Why Housing Is Becoming Neo-Feudal: The Collapse of Home Ownership
8th December 2025
This video essay examines the collapse of housing affordability across the developed world and the demographic, economic, and political consequences that follow. Drawing on Joel Kotkin’s analysis, it argues that restrictive planning regimes, urban-containment strategies, and elite-driven housing policies have undermined the pathway to ownership that once sustained the middle class. Over the last two decades, housing prices have risen far faster than household incomes, locking younger generations out of wealth accumulation and family formation.