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.

"Apples are bought and sold quite regularly, there are readily available substitutes like oranges and bananas" Did you just compare apples and oranges

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.

As a georgist... the attention is very much appreciated. All 20 of us are happy to just be mentioned.

“Land is permanent.” Coastal Florida looking at rising sea levels: 👀😐

This is how the left can critique its self constructively! Well done!

Lol I created that /r/breadtube thread. Glad you took up the mantle!

The virgin Response Video versus the Chad Constructive Criticism.

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.

Being critical but keeping the point. I like this. Keep up the good work.

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'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.

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 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!

"we all have blind spots and I'm hoping I can add to our understanding" Earned a like just for that

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.

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.

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 KZfaq career so kudos my friends, subbed

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)

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!

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.

If apples had good market feedback red delicious apples wouldn't exist

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’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

It seems like Olly’s point about the housing market is valid so long as the caveat *as it exists* is added to it.

"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.

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 :)

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!!

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.

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.

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.

So glad I’ve discovered you! I’ve been wanting to learn more about economics but didn’t know where to start

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.

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.

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.

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

Thought this was going to be a gotcha video, turned out to be super interesting, thanks for providing so many references, great work man!

Was expecting right wing trash, very pleasantly surprised by the content of this video. Thanks for introducing me to alternative solutions. Subscribed.

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

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.

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.

Thank you for including the books and further reading, you've become the best source for surveying and understanding alternative economic models

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

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

one nitpick, land isn't permanent. there will be quite a shift in land use in coastal areas due to rising sea levels.

Teach the landlords how to code after we take their property

This is honestly really nice to have. I’ve been interested in learning more about economics but didn’t know where to start.

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).

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!

Thank you so much for this, as an architect and on the left I always thought ollies video was rather badly thought out , it's always good to get things sistematicly explained

I'm really pleased to find this video! Great content! I would be great if you could explore your proposals in separate videos

"I see no indication that Olly has changed his thinking" Boy did this age well

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.

16:07 maybe landlords should get a job instead of leeching my money, if its so unprofitable

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.

Homeless person: if I only gotten a better realtor

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.

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.

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.

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.

Oh God you're the one KZfaqr I never thought I needed. Thanks so much for starting this channel.

Wasn't sure what to expect when i saw this in my recommended but this was informative and well paced. just subbed & excited to see your future vids!

Fantastic stuff! Thanks for putting this together.

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 best economic-related breadtube channel these days is Folding Ideas. His recent NFTs, Decentraland, Gamestop trilogy are incredible and so well researched.

AMAZING CONTENT. We definitely need this on the left!

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

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!

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".

Loved the closing jab at YTs format for notifications.

This is excellent analysis. Look forward to seeing more of your work!

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

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

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!

I love the explanation in this video. The philosophy tube video got me to think differently about the housing market but left me with questions that you answer really well.

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.

"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.

Love your videos! I'm planning on finishing my degree in economics (after many years off galavanting 🙃) and you're already covering many of the topics that have drawn me to this path. Do you have any books that you'd recommend for alternative perspectives on economic theory and policy? I've already got a list complied, and pulled some from your resources, but would love any additional reccs. Keep up the good work 😁

honestly I would've wanted a longer video on this. Good job!

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.

This is a pretty good video, damn. You need more subs.

I NEEDED THIS!!! I think we all needed this. I love the ideas that Breadtube has, but always wondered if they were actually realistic or possible, but since I'm also not an economist I can never tell. I think a collaboration like this is essential. Even video collabs would be awesome. Ever think of doing one? Thank you!

A nuanced view of the left itself, balancing end goals and methodology and seeing pitfalls along the way, sir you got me interested.

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.

Question: I have lived in a uk countryside village and over time, more and more fields get turned into agriculture or housing. It worries me a lot in terms of biodiversity and habitat fragmentation, though I also understand the need for new housing. If a land tax would make owners of undeveloped land more likely to build, is there a way to save valuable habitat?

This was excellent, thanks for explaining land banks, community land trusts, and mutualism so succinctly.

Great video man! Stumbled upon your video right after I stumbled into Philosophy Tube about 3 days ago. I myself study Economics formally, but most of the videos I watch are definitely more sociological and philosophical. So I really appreciate your additional perspective for the economic/policy dimension and will be giving your channel a further look!

Your source on the idea that landlords use their extra properties just to make a living is Bloomberg BLOOMBERG

Socdem here (I KNOW), but new subscriber. Cool stuff

Honestly, that was great! I really, REALLY liked the ending bit about how to address issues in the housing market that are cohesive with the structure of the current economic system, but that would also ideally start to propel the goalposts in the direction of less bloodthirsty societies. I feel like most of """breadtube""" is basically just punditry at this point, and it's refreshing to get some analysis backed by real expertise. Thanks!

Really nice and easy-to-understand approach you got there mate. Subscribed!

"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.

Currently, in many places where the housing crisis is most acute, planning restrictions prevent or greatly increase the cost of building social housing.

This is definitely a sketchier part of my own knowledge, so great to hear you'll be tackling this!

I’m glad you’re filling this niche! I hope we can get more diverse views in lefttube, in all senses of the word.

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

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.

i have subscribed to your newsletter and look forward to hearing more

I love the space you give for ppl to make up their own minds on issues, esp by not making petty comments on others, it's a refreshing approach