Comment by Vaushite

But the incentives are not aligned, we are slaves to Moloch, the god of path dependence as described in Slate Star Codex.

Imagine what happens if landlords decided one day to collectively demand more money than actually exists in the total monthly income of workers. What would happen?

You can point out that if everyone just stopped paying rent, their houses and apartments would still exist, and they could live rent-free as their landlords would have no money to spend on enforcement. Technically, this is not untrue. But it's not what would actually happen, is it? One person would be the first to default on their rent, and their landlord would use the money collected from all their other tenants to seize back that tenant's formerly rented property. No individual tenant would dare to be the first to stop paying rent, so they all continue paying rent, selling their stuff, taking out loans until there's physically no way for them to keep paying, and only then do they default.