Media continues to push the WEF narrative ”You own nothing and you’re happy” – CNN says: ”Housing affordability is in crisis: you will never own anything again”
At some point, debt became the norm, and ownership the exception. The World Economic Forum’s vision of ”2030”, where you don’t own a car, a house or even clothes, long seemed like a futuristic fantasy. Now a recent CNN analysis entitled ”Affordability is in crisis. The solution: you’ll never own anything again” brings the same idea straight into the mainstream – no longer as a hypothesis, but as news about economic policy.
Context: the WEF vision shifts from lifestyle to business news
The phrase ”You’ll own nothing and be happy” comes from an essay written by Danish politician Ida Auken for the WEF, ”Welcome to 2030. I own nothing, have no privacy, and life has never been better”. In it, the narrator describes a city where people own nothing, but everything – housing, mobility, goods – is offered as a service and as packages optimised by algorithms(Medium).
The original idea was sold as ”sustainability” and the ”sharing economy”: when you don’t own, you consume less and save the planet. Critics were quick to point out that, in practice, the model would mean someone else owns everything – and you pay rent for the rest of your life.
The next move was the Wall Street Journal’s lifestyle report ”The Extreme Renters Who Own Nothing, Not Even Their Jeans”, which featured young Americans who rent practically everything – including their clothes.(wsj.com) The article was marketed as a trend story about a ”new way of living”, not as an alarm bell that ownership is escaping the reach of the common man.
And now CNN’s business analysis hits the nail on the head: ’Housing affordability is in crisis. The solution: never own anything again.” The headline is so close to the WEF slogan that it cannot be explained away as a mere coincidence.(Muck Rack)
Evidence: 50-year mortgages and the BNPL debt spiral
The CNN article describes two phenomena that are ”solving” the runaway prices in the US:
- 50-year mortgages
The Trump administration has floated mortgages that are spread over 50 years – effectively the length of a career. CNN describes this as an ”innovative” way to bring down monthly payments. In reality, it doubles the interest costs compared to the already steep 30-year loan.(Muck Rack) - ”Buy Now, Pay Later” – apps for everyday life
The article highlights that more and more people are using BNPL services (Klarna, Affirm, etc.) to finance their weekly living expenses – food, clothes, even petrol.(Muck Rack)
– According to a LendingTree survey, about a quarter of Americans use BNPL services, and a significant number of those specifically for groceries.(Fortune)
– 41% of BNPL users report late payments in the past year, indicating a direct payment problem, not ”smart financing.”(LendingTree)
– Analysis by central banks and research institutions echoes the same message: on average, BNPL users have riskier credit profiles, more debt, and lower scores for ability to pay.(kansascityfed.org)
Against this background, CNN’s framing is revealing: the problem is not that prices, interest rates and wealth inequality have got out of hand, but that the masses have not yet been offered long enough debt chains and easy enough ”buy now, pay later” pipelines.(Muck Rack)
Analysis: putting the WEF vision into practice – replacing ownership with lifetime renting
When you put the WEF’s 2030 vision, the WSJ’s ”extreme renters” and CNN’s affordability analysis side by side, it’s easy to see the pattern:
- Step 1 – Ideological groundwork: the WEF publishes a utopian story of a city where you own nothing, but ”you are happy” because everything is a service and algorithms decide for you(Medium).
- Step 2 – Normalisation through lifestyle media: the WSJ smilingly reports about young people who don’t even own their jeans, but rent everything in the name of ”flexibility”(wsj.com)
- Step 3 – Translation of economic journalism: CNN reports that housing affordability is in crisis and the solution is to never own anything again – not as a problem of policy making, but as an unavoidable circumstance that citizens must adapt to.(Muck Rack)
In all three cases, the logic is the same:
– the price of ownership is not questioned
– Central bank zero interest rates, asset inflation, institutional housing investors and regulation are not ”to blame”(Wikipedia)
– the only solution is to change what we consider normal: owning becomes a luxury, renting the norm.
The 50-year mortgage is a great example. It doesn’t make a home ”more accessible”, it just locks you into the bank’s milking cow for the rest of your working life. The payments go down month by month, but the interest costs explode – and if something goes wrong (unemployment, illness), you’re still in debt when the house is already in the bank.
The BNPL changes the basic logic: before, debt was taken on for big purchases, now the debt break is sunk into everyday necessities. Buying food in four instalments is not a ”convenient way to pay”, but a sign that your salary is no longer enough to cover basic expenses(LendingTree).
Consequences: debt slavery + digital surveillance = total control
What will come of this?
- Concentration of wealth
When the middle class can no longer afford to buy homes, cars or even appliances without a 30-50 year chain of debt, ownership will shift to the financial sector and large corporations. The slightest default is enough to get a loan repriced or a credit line closed. - The generation gap
Older generations still have tangible assets: a home, a plot of land, maybe even a debt-free car. Younger generations will be left a ”legacy” of subscription services, rights of use and debts – and possibly even a system for recovering loans and mortgages. - Soft slavery in the digital economy
By combining digital identity, credit baskets and tokenised money (BNPL, credit cards, future CBDC experiments) in one package, a system is created where you never have to be physically locked up anywhere. All you have to do is press a button to cut off access and payment channels: home, mobility, food, belongings – everything is permission slips, not ownership.(federalreserve.gov) - Refining the narrative
This CNN article is an important piece. It does not address the root causes – central bank policies, market structures, policy decisions – but frames debt growth and ownership disappearance as ”innovative solutions”. Repeat this enough and people start to see as perfectly normal what 20 years ago would have been called feudalism.(Muck Rack)
Conclusion: the problem is not that you ”can’t” own – the problem is that you are not allowed to own
It is tempting to think that ”this is just the way it is”: prices went up, interest rates went up, competition got tougher – and so people stopped owning their houses and rented for the rest of their lives. This is a nice story for those who have those homes, cars and services lined up on their balance sheets.
The real picture is uglier:
- policy decisions and central bank policy have effectively pumped up wealth to the owning minority
- the housing market has been turned into an investment product, not a fundamental right for people
- consumers have also been sold the idea that debt is the norm, and that ownership is just a ”boomer privilege”.(Wikipedia)
The CNN headline sums it up with startling honesty: ”Affordability is in crisis. The solution: You’ll never own anything again.” It’s not about a solution, it’s about getting used to it.
If we accept this narrative, we accept a new plantation: no barbed wire, no chains – just an endless subscription that charges your card every month.
Of course, no one will come knocking on your door and announce that ”you have now been upgraded to a debt slave”. It will be done more softly: with articles telling you that ”this is how young people live nowadays”, that ”owning is old-fashioned” and that ”the solution to the crisis is to never own anything again”.
Whether or not to accept this is not an economic decision, but a life-long decision.
📚 So urces
- CNN Business: Affordability is in crisis. The solution: You’ll never own anything again (12.11.2025). https://www.cnn.com/2025/11/12/economy/affordability-crisis-mortgage-debt-bnpl(Muck Rack)
- Ida Auken / World Economic Forum: Welcome to 2030. I own nothing, have no privacy, and life has never been better (2016). https://medium.com/world-economic-forum/welcome-to-2030-i-own-nothing-have-no-privacy-and-life-has-never-been-better-ee2eed62f710(Medium)
- Wall Street Journal: The Extreme Renters Who Own Nothing, Not Even Their Jeans (17.8.2024). https://www.wsj.com/personal-finance/renting-lifestyle-economy-cars-furniture-clothes-b7329a4a(wsj.com)
- LendingTree / news reports on BNPL’s use of food and late payments. E.g. New York Post & CBS News (2025). https://www.lendingtree.com/personal/buy-now-pay-later-loan-statistics/(LendingTree)
- Federal Reserve analyses of the indebtedness and risk profile of BNPL users. For example, Richmond Fed: Buy Now, Pay Later: Market Impact and Policy Considerations (2025)(richmondfed.org).