One of the brilliant reframings in @DrCameronMurray’s book on Australian housing, which I hope I’m…

One of the brilliant reframings in @DrCameronMurray’s book on Australian housing, which I hope I’m understanding correctly, is the mistaken idea that housing is in fact a market to begin with. /1 https://t.co/5kG98SiyWc

Because the stock of housing is regulated, it’s law that both defines ‘land’ and makes it available, property is in reality a monopoly good. Owners of property are better thought of as franchisees, of this monopoly. You have to buy into the monopoly to even begin ‘trading’. /2

If you’re selling cars, capsicums or carrots on the other hand, you can create fresh product and trade it in a market. Nobody can create fresh land though, except government. It’s a monopoly good. /3

And this doesn’t mean we should all rush out and become illegal settlers or occupiers of vacant land either, to fix things. It just means we need to stop thinking that property sales operate as a market that will drive prices down. /4

Nobody expects a new McDonalds franchise to drive down the prices of Big Macs. That’s not what franchises and franchisees do. /end