory is what gets SOME people (like me, INTP) on board with something that makes logical sense... way more than unregulated markets... but the majority of the population is answer-focused rather than idea focused. So it makes sense UE would sort of gloss over or throw out that justification. THIS is the "Leftism works logically" argument I try to make online, but have trouble moving that internally consistent logic that brings me to leftism OUT of my own thought language into something others would buy-in on, even if they don't have the same foundational background and knowledge I do.
So I will gladly be subbing and watching where this goes. I think this channel and approach has big potential to both do a lot of good, educate and expand the minds of people, and become popular as well.
"Breadtube and leftism as a whole is lacking in concrete details"
As well as too allergic to the dreaded "compromise". Anything short of revolution often gets shot down, but if we're going to have any meaningful change enacted it unfortunately needs to take into account the systems we currently live in. Not all compromises are capitulations to fascism.
@@KingBobXVI We can work to improve the material conditions for the working class but revolution is still the eventual goal as it is the only way to achieve a socialist mode of production
I'm glad any intp is on board.
Thing is: _BreadTube_ does not always equate to Leftists/Left(ism?). To my knowledge, _BreadTube_ is a collection of progressive-friendly TH-camrs; not necessarily having to deal with Socialist economics/politics (which is what Left Wing means). So of course these "big 3" aren't good at explaining economics *because that's not what they're about* - they explore topics _through their own unique perspective/in certain angles/on a particular lense_
MBTI isn't Jungian, but go off
This in interesting but doesn't say much about homeless people stuck in poverty anf unenployement, as well as middle class rent burdened people. I think you rightly focused on economics and not ethics, but I'd love to hear sustainable alternative on the economic side that guarantee housing rights, maybe even the benefits of bettering the living standards (healthcare, productivity, etc.)
So happy to see both some realism from someone economically minded and also some criticism from someone who agrees on principle, but wishes to argue about the details and the implementation of ideas. When people disagree on principle it’s just a debate of emotionally based bias vs emotionally based bias which I’m tired of. Debate’s purpose is the advancement of ideas, not for a dopamine rush from the social acceptance of one’s peers for having quick wit and charisma.
A nuanced view of the left itself, balancing end goals and methodology and seeing pitfalls along the way, sir you got me interested.
I thought that this video was overall very good, though at the end, the point about disrupting landowners who use their land to make a living seems like it needs to be talked about. From my perspective, thinking of the labour theory of value, owning land and making a profit off of it seems more akin to stealing value from labourers. While we do need to find ways to fulfil everyone's needs, letting people continue to profit off of their land seems to me like it would perpetuate an unequal system. However, I may have misunderstood something if anyone wants to enlighten me
Great job! This was sorly needed on this platform imo. I hope you'll consider responding to or at least incorporating responses to some of Destinys crtitiques of breadtubers/leftist in future videos. He has probably stood for the most significant backlash against them on this platform and his arguments have often hinged on mainstream/neoclassical garbage. Maybe a friendly chat with Vaush would be nice? Anyway I'll stick around for more critiques of leftist- and mainsream/liberal econ hot takes!
The issue with this argument is that, while thorough, it misses the key grasp which is that we *should not want* a housing market. Because even if a ideal housing market is, academically or hypothetically possible, it's not possible in reality. You will never get the housing market into this state where everyone has a near ideal home, because a house is fundamentally not something that *should* be a commodity, and more than that, the market is not incentivised to give everyone a good home, its incentivised to maximise profits, and those are not necessarily the same interest. Olly's comments were simplistic but not incorrect, provided you understand the housing market *as it is* and you understand why it is how it is, and vitally, you understand *the only place it can go*.
What are the criteria to be met before a housing market can be called something other than a market?
Ok, but what about wanting and working towards better houses, or multiple houses? I don't think any system should be put in place to actually restrict that, only to help those who have trouble even getting to own a house at all in the first place.
@@pedrobettt what about homeless people.
@@kevinwillems8720 What about them? They should be housed, that's obvious. Allowing people to still have the possibility of owning multiple houses or getting/building better ones doesn't conflict with that.
@@pedrobettt See, but it does
Love this video! Excited to see more from you, especially because economics is something i lack a lot of knowledge in. Keep up the good work, bro
19:37 Because over the years I've subscribed to many channels, so many, in fact, that my subscription page is really crowded, and it's not uncommon anymore to miss several videos because they got buried under the wave of content that all those channels produce every day. So that's what the bell is for. So we get notified of your videos in particular and don't miss them. Which is a separate feature because if I was notified of every channel, my inbox would just be a second subscription page... but in my inbox.