you know I literally went into Oxford and said listen the economy is collapsing I know why 

I've made millions of pounds doing it  I was one of the best economists in  

best traders in the whole world, one of  the biggest banks in the whole world  

I don't want it to happen, can we stop it?  and they were completely not interested

okay I wanted to do a video called  the World of Economics which basically  

explains to you exactly what economics is, the  different spaces, the different people in the world  

of economics, how it takes shape, um I wanted  to understand, I wanted to explain it because  

basically this affects policy, affects government,  it affects the way the economy is managed,   

it massively affects your life, especially with regards to things like; the economic management or

mismanagement of Covid & 2008 (GFC) & yet I think  ordinary people generally don't have good awareness  

of how that world works why the different  people are in the different spaces and also  

who you see and who you don't see and what's  happening on your TV and what's happening  

behind the screen so today we're going to explain  the world of economics. I'm going to take you back  

to university because this is basically where the  World of Economics begins and where most economics  

professionals and most economic students start  their life right, so I studied at London School of 

Economics (LSE) and most powerful economists and  people who end up in powerful roles in government,  

in central banking, in media, in finance will go to one of these 'elite economics institutions'  

so in this country the UK we have quite a lot  of elite universities we've got the London  

School of Economics, we've got Oxford, we've  got Cambridge, we've got other universities  

like Warwick and Imperial and Durham and UCL a lot of prestigious universities which will produce  

professional economists who can go and  work in professional economic spaces  

um there are a lot of very powerful universities  in the US such as Harvard and Yale and Princeton  

and MIT and Chicago is quite influential in economics and there's there's one big one  

called Bacconi in Italy and another big one in  Paris and the point I want to get through to you 

here is most powerful economists come through  a pretty small number of elite universities  

they tend to come from richer families  because economics itself is the least  

economically diverse subject of any in a major  university which means that economic students  

tend to come from richer families, there's  very few that tend to come from poor families  

now say you get into one of these top universities,  when you're actually in the university I think  

it's interesting I think most people  will be interested to understand that  

the vast majority of what you do on an  economics degree is basically memorising  

and regurgitating Algebra, I think people would be  really surprised to know that we don't talk about  

why housing has become unaffordable or why  increasingly it's difficult to get well-paid jobs  

or difficult to securely have a family, these are  things which in elite universities you know and 

I studied 3 years at London School of Economics  & more recently did a 2 year Masters at Oxford,  

at elite universities we don't discuss things like  the cost of living crisis or house price crisis  

or increased poverty; these things are, if you're  lucky you might be able to take them in the sort  

of optional module which nobody who's serious  about becoming an economist would take, what we  

generally do is algebra, algebra, algebra, lots and  lots of algebra and um economists tend to be very  

good at algebra because that's what they've done  they memorize a lot of algebra for complicated  

models and they repeat the algebra in the exam  that's basically the training of an economies  

the next important step in the World of  Economics is what happens when you finish  

your undergrad degree, now at this  point the World of Economics which  

up until your 21-22, has lived in the  universities, it starts to split in essence,  

a huge number of economics graduates from these  top universities go into Finance and these guys  

who go into Finance you will never hear them, you  never see them, they're not going to be on your TV,  

very few of them will never work for  government, for civil service, for the media  

these guys can make a lot of money they can make a  million pounds a year, two million pounds a year if  

they're very successful they can make £10 million  a year these guys can make a lot of money but  

you will never hear them, these guys they disappear from the public world once they go into Finance

other people go into public facing jobs and  these are the economists that you see so  

these are the economists that might write  for the guardian or might work in media or  

might work for the central bank and become  chief economist of the central bank or  

head of central bank monetary policy committee or  they might end up going into academia and becoming  

prestigious academic economists, basically at this  point, normally the end of the undergrad sometimes  

the end of the post grad, there's a split in  economists between those that basically go  

out into finance to try to make money and those  that stay in some public facing role; academia,  

think tanks is another place that people can go but there's a split at this point; those who go in  

to the money world & those who go into the public  facing world and it's important to understand

there's an enormous difference  in expected financial outcomes  

in this world right so if you stay, if you  want to become a public-facing economist  

you are probably gonna have to do a master's degree, you might well have to do a PhD, so you're going to be 

staying at University for at least another  four years it could be five six seven years  

um and you will be probably paying to study  if you're lucky you might get a scholarship  

which means that you you know basically  enough to sort of live off but you're  

probably going to have five six seven years  of of of poverty at least in terms of your  

income from your work or you might even be paying  to work whereas if you go into finance you know I  

was literally a multi-millionaire at 25. so  there's a massive massive difference in the  

expected financial outcomes of depending on which  direction that you go in um and for this reason

for most people going into finance is a much more  attractive option because it's just unbelievably  

better paid than going into public facing  economics, which sort of raises a question  

of who goes into public facing economics?  um and I think you either have to be rich  

or a bit crazy really because you know I come  from a poor background right and um I made a lot  

of money in the city and that is the money which  I used to fund this Channel and that is the money  

which I used to buy the place that I live in and  then my brother needed to buy a place I helped him  

buy a place and now my sister needs to buy a place  I'm helping her buy a place so basically this is  

the money which provides complete financial  security for me, my family, my kids if I ever  

have kids um and if I had gone into Academia, I  wouldn't have a property, my brother wouldn't have  

a property, my sister wouldn't have a property and  probably I would never be able to comfortably have  

a family so that it's a massive massive financial  sacrifice you make to go into public facing  

economics and whilst there are some people who  believe in it so much they will do that the vast  

majority of people who are able to do that are  people who are from richer backgrounds because  

they can afford to take that financial hit, their  parents can support them throughout their studies  

um it's important to realise even after you  graduate in that public sector space you're  

probably not going to make a lot of money for  the first few years of your career working  

as an economist in the media, in academia, in in the  world of think tanks, the world of government, civil  

service, so that's the first thing to understand is  that we there's basically 2 worlds of economics  

a world that is very well paid which you never  see and a world which is pretty badly paid but  

you do see and these guys are the guys whose job  is to protect you basically the guys who and you  

kind of need to ask yourself okay well what  kind of people are you probably gonna get and  

of course you know there are good people who  go into academia, who can go into think tanks,  

go into civil service, go into government and  I know a lot of them so it's still possible that  

we get good people in this in this world of  of public facing economics but then I think

then we need to start talking about the  second question which is the differences  

in incentivization and motivation structures for  the people in the two different worlds right so  

the best paid 10,000 economists in the world  are probably all traders, that's the first thing  

that you probably should know right I think that's  quite interesting right because you probably don't  

know personally any traders you know there are  a couple who have a public profile like it's me  

and there's like a couple others I don't remember  their names but um the vast majority of traders  

you'll never hear from, so the economists that you see for example is it Evan Davis the guy on BBC

you know Andy Verity I'm not sure but whatever the guys you know Larry Elliott at the guardian or  

Huw Pill chief economists of the Bank of England or um Andrew Bailey head of the Bank of England 

or Janet Yelen who used to be head of the Fed,  all of these people, these economists have all  

are basically do not have, are not the best paid  economists, so what I think it's quite interesting is  

a little bit like when we watch the news, when  we interact with the public facing economics  

we think we're looking at the best economists  but it's a little bit like we're watching like  

division 3 football (I love division 3 football because Leyton Orient just won the league) but  

and we think we're watching the Premier League  but in reality the Premier League is happening  

in some skyscraper that you never see so  I think the first thing is to realise that  

all of the best paid economists are not in the  public's sphere right and those guys, the traders  

they are very very, well I think maybe that's  changed a little bit since I was there but  

in general when they're very well incentivised  to make predictions that are right, it's a very  

it's not an immoral world, it's more of an amoral world right, your job is just to be right  

just be right, just be right, you know so when i was there, are things gonna be good or are things

gonna be bad? 'I think things are gonna be bad' oh you're right, here's your money & it's also very 

there's a very transparent analysis structure, so people  can see who's the best economist at Citibank so  

when I was a Citibanks top economist, you know  there was a spreadsheet that went out to all the  

traders on the floor and they could see oh this year, Gary's the best Citibank trader or 

economist, in terms of his predictions were the  best predictions right so very a-moral and not  

immoral but just, very objective very transparent  in incentive structure, for those traders, try and  

be right, try and be right, try and be right,  everybody can see who's right & who's wrong  

now let's consider the traders in the public sphere, the sorry the economists in the public sphere  

see i'm always reminded of this one professor i had at Oxford who wrote a paper and then he lectured

us on the paper saying that if the Eurozone  had not done quantitative easing then their  

GDP would have been something like 3.7% lower he  made a really specific prediction about how much  

lower GDP would be if they hadn't done that and that was interesting for me because  

it's very rare that economists make very clear  specific predictions (economists in academia)  

so what because in my experience economists in  academia very rarely just try and think about  

try and like really specifically be right about  something so I put my hand up because I was  

interested and I said to him "do you think that's  right?" and he said to me "what do you mean?"  

and i was like, you know, would you, you know "did you write this paper?" he was like "yes" and  

I was like "you know do you think that's right?" &  he said to me "I don't, I don't know what you mean!"  

I said "do you think its right, that if the ECB didn't do QE, then Eurozone GP would be 3.7% lower?" and  

he just said "I just I don't know what you mean!" and  i thought that was so interesting but super telling  

about what most (there are of course some good  people in academia) what most academic economists  

are doing in their career which is, what they get  rewarded for, what they get paid for, what they get  

promoted for; is writing very mathematically  flamboyant mathematically elegant papers  

they don't have time to think about what actually would have happened, what's going to happen,  

what's really happening because that's not what they get paid to do, that's not what they get incentivised  

to do, that's not what they get rewarded to do and  if you were to actually do that as an economist  

it would seriously jeopardize your career because  it's being an academic economist is not easy it's  

not easy and I think I want to link this back to  what it's like being an economic student which is  

economic students I've mentioned they spend all  their time doing algebra and you might be thinking  

well why don't the economic students argue against  that? why don't they criticise? well but the fact is  

being an economic student at an elite  University is ****ing hard, like they have  

a lot of algebra to memorise, seriously  a lot and when you go to these exams  

if you haven't memorised the algebra, you're going to fail the exam right so these  

guys are busy and they're working damn hard  to memorise the algebra they don't really  

have time to question what's happening if they  want to get a good degree and to get a good job  

and it's the same for the professors being  an economics professor is not easy, you have  

to write really complicated papers and if you  don't write those papers you're not going to  

get promoted, we've already discussed that it's  not a very lucrative job it's very competitive  

it's a struggle to make ends meet unless you're  from a rich background right so these professors  

they are not paid to try and understand stuff and  I think that the traders who are paid to be right  

it's very difficult to be right about the real  world without some understanding but to write  

a very elegant mathematical paper that is you  don't really need to know anything about the  

real economy so these academics primarily  are just trying to write fancy papers  

now that brings us to the next world of  public economics which is the media now  

I've been floating around the economics media  now for a couple of years and um I'm not going to  

name any names but it is one of the most comedic  spaces I have existed in my entire life and I can  

guarantee you with absolute certainty that the  vast majority of people in the economics media  

have never even asked themselves the question  of "should I try and be right?" their job is to  

write professional looking articles and to  produce professional looking media content  

especially if you're considering the news and  the radio these guys run 24 7 content right and  

they need people to come on, and they don't  know who the best people are, they're calling  

around, they call me up "hey can you come and talk about this" and I'll be like  

"I don't really know about that" & they'll be like "yeah it'll be fine" you know these guys 

they just want to produce professional looking media content, and I don't think there is

any more comedic space within economics and  economics media and that is again because  

nobody, if you write an article, you know I've  mentioned it many times, I predicted at the  

beginning of Covid we would have a cost of living crisis at the end of Covid  

nobody goes back and checks right you know if somebody's written that in the guardian you  

know, well I did write in the guardian, nobody  goes oh let's get that guy back who was right  

3 years ago right, you know nobody goes back,  media is the classic example of economics where  

nobody checks their homework but what you  are judged on is a looking professional and 

sounding professional, and economists  in general, will act according to their  

incentives, so economics and academia are trying  to write fancy papers, economics in the media are  

trying to present professional looking content  but none of them really care about being right  

economics in the central bank well I mean in the  central bank I think they they are slightly more  

tied to reality but as you can see the central  bank has done a phenomenally poor job of managing  

inflation in the last few years and they've done a  phenomenally poor job of managing the economy  

in the last 20 years, you know does anybody get fired? does anybody get fined? you know and  

I would like to talk to more people in Central  Banking because I think here is a space where  

people could be more open-minded but I think  the problem you have is the vast majority of  

senior economists at central banks are basically  academics and they've been steeped in this world  

of just learn and repeat, just memorise and I  think again you have a problem of basically  

there is not seriously any reward for  being right and I think the end result is  

in the whole of, oh of course we should mention the  last World of Economics which is government and  

um you know I'm not going to mention any names but I talk to politicians and I tell them 

"if you don't fix inequality, the economy will  collapse and living standards will collapse" 

and they turn around and they say to me  "yeah but we don't think it's a vote winner"  

& that tells you the incentivisations of government right these guys need to win elections and  

and most of what they spend their time doing is thinking "how do we win elections?" so i think  

what you have in the World of Economics is quite  interesting right you have one group of people  

who you will never see who get paid a ton of money  specifically to be right and people who are right  

get aggressively promoted and aggressively  rewarded and people are wrong get fired and  

they are in no way given any responsibility to  manage your economy and then in the world of  

public economics you have a load of people who  are doing like weird different kinds of dances  

essentially you have academics, who are trying to  write fancy papers, media people who are trying to  

produce professional looking media, government  people who are trying to win elections and you  

know people who think tanks who are generally  just trying to push whatever political view  

they want, but nobody is rewarded for being right  so nobody is trying to be right, I think the end  

result is what you've what you have is really the  kind of the complete intellectual death of public  

economics as a result of these two things which is  number one aggressively sucking or aggressively  

incentivising through money all of the best people  to not work in the public sector and then creating  

incentive structure in the public sector such  that you are heavily incentivised not to actually  

try to be right and that brings us to the next  thing which is how can we fix this okay so  

in a sense what you have with this division is  a natural manifestation of wealth inequality  

in society which is the very rich can pay people like me a lot of money to work for them  

whereas governments are increasingly bankrupt  media doesn't really care about how good you are  

and only cares about what you look like so  this public sphere is never going to pay enough  

to compete with finance but there are still  people within economics who care enough about  

preventing the collapse of our society that they  would work for government in the public sector  

even for no money you know I would be willing  to support government in preventing economic  

collapse even for free I do this YouTube channel  for free because I don't want society to collapse  

but because we have no structures of identifying  and rewarding good people in public economics it  

becomes impossible for people like me to actually  get senior jobs in public economics and I think  

it's so interesting that I could go and walk in  the skyscraper and get paid two million pounds  

a year to bet on the collapse of our society but  if I went to try to speak to you know I literally  

went into Oxford and said listen the economy  is collapsing I know why I've been millions of  

pounds doing it I was one of the best economists  in best traders in the whole world one of the  

biggest banks in the whole world I don't want it  to happen can we stop it and they were completely  

not interested and you know I've been out here you  know I know people in government must have seen  

these videos saying let's stop the... but they're  not interested, I think what we need to do is we  

need to start checking the homework of economists  in the public sector we need to start saying okay  

make predictions and let's find out who is able  to correctly predict what is happening because  

economics is not a physical science we can't do  experiments so it becomes very difficult to know  

with certainty who was right and who was wrong  because we can't go back so for example I said  

at the beginning of Covid we are going to see a  massive cost of living crisis at the end of Covid  

and that happened but now people turn around and  say oh but you just got lucky because it happened  

it was because of the war in Ukraine and that's  the reason why it happened then you actually got  

lucky right um and you know my history is you know  I've been lucky for a ****ing long time right you  

know I've retired at age 26 because I have a very  long track record of making correct predictions  

right but in the public sector and in finance that  is enough to you know put Gary in the front line let  

him manage the money let him make the decisions  because he has a track record of being right but  

in the public sector there is no way essentially  for somebody like me who has a long track record  

of being right to criticize or challenge the  people in power even if they have a long track  

record of being wrong and if that's what you  create as your system of managing the economy  

is inevitable that your economy  will collapse basically because  

you will end up with with idiots running  the economy and there will be no way for  

even well-meaning people who are willing to do  it for free and who understand to challenge them  

so I think we need to start forcing  public sector economies to make  

predictions of the future, I think that if we do  this this will happen, if we do that that will  

happen, so that we can start taking the microphone  away from these posh boys who are always wrong  

and giving a bit of power to people who actually  understand what's happening because otherwise  

of course they're all going to go work in the  skyscrapers for two million pounds a year why  

are you going to work for government if they're  not even going to listen to you if you're right so  

that is to conclude the world of Economics it  is honestly it's an absolutely comedic situation  

it's an absolutely comedic situation with all of  the best guys locked away in the skyscraper and  

you know I've worked I've been at two of the top  universities in the world for economics I've been  

on the trading floor I've worked in the media I've  been in think tanks the quantity of discussion  

on the trading floor is I don't want to give the  impressionable Traders as Union since they're not  

but the quality of discussion trading for is so  much better because people are trying to be right  

and at the moment all of the people who are taking  your tax money to run the economy are not trying  

to be right & um that is why they keep getting it wrong so we need to fix it we need to

hold economists to account we need to have  actually intelligent people running the economy  

and i know we don't so um let's change  it share this video around let people  

know the system is broken but it can be  fixed if we just put good people in charge  

let's change it thank you! *a couple of questions if you dont mind*

*um so you used to mention about checking their  homework, yeah is it really like no one who's work* 

*you check and they at least get a a little bit  right or* I think there's a silver there's a super  

when I challenge economists about you guys have  are always wrong consistently consistently wrong  

what they say to me is oh but it's impossible to  be right it's and it's how funny is that some posh  

boy who's basically barely left his mother's womb  right just been like silver spoon fed through his  

whole career being wrong his whole career talking  to me right ****ing expelled from school ****ing

multi-millionaire at 25 because he keeps being  right predicting the economic economic crisis and  

he just turns around and says the reason we're  always wrong is because it's impossible to be right  

and there's there's this kind of there's this  self-protecting like nihilism that has like  

dripped into their consciousness which is yeah we  know we're always wrong but we're still the best  

and you know it's a little bit like you go  to watch your local pub team and they're all  

like yeah we lose every game but we're the  best because it's impossible to win games  

you know it's impossible and every day the  traders are getting like way right yeah but it's  

you know that's what that was what will happen if  you you know if you bankrupt your public sphere  

and you pay all of the best people to work for the  rich you know you know imagine imagine building  

a football team with no funding and expecting to  beat ****ing man city and then when you continually  

lose say it's impossible to be good at football  thats what all these economies say and its such  

a comedy, it's a comical farce what is happening  in the world of Economics, um but you see the  

consequences it's ****ing horrible you know what  I mean and it's it's yeah it's it's truly amazing  

I think what we're witnessing is so amazing  so amazing and it's uh this like complicated  

it's like a complicated mixture  of corruption greed and idiocy