workers are on sale for rich people because rich  people have made a ton of money, the price of  

everything has gone up and wages have not kept up so wages are cheap, workers are cheap,

rich people are laughing right and ordinary people are struggling so that is why these guys  

are trying to hire more labour  because its super cheap for them

okay this one is strikes wages and the job  market in general what do we think about that  

so there's been a lot of interesting economic  discussion of the job market in the last couple  

of years since lockdown okay and a lot  of economists have been confused because  

wages have been falling significantly in real  terms and yet job vacancies are all-time lows  

so first let's cover this; are wages going  down or going up right because in real terms  

sorry in nominal terms, wages are increasing the  fastest they've ever been for ages they're going up  

about 4-5% a year but when we compare  it to inflation that's a real terms fall of like  

negative five percent so first things first what  matters is the real value of your wages, wages are  

collapsing sometimes that's misconstrued in the  media they say wages are rising wages are not  

wages are falling really really quickly, living standards are falling, why are economies confused okay  

so if wages are falling they think well the job  market must be weak because wages are going down  

but there are super *high* vacancy levels  right so they're saying well that is  

a sign that the job market is strong it's  easy to get a job because there's you know  

sorry super high vacancy level so  there's really high vacancy levels  

people are struggling to find workers right,  people wanna hire workers but the wages are low so  

is the job market strong or is the job market week? wages are falling - weak job market, companies are  

struggling to find workers - strong job market  and I think this can easily be understood if  

we understand that what happened during COVID was partially a massive devaluation of the currency  

so we've been speaking from the very beginning  of the channel about the fact that since the  

beginning of COVID an enormous amount of money  has been distributed by governments across the  

world, 700 billion pounds in the UK, 8 trillion  dollars in the US; massive amounts of cash  

this cash has been accumulated largely in the bank  accounts of richer people, if people have way way  

way more money, effectively that means that money  has been devalued so what that means is the value  

of money is less so if the price of everything  is to stay the same it needs to go up, so let's  

say the value of money goes down 20%, the price of  everything needs to increase by 25% to offset that

the problem is some prices are able to change much  more quickly than other prices so if Sainsbury's wants

to increase the price of its pasta, it's easy you  know it's not difficult to do you know what I mean  

if the price of wheat on global markets or oil  needs to change it happens at the blink of an eye  

some prices are easy to increase but your wage  is not easy to increase right you can't just be  

like oh well sorry currency's been devalued so  I'll give it myself a 20% wage increase right you  

can't do that, so what that means is, the prices  which companies can change automatically  

like basic goods and services, like the price of  basic essentials they all go up super quickly  

but your wage doesn't, this is what economists  call a 'sticky price' certain prices are hard  

to change, you can't change your own wage, so  that means that all of the prices of goods and  

essentials goes up but your wage stays the same,  what does that mean? your wage has been cut so  

the devaluation of currency has allowed for a  significant cut in the wages of everybody in  

the country at the same time we've given enormous  amounts of cash to the richest 10,15,20 percent  

but what does that mean? well companies have  the cost especially if you're selling to richer  

people your business is booming because  people are flush with cash (richer people)  

wages are super cheap right because they've  been cut 10% real terms you're going to try  

and hire more people simple and I think once you  understand that what's happened is a massive cut  

in wages well then it makes sense of course there  are a lot of vacancies of course there are a lot  

of jobs because labour's really cheap, labour is  super cheap, richer people are flush with cash  

& I tell you if you go to central London it's booming, it's booming because richer people who are the 

people who go to restaurants in central London often, have got loadsa cash and labour is really really cheap  

so what has happened in the last two  three years is that the increase in inequality  

caused by COVID policy and the decrease in the  value of currency caused by COVID policy have  

allowed a massive decrease in real wages which is  the main reason why living standards have fallen  

which is why we see what we see in the  job market so that raises the question of 

what do we think about the strikes?  what do we think about people's wages?

well of course it's totally unacceptable that living  standards for nurses for teachers are collapsing  

at the same time as we have seen the largest and  fastest ever increase in millionaire billion a  

month in the country it's totally unacceptable  and these people should get a pay increase  

but you have the problem of it's very difficult  to fix the symptoms, if you don't fix the cause  

700 billion pounds has been transferred  from the government to the richest people  

in the country, the government's financial  situation has deteriorated, it's as simple  

as that, the government's financial situation has  deteriorated and if the government is super poor 

how do they pay a decent public sector wage?  you see what I'm saying so of course 100 percent  

government workers, NHS workers, teachers should get  their pay increases they shouldn't be accepting  

what they are asking which is five-ten percent (real) decrease in wages, when the rich are making a ton  

of money, but the question which is never spoken  about has to be spoken about more of where the  

money comes from needs to be discussed because  if you don't tax the rich who've made a ton of money

then you're going to end up taxing ordinary working people are increasingly being squeezed  

so should the public sector workers get their pay increases? yes, who should pay for it?  

the group of people who've seen the biggest  and fastest ever increase in their wealth  

and their living standards in the history of  the country which is the rich & the super rich

Thank You

money currently is flowing from the  government to the rich, leaving the  

government with big piles of debt and  the rich with big piles of money there's  

there's 1 other thing they can do with that massive  amount of income, they can buy your mum's house!