If you want to outperform others’ labor prices, there are only two ways.

This isn't inflation—we're simply seeing prices return to their natural state, the state they'd be in without subsidies.

The first scenario is what you've witnessed over the past 25 years: a select few drained six wallets to buy homes, and you benefited from transferred subsidies. You didn't outperform on merit—you were lifted by subsidies.

In the second scenario, you can't remain ordinary.

Because you're human, and so is everyone else. If your value must surpass others', how do you achieve that? You need to offer a relative advantage—either a capital advantage, allowing you to access high-barrier, scarce assets; or a talent advantage, colloquially meaning your "price" rises faster than theirs.

If you're ordinary, your labor pays for others' labor—how could any surplus remain?

How does land consolidation occur?

After several cycles, there's always a lean period when harvests fall short. Paddy fields then accumulate in the hands of landlords. First, landlords are wealthy. Second, they're experienced—they've survived many such cycles. In a sense, they're Warren Buffett of another domain.

During famine years, Huang Shiren might say to Yang Bailao: "I'll buy your paddy field. I don't want your dry land—you keep it. Sell me the paddy, and I'll give you several sacks of grain to bridge the lean season."
Now flip the roles. Could Yang Bailao easily do what Huang Shiren did? Could Yang Bailao approach Zhang Bailao and say, "Sell me your paddy field, and I'll give you several sacks of grain to tide you over"?
Impossible.

Yang Bailao has no surplus grain of his own.

With ample idle capital, at the right time, using the right tactics—consolidation happens.

Today: insist on halting real estate loans, allow bankruptcies, lift price caps, and directly enter the market to mass-acquire homes at 50% off, converting them into rental housing for migrant populations?