When Do Markets Break?

What happens when markets stop working?

That is the question at the core of this video, and it matters because we are entering a period in which shortages of essential goods may become impossible to ignore. Oil supplies are already being disrupted. Gas, fertilisers, industrial chemicals and food supply chains are under pressure. And when essentials become scarce, markets ration by price, not by need.

That means those with the least money lose first.

In this video, I argue that neoliberal economics has no answer to a world of absolute shortages. Markets work in conditions of stability, adequate supply and clear price signals. But when fear, disruption and scarcity dominate, those conditions disappear.

So what happens then?

I explain why governments may be forced to intervene through rationing, price controls and deliberate allocation of resources, just as they did during and after the Second World War. I also explore how systems for rationing fuel, energy, and food could actually work in a modern economy.

This is not an argument against markets in normal times. It is an argument about what happens when markets fail.

And I think that moment may be much closer than most politicians are willing to admit.