Your entire argument is focusing on the micro, not the macro. Buying a house is an investment for the person who did it. But if the person you buy from turns around and spends the money on consumption, there is no <i>net</i> investment. One person shifted to investment, another shifted to consumption, the macro effect is zero.<p>A <i>net</i> investment in houses would involve more housing being owned than before. This would require more houses to be built, and this in turn would require people a shift of workers&#x2F;materials&#x2F;etc from other uses into housing construction. Present day consumption goes down in return for an increase in future consumption.<p>The result is that in the future, productive capacity has increased and more housing is available to consume.<p>If you want to see the result of a lack of <i>real</i> investment, look at SF. All sorts of games being played with money, but nominally wealthy people can&#x27;t even afford a flat without roommates.<p><i>But as I keep trying to tell you, consumption is the motor of capitalism. It is the demand part of supply and demand. Without consumption, there is no production. And production is what creates all the wealth. Everybody would be poorer.</i><p>Why don&#x27;t you explain the mechanism by which this occurs <i>in real terms</i>? I&#x27;m pretty sure you&#x27;ve wildly misunderstood Keynesian economics and are conflating the Keynesian cure for prideful workers (which we don&#x27;t have now - full employment) for some sort of general growth prescription.