Glenn, Joy is a passionate, challenging debater, but you conceded so much without even relying on the basic economic truth that there is never a free lunch to challenge her. In my view some of her ideas are worth exploration such as having a health care system for all, getting post high school education (note I didn’t say college) figured out so it can benefit more people and even a change in tax policy to support those changes and/or make the system fairer, whatever that means. That said, whenever major changes are being made within a country as large as ours there are always downsides. You even pointed this out yourself, but conceded pushing her to at least talk about the downsides which you know exist even if you don’t know what they are. She even admitted near the end she wasn’t getting all her stories/facts straight. I don’t think this was intentional on her part. It sounded like her passion had, to some extent, taken over her thinking which is how good intentions usually go astray.
Here are a few points you could have explored/challenged:
40% of Americans can’t meet a $400 dollar emergency. It is sad that this is true for any Americans, but this oft quoted statistic isn’t true in the way the people who use it want us to believe it is. It’s a misunderstanding or misrepresentation of statistics from a Federal Reserve report. Here’s a Bloomberg article with the details. https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2019-06-04/the-400-emergency-expense-story-is-wrong
The downsides of a universal healthcare system. No change of that magnitude will be without cost and to sell it as such is disingenuous or naïve. You gently poked at one issue and let her off the hook without any real effort: you don’t fundamentally change roughly 20% of any economy without real damage. Another more specific example which is all to close to home for me is the effective rationing and or prioritization of certain areas of medical. Canada has had major issues with getting people common orthopedic procedures in reasonable and recommended timeframes. This eventually led to people paying off surgeons to get ahead in the lines. Just type “wait time in Canada for hip replacement” and there are tons of articles and reports.
Many aspects of her student loan forgiveness argument: (1) the devaluing of public college education; from everything I read about application and acceptance rates public college are in high demand. Maybe we should spend more on building or expanding but they sure haven’t been devalued. (2) Claiming that because some people don’t seem to have gotten enough of a benefit from their college education we should forgive all or most student loans. I’m not saying if people were duped by specific institutions by promises of outcomes that they shouldn’t be prosecuted. (3) Claiming that effectively no one loses or pays for loan forgiveness. A quick internet search turns up plenty of articles on where buck stops. https://thehill.com/changing-america/3012034-who-will-pay-if-biden-cancels-student-debt/
The slippery slope of having an effective cap (via a tax) on wealth potentially leading to the government effectively dictating how much a person or family can have in any domain of life or that governments in general have an incentive to continue to expand their reach and the more involvement they have the more they reach. Not because this is the nature of government, but because this is the nature of people who want to run government. With all good intentions they have a vision of how the world should be and want to impose that on the rest of society.
Glenn have more faith in your knowledge that there’s always a cost, relative winners and losers, especially when dealing with someone who is a well trained in how to pitch policy. (By the way, this doesn’t mean all her ideas are completely bad ones.)
Ms. Gray said many things that are so false she must know they are. One example: she said "imagine that I make $50,000 and I'm paying 30%taxes on that..." People making $50K pay nowhere near that much. The *marginal* rate at $50K is 22%, and of course she gets the standard deduction and probably many others, so her effective marginal rate will likely be a lot lower. Now if she's in a high tax state like I am (NJ) then it's higher
She's totally wrong on so many points - as many others have noted. But a key one is the idea that the Reps are not "going for the center". Horse manure. Vance, DeSantis & Trump are all aimed at the center - the media mis-labels anything normal as "far right".
J.D. Vance just won the Rep primary for Senate in Ohio, with Trump's backing. ["idiot" Trump went 55-0 in endorsements, none lost (or 50-5-0 if you count runoffs as ties)]. Vance is certainly going for working class - Whites, Blacks, Hispanics, Asians.
Rod Dreher reprinted his 2016 interview with JD, soon after his book came out (Hillbilly Elegy).
Rod would be a good candidate for you to interview - for Christian Populism.
Family, Nation, God,.
Big issue that Briahna avoids talking about (in this except) is personal agency, being empowered to make decisions about your life that affect your life. Bernie & socialism all assume no personal power to help yourself by better lifestyle decisions. Usually unspoken is why - avoid "blaming the victim".
Vance: " We’re no longer a country that believes in human agency, and as a formerly poor person, I find it incredibly insulting. To hear Trump or Clinton talk about the poor, one would draw the conclusion that they have no power to affect their own lives. Things have been done to them, from bad trade deals to Chinese labor competition, and they need help. And without that help, they’re doomed to lives of misery they didn’t choose. " << from 2016, but still relevant.
Maybe the lack of leftist populism is that many of the left's ideas just are not that popular. When enacting things by force is your MO, that's not popularity at work. These people speak in platitudes that have no real-world foundation. We're asked to believe that a govt bureaucracy that can barely manage the basics - roads, public safety, schools - is magically equipped to tackle health care or climate. By what logic? You don't take the kid who is failing basic math and toss him into the calculus class.
It's so easy, almost mindless, to sit in the comfort of a six-figure taxpayer salary and decree that all businesses must pay whatever "a living wage" is deemed to be on this day. Only someone who is abjectly clueless about what goes into a business can make such a blanket statement with a straight face, and never mind the pretense that such a move would occur in a vacuum. It's like progressive ideas are based on emotion rather than logic or reason.
Geez, Glenn, Briahna is a smart, well prepared woman, but if you’re not going to even contest her largely erroneous and misleading factual recitals, it’s not a conversation, it’s a filibuster—and neither informative nor entertaining.
One, we already have a very progressive tax system.
"in 2018, the top 1% of income earners—those who earned more than $540,000—earned 21% of all U.S. income while paying 40% of all federal income taxes. The top 10% earned 48% of the income and paid 71% of federal income taxes."
Two if you want a European level of a safety net, then you need European levels of taxes. That means the middle class will pay a LOT more in taxes. Glen briefly made the point, but not enough I don't think. You could tax the rich at 100% of income, and it wouldn't come close to paying for a European level of a welfare state.
Three incentives matter, and people respond to incentives. If you people can't keep enough of the fruits of their labor, then maybe they just don't try. I'm not opposed to a safety net, but it should be limited and require people to work as much as possible.
Four on healthcare. Countries with socialized medicine ALL keep their costs down by rationing care. Moreover, the world's healthcare R&D is largely subsidize by Americans. That sure did come in handy during the pandemic. On a side note, I do biotech investing. This is risky investing, many of them don't pan out. Thus the ones that work need to pay off BIG time. Every successful drug needs to pay for dozens perhaps hundreds of drugs that don't work.
The left focuses too much on who pays for healthcare. But what we should be focused on is bringing total healthcare costs down. You do that by increasing healthcare supply faster than demand and requiring competition.
Healthcare Prices should be required to be posted online. And providers should not be able to change the prices depending on who is paying. IE you don't have to pay more because you are a cash payer (or less if you are the government).
Once we had pricing transparency then competition could actually start taking place.
We probably also need to look at healthcare consolidation affecting competition.
Because the government already controls healthcare spending for the segment of society that needs the most healthcare, how could you really obtain price competition at this point?
Briana makes the correct point that college costs have gone up so much because of federal backed student loans means colleges haven't tried to keep costs down. But then thinks that the solution is for college to be free???
But there is no free. That just means that even more costs will be foisted on the tax payer.
Instead student loans should be limited based on the expected value of your degree. People need to be thinking about what their expected value of their major is before you ever start college. That grievance degree isn't going to pay for itself.
I do think student loans should be dischargeable in bankruptcy if needed. But colleges should be on the hook for part of that debt. That would also help keep costs down
My first class at a community college Bus 101, had us to a Monster.com report were we researched jobs. I was thinking of doing business management, but that opened my eyes. I saw all the accounting jobs out there and switched to accounting.
don't go to college to find yourself or any of that other BS (unless you are independently wealthy of course). Go with a career in mind and make sure that degree fits the bill.
Yes sometimes we end up in different career fields than when we started. But at least that gets you in the door to where you can build some experience.
Sometimes I think people don't realize how much "socialism" -- and I mean that in a good sense -- we already have in our system. We hear about minimum wage a lot, but next to nothing about Earned Income Credit. Earned income credit, basically, raises minimum wage. And for the social engineering fans out there, EIC has the added benefit of allowing social engineering. Let them try writing "single mothers get higher pay" into a minimum wage bill.
Then there's the way Social Security pays out. Meaning those who earn less get a MUCH higher percentage of their income in retirement that those who make close to their FICA cap. In my mind, that is great thing, the way it should be. It works just as it should. We could brag about the "socialism" we already have in our system. We have nothing to be ashamed about in that regard.
As for healthcare, I'm not sure what they want. Who exactly isn't getting healthcare? What aren't they getting? Can we not say that bad health habits are way more injurious to citizens than any claimed lack of health care? Drugs, alcohol, overeating, a violent lifestyle -- these are major, major problems in the U.S. As well, Steve Jobs, one of the wealthiest people in our lifetimes died at 56. Paul Allen, another of the richest in our lifetimes, died at 65. The point being that you can't buy good health. Can't buy eternal life. And some people have fatalistic attitudes about life; is it fair to spend millions to keep one person going for an extra year or two when another guy declines $10,000 treatment that could potentially add decades?
Oh, well, it seems we rarely get honest discussion in America. That's why we all love Glenn and John so much.
Apologize I didn't have time for the video, so don't know what I missed. Yeah, she *would* be 100% Bernie would-a won. I'm sorry, the center will *never* vote for a socialist. Won't happen. That's why they all backed Biden, because he *could* win. And he *did.* Otherwise it would-a been four more years of Trump.
But she's not entirely delusional. I agree with her that neither party is going for the center. The flaw in her thinking, which is why I can manage to take her very seriously, is that she thinks these problems come because the Democratic party isn't far enough to the *left.* Ruy Tuxiera has written a number of articles about the *facts* of the matter. The *facts* of that matter is that the Dems are *already* too far left. The Dems are now the party of the monied interests. She was right about the big money going to Biden. But that's not all. The people who *run* the Dems are the PMC elites, right?
People that voted for Trump may not be the most erudite. But they know when they're getting the shaft from the PMC elites that make up the Dems. Me? I voted for Biden. But if I'd known ahead-a time what "Woke" even meant, and that Biden was the *president* of the Woke, I might not have. People will wonder at the news. He issued two executive orders on Jan 1. One for Kendi-style equity and the other for trans rights. And then there's his Equality Act.
You know how many people in this country know anything about this trans "stuff." So few that if You said ZERO You wouldn't be far off. England, France, Sweden and the Netherlands I think. They're pulling *away* from this gender-affirming *crap* because there's ZERO, zip, zilch, NADA SCIENCE behind it.
No strong studies in favor, and reports of grievious harm from it. Who knew?
That's why the Repubs are the party of populism. Simple as that. American don't want this Progressive Woke nonsense. Not more of it.
Others explained the economic downsides of Socialism. I would only add that the $15 minimum wage has one unintended consequence that people just refuse to even look at. It will speed UP the trend towards AI and automation, right? You can buy a burger-flipper for $60K. Compared to a $15 / hour burger-flipper who sometimes doesn't even show up?
Better bet would be to slow DOWN automation. It'll be hard to make adjustments no matter how soon it comes, right?
While sharing most of your reservations, I did vote for trump, because I feared exactly the kind of disaster we have in Biden. Sometimes the devil you know is better than the one you don’t.
I understand. Trump got some good things done. Still, IMO, he did too much to energize the Progressive Nut-Wing of the Dem party. Division at a time we needed consensus. That's why he lost the election.
I have a suggestion for your next female guest: Dorothy Moses Schulz. Manhattan Institute. She just wrote an article at City Journal about fare jumping on subway systems.
"Some cities have replaced police officers and fare-compliance officers with outreach workers and fare ambassadors. Refusing to enforce the law on the transit system is a recipe for declining fare revenue, increasing fare evasion, and skyrocketing crime."
Fare ambassadors?
And: "Both Lieber and Mayor Eric Adams have observed that a small number of evaders are stopped and even fewer are issued summonses—in no small part because the Manhattan and Brooklyn district attorneys refuse to prosecute these cases."
Progressive economics is Ptolemaic economics. Ptolemy and other geocentrists believed that the sun and planets revolved around the earth. Rather than accept the simpler heliocentric theory, geocentrists created increasingly elaborate and incorrect mathematical models to explain the heavenly bodies’ motion.
Similarly, progressive economics begins with a fundamentally flawed belief system. This 2016 statement from Bernie Sanders shows the core error: “You don't necessarily need a choice of 23 underarm spray deodorants or of 18 different pairs of sneakers when children are hungry in this country.”
Bernie Sanders described wealth and called it poverty. A grocery store that carries twenty three types of deodorant will also have ten varieties of apples in its well stocked produce section; fourteen different flavored yogurts; an entire aisle filled with breakfast cereals; pastas, breads, meats, cheese, desserts… Another store a few blocks away will be similarly stocked. This range of choices is the very definition of a wealthy society!
At its core, wealth is measured in options. Wealth is not measured in dollars, or land, or stocks, or other assets.
Again, wealth is measured in options. People and societies with a greater range of options are wealthier than those with fewer options. For example, America is much poorer now than at the beginning of the pandemic, and the last round of COVID relief accelerated the drawdown. The Fed’s reduced flexibility over the last year demonstrates this fact. In 2021 inflation was deemed transitory, and it was thought that the Fed MIGHT have to raise rates in 2022. Now, inflation is persistent and the Fed MUST raise rates at every opportunity through the end of the year. The Fed’s options have been greatly reduced over the past year; ergo, America must be much poorer than previously thought.
Just as wealth is measured in options, economic value is measured in productive output. Bernie’s statement shows that progressives misperceive wealth; similarly, progressives cannot understand economic value.
Raising the minimum wage without a corresponding increase in productivity is akin to converting from inches to millimeters and saying that everything is now 25X bigger. Except you are messing with people’s lives. For example, the median annual income in Mississippi is approximately $30K; conceivably, unemployment could hit 50% there under a $15/hour minimum wage. Nationally, unemployment and prices would rise, and some marginal (typically local and smaller) businesses would fail.
Progressive policies harm the most vulnerable-the opposite of their stated goal. The bottom economic rung is knocked out for the least skilled; the family owned hardware store closes while Home Depot thrives; and the poorest suffer most from the resulting inflation as the minimum wage doubles while everyone’s productivity-the true measure of economic value- is unchanged.
These deleterious effects are a natural consequence of progressive’s backward economic understanding. Progressive policies yield regressive results, as even Bernie’s statement implies. For he is saying that there are too many deodorant manufacturers and shoe companies employing too many people. His economic vision mandates consolidation into an oligarchy or similar wealth stunting economic system.
"At its core, wealth is measured in options." Is it? Always? In every case?
Even if it is, the problem that Bernie and his ilk like to call attention to is that the general welfare or common good of the country cannot be achieved if as a country we decide that the purpose of economic activity is to increase consumer options as compared to, say, provide for the needs of the whole population in a way that enables all (or at least most) to flourish. While wealth is (or can be) a social good, if all that it creates is an infinite amount of options that enables people to waste a substantial amount of their lives deciding which option to go with, then maybe we ought to view wealth as something of a mixed blessing and not as the only or best thing that we rely on to determine the general health & welfare of a society.
"Bernie Sanders described wealth and called it poverty." Yes, the paradox of having great wealth is that it can create certain kinds of poverty, especially the kinds that the materially-obsessed are oblivious to.
To me the idea of having wealth means having more options is fine. It's the incentive for accumulating more wealth. The problem with Bernie and BJG types is that to then equality is everyone having the same options without any effort on their part. That's the equity argument. Remember Kamala Harris' cartoon. If the 2 men start at the same level, they will attain the top. No discussion about who expends more energy, whose stronger, quicker, better climber. Also no discussion of what they find at the top or what they do with what they find or see.
The point that I was trying to make is, what is the purpose of accumulating wealth? If it’s to have more options, what does having those options serve? Accumulating wealth for it’s own sake or “to have more options” (as if there isn’t a limit to the number of options a person can have without suffering from cognitive overload) strikes me as being anti-social, and in any event, is just greedy. The wealthy don’t live in a void - what they do (or don’t do) affects other people, probably more so than whatever mundane choices your average Joe makes on a daily basis. If there’s no sense that as prominent members of our interdependent society, they have an obligation to serve others, then how can we make demands on any other person to behave in ways that aren’t entirely selfish? If everyone is just pursuing their own desires without any consideration of how their choices impact others, then how can we expect to maintain social cohesion?
Meeting the basic needs of at least most of the population doesn’t mean that there still isn’t going to be a certain amount (or even decent amount) of inequality - given the diversity of abilities, interests & inclinations that’s to be found in any population (not to mention whatever other advantages some people might have from their family or even social/kin group) and the choices that people make, there’s really no way of getting around the reality of wealth inequality (unless of course some sort of totalitarian regime is imposed). But trying to reduce inequality doesn’t have to involve imposing the sort of equity regime that some people are pushing these days. And of course *how* we go about making sure basic needs are met is obviously something that people are going to have disagreements on. But the goal of making sure that basic needs are met is one that I think any functional society needs to have to avoid breakdown and ensure its survival.
So much to unpack here. Meeting basic needs is why we have a welfare system. Don't know where you are, but in my state all the welfare benefits add up to approx. $40k. with very little skin in the game. Which with inflation is not a lot, but the person making $41k can barely make make it. "Greed is good!" when it incentivizes ingenuity and entrepreneurship. Most (not all) of the wealthy employ others and give much to charity. I don't want to reduce inequality, I want everyone to have the opportunity, depending on their abilities and "greed" to be on the other side of the divide.
I probably should have elaborated on what I meant by “basic needs” (which I think is different from what the Bernie crowd has in mind). While there is a material component whose provision can involve the state, there’s also a psycho/social/spiritual component that the state can’t directly provide but can only foster via the promotion of a culture that respects and encourages the establishment of intermediary institutions (family, religious establishments, voluntary associations, etc) that act as conduits for the transmission of culture and direct the education and character formation of individuals (as well as serving as checks on both the power of the state and of the individual).
The welfare recipient who lives off the state and whose dependency nurtures a sense of entitlement is the low-status corollary of the ultra-wealthy citizen who amasses a fortune with few, if any, limits and without any sense of obligation to the greater good. Neither is bound by strictures that compel pro-social behaviors (taking responsibility for oneself and/or others and not living merely for one’s own self-gratification) or attitudes that accord with dignified living (gratitude, generosity). Greed, being a vice, can never be good. While a desire for fortune often does play a role in spurring innovation and entrepreneurship, there are usually other motivations as well, and in any event, there is no reason to think that greed does spur those things, as it’s very often the case that greedy individuals will just sit on their money and find the easiest ways to make it grow (hence the increasingly distorting economic effects of the rentier class). The reason you should be concerned about inequality is because passed a certain point, society will become so unstable that the have-nots (and this is particularly the case if a significant portion of those people are young males) may lash out. As in, a way that is not peaceful.
While I can agree totally with everything up to "Greed". I believe a certain amount to greed necessary to encourage work, innovation, etc. and to encourage the desire to hold on to & protect what has been attained. Miserliness is what I call your definition of greed. Tomato/tomato. I wonder if much of this angst over "inequality" or "inequity" is reinforced and heightened by those who espouse identity/victimhood ideologies in the Press or on social media, but are never actually affected by their "solutions". Today the emphasis seems to be decrying what the "have-nots" don't have and not how to get what they don't have.
you've hot the nail... Apparently "productiveness" and "earn-ability", like "meritocracy", are Enlightenment, Capitalist ideals born in white supremacy and need to be stamped out.
Bernie remains an economic illiterate. So do his followers. If elected, we would still face the major problem of inflation and excessive debt. Regardless, why bother to discuss anything with this person -- one whom I consider from her dialogue, an idiot?
It seems all the neo-socialists of the Bernie camp share the same problem. They cannot think clearly, though they pretend otherwise. Example > firm makes 300 million in profit. Firm is socialist in the image of Bernie. So, what to do with the profits?
There are basically two options: consume the profits or re-invest. Who will consume the profits? How much will they consume and to whom will it be distributed? For the amount not consumed, where will it be reinvested and who will decide how it shall be reinvested? Yes, these are important questions.
Are the “workers” smart enough to know where to reinvest? Are they smart enough to understand what future demands are imperative for the continued success of the operation? If so, how did they acquire their knowledge about the future? How did they learn about the changing nature of markets for their products?
Clearly, the optimal answers to these (and other) important questions are beyond the pale for most line workers. There is NO necessary relationship between the consciousness of the ‘soviets’ and the optimal strategy for re-investment vs consumption. However, under capitalism, the owners would have a vested interest in answering these questions such that profits would be maximized, losses minimizer.
I mean, REALLY. What are the goals of the Bernie Crew? Why should anyone think they have reasonable ‘answers’ to economic problems of scarcity?
Please Glenn, deal with folks who have greater comprehension about “our” economic problems. This lady is clueless.
Thanks for that. I didnt know about the Florida $15 minimum wage vote, which was part of an important larger point. She made it in her own way and I wish it would gain more traction: there is substantial overlap in policy opinion among large chunks of the electorate, particularly about bread-&-butter i$$ues. The TPP was one. I didnt like Trump and voted for Bernie thrice (wrote him in over Biden), but I was glad Trump cancelled it. Bernie would’ve also, he was adamantly opposed to it. She’s spot-on about the Dems and their self-defeating conceits and arrogance. The only hope for a revival of representative democracy is the over-due demise of the two party system. Hope I live to see that.
It gladdens me that populist ideas - left and right - are so unpopular. Biden has many flaws, but he is not Trump, and he is not Sanders. It's too bad figures like Trump, Sanders, AOC, Tucker Carlson, Marjorie Taylor Green, Elizabeth Warren, etc. are even known to the public.
I used to have some respect for BJG - she’s a progressive blinded by lies - name one progressive run city that’s thriving ? Doing well? She said nothing about children out of school knowing young low income kids suffered - businesses shut down - she supported crazy mask mandates vaccine mandates etc. - she’s as bad as the squad ,, sorry
BJG had a big effort on "min. wage - $15" -- but some cities have tried it in reality. No big decrease in poverty. Problem - no increase in the number of jobs for poor people.
Glenn was weak about no pushback on jobs -- the big reason against higher min. wage. Why not $20, $30, $50/hr? Because of fewer jobs.
Poor people need MORE jobs. More jobs for low IQ folk, for disturbed, for those with lousy educations, lousy parents, lousy neighbors; those who live in high crime areas, those who live in areas with low marriage rates / high rates of kids with unmarried parents.
10 jobs at $10/ hr is far better than 6 jobs at $15, even tho it's close in terms of money.
Think of the poor kid from the Jordan Peterson talk, think of Forrest Gump. Nothing is as helpful to most poor folk as a job ... except a better job.
Glenn, Joy is a passionate, challenging debater, but you conceded so much without even relying on the basic economic truth that there is never a free lunch to challenge her. In my view some of her ideas are worth exploration such as having a health care system for all, getting post high school education (note I didn’t say college) figured out so it can benefit more people and even a change in tax policy to support those changes and/or make the system fairer, whatever that means. That said, whenever major changes are being made within a country as large as ours there are always downsides. You even pointed this out yourself, but conceded pushing her to at least talk about the downsides which you know exist even if you don’t know what they are. She even admitted near the end she wasn’t getting all her stories/facts straight. I don’t think this was intentional on her part. It sounded like her passion had, to some extent, taken over her thinking which is how good intentions usually go astray.
Here are a few points you could have explored/challenged:
40% of Americans can’t meet a $400 dollar emergency. It is sad that this is true for any Americans, but this oft quoted statistic isn’t true in the way the people who use it want us to believe it is. It’s a misunderstanding or misrepresentation of statistics from a Federal Reserve report. Here’s a Bloomberg article with the details. https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2019-06-04/the-400-emergency-expense-story-is-wrong
The downsides of a universal healthcare system. No change of that magnitude will be without cost and to sell it as such is disingenuous or naïve. You gently poked at one issue and let her off the hook without any real effort: you don’t fundamentally change roughly 20% of any economy without real damage. Another more specific example which is all to close to home for me is the effective rationing and or prioritization of certain areas of medical. Canada has had major issues with getting people common orthopedic procedures in reasonable and recommended timeframes. This eventually led to people paying off surgeons to get ahead in the lines. Just type “wait time in Canada for hip replacement” and there are tons of articles and reports.
Many aspects of her student loan forgiveness argument: (1) the devaluing of public college education; from everything I read about application and acceptance rates public college are in high demand. Maybe we should spend more on building or expanding but they sure haven’t been devalued. (2) Claiming that because some people don’t seem to have gotten enough of a benefit from their college education we should forgive all or most student loans. I’m not saying if people were duped by specific institutions by promises of outcomes that they shouldn’t be prosecuted. (3) Claiming that effectively no one loses or pays for loan forgiveness. A quick internet search turns up plenty of articles on where buck stops. https://thehill.com/changing-america/3012034-who-will-pay-if-biden-cancels-student-debt/
The slippery slope of having an effective cap (via a tax) on wealth potentially leading to the government effectively dictating how much a person or family can have in any domain of life or that governments in general have an incentive to continue to expand their reach and the more involvement they have the more they reach. Not because this is the nature of government, but because this is the nature of people who want to run government. With all good intentions they have a vision of how the world should be and want to impose that on the rest of society.
Glenn have more faith in your knowledge that there’s always a cost, relative winners and losers, especially when dealing with someone who is a well trained in how to pitch policy. (By the way, this doesn’t mean all her ideas are completely bad ones.)
Ms. Gray said many things that are so false she must know they are. One example: she said "imagine that I make $50,000 and I'm paying 30%taxes on that..." People making $50K pay nowhere near that much. The *marginal* rate at $50K is 22%, and of course she gets the standard deduction and probably many others, so her effective marginal rate will likely be a lot lower. Now if she's in a high tax state like I am (NJ) then it's higher
https://turbotax.intuit.com/tax-tools/calculators/tax-bracket/
She's totally wrong on so many points - as many others have noted. But a key one is the idea that the Reps are not "going for the center". Horse manure. Vance, DeSantis & Trump are all aimed at the center - the media mis-labels anything normal as "far right".
J.D. Vance just won the Rep primary for Senate in Ohio, with Trump's backing. ["idiot" Trump went 55-0 in endorsements, none lost (or 50-5-0 if you count runoffs as ties)]. Vance is certainly going for working class - Whites, Blacks, Hispanics, Asians.
Rod Dreher reprinted his 2016 interview with JD, soon after his book came out (Hillbilly Elegy).
https://www.theamericanconservative.com/dreher/two-beautiful-words-senator-vance/
Rod would be a good candidate for you to interview - for Christian Populism.
Family, Nation, God,.
Big issue that Briahna avoids talking about (in this except) is personal agency, being empowered to make decisions about your life that affect your life. Bernie & socialism all assume no personal power to help yourself by better lifestyle decisions. Usually unspoken is why - avoid "blaming the victim".
Vance: " We’re no longer a country that believes in human agency, and as a formerly poor person, I find it incredibly insulting. To hear Trump or Clinton talk about the poor, one would draw the conclusion that they have no power to affect their own lives. Things have been done to them, from bad trade deals to Chinese labor competition, and they need help. And without that help, they’re doomed to lives of misery they didn’t choose. " << from 2016, but still relevant.
Maybe the lack of leftist populism is that many of the left's ideas just are not that popular. When enacting things by force is your MO, that's not popularity at work. These people speak in platitudes that have no real-world foundation. We're asked to believe that a govt bureaucracy that can barely manage the basics - roads, public safety, schools - is magically equipped to tackle health care or climate. By what logic? You don't take the kid who is failing basic math and toss him into the calculus class.
It's so easy, almost mindless, to sit in the comfort of a six-figure taxpayer salary and decree that all businesses must pay whatever "a living wage" is deemed to be on this day. Only someone who is abjectly clueless about what goes into a business can make such a blanket statement with a straight face, and never mind the pretense that such a move would occur in a vacuum. It's like progressive ideas are based on emotion rather than logic or reason.
Geez, Glenn, Briahna is a smart, well prepared woman, but if you’re not going to even contest her largely erroneous and misleading factual recitals, it’s not a conversation, it’s a filibuster—and neither informative nor entertaining.
Wide ranging conversation. A couple of points.
One, we already have a very progressive tax system.
"in 2018, the top 1% of income earners—those who earned more than $540,000—earned 21% of all U.S. income while paying 40% of all federal income taxes. The top 10% earned 48% of the income and paid 71% of federal income taxes."
Two if you want a European level of a safety net, then you need European levels of taxes. That means the middle class will pay a LOT more in taxes. Glen briefly made the point, but not enough I don't think. You could tax the rich at 100% of income, and it wouldn't come close to paying for a European level of a welfare state.
Three incentives matter, and people respond to incentives. If you people can't keep enough of the fruits of their labor, then maybe they just don't try. I'm not opposed to a safety net, but it should be limited and require people to work as much as possible.
Four on healthcare. Countries with socialized medicine ALL keep their costs down by rationing care. Moreover, the world's healthcare R&D is largely subsidize by Americans. That sure did come in handy during the pandemic. On a side note, I do biotech investing. This is risky investing, many of them don't pan out. Thus the ones that work need to pay off BIG time. Every successful drug needs to pay for dozens perhaps hundreds of drugs that don't work.
The left focuses too much on who pays for healthcare. But what we should be focused on is bringing total healthcare costs down. You do that by increasing healthcare supply faster than demand and requiring competition.
Healthcare Prices should be required to be posted online. And providers should not be able to change the prices depending on who is paying. IE you don't have to pay more because you are a cash payer (or less if you are the government).
Once we had pricing transparency then competition could actually start taking place.
We probably also need to look at healthcare consolidation affecting competition.
Because the government already controls healthcare spending for the segment of society that needs the most healthcare, how could you really obtain price competition at this point?
That definitely makes it trickier. But I think there can be methods to make it better. Cost sharing, or even rebate checks to encourage thrift
A great table on the tax data at this site, from 2019. https://taxfoundation.org/publications/latest-federal-income-tax-data/
One additional point on college costs.
Briana makes the correct point that college costs have gone up so much because of federal backed student loans means colleges haven't tried to keep costs down. But then thinks that the solution is for college to be free???
But there is no free. That just means that even more costs will be foisted on the tax payer.
Instead student loans should be limited based on the expected value of your degree. People need to be thinking about what their expected value of their major is before you ever start college. That grievance degree isn't going to pay for itself.
I do think student loans should be dischargeable in bankruptcy if needed. But colleges should be on the hook for part of that debt. That would also help keep costs down
My first class at a community college Bus 101, had us to a Monster.com report were we researched jobs. I was thinking of doing business management, but that opened my eyes. I saw all the accounting jobs out there and switched to accounting.
don't go to college to find yourself or any of that other BS (unless you are independently wealthy of course). Go with a career in mind and make sure that degree fits the bill.
Yes sometimes we end up in different career fields than when we started. But at least that gets you in the door to where you can build some experience.
Good comment.
Sometimes I think people don't realize how much "socialism" -- and I mean that in a good sense -- we already have in our system. We hear about minimum wage a lot, but next to nothing about Earned Income Credit. Earned income credit, basically, raises minimum wage. And for the social engineering fans out there, EIC has the added benefit of allowing social engineering. Let them try writing "single mothers get higher pay" into a minimum wage bill.
Then there's the way Social Security pays out. Meaning those who earn less get a MUCH higher percentage of their income in retirement that those who make close to their FICA cap. In my mind, that is great thing, the way it should be. It works just as it should. We could brag about the "socialism" we already have in our system. We have nothing to be ashamed about in that regard.
As for healthcare, I'm not sure what they want. Who exactly isn't getting healthcare? What aren't they getting? Can we not say that bad health habits are way more injurious to citizens than any claimed lack of health care? Drugs, alcohol, overeating, a violent lifestyle -- these are major, major problems in the U.S. As well, Steve Jobs, one of the wealthiest people in our lifetimes died at 56. Paul Allen, another of the richest in our lifetimes, died at 65. The point being that you can't buy good health. Can't buy eternal life. And some people have fatalistic attitudes about life; is it fair to spend millions to keep one person going for an extra year or two when another guy declines $10,000 treatment that could potentially add decades?
Oh, well, it seems we rarely get honest discussion in America. That's why we all love Glenn and John so much.
Apologize I didn't have time for the video, so don't know what I missed. Yeah, she *would* be 100% Bernie would-a won. I'm sorry, the center will *never* vote for a socialist. Won't happen. That's why they all backed Biden, because he *could* win. And he *did.* Otherwise it would-a been four more years of Trump.
But she's not entirely delusional. I agree with her that neither party is going for the center. The flaw in her thinking, which is why I can manage to take her very seriously, is that she thinks these problems come because the Democratic party isn't far enough to the *left.* Ruy Tuxiera has written a number of articles about the *facts* of the matter. The *facts* of that matter is that the Dems are *already* too far left. The Dems are now the party of the monied interests. She was right about the big money going to Biden. But that's not all. The people who *run* the Dems are the PMC elites, right?
People that voted for Trump may not be the most erudite. But they know when they're getting the shaft from the PMC elites that make up the Dems. Me? I voted for Biden. But if I'd known ahead-a time what "Woke" even meant, and that Biden was the *president* of the Woke, I might not have. People will wonder at the news. He issued two executive orders on Jan 1. One for Kendi-style equity and the other for trans rights. And then there's his Equality Act.
You know how many people in this country know anything about this trans "stuff." So few that if You said ZERO You wouldn't be far off. England, France, Sweden and the Netherlands I think. They're pulling *away* from this gender-affirming *crap* because there's ZERO, zip, zilch, NADA SCIENCE behind it.
No strong studies in favor, and reports of grievious harm from it. Who knew?
That's why the Repubs are the party of populism. Simple as that. American don't want this Progressive Woke nonsense. Not more of it.
Others explained the economic downsides of Socialism. I would only add that the $15 minimum wage has one unintended consequence that people just refuse to even look at. It will speed UP the trend towards AI and automation, right? You can buy a burger-flipper for $60K. Compared to a $15 / hour burger-flipper who sometimes doesn't even show up?
Better bet would be to slow DOWN automation. It'll be hard to make adjustments no matter how soon it comes, right?
Sorry it's so long.
While sharing most of your reservations, I did vote for trump, because I feared exactly the kind of disaster we have in Biden. Sometimes the devil you know is better than the one you don’t.
I understand. Trump got some good things done. Still, IMO, he did too much to energize the Progressive Nut-Wing of the Dem party. Division at a time we needed consensus. That's why he lost the election.
Granted, Biden no better, IMO.
I have a suggestion for your next female guest: Dorothy Moses Schulz. Manhattan Institute. She just wrote an article at City Journal about fare jumping on subway systems.
"Some cities have replaced police officers and fare-compliance officers with outreach workers and fare ambassadors. Refusing to enforce the law on the transit system is a recipe for declining fare revenue, increasing fare evasion, and skyrocketing crime."
Fare ambassadors?
And: "Both Lieber and Mayor Eric Adams have observed that a small number of evaders are stopped and even fewer are issued summonses—in no small part because the Manhattan and Brooklyn district attorneys refuse to prosecute these cases."
Any opinion on the theory that Trump was just Orange Bernie Sanders with Republican votes?
Progressive economics is Ptolemaic economics. Ptolemy and other geocentrists believed that the sun and planets revolved around the earth. Rather than accept the simpler heliocentric theory, geocentrists created increasingly elaborate and incorrect mathematical models to explain the heavenly bodies’ motion.
Similarly, progressive economics begins with a fundamentally flawed belief system. This 2016 statement from Bernie Sanders shows the core error: “You don't necessarily need a choice of 23 underarm spray deodorants or of 18 different pairs of sneakers when children are hungry in this country.”
Bernie Sanders described wealth and called it poverty. A grocery store that carries twenty three types of deodorant will also have ten varieties of apples in its well stocked produce section; fourteen different flavored yogurts; an entire aisle filled with breakfast cereals; pastas, breads, meats, cheese, desserts… Another store a few blocks away will be similarly stocked. This range of choices is the very definition of a wealthy society!
At its core, wealth is measured in options. Wealth is not measured in dollars, or land, or stocks, or other assets.
Again, wealth is measured in options. People and societies with a greater range of options are wealthier than those with fewer options. For example, America is much poorer now than at the beginning of the pandemic, and the last round of COVID relief accelerated the drawdown. The Fed’s reduced flexibility over the last year demonstrates this fact. In 2021 inflation was deemed transitory, and it was thought that the Fed MIGHT have to raise rates in 2022. Now, inflation is persistent and the Fed MUST raise rates at every opportunity through the end of the year. The Fed’s options have been greatly reduced over the past year; ergo, America must be much poorer than previously thought.
Just as wealth is measured in options, economic value is measured in productive output. Bernie’s statement shows that progressives misperceive wealth; similarly, progressives cannot understand economic value.
Raising the minimum wage without a corresponding increase in productivity is akin to converting from inches to millimeters and saying that everything is now 25X bigger. Except you are messing with people’s lives. For example, the median annual income in Mississippi is approximately $30K; conceivably, unemployment could hit 50% there under a $15/hour minimum wage. Nationally, unemployment and prices would rise, and some marginal (typically local and smaller) businesses would fail.
Progressive policies harm the most vulnerable-the opposite of their stated goal. The bottom economic rung is knocked out for the least skilled; the family owned hardware store closes while Home Depot thrives; and the poorest suffer most from the resulting inflation as the minimum wage doubles while everyone’s productivity-the true measure of economic value- is unchanged.
These deleterious effects are a natural consequence of progressive’s backward economic understanding. Progressive policies yield regressive results, as even Bernie’s statement implies. For he is saying that there are too many deodorant manufacturers and shoe companies employing too many people. His economic vision mandates consolidation into an oligarchy or similar wealth stunting economic system.
"At its core, wealth is measured in options." Is it? Always? In every case?
Even if it is, the problem that Bernie and his ilk like to call attention to is that the general welfare or common good of the country cannot be achieved if as a country we decide that the purpose of economic activity is to increase consumer options as compared to, say, provide for the needs of the whole population in a way that enables all (or at least most) to flourish. While wealth is (or can be) a social good, if all that it creates is an infinite amount of options that enables people to waste a substantial amount of their lives deciding which option to go with, then maybe we ought to view wealth as something of a mixed blessing and not as the only or best thing that we rely on to determine the general health & welfare of a society.
"Bernie Sanders described wealth and called it poverty." Yes, the paradox of having great wealth is that it can create certain kinds of poverty, especially the kinds that the materially-obsessed are oblivious to.
To me the idea of having wealth means having more options is fine. It's the incentive for accumulating more wealth. The problem with Bernie and BJG types is that to then equality is everyone having the same options without any effort on their part. That's the equity argument. Remember Kamala Harris' cartoon. If the 2 men start at the same level, they will attain the top. No discussion about who expends more energy, whose stronger, quicker, better climber. Also no discussion of what they find at the top or what they do with what they find or see.
The point that I was trying to make is, what is the purpose of accumulating wealth? If it’s to have more options, what does having those options serve? Accumulating wealth for it’s own sake or “to have more options” (as if there isn’t a limit to the number of options a person can have without suffering from cognitive overload) strikes me as being anti-social, and in any event, is just greedy. The wealthy don’t live in a void - what they do (or don’t do) affects other people, probably more so than whatever mundane choices your average Joe makes on a daily basis. If there’s no sense that as prominent members of our interdependent society, they have an obligation to serve others, then how can we make demands on any other person to behave in ways that aren’t entirely selfish? If everyone is just pursuing their own desires without any consideration of how their choices impact others, then how can we expect to maintain social cohesion?
Meeting the basic needs of at least most of the population doesn’t mean that there still isn’t going to be a certain amount (or even decent amount) of inequality - given the diversity of abilities, interests & inclinations that’s to be found in any population (not to mention whatever other advantages some people might have from their family or even social/kin group) and the choices that people make, there’s really no way of getting around the reality of wealth inequality (unless of course some sort of totalitarian regime is imposed). But trying to reduce inequality doesn’t have to involve imposing the sort of equity regime that some people are pushing these days. And of course *how* we go about making sure basic needs are met is obviously something that people are going to have disagreements on. But the goal of making sure that basic needs are met is one that I think any functional society needs to have to avoid breakdown and ensure its survival.
So much to unpack here. Meeting basic needs is why we have a welfare system. Don't know where you are, but in my state all the welfare benefits add up to approx. $40k. with very little skin in the game. Which with inflation is not a lot, but the person making $41k can barely make make it. "Greed is good!" when it incentivizes ingenuity and entrepreneurship. Most (not all) of the wealthy employ others and give much to charity. I don't want to reduce inequality, I want everyone to have the opportunity, depending on their abilities and "greed" to be on the other side of the divide.
I probably should have elaborated on what I meant by “basic needs” (which I think is different from what the Bernie crowd has in mind). While there is a material component whose provision can involve the state, there’s also a psycho/social/spiritual component that the state can’t directly provide but can only foster via the promotion of a culture that respects and encourages the establishment of intermediary institutions (family, religious establishments, voluntary associations, etc) that act as conduits for the transmission of culture and direct the education and character formation of individuals (as well as serving as checks on both the power of the state and of the individual).
The welfare recipient who lives off the state and whose dependency nurtures a sense of entitlement is the low-status corollary of the ultra-wealthy citizen who amasses a fortune with few, if any, limits and without any sense of obligation to the greater good. Neither is bound by strictures that compel pro-social behaviors (taking responsibility for oneself and/or others and not living merely for one’s own self-gratification) or attitudes that accord with dignified living (gratitude, generosity). Greed, being a vice, can never be good. While a desire for fortune often does play a role in spurring innovation and entrepreneurship, there are usually other motivations as well, and in any event, there is no reason to think that greed does spur those things, as it’s very often the case that greedy individuals will just sit on their money and find the easiest ways to make it grow (hence the increasingly distorting economic effects of the rentier class). The reason you should be concerned about inequality is because passed a certain point, society will become so unstable that the have-nots (and this is particularly the case if a significant portion of those people are young males) may lash out. As in, a way that is not peaceful.
While I can agree totally with everything up to "Greed". I believe a certain amount to greed necessary to encourage work, innovation, etc. and to encourage the desire to hold on to & protect what has been attained. Miserliness is what I call your definition of greed. Tomato/tomato. I wonder if much of this angst over "inequality" or "inequity" is reinforced and heightened by those who espouse identity/victimhood ideologies in the Press or on social media, but are never actually affected by their "solutions". Today the emphasis seems to be decrying what the "have-nots" don't have and not how to get what they don't have.
you've hot the nail... Apparently "productiveness" and "earn-ability", like "meritocracy", are Enlightenment, Capitalist ideals born in white supremacy and need to be stamped out.
Sorry. "Hit the nail..."
Yes a higher minimum wage will either drive inflation or unemployment.
You sold me. Rather, You said what I believe a lot better 'n I would-a. Thank You.
Bernie remains an economic illiterate. So do his followers. If elected, we would still face the major problem of inflation and excessive debt. Regardless, why bother to discuss anything with this person -- one whom I consider from her dialogue, an idiot?
It seems all the neo-socialists of the Bernie camp share the same problem. They cannot think clearly, though they pretend otherwise. Example > firm makes 300 million in profit. Firm is socialist in the image of Bernie. So, what to do with the profits?
There are basically two options: consume the profits or re-invest. Who will consume the profits? How much will they consume and to whom will it be distributed? For the amount not consumed, where will it be reinvested and who will decide how it shall be reinvested? Yes, these are important questions.
Are the “workers” smart enough to know where to reinvest? Are they smart enough to understand what future demands are imperative for the continued success of the operation? If so, how did they acquire their knowledge about the future? How did they learn about the changing nature of markets for their products?
Clearly, the optimal answers to these (and other) important questions are beyond the pale for most line workers. There is NO necessary relationship between the consciousness of the ‘soviets’ and the optimal strategy for re-investment vs consumption. However, under capitalism, the owners would have a vested interest in answering these questions such that profits would be maximized, losses minimizer.
I mean, REALLY. What are the goals of the Bernie Crew? Why should anyone think they have reasonable ‘answers’ to economic problems of scarcity?
Please Glenn, deal with folks who have greater comprehension about “our” economic problems. This lady is clueless.
Thanks for that. I didnt know about the Florida $15 minimum wage vote, which was part of an important larger point. She made it in her own way and I wish it would gain more traction: there is substantial overlap in policy opinion among large chunks of the electorate, particularly about bread-&-butter i$$ues. The TPP was one. I didnt like Trump and voted for Bernie thrice (wrote him in over Biden), but I was glad Trump cancelled it. Bernie would’ve also, he was adamantly opposed to it. She’s spot-on about the Dems and their self-defeating conceits and arrogance. The only hope for a revival of representative democracy is the over-due demise of the two party system. Hope I live to see that.
It gladdens me that populist ideas - left and right - are so unpopular. Biden has many flaws, but he is not Trump, and he is not Sanders. It's too bad figures like Trump, Sanders, AOC, Tucker Carlson, Marjorie Taylor Green, Elizabeth Warren, etc. are even known to the public.
do an interview with ruy teixeira! Who could make the case for a variant of left populism more than she could.
Yeah, one that would make a *lotta* sense. He's always had his fingers on the pulse of the Democratic party.
I used to have some respect for BJG - she’s a progressive blinded by lies - name one progressive run city that’s thriving ? Doing well? She said nothing about children out of school knowing young low income kids suffered - businesses shut down - she supported crazy mask mandates vaccine mandates etc. - she’s as bad as the squad ,, sorry
BJG had a big effort on "min. wage - $15" -- but some cities have tried it in reality. No big decrease in poverty. Problem - no increase in the number of jobs for poor people.
Glenn was weak about no pushback on jobs -- the big reason against higher min. wage. Why not $20, $30, $50/hr? Because of fewer jobs.
Poor people need MORE jobs. More jobs for low IQ folk, for disturbed, for those with lousy educations, lousy parents, lousy neighbors; those who live in high crime areas, those who live in areas with low marriage rates / high rates of kids with unmarried parents.
10 jobs at $10/ hr is far better than 6 jobs at $15, even tho it's close in terms of money.
Think of the poor kid from the Jordan Peterson talk, think of Forrest Gump. Nothing is as helpful to most poor folk as a job ... except a better job.
For the record, FDR did not create Medicaid. That was LBJ.