Barry's Economics

The Science Used to Control Your Behaviour....Last week I posted a video abotu Diary of a CEO that got 250,000 views in two days. Last Month I posted a video that now has HALF A MILLION VIEWSAnd the first thing my brain did was whisper: do it again. This video is about the business model of every major social media platform on earth and what that does to viewers (your scroll is not random), what i...

Diary Of A CEO podcast has 50 million listeners. Any of these Success podcasts - the Steven Bartlett or Chris Williamson types all promise you the secrets, strategies and frameworks of the world's most successful people. How to be Successful. Here's the problem: The science says it can't deliver on that promise. And not only that - if you look closely you can see that the business mode...

Everyone is arguing about whether the war on Iran was justified. That might not be the most important question. The deeper question is what happens when powerful actors publicly demonstrate that the rules of the international system don’t apply to them. Rules can feel frustrating. They slow decisions down and constrain power. But they also play a critical role in stabilising cooperation between so...

The people who built social media often don't let their own children use it. These aren't worried parents who don't understand the technology. They're the engineers and executives who built the platforms and saw the internal data. And many of them made the same decision. Not my kids. So why isn't that the end of the argument? This episode looks at why that fact keeps getting ig...

Why does the system feel too big to fight? In this final episode of the Epstein Economy series, Barry explores the neuroscience of learned helplessness. Featuring research from: – Maier & Seligman – Damon Centola – Christakis & Fowler Large systems don’t just concentrate wealth. They concentrate perceived power. But your brain may be underestimating how much influence coordinated action ac...

This video is about the gap between - what you feel about Epstein and what you feel about other, bigger news stories - and why it's not a moral failure. It's neuroscience. Featuring research from Paul Slovic (psychic numbing),Robin Dunbar (the Social Brain Hypothesis), Siddharth Kara (cobalt mining), and Shoshana Zuboff. This is the third video in the series. The first two:1 - Your Brain W...

Why are we so addicted to hunting monsters - and what does that addiction protect? In this video, I explore the neuroscience and psychology behind our obsession with the Epstein scandal. And how the structure that created Epstein remains invisible This is part 2 of a series. Part 1: "Epstein Isn't an Aberration. He's an Inevitable Outcome" Part 3 coming next Sunday. Research Disc...

The Epstein Scandal Should Be Called "The Billionaire Scandal"Everyone thinks Jeffrey Epstein was an aberration. The science says he was inevitable. This video breaks down the neuroscience, psychology, and economics that explain how extreme wealth concentration doesn't just create inequality. but manufactures monsters. I’m Barry Ferns – a comedian whose personal journey through failu...

Your accent isn't just how you sound. It's how you're judged. Within seconds of hearing someone speak, we make snap judgments about intelligence, trustworthiness, class, and competence. And we pretend we don't. What happens for you when Gary Stevenson's working-class voice has a posh accent? Why received pronunciation makes people sound more trustworthy (even when they're l...

There's a story running in the background of your mind right now. You didn't start it. You didn't agree to it. And it's ruining your life. That story has a headquarters: Wall Street. A place where the myth that "greed is good" isn't just believed, it's acted out, every single day. But here's what most people don't know: stories aren't just entertainmen...

Your rent is up. Your bills are unpaid. But the government says the economy is FINE. Why? The answer is one of the simplest mathematical illusions in politics: GDP and averages. GDP was invented in the 1940s to measure wartime tank production. It doesn't care about your quality of life. It doesn't care who gets the money. It just measures "busy-ness" - and billionaires walking in...

This video isn’t about attacking Rory Stewart, or about bad faith, stupidity, or intent. It’s about something more uncomfortable... and much more common. Some of the biggest mistakes in modern politics and economics aren’t made by extremists or idiots. They’re made by intelligent, well-meaning people who all make the same mistake at the same time, and don’t notice it. Decision science has a word f...

We like to believe that extreme success comes from brilliance. That the people who win - whether in a game, a market, or an economy must be smarter, sharper, more deserving than everyone else. That story is comforting. Because it makes outcomes feel fair. But here I'm going to look closely at that storyIt’s about how stories protect systems — and why asking the right question matters more than...

Why do the people with the most power so rarely get challenged? While watching The Traitors, something clicked for me about how inequality actually works — and why so many debates about wealth, power, and redistribution never go anywhere. This video isn’t just about the TV show. It’s about information asymmetry, silence, and how systems protect power without anyone needing to conspire. This video...

We hear them all the time — “Don’t hate the player, hate the game,” “If you’re not growing, you’re dying,” “Losers blame the system.”They sound harmless — even motivational — but these phrases carry the logic of toxic economics: ideas that protect inequality by making it feel “normal.”In this video, I break down the hidden psychology behind everyday money talk — and why language itself can be one...

This is an attempt at re-framing rather than absolute economic analysis.(For any 100% Capitalism Absolute Haters out there)But if we can change the story we can change the path IMO....You’ve been told that if you dislike inequality, monopolies, and rigged markets, you must “hate capitalism.”When people defend today’s economy, they often point to Adam Smith — the “father of capitalism.”But Smith wh...

We’ve misunderstood A Christmas Carol for 180+ years. Everyone thinks it’s about kindness, redemption, or personal transformation……but Charles Dickens was doing something deeper. Analysing the effects of wealth on both the Economy and the Human Mind. This is a fresh interpretation of A Christmas Carol — not as a moral fable, but as a story about economics, bias, inequality, and the psychology of w...

When people talk about poverty, they usually talk about money. Low wages. High rent. No savings. No safety net. But that’s only half the story. The most corrosive part of inequality isn’t just material hardship — it’s humiliation. It’s the quiet, daily experience of being ignored, talked over, looked down on, or treated as if your life matters less. This video looks at what inequality does psychol...

Why Slow Horses Is About You (Not Spies) Because Slow Horses Isn’t Fiction — It’s How Power Really WorksSlow Horses isn’t just a spy show — it’s one of the most accurate portraits of modern power, bias and inequality on TV.Here’s what the rejects of Slough House can teach us about who actually sees the truth… and why the “polished elite” so often get it wrong. In this video, I break down the psych...

Why isn’t the economy growing anymore? Because it can’t. We’re not in the “Cowboy Economy” of endless expansion — we’re on Spaceship Earth, a closed system with finite resources. Economists were warned about this in 1966… and ignored it. In slow-growth economies, inequality explodes, billionaire wealth takes off, and everyone else feels squeezed. This isn’t a glitch — it’s the new normal. Sources...

Why you're not wrong:In this video, I break down the psychological and social mechanisms used (often unconsciously) to silence people when they talk about a Wealth Tax or Capital Taxation. Key social-psychology theories & studies referencedEMOTIONAL DISMISSAL / INVALIDATIONKatz & Gottman (1999) – Emotion dismissing vs emotion coaching. Defines emotional dismissal as minimising or refra...

THE BBC IS BIASEDEveryone shouts about BBC bias:The Left says it’s protecting billionaires. The Right says it’s woke propaganda. What is the truth? Support Barry’s EconomicsHelp us stay independent and keep making videos like this.- https://www.buymeacoffee.com/barryseconomics - https://ko-fi.com/barryseconomics - https://www.patreon.com/barryseconomics Follow and Subscribe for future videos! More...

The difference that sets Gary Stevenson apart isn't solely his trading success, his hard economics, or even his communication skills. It’s the perspective he brings — a perspective almost completely missing from the UK’s media and political class. In this video, I break down:• why Gary’s background lets him see the 50th percentile clearly• why wealthy commentators struggle to understand inequa...

Britain’s Budget isn’t an economic plan — it’s a ritual designed to shape your perception of how the country is doing. The Red Briefcase. The solemn walk. The shouting in the Commons. The “Winners and Losers” newspaper spreads. None of this is accidental. This video breaks down how the Budget uses three powerful psychological biases — Authority Bias, Status Quo Bias, and Anchoring — to make us fee...

In this video, I break down why treating wealth as a non-zero-sum game lets governments tax the poor while protecting the rich — and why it keeps the status quo firmly in place. I use a pie (yes, an actual pie) to explain how we confuse total growth with who actually gets the benefits of that growth… and why saying “we just need the economy to grow” is often a distraction from taxing the people mo...