So they resort to a system that ends in intense misery? I think one huge issue is perspective and a lack of educating the youth on how horrible socialism has been for millions who’ve tried.

People are turning against a system they never actually experienced. The conditions Thiel describes aren’t the result of capitalism working too well. They’re the result of capitalism being slowly replaced by policy-driven scarcity. Student debt didn’t rise because markets ran wild. It rose because government guaranteed the loans. Housing didn’t become inaccessible because property rights failed. It became inaccessible because zoning boards, permitting regimes, and “planning authorities” restrict supply by design. Wages didn’t stagnate because capital exploited labor. They stagnated because taxes, inflation, and regulation drag wealth creation down while inflating the cost of living. So the resentment is real. The generational break is real. But the target is misplaced. People are losing faith not in capitalism, but in a system that wears capitalism’s language while operating as coordinated political control. Ownership was throttled, not by markets, but by policies that prevent individuals from accumulating and applying capital. If you remove those restraints, opportunity expands. If you double down with more control, you get collapse. The question is not whether people will rewrite the system. The question is whether they’ll recognize which system failed.

When Peter Thiel makes sense about Millennials, the system's in deep trouble. He's right: you can't bury a generation in debt, price them out of housing, and feign shock when they lose faith in capitalism. But it's not capitalism they're rejecting—it's crony capitalism. Rigged markets. Billionaire bailouts, crumbs for everyone else. Millennials aren't lazy or stupid—they're furious, and rightfully so. Promised a ladder, handed an anchor. Fix it: Unrig the system. End the Fed. Crush student debt. Make housing affordable by ditching government interference. Give people real ownership and opportunity, and they'll defend capitalism themselves—no sales pitch needed.

Interesting for sure, but there seems to be a disconnect between housing being affordable where young people prefer to live and where they can actually afford to live. In other words, they are free to move like so many others have done before them.

What are we going to do about student debt, that also benefits ppl who didn't go to university?

World's largest political party (by members): 1.🇮🇳 Bharatiya Janata Party - 180 million 2.🇨🇳 Chinese Communist Party - 98.04m 3.🇮🇳 Indian National Congress - 50m 4.🇺🇲 Democratic Party - 47.13m 5.🇺🇲 Republican Party - 36.01m 6.🇮🇳 AIADMK - 16m 7.🇹🇷 AK Parti (AKP) - 11.24m 8.🇪🇹 Prosperity Party - 11m 9.🇮🇳 Aam Aadmi Party - 10.05m 10.🇵🇰 Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf - 10m 11.🇹🇿 Chama Cha Mapinduzi - 8.4m 12.🇻🇪 United Socialist Party - 7.6m 13.🇰🇵 Worker's Party of Korea - 6.5m 14.🇮🇳 Telugu Desam Party - 6.5m 15.🇰🇭 Cambodian People's Party - 6m 16.🇻🇳 Communist Party of Vietnam - 5.3m 17.🇰🇷 Democratic Party of korea - 4.05m 18.🇦🇷 Justicialist Party - 3.81m 19.🇰🇷 People Power Party - 3.47m 20.🇲🇾 United Malays National Organisation - 3.39m 21.🇦🇴 People's Movement for the Liberation of Angola - 2.70m 22.🇧🇷 Brazilian Democratic Movement - 2.13m 23.🇷🇺 United Russia - 2.07m 24.🇦🇷 Radical Civic Union - 1.99m 25.🇵🇾 Colorado Party - 1.98m 26.🇧🇷 Worker's Party - 1.63m 27.🇲🇽 Institutional Revolutionary Party - 1.58m 28.🇵🇭 Partido Federal ng Pilipinas - 1.50m 29.🇹🇷 Republican People's Party - 1.36m 30.🇧🇷 Brazilian Social Democracy Party - 1.35m

Every person who claims to be a capitalist is a socialist when they need it. The 2008 financial crisis is the perfect example of course. Profits were privatized and losses socialized. It’s all done in the name of “stabilizing the economy and system”. But it’s all nonsense.

Went for a long one here as it is one of the topics that is in my head for 20 years already..😅 1/12: Long mindflow/read ahead. This is as a topic is as simple as it is complex, and Thiel painted very straight forward picture. Systems, we created are live changing systems, and capitalism in all its flaws has been a system to prove itself as most efficient on larger scale of parameters (social peace, prosperity, education and general development). But it comes in shrinking time lapses.

And then we had COVID. The rest, as they say, will be history. Young people see record profits announced over the last few weeks, followed by massive layoffs. So many young people have zero financial literacy. We must change that, because they will build companies that work for everyone, not just shareholders.

Funny how they act shocked that young people are “turning socialist” when the system was designed to drown them in debt, price them out of housing, and leave them with zero ownership in the country they’re told to “protect.” Gen Z didn’t betray capitalism — capitalism betrayed them. And that’s exactly why NYC just elected Mamdani… not another billionaire puppet like Trump.

So too much free money (student loans) leads to more socialist tendencies. It’s a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Predicting socialism? We've had socialism for the rich since 1971. Or are you still confused.

Goes back to ther Founding Fathers. Adams and Jefferson specifically connected the widespread availability of affordable or "cheap" land to American prosperity, social stability, and the success of its republican form of government. They believed that a democratic republic required a broad base of property ownership to ensure its existence. @InvestAmerica24 is one pathway. Need many more

“too much student debt and lack of affordable housing keeps young people with negative capital for too long.” This is absolute nonsense. There is PLENTY of affordable housing in the US. The problem with all of these young people is that they have grown up in a 5 bedroom 4 bath house and they have completely lost perspective. Ask yourself Chamath; are any of your kids going to live in a 2 bedroom one bath?

As a New Yorker, definitely did not vote for the Mamdani but the living situation in the city is absolutely absurd to be honest and Thiel is spot on! Much of the younger generation have completely turned against the system for these reasons... It's an unfortunate reality.

Let me talk about the solution on your pod. We are the only folks that have the cure and it’s surprisingly simple.

Thiel didn’t predict socialism, he predicted basic arithmetic. Debt up, assets out of reach, and people start voting emotionally instead of rationally. Every economy gets the ideology its balance sheets deserve.

Yeah, pretty simple, right? If you forbid the new generation from having the capital (homes, good job, growth potential), then they don't see themselves supporting it And they dont have much choice but switching to something else

Wrong. They were told college was the only way They were told everybody deserves a trophy They we're told they can be anything they want and be successful These are all lies. Years of being told that they're entitled to everything they want is the main reason for the demise

The problem was not caused by capitalism but the solution must come from it. Otherwise, the knee jerk reactions against entrenched status quo is easily exploited to empower socialism as they did repeatedly in history.

This would be a great topic for an All-In pod with Peter! I think this is correct, but goes further than just owning a home or student debt. It's the broader fiat system at large that is broken that incentivizes debt, while robbing everyone through monetary debasement. This makes all debts harder to pay off, while making everyday living increasingly more expensive.

This include the announced ask by OpenAI to socialize investments and potential losses?

I think for a portion of those believing they don’t have a stake in the capitalist system, it isn’t that they don’t have capital to feel that they do. It’s that compared to others, they don’t. Their disgust with capitalism is more about their insecurity, guilt, greed and jealousy. You see this across 2 types: 1. Call them the 2-9% that have it so good but live in a world where they consider themselves poor. 2. Privileged people that don’t earn their own capital, thus take it for granted, and despise those that worked for it and earned it.

Ok what did they do about it? A lot of masters of the universe opining about problems but taking no concrete actions to solve it. Being a donor does nothing. Any one speak to Larry Fink or try and effect the market forces by getting into it? No just building the businesses that make more cash… EVERYONE does more jaw boning than doing…

People are mad at capitalism for problems it didn’t even cause. The real villain is policy-driven scarcity sneaking in the back door. Student debt ballooned not because markets ran wild but because rules changed the game. Ever wonder why everyone blames the system they never actually lived in? Maybe it’s easier to hate a ghost than admit the rules were rigged all along.

This is directionally correct, but there is some nuance. There are neighborhoods that are within an hours radius of Midtown Manhattan. But for reasons unrelated to affordability, recent college graduates choose not to move there.

Capitalism has failed the general public. Full and the experiment is over. The secret is out and everyone knows that capitalism only rewards the stakeholders and there ever increasing greed for more profits at the expense of the very people that make the company profitable from suppressed wages and benefits.

Referring to game theory, once one actor takes all, the other actors and factors push reset. We are at an abyss, we are on the edge of decades of social turmoil, a century of humiliation. The disintegration discouraging steady accumulation as the currency cheapens, hope dims.

@moseskagan basically my thesis as well. When people feel like everything’s too expensive and that the world doesn’t work for them, they’ll blow up the system. Trump and Mamdani voters are a result of the same discontent.

The stake should be through the stock market, not through the government redistributing success. Make it easier / more desirable for companies going public sooner. Put social security contributions in S&P ETF. Every employee gets stock in the company they work for.

Kinda a no-brainer — hasn’t it been for a long time?