Private equity funds and other Wall Street investors are buying up homes across the US and the West, driving up rent and the cost of living. Economist Michael Hudson explains how these corporate landlords are a result of the system of financialized capitalism, dominated by an unproductive rentier class. He is interviewed by host Ben Norton.

VIDEO: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qJd0d7Uda2M

Transcript: https://www.geopoliticaleconomy.report/p/corporate-landlords-rent-michael-hudson

Part 1 of this interview: https://www.geopoliticaleconomy.report/p/world-us-financial-colonialism-economist-michael-hudson

Read Michael's article "How the Global Majority can free itself from US financial colonialism": https://geopoliticaleconomy.com/2025/07/17/michael-hudson-global-majority-us-financial-colonialism/

Michael's website: https://michael-hudson.com/

Topics

0:00 Cost of living crisis in West

0:30 Blackstone: largest US landlord

1:07 Blackstone CEO is Trump donor

1:49 Investors buy up US homes

2:36 Wall Street buys single-family homes

3:54 Wall Street buys up neighborhoods

5:31 Homelessness rises in USA

6:06 Blackstone buys up homes in Spain

7:34 Introduction to Michael Hudson

9:12 Highlights

10:43 Interview starts

11:58 Feudalism, capitalism, & rentier class

16:58 Adam Smith, David Ricardo, & Karl Marx

19:10 Difference between value, price, & rent

21:33 Bankers, industrialists, & landlords

27:34 Theory of comparative advantage

28:20 Problems with economics education

30:57 Profits vs rent

32:48 Financialization and GDP

37:21 Adam Smith in Beijing

38:47 Peter Thiel defends monopolies

40:20 China's reform and opening up

43:06 China's public ownership of finance

44:25 Need to tax land rent

50:45 China's industrialization

53:54 Passive income (ie, rent seeking)

56:01 Mainstream "junk economics"

59:07 Outro