Comments by "Wandering Existence" (@WanderingExistence) on "If Nobody Can Afford A Home... Who's Going To Buy Them?" video.

Even wage labor is renting yourself via "self ownership". Employment is literally renting another human being as if they're property. The employer-employee relationship is a very insidious dynamic. Employment is a rental contract, like if you rented capital (say, a chainsaw from Home Depot), you pay rent for the "time preference" (basically the cost of time) for a piece of property. Capitalism is based on a principle of self ownership, which sounds empowering, until you realize that most people don't own enough capital goods to make enough income other than themselves, and must rent out the authority over themselves as pieces of "human capital". This is a process of dehumanization where human beings are valued for their return on investment as capital goods. This is why, at the very least, capitalism needs unions and safety nets (or abolishment), or else the system won't value people for their human value. Importantly we must also think about our sick, elderly, and disabled people, as they can't provide competitive economic return for the investor class to value. We must figure out a way to change this economic system if we wish to value each other.
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Land is a monopoly price because it has an inelastic supply, basically you can't just make more space. In fact a lot of the price of land is dependent on the surrounding amenities, like closeness to downtown, schools, parks and scenic areas. Increased rental prices go to landlords who didn't even make the amenities that increased the value. "The rent of land, therefore, considered as the price paid for the use of the land, is naturally a monopoly price. It is not at all proportioned to what the landlord may have laid out upon the improvement of the land, or to what he can afford to take; but to what the farmer can afford to give." — Adam Smith, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, Book I, Chapter XI "Of the Rent of Land"
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Maybe we need to reevaluate the structure of the corporation. Maybe cooperation needs to be explored, like worker and consumer co-ops, community land trusts, and credit unions.
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@TheMysteryDriver I mean, they could, but it's not necessary for the extraction of economic rents. Besides, petitioning (lol, you mean plutocratic lobbying??? 😅) the government to use tax dollars to say, build a stadium, meaning landlords would be again socializing costs to privatized gains. Not to mention other landlords that didn't lobby the government would also be able to capture increased rents due to the creation of amenities that they had no part in.
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@me-myself-i787 Move somewhere else?🤦🏼 Yeah, that's why ritzy ski resort areas, like Vail and JHole, have a hard time finding staff to serve the billionaire class because billionaires have pushed everyone out. This type of inequality breaks down the economy and it breaks down society. You keep justifying the system that is literally a plutocracy, as evidenced in the 2014 Princeton study 'Testing Theories Of American Politics' by Page and Gilens.
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 @موسى_7 Thanks 😝
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@TheMysteryDriver So you're just ignoring the extortive rent seeking behavior? You're valuing landlord profits over people. People need some financial breathing room but increasing rents at such high rates sucks all of that air out.
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@me-myself-i787 🤦🏼 why do you think all amenities are all publicly funded? Being close to downtown where there are private businesses and restaurants is not publicly funded. Spillover value happens the other way too; places that usually have a lot of renters don't necessarily care about the place as much and decrease property values by not taking care of the outside of the property. The point is that the value of one plot is dependent on the value of surrounding plots.... It's called 'externalities' or spillover value and it's why private landowners aren't fully responsible for the value of their property, which lends to rent seeking (extracting profit for little to no added value).
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@elbarto4069 Why is that the false dichotomy? Personally, I've been interested in two grassroots groups focused on economic democracy, called the Next System Project and the Democracy Collaborative. They have devised a way to keep production local and contract service to cooperatives, called the Preston Model. They have helped multiple cities struggling with job loss due to factory closures build back their communities, in the US and UK. In addition, trade unions, collectives, public banks, credit unions, community land trusts, CSA's, and many other democratically controlled institutions can work together to create democratic networks outside the market to create an economy that doesn't reduce people, their governments, and the environment to a monetary value. I think this can be a viable strategy to give people the autonomy over their work. I believe economic democracy is the only way people who work for the economy will have the economy work for them, their families, and the planet too. This way of revitalizing communities by building community wealth has helped many communities all over the globe, and it is utilized by the UK labor party and touted by Jeremy Corbyn. Preston, Lancashire became the most improved city in the UK because of community wealth building. https://youtu.be/MObfh_VNqs4 Not to mention, much of the progress in labor rights has been due to union's collective power. The thing that draws my conviction to the movement is that I can see it now, helping empower people to live happier, healthier, and wealthier lives.
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 @valdencorr2861 I would love to hear your definition of capitalism.
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@valdencorr2861 When has capitalism ever been "free market", lmao? Governments literally helped shape private property and money. It was the US government that distributed 160 acres of private property to pioneers from native Americans after violently removing them from their lands. It was Henry the 8th that used the Protestant Reformation to redistribute land titles with the ramping up English Land Enclosure Acts. Even in ancient times, government violence fostered the need for money for payments of soldiers, rather than credit, as explored in Debt: the First 5000 Years by David Graeber. Capitalism uses markets but the degree to which they are completely "free" with perfect competition is variable- that doesn't mean it's "not true capitalism". In fact, capitalists love less competition. Here's a quote from the famous Wall St investor Peter Lynch "In business, competition is never as healthy as total domination.” If you think capitalism is only found in 'perfect competition' (yes, that is the econ definition of "free markets") then sorry to spoil your childlike ideology, but the history of private property and money disagrees with your "no true capitalism" fallacy.
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@HH-le1vi Even co-ops have profits/ surplus, it's just shared; "In the 11 years since then, Evergreen Cooperatives has added three more cooperatives to its ranks, growing from two companies with a total of 18 workers in 2010 to five companies with approximately 320 workers. Those workers are paid 20 to 25 percent higher than employees at the cooperative’s competitors. “Our average pay rate is close to $15,” says John McMicken, CEO of Evergreen Cooperative Initiative. “But when you take profit sharing into account, which could equate to $4 to $5 an hour, we’re hoping that we have a shot at breaking the $20 an hour ‘blended rate,’ if you will.” In 2019, the average compensation at Evergreen Cooperative Laundry was around $18 per hour." - Despite a Rocky Start, Cleveland Model for Worker Co-ops Stands Test of Time, by Brandon Duong
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@johkupohkuxd1697 Capital bias, you live in a system that provides tools and incentives to produce one and not the other. It literally starts at business school where they don't teach about cooperative economics- generally labor is seen as the cost that needs to be reduced so that shareholders can increase their profits. Co-ops oftentimes have a harder time getting loans because many banks don't understand the socialized aspect of coops and they want an individual to sign onto the loan. Co-ops to fund co-ops are one solution, like Valley Alliance Of Worker Cooperatives, but again these are rare in this economy because of the institutional bias towards capital profits. RFKjr has a great speech about how we value our economy based on GDP, a number that even includes the price of Napalm and Nukes and armored cars to fight our city riots due to inequality and racism. Capitalism says anything that makes money is good, even if it's based on inhumane social arrangements. Here's a bit more on Capital Bias, the RFKjr clip is @8:45 https://youtu.be/TF6J_HfH0Go?si=tCihArO9Lgbuomad It's kinda like asking "why aren't there more private businesses in feudalism" ... Well because feudalism was based on a different system of incentives and it took the abolishment of feudalism for capitalism to fully emerge. That's why abolishing private property for social ownership is necessary to change the inherent unhealthy values capitalism uses.
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@evilds3261 I mean, that's why unions are important, because they increase bargaining power so you can get the most. The UAWs are scheduled to strike tonight at midnight across the 3 major manufacturers.
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@rubyherring That's literally what property rent is.
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@MrD_2112 Lol, it's always the one that say "learn some basic econ" that don't understand econ. Do you realize this is literally based on liberal philosophy and neoliberal economics? People deserve self-determination. Alienation is not freedom.
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No, just no. Look at the massive waste of ghost cities in China... then they demolish the buildings. It's an ecologically travesty to waste all those resources and it's prone to corruption. We currently have more peopleless homes than homeless people. We allow real estate to be used as an investment rather than a means of living. Let's not just make more investment properties like China has done.
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