Ben Shapiro vs. Ana Kasparian FULL DEBATE

[0:00] let me ask each of you to introduce the other ben would you like to introduce anna sure so [0:06] this is anna kasparian she is first of all big round of applause for anna because this is a [0:10] chamber of commerce meeting anna is quite famously a bernie sanders support so it takes a lot of guts [0:19] to get up in front of a business audience and she really deserves a lot of credit for that for sure [0:23] she's the co-host of the immensely popular young turks which is a show you can find on youtube [0:29] it's also a podcast and it's available pretty much everywhere and she is also the producer of [0:33] that show executive producer of that show thank you ben anna your turn all right um first of all [0:42] thank thank you for having me um it's a pleasure to be here and everyone's been so hospitable and [0:47] incredibly polite and nice and i really appreciate that ben i just found out uh based on what gene [0:54] told me in like suggested me to be a part of this conversation and i really appreciate that [1:00] um you know ben is the co-founder of uh the daily wire incredibly incredibly well known uh especially [1:07] in the media space the new media space specifically but he's certainly made his rounds in traditional [1:12] media as well um and he has uh really popularized a lot of conservative ideals conservative beliefs that [1:21] i think were getting a little played out by some of the uh old guard of conservatism so um you know [1:29] ben is known for being sharp uh being able to defend his uh viewpoints without engaging in personal [1:36] attacks so looking forward to having this conversation with ben and uh you know sharing [1:41] our ideas with one another and you know with everyone here so thank you for having me well we love [1:44] civility so thank you so for those of you who who looked at it you know our topic is leading political [1:53] voices of the next generation of leaders so your thought leaders within your individual um within [1:59] your generation a generation that's much younger than mine um what would you like the people of [2:05] your generation to know moving forward anna let's start with you well i think that my generation is [2:12] certainly pretty passionate about changing things certainly changing the way that they work and live [2:18] we're seeing that play out currently with the pandemic and the labor shortage that's taking place [2:25] and i'd like them to know that we don't really need to reinvent the wheel we've seen strategies and [2:31] solutions that have worked in the past this country has gone through many terrible things in its history [2:37] it's very short history you know relative to other countries and uh despite all those awful things that [2:43] have happened things like the great depression for instance uh the country was still able to pull [2:48] through and i i would suggest looking to history at the solutions that worked um specifically a strong [2:56] labor movement in order to you know really rework the power dynamic that we're seeing right now in the [3:02] workplace i think a lot of the reasoning for not going back to the jobs that workers were previously [3:09] working in uh prior to the pandemic has to do with the fact that hey you know we've been staying home [3:15] during the lockdown uh now we realize that spending time with our family having a little free time for [3:21] ourselves being able to go out doors and do recreational things that's important to us so [3:27] they're reimagining what their lives could be like if they take a little bit of power back uh in the [3:33] workplace and i think that that's definitely possible um they just got to fight for it they got to [3:39] organize they got to work together and not get distracted by manufactured culture wars that [3:44] we see play out in the media every day and how about folks on your side so i mean i think that [3:49] for folks on my side i sort of have the same message for for everybody on all sides which is that [3:54] the world did not begin spinning when you were born and there's a great amount of wisdom accumulated [3:59] wisdom that has built up over literally thousands of years in the united states over hundreds of years [4:04] that is well worth going back to as a source of both inspiration and understanding of exactly why the [4:10] system is supposed to weigh and work in a particular way and that requires a certain understanding of [4:14] human nature of human beings as both capable of amazing things but also as inherently flawed and [4:19] ambitious and why you need a governmental system that is capable of checking ambition with ambition [4:23] checks and balances subsidiarity the the belief in in a federalist system that allows for [4:28] experimentation on a local level without attempting to cram one size fits all solutions on everybody [4:32] from the federal level but that begins with reading history it does begin with understanding some [4:37] basic philosophies about how the united states works because if it feels like the country is [4:41] coming apart it really does feel like that more and more every day that is because i think that [4:45] there is a failure to agree on some of the central bases for the country so we're either going to have [4:49] to clarify where the disagreements are or we're going to be in serious trouble as a country i love the [4:53] answers because it leads directly into what i want to ask you about next it's going to be the most obvious [4:57] statement i'm going to make tonight the last 18 months have seen significant turmoil not only [5:02] with covid but with our social our cultural upheavals as we've seen uh people you know protesting some [5:08] just horrible egregious acts uh as you noted the future of work how we work all those things are [5:13] out there for discussion trust in institutions um and and trust or an understanding has been said [5:20] of literally the basis of our society i saw a great quote i mean we've had the 1619 project we've had [5:26] the uh the book called 1620 1776 commission all of them designed to push back on that i saw a great [5:32] quote from a noted political scientist who said america is not a lie but a disappointment but a [5:39] disappointment because it is a hope would you agree is that that's a good description and would you also [5:45] agree that the u.s is an exceptional country ben i'll start with you i mean i obviously believe that [5:50] the united states is an exceptional country i think that our history is filled with moments of glory it's [5:54] also filled with some terrible tragedy and some terrible evil there's no question about any of [5:59] that to suggest that america is a disappointment is to suggest that utopia is a real place uh or that [6:04] the it whenever you say somebody's a disappointment you have to say compared to what what exactly are [6:09] you shooting for compared to the ideal of course everybody's a disappointment saints are disappointments [6:13] compared to the ideal but if what you're talking about is america as a whole is somehow disappointing [6:18] compared to for example what other countries around the world stand for or what they have provided to [6:22] their citizens or what they have provided to the globe then by no means is america a disappointment [6:27] america is a tremendous success story in fact it's the greatest success story in world history so there [6:38] are parts of that i agree with uh some parts that i disagree with uh for the most part i just want to [6:44] note that the idea of america is an incredible uh idea uh i think that the country has failed to live up [6:52] to its ideals i think that there are certain things that are transpiring as we speak that uh go unchecked you [6:59] know we are supposed to have a system of checks and balances but i think more often than not we see [7:04] a system that is in fact rigged in favor of the powerful i'll give you specific examples you know [7:11] in the beginning of the pandemic there were lawmakers in the senate who engaged in this minimalizing [7:19] just completely minimizing uh the severity of the pandemic to the point where i actually didn't think [7:25] that covid was a serious threat to me my health my family's health uh in fact in february i went on [7:32] a cruise with my in-laws and had a great time and didn't think that covid was going to be an issue [7:37] then i find out of course a month later everything starts shutting down uh people i know get incredibly [7:44] sick and then news reports come out in regard to members of the senate who had a classified briefing [7:51] closed door briefing on the severity of covet and immediately turned around and started selling [7:56] their socks they started buying tech stocks realizing that people are likely to work home [8:03] so they might need to invest in technology or companies that offer technologies that make that [8:10] possible basically there's insider trading happening within the senate and i'm saying it out loud and i'm [8:15] saying it on a regular basis because that kind of activity that type of behavior first of all is [8:20] illegal for the average american should not be legal for members of the senate uh the fact that we have [8:25] the fact that we have lawmakers who are personally invested in businesses that they're deciding [8:36] legislation on is unacceptable so when you talk about the lack of trust in our institutions i understand [8:42] that lack of trust and that lack of trust has led to the situation that we're experiencing today with covid [8:48] where people don't believe in what the cdc is telling them where people question what journalists [8:54] are reporting about they just assume because of the lies that have been told because of the system [9:00] being rigged against them they just assume that they're being lied to and and now we find ourselves [9:05] in this difficult position where we're trying to find solutions we're trying to come together [9:09] so we combat covid effectively get people back to work so people can thrive families can thrive but [9:15] that's incredibly difficult to do when people don't trust in our institutions so earlier this evening we [9:20] had three of us had some interesting conversations about the way that our culture is broken the way [9:26] that civility has broken down let me give you a couple of numbers that are actually pretty scary 15 [9:30] of americans have terminated a friendship over political differences the reality is 53 of the r's [9:36] have a democrat friend only 32 of democrats have a republican friend um granted a lot of that his report [9:43] is being related to former president trump uh kevin drum who i don't know but is a liberal journalist with [9:50] mother jones said quote if you hate culture wars blame liberals he wrote that in washington monthly [9:58] is it fair to blame more liberals for the culture divide or is it one that both sides have to take [10:03] blame for i think that both sides certainly engage in manufactured culture wars and it's frustrating to [10:09] see it um full disclosure i myself uh have engaged in it and i think instead of being oblivious [10:18] or delusional about it um it's important to acknowledge when you've made the mistakes right [10:23] and so the demonizing doesn't help uh at the end of the day we have to realize that we're all americans [10:29] we all want the same thing fundamentally we are the same we might have different solutions different [10:34] ideas demonizing the other side doesn't help uh to accomplish any solutions again we're seeing that [10:41] play out in real time as we speak um i think that there's a market for the division and that market [10:47] is being exploited by our media it's being exploited by politicians um and i mean facebook is in the news [10:55] today i think that facebook uh you know it makes money based on engagement and people are engaged in [11:01] the constant conflict um so it's important to be honest about what the real threats in society are [11:09] i think it's important to focus on why it is that you know certain industries including the media [11:16] engage in this culture of division and we ought to talk about how the incentives are in the wrong place [11:22] i mean there are no incentives to engage in you know friendly conversation or friendly debate i hate [11:29] that my chair you know and i'm short so i'm trying to figure out how to do this i hate turning my back to [11:35] people um here i'll just do this i'll sit on the very edge um but you know we got to be aware of why [11:43] it is that people engage in the divisive rhetoric that they engage in there's a profit motive behind [11:49] it oftentimes i see it play out in the media it's really really hard not to fall victim to it myself [11:55] right but when i take a step back and i look at where the country is right now it's shameful you know we [12:02] don't see each other as fellow americans we don't see each other as even fellow colleagues or workers [12:07] in the workplace everyone has a political identity and that's it and that's not helpful i think the [12:13] division in the country is incredibly embarrassing especially on a world stage and we got to be more [12:18] cognizant of that as we engage in political discussions i certainly agree with an enormous [12:27] amount of what what anna is saying about the the nature of sort of the world that we live in where [12:31] people feel as though they are going to be ostracized socially they feel that they might [12:34] be fired depending on their political point of view uh they feel as though if they make comments [12:38] openly and this is true for pretty much everybody across the political aisle actually with the [12:41] exception of people who consider themselves on the far left according to a cato study basically every [12:46] political subgroup in the united states feels uncomfortable speaking openly about what they [12:49] believe except if you're on the far left because then you get to find people's old tweets and do that [12:53] sort of stuff um but the the you know i i i'm not going to pretend that i think that the culture wars are [12:59] irrelevant i don't i think that many of the culture wars are highly relevant and and not just [13:03] relevant i think that they may be indicative of sort of where the country is going because the way [13:08] that most people experience interactions with the government uh particularly the federal government or [13:12] politics generally is not always based on tax rates or the very minute internecine debates that [13:17] we have over 3.5 trillion dollar bills that nobody knows what's in and then everybody just votes before [13:21] they read the thing a lot of the way that people engage in politics we can i'm sure we'll get into it but [13:27] the the i think that a lot of the ways that socially there's been a pretty strong push from [13:33] the left over the course of the last 10 years in particular and it's driven a lot of reactionary [13:38] resentment on the part of people who are on the right and i would suggest that a lot of the the [13:42] support for president trump for example is driven by precisely that it wasn't just about his economic [13:46] program which differed from sort of the traditional laissez faire republican economic program a lot of it [13:50] was about the idea that he was a culture warrior who was going to punish enemies and and all of this [13:54] and so to pretend that the culture war either doesn't exist or that people are making it up in [13:58] their imagination or that they are overestimating the impact of it on their life is to ignore [14:03] how people are being treated in the spaces that they treat with every day on facebook on twitter [14:09] in the workplace i mean one of the reasons that my family and i left california is not just because [14:13] the living standard although florida is way better uh it is also because you know we left a place [14:18] where we felt as though our children were going to be socially ostracized for a place where we feel [14:21] our children are not going to be socially ostracized and that's a big thing yeah no i mean you actually [14:26] brought up a few issues that i agree with um number one issue is the constant policing of people's [14:34] past what they've said in the past i think holding people to uh the current standards based on the [14:40] current culture um you know if you're looking at tweets for instance from 2009 and you're judging that [14:48] tweet based on what the current culture or the current standards are it's a little ridiculous [14:53] right so going around demonizing people based on their past statements um it shuts down a conversation [14:59] that could be had right a conversation about oh hey look society has actually progressed on this [15:06] and you know look at what was okay i mean you you have late night hosts who were in blackface not too [15:14] long ago right but the culture has changed i think that you know society as a whole not everyone but [15:20] society as a whole has realized oh well blackface has a pretty terrible history and maybe it's not a [15:26] good idea to dress like that as like a cute little halloween costume but beside the point you know i don't [15:32] think that the culture wars are are fake i think the culture wars are taking place the point that i'm [15:38] trying to make is that oftentimes whatever the culture war is of that moment it is manufactured [15:45] as a distraction a perfect example will be you know critical race theory which is not taught in [15:50] elementary schools critical race theory is a graduate level uh curriculum and the fact that it's turned [15:58] into some weird like oh we need to ban critical race theory in elementary schools it's ridiculous and a [16:04] massive distraction that i think is intentionally meant to be a distraction from what people are [16:10] really feeling frustrated about the precariousness of their lives of their work lives uh the fact that [16:17] people feel overworked that they have no control over the work that they're doing that they feel [16:22] alienated over the work that they're doing these are very real issues and i think that you know the [16:28] fact that it's really largely been ignored by both the press and the very political leaders who [16:34] were elected to represent them in the first place has led to the anger that we're seeing bubbling up [16:39] both on the left and the right ben i think you want to make a couple comments yeah i mean this will be [16:43] a very quick note i mean i obviously disagree with you about critical race theory and whether it is [16:46] taught in the public schools critical race theory which i studied in law school i had started off as [16:50] a legal theory but it has an element of praxis and practice uh that was meant to be implemented which [16:55] is why it is taught in education schools as well and why in elementary schools yes a very boiled down i mean [17:00] ibram x kendi is is preaching a very boiled down version of critical race theory and his book is [17:04] assigned in elementary schools and the fact is that when you are having elementary school students who [17:09] are having to check off boxes with regard to their race and then explain to each other whether they [17:13] are historically privileged or not in fourth or fifth grade that's that's a very dumbed down version of [17:18] critical race theory there's sort of a game that gets played with regard to legal theories that end up [17:22] being boiled down intersectionality is another great example of this kimberly crenshaw writes a very [17:25] intelligent law review article about intersectionality and how you can be a member of more than one [17:30] minority group and be discriminated against in a variety of ways and then that is used as the [17:34] basis for a much broader move in american political life and then as soon as you point that out they [17:39] say well that's not intersectionality it's the original law review article that's that's a bit [17:42] of no true scotsman games playing and so i i object to that and and look it is a relevant issue when you [17:47] have terry mcauliffe who's running for governor of virginia literally saying in open debate that it [17:51] should not be parents who are making educational decisions for their children it should be the people in [17:55] education i mean that that that is a culture war issue that i think is of key importance to people who have kids [17:59] right well see i mean i think that that's part of what leads to the lack of trust in our institutions [18:04] i mean yes as a parent you get to make decisions about which school you want your kid to go to if [18:09] you're uncomfortable with the public school curriculum you can take a look at private school options um if [18:14] you don't want that you can homeschool uh but who gets to be the i mean we're talking about parents [18:20] making those decisions who gets to be the arbiter of you know which parent gets to be the arbiter of what [18:26] gets taught in any particular public school i i'm i'm not really buying that they're learning about [18:31] critical race theory or even a boiled down i'm sure i'm positive that you know elementary schools are [18:36] not learning about systemic racism and even if they are uh even if it's a boiled down version of that [18:42] learning about systemic racism is important i think that that's something that's an issue in this [18:47] country that uh gets ignored or completely denied and i think that's wrong i think that's what also leads [18:53] to the division that we're experiencing well that's that's going to be the major culture war [18:57] issue right because the fact is that i as a parent believe that if you're going to you think there's [19:01] no systemic racism i believe that it depends on how you define systemic racism so if you're talking [19:06] about legal regimens of racism no if you're talking about history has after effects of course so i think [19:12] there's a real problem with semantic overload in a lot of our political conversations and when people [19:15] say systemic racism sometimes what they mean by systemic racism is history has consequences you can't [19:20] have 150 years of oh what 300 years of slavery followed by jim crow and uh and that not have [19:26] after effect which of course is true and sometimes what they mean is that every inequality in american [19:30] public life is due to some systemic inequity that is currently taking place in the united states which [19:34] i think is absolutely 100 false i mean we certainly see that playing out in our criminal justice system [19:40] are you going to deny that or are you going to say that let's say african americans or latinos are just [19:45] inherently more criminal or i'm not going to say either of those things i'm going to say that as an [19:50] example why are they overrepresented in our prisons i mean especially when you consider [19:54] this may be beyond the scope of our conversation but the answer is because not all groups commit [19:57] crimes at the same level that has nothing to do with genetics that has everything to do with [20:02] circumstances you guys hold those thoughts on education because i do want to get back to some [20:06] of that too but let me move on to something else we talked about um we talked about the trust issue [20:12] and there's some very interesting surveys out there on trust uh gallup did a survey there's a drop [20:17] across the board and trust in all institutions except law enforcement which is very interesting [20:23] congress sorry for my friends there is the lowest uh media is down there almost as low as congress [20:32] those that rank the highest or small business and the military so this low media rank is that fair or is [20:38] that being manufactured as part of a culture war uh oh it's fair i mean it's entirely fair i mean it's i [20:45] i think that one of the things that we've seen for both good and bad the the fragmentation of media [20:50] is a result of systemic distrust in the media and that's existed for a very long time and that's [20:53] nothing new uh and i think that it's completely fair for people to look at the media i know there [20:57] are people on the left who think that the media is too right-wing right obviously we on the right [21:01] think that the media is far too left-wing but i think that that that sort of distrust in media sources [21:07] is very often justified i think that we're requiring more of people than we used to in the past because [21:12] once people have realized that there's an inherently political angle to how people cover the news [21:15] now we're asking them if you want a full rounded diet you actually have to choose it yourself right [21:20] you have to cultivate yourself to watch the young turks and then watch my show and decide who you [21:23] agree with and where there's sort of a common locus of fact that's the fact and everything else is the [21:27] opinion that's asking a lot of viewers where we didn't used to ask very much of viewers at all right [21:31] you just turn on the evening news and buy whatever walter cronkite is saying whether it's true or not [21:34] um i think most americans waking up to that is a good thing uh the systemic lack of trust in media has some [21:40] bad downstream effects sometimes because when there are no gatekeepers there are no gatekeepers [21:44] so i like the fact that there are no gatekeepers because i think the the gatekeepers were very [21:47] often biased but without gatekeepers sometimes bad stuff gets through yeah i mean i think that right [21:53] now we are experiencing people existing in various filter bubbles so uh if you are for instance uh consuming [22:02] most of your news online if you like a particular brand of programming uh if you let's say lean more [22:08] conservative and you're watching mostly conservative news algorithms offer up more and more conservative [22:14] news and so when you get a if you have preconceived notions and all of a sudden you're hearing or [22:20] reading something that challenges those preconceived notions you're gonna have a negative reaction to [22:25] it and you see that playing out across the board i'll give you an example i mean i have family members [22:30] who are constantly consuming news online um my mom's a good example right she's uh you'd be surprised she's my [22:37] mom because she's on facebook she clicked on a link to let's say the daily wire perfect example [22:43] well facebook is gonna be offering up more daily wire type content and then all of a sudden when [22:49] she's watching the young turk she'll be like well you know i read on facebook or i read on the daily [22:53] wire whatever uh that x y and z happened and you're wrong right um that conversation doesn't actually [23:00] happen that often but i'm giving you an example i was hopeful there for a second [23:07] so look there are all sorts of issues with the media right i mean the the media for the longest [23:13] time completely ignored the very real frustrations that workers have been feeling in this country [23:20] i mean the federal reserve released data indicating that nearly half of americans can't even afford a 400 [23:26] dollar emergency at the same time you tune into cnn cnbc msnbc i mean it doesn't matter across the [23:33] board and they're like the economy is doing great uh you know we're seeing uh record growth and what [23:38] they're specifically talking about is the stock market but the stock market is disconnected from the [23:44] reality that the majority of workers are experiencing so i think that that type of stuff leads to [23:50] uh people feeling you know distrustful toward the press at the same time they exist in these filter [23:57] bubbles and have their preconceived notions it's hard to challenge that so there's a lot of different [24:02] things happening at the same time i don't blame people for not being so trusting of the media one other [24:08] thing that i'll note is that the incentives are always in the wrong place the kind of stories that [24:14] i want to talk about on the young turks and do talk about on the young turks get no attention they [24:18] don't do well in terms of the number of views i want to talk about international news i want to [24:22] talk about what's happening in brazil i want to talk about what's happening in ecuador it'll get [24:26] like maybe 40 000 views at most you know it gets a lot of views i don't know anna kasparian destroys [24:33] this person or here's the latest cat fight like i hate it it's garbage it's garbage because it leads [24:40] to people not trusting the press but at the same time the profits are there the money is there and i think [24:47] you see that play out across the board whether you're talking about cable news or online media [24:52] yeah and at the at the dinner table we're having an interesting conversation it's clearly a [24:55] generational thing my generation grew up watching walter cronkite and uh huntley and brinkley and [25:01] and all these folks and one of the things that i saw in your bio was that you got interested in this [25:05] field because of barbara walters so what happens now to the barbara walters i mean where does news [25:11] reporting go are we gonna will the nightly news be a thing of the past and are we simply going to [25:16] continue to retreat to those mediums that demonstrate that we know everything already [25:21] where's where's this going to go now well let me just note i i loved barbara walters on abc's 2020 [25:28] so i remember um as a kid you know like getting super excited after tgif was over because uh abc's [25:35] 2020 would be on and i i was like fascinated by the fact that this woman was getting paid to talk to [25:42] these incredibly interesting people from around the world and i was just fascinated by the [25:47] conversations that's how i got interested in journalism in the media but i just feel like [25:53] the type of conversations that she had or just news about world events they don't seem to attract the [26:02] kind of attention that they used to and it might be because of an oversaturated market it might be [26:08] because conflict tends to sell manufactured conflicts tend to sell but it's i wish we can [26:16] get back to a place where journalism still really existed where there was like ethical standards that [26:24] were you know that reporters abided by anchors abided by i wish there was a clear distinction between [26:31] opinion and actual hard news journalism you know this is what i talk about with my journalism students [26:38] whenever i have the time to teach uh i always tell them i'm like look there's a difference between [26:42] what i do which is analysis opinion and what you should be doing as an investigative journalist for [26:49] instance you know going out there and actually gathering the news talking to both sides not [26:54] equating both sides and acting as if you know you're completely neutral um but making sure that you [27:00] gather the facts on the ground and report them as they are it's really hard to find that these days [27:06] there's still great journalism taking place i wouldn't be able to do my analysis or my job [27:10] without that great journalism taking place but these are the people who are oftentimes not paid well [27:18] ignored um and don't get any of the benefits that someone might in the media if you engage in the [27:24] conflict nonsense can we go back ben and separate the fact-based from the opinion now or is it going to [27:29] be conflated for the foreseeable future i mean i think the truth is that that was a relatively modern [27:34] construct i mean if you go back to the foundations of the republic the people who were reporting were [27:37] also doing opinion and that was true all the way through the beginning of the 20th century it was [27:41] really only with walter lippman in the 1920s that you start talking about objective standards in [27:45] journalism and there's a difference between an objective standard that you apply to how a story is [27:49] reported and being an objective reporter meaning you have no politics at all and i think frankly if [27:53] you want to reinstall some sort of institutional trust it would be good for reporters to say here's who i [27:57] voted for and then here are also the facts that i am reporting on because otherwise it ends up being a gotcha right [28:02] i see how you're reporting that i see what you're doing i know what you really think about this [28:05] story uh so that that's a major issue i think the other big issue obviously i mentioned gatekeepers [28:09] before i'm very wary of the reinstallation of institutional gatekeepers because if you want [28:14] to talk about market incentives the big players have all the incentives to ensure that they are the [28:17] ones who maintain their access via the gates and this is one of my great fears with some sites that [28:22] we've been very successful with like facebook is that re-establishing the idea that there are [28:26] quote-unquote trusted news sources and those all coincidentally are legacy media sources [28:30] uh means that everybody who's not a legacy media source somebody who started up a company in the [28:34] last 10 years right we opened in our doors in 2015 we're not legacy media and so we don't have that [28:39] legacy so now you're shutting out all the players who are actually entering the market so you actually [28:43] mentioned again just a little bit of a shift because you got my attention earlier you're both born and [28:48] raised in california you left you stayed but we had an interesting conversation at the dinner table that [28:54] maybe your perspectives on california aren't all that different ben i know you said you you were afraid your [29:00] kids weren't going to be we're going to have a difficult time because of their political views [29:04] so um are you sad you that you left california or tell i have not thought for one day about that [29:09] decision that was the it was it was one of the best decisions that i have ever made for my family [29:15] uh we are overjoyed florida is a wonderful state uh basically you know because of my orthodox jewish faith [29:20] that means that i had to move to a place that had some significant jewish resources and so i was looking [29:24] for a place that had those resources uh was in a red state preferably with zero percent state income [29:30] tax and that narrowed it down to basically dallas and florida and so we ended up in florida uh it's [29:36] wonderful but i mean it wasn't just that it was the it was really a lifestyle thing because my wife for [29:39] years was saying yeah we're paying higher taxes but you make a lot of money so you know that's fine but [29:43] the problem is you don't get any of the public services back in california so in our area which is [29:47] a fairly decent suburb you had just an inundation of homelessness in the area like my kids could not walk [29:52] around the neighborhood we'd open up our front gate there'd be a person shooting heroin in their [29:55] foot literally in front of our house or a person passed out on the street uh we had our business [30:00] on ventura boulevard we had to board up windows during the during the george floyd you know some [30:05] protests some riots uh the we we had you know the there were there was a homeless person who smashed [30:11] the the front plate glass window of our establishment when we left and we moved our main business to [30:16] nashville then my family and a small core of the business moved to florida when we left uh we thought [30:21] that we were going to lose probably half the people working for us instead i think over 90 [30:24] of the people were like you're going get us out of here everybody wanted out there's a reason people [30:28] are leaving california well anna uh you shared some concerns too and california like pennsylvania [30:34] uh lost another congressional seat so their population is not growing certainly not at the same rate as [30:39] texas florida etc so share some of your concerns because you talked a little bit about it before [30:44] sure um so california is poorly governed right now um you know i was pretty blunt and uh transparent [30:54] about the fact that i signed the petition to recall gavin newsom so i signed it too we were on exactly the [30:59] same page right now unfortunately the individuals running against him were worse than he was or is [31:07] and so unfortunately when uh the ballot showed up to my uh in my mailbox i ended up voting against the recall [31:15] but i was hoping that there would be a better candidate uh to challenge him i didn't like [31:19] any of the candidates now the reason why i've decided to stay in california is because i love [31:23] the state i know what the state is capable of and i i would much rather stay and fight to make the state [31:28] better in any capacity that i have uh but with that said uh the issue i mean the issues in california are [31:34] endless uh you have corruption i mean literally a city council member had his office raided by the fbi [31:43] because of the pay for play scheme that he was engaged in you have real estate developers running [31:49] amok uh you know you have this effort to build public housing to alleviate some of the homelessness [31:55] but at the same time you know you have the uh lawmakers in the state having like giving these [32:01] sweetheart deals to developers who are very clearly inflating their prices and taking forever to build [32:07] said public housing so there's all sorts of mismanagement i disagree with the way that they're [32:11] handling the homelessness issue as well although i think my solutions might be a little different [32:16] i think that this idea of um you know being incredibly laxed with camping um has been pretty [32:23] disastrous and has attracted um look homelessness isn't just a california issue it's an issue throughout [32:30] the country but when other states are pretty strict against uh encampments and california is very [32:38] relaxed what do you think that's going to do it's going to attract homelessness uh in the state as [32:43] well i want to provide housing for everyone i consider it a human right but i think the way that [32:49] the state is doing it through a public private partnership has not worked out at all thank you [32:54] so let's let's move on to another public policy issue one that's being debated in washington right now [33:01] tax the rich is a very popular sentiment it's also now a fashion statement i guess which we which we've all [33:06] seen um so when president biden looks into the microphone and says pay your fair share what does [33:12] that mean it means that if you're one of the 55 corporations that literally paid absolutely nothing [33:20] in federal income taxes uh in 2020 and in fact received 3.5 billion dollars in tax refunds or rebates [33:29] or tax refunds i should say uh maybe you should uh pay your fair share but here's the thing if the tax [33:34] code is written in a way where corporations can legally take advantage of loopholes and incredibly [33:41] low effective corporate tax rates they're gonna do it right so it's one thing to say pay your fair [33:48] share it's another thing to actually write a tax code that is a little more equitable and ensures that [33:54] everyone is in fact paying their fair share and what's pay your fair share mean i mean the the obvious [33:59] answer would be a flat tax but the the the longer answer is that the united states has one of the [34:05] most progressive income tax systems on planet earth uh most of the systems in for example northern [34:10] europe are far less progressive the the top tax rate kicks in a lot lower on the income scale because [34:14] you have to pay for the large-scale social services uh the the people who are at the top of the income [34:18] bracket in the united states the top quintile essentially pays all net taxes in the united states not some [34:23] not most all and the reason for that is because there are tax transfers and the transfer of payments that [34:27] are inherent in public services do not accrue to the people at the top of the tax bracket they accrue [34:31] to everybody else who is who's receiving that sort of funding when we talk about you know higher taxes [34:36] on corporations we do not have one of the world's lowest corporate tax rates we are somewhere in [34:40] the middle in looking at the oecd countries we are we're certainly not the lowest on the totem [34:45] pole in terms of our corporate tax rate in fact you know right-wing sources like the heritage [34:48] foundation will say that it is much friendlier to do business in places like denmark or sweden in many [34:52] cases than it is to do business in the united states tax rates pretty high in denmark and sweden [34:57] the personal income tax rate is very high in denmark and sweden the corporate tax rate is [35:01] basically near or on par with that of the united states if we were to raise our corporate tax rate [35:06] the way that the president biden is talking about we'd actually have a higher corporate tax rate than [35:09] china currently does the the notion that corporations ought to be paying tax at all in my view is mistaken [35:14] given the fact that the income is immediately either reinvested in the company or passed on to people [35:19] who immediately pay all of that tax by the time the by the time you actually receive your income in this [35:24] country the income has been taxed about seven different ways right you're getting taxed through [35:27] the corporation then it's passed on to you as salary which is taxed if you invest it in the stock market [35:31] and then you sell your stock that is taxed as capital gains tax when you die the government taxes that as [35:35] well so how many times can you tax the same dollar before people begin to disinvest let me um i'd like to [35:47] respond to that though okay go ahead go ahead to argue that the uh corporate tax rates in the united [35:54] states are too high or that you know i mean first off let me just touch on the comparison you gave [36:00] regarding uh taxes progressive taxes uh in european countries versus the united states i mean yes the [36:08] taxes might be higher in those european countries but what do people living in those countries get in [36:13] return they get incredible child care i mean listen uh the average american family two-income household [36:20] spends a whopping 22 percent of their household income on child care alone right so when you're [36:28] talking about european countries that offer quality child care that by the way that opens up the [36:34] opportunity for people to go to work something that we should maybe think about as we're dealing with [36:38] this labor shortage 64 000 women left the job force in april alone not because they want to but [36:45] because they can't afford child care everything in this country is privatized everything has a for-profit [36:52] model and there's consequences that come along with that including for the business community [36:57] that might want you know a more robust social safety net uh program social safety net to ensure that [37:02] people feel comfortable enough to go to work uh but we don't have that here so yes people [37:08] might pay more in taxes including those lower on the income scale but what they get in return is [37:14] far greater than what people in this country have been getting the united states has spent since the [37:19] war on poverty some 22 trillion dollars in the war on poverty we spend an awful lot on social services [37:24] in this country on a per capita level in fact it is very much on par with what the european [37:28] countries spend it's just not spent particularly well when it comes to things like child care a very [37:33] young elizabeth warren before she became senator elizabeth warren specifically wrote about universal child [37:37] care and she said that it actually was contributing to what she called the two income track you know in [37:40] a book that she wrote in the early 2000s and what she talked about is the fact that there are a lot [37:43] of women who for example may not want to work and what you're actually doing is incentivizing people [37:48] to have to go to work because you are now providing child care as opposed to providing a competitive [37:52] advantage to for example families where one parent is working i agree with you by the way that you know [37:58] child care is a very difficult issue i also agree that this is why we used to have for example family [38:02] structures that were conducive to allowing people to help out we had we there are many businesses [38:07] that do provide for some form of child care we certainly have many businesses that provide for [38:11] some form of maternity or paternity leave the the european countries which obviously have been used as [38:17] a model by by a lot of folks on the left between 1970 and 1993 they experienced exorbitantly low rates [38:23] of growth and the reason for that was because they radically overburdened their social safety net systems [38:28] it created enormous social problems it created enormous immigration problems they had to scale a lot of [38:32] those back and why but why why would it create immigration problems it created immigration [38:37] problems because a lot of people were coming specifically for the benefits yeah okay well [38:40] yes that would be that would be to my point which is it creates more problems very often than it's [38:43] i mean but i mean sure i guess that's yes if i put a free donut sign in my shop people will come [38:50] for the no but if you have if you have a robust if you have a society that actually takes care of its [38:57] workers right if you have a society that makes your life a lot easier people are going to want to [39:03] it's part of the reason why at you know people wanted to come here people are going to want [39:07] to live in countries that have both economic opportunity the vastest immigration the vast [39:12] immigration programs that again just make your i mean we talk about freedom if you look at the [39:18] world freedom index okay we like to think of the united states as the freest country we're not the [39:23] freest country you look at that list we're like pretty low down compared to a lot of these nordic [39:30] countries denmark is top of that list so look denmark has a mixed economy when we have these [39:36] debates about whoo socialism versus capitalism i think that those debates are a little ridiculous [39:41] because every country is a well not every country but most countries are mixed economy right the united [39:47] states right exactly now the the issue with the united states is there used to be a time when [39:53] public universities were free right you didn't have to dig yourself into a massive hole to get an [39:58] education there was a time in this country where there was universal child care that was cut down [40:05] to the point where it's like no longer in existence unless you're desperate and have like no money and [40:12] need to take advantage of some programs that are available in some states but my point is like [40:18] we have an issue here where on one hand you know we're experiencing a labor shortage we want people [40:24] to go back to work on the other hand people literally can't afford the child care necessary [40:29] in order to put their kids in a daycare put their kids in child care and be able to go to work [40:34] without their entire paycheck the biden bill the biden bill removes many work requirements for many of [40:39] the payments that are being made to people and it's incentivizing people not to go to back to work [40:43] which is why we have 10 million open jobs in the united states and people not coming back that's not [40:46] that is not what that bill does in fact that's not what that let me move on are you talking about [40:52] the right uh 3.5 trillion dollar i'm talking about the 3.5 trillion dollar 3.5 trillion dollar [40:56] reconciliation offers universal pre-k which opens up the opportunity for mothers to go to work [41:03] if they want to go to work the 3.5 trillion dollar bill by the way has all sorts of subsidies for [41:09] corporations which i don't really understand why the business community isn't salivating over that [41:13] because rather than just going full force with public programs which i think would be the right [41:19] way to go it's offering all sorts of subsidies uh in these you know public private partnerships [41:24] now the physical infrastructure bill has a lot more corporate giveaways which is why the you know [41:29] business community absolutely loves it offers the chance to privatize public infrastructure which is [41:35] why the business community absolutely loves it but at the end of the day if we don't create a society [41:41] where americans can actually have families and go to work then we're going to be in a lot of trouble [41:47] so to go back to your immigration point you made a mention a moment ago of people immigrating to [41:50] the country for the benefits that's just abjectly untrue the fact is that the united states's great [41:54] immigration growth throughout the beginning of the republic all the way up through about 1930 [41:58] was entirely driven by people who were leaving places that in many cases had broader benefits [42:02] places like germany to come to the united states where there was no social safety net the fact is that [42:07] the vast majority of people who used to leave and come to the united states were coming specifically to build a [42:10] life knowing that they really didn't have a lot of social safety net now that's not an argument that [42:14] there shouldn't be some state and local possibility for social safety net but the notion that the way [42:19] that you build a successful country that is a world power and is capable of not only making sure that [42:23] the citizens are taken care of but essentially making sure that the entire western world is taken [42:27] care of which we did throughout the cold war the idea that you do that simply by raising the number of [42:31] social security payments that you're making to people or benefit payments that you're making to people [42:34] this is the way that you build that sort of economy is just non-born out by empirical [42:39] we've had a real far-ranging conversation yes ben let me ask you another question our organization [42:46] is one that on a daily basis supports whatever you want to call it the free market system system of [42:51] economic choice it was disturbing to me and i think to our organization when the national education [42:57] association looked at a resolution i believe it passed one of their committees that called the free [43:03] market system one of oppression but didn't call out other totalitarian regimes so what does it say [43:11] when our educators don't seem to believe in the free market system well i mean obviously i love [43:16] this question so i i i will say that the the national education association is a very far left group [43:22] and so it's not a particular surprise that they're characterizing uh freedom of the market in in that [43:28] particular way it also goes back to the conversation we were having earlier about what sort of control [43:31] parents should have over the education of their own children there's a reason i send my kids to private [43:34] school uh the the notion that that capitalism is a system of unfreedom while government largesse is [43:41] a system of freedom ignores the fact that somebody actually has to pay the bills it also ignores the [43:45] fact that all growth not some all growth that has ever happened is a result of capitalism meaning it is [43:51] the result of free market transactions in which people consent to services and goods from other [43:56] people in which people innovate and make new products there's a reason that we're not still riding [43:59] horses and buggies around that is because of innovation it's because of incentive structures it's because [44:03] people get to keep the fruit of their own labor and then use those fruits of their own labor in [44:06] order to invest in things the the true growth in the american economy was never just a question of [44:11] dollars and cents it was what you got for those dollars and cents all of that is driven by [44:15] entrepreneurs who are willing to take risk and when you disincentivize risk you end up disincentivizing [44:19] people from taking those risks as we become a much more wage-based society and that that has happened [44:24] for a large segment of the population that means that you are incentivizing people to not take those risks [44:31] and countries that don't have people taking those risks end up being countries that economically [44:34] stagnate yeah so those are the ideas that actually funny enough um have been repeated over and over [44:48] again in our education system the idea that you know children or students in this country are taught [44:55] that capitalism is evil is new to me because i certainly did not get that type of education uh quite the [45:01] opposite in fact uh you know freedom is an interesting way of framing it because the fact [45:06] of the matter is if you are financially stable if you are you know in the top 10 of this country for [45:14] instance you probably feel incredibly free you have options endless options available to you you [45:20] probably have a nice nest egg you have a little bit of that economic freedom but you know there are two [45:25] different things at play number one well when you look at what is incentivized under capitalism it's [45:32] actually led to a lot of our own civil liberties being violated for instance data collection that [45:38] takes place on a regular basis without our own knowledge by these social media companies by these [45:44] tech companies who make their money not off of advertising for instance they make the majority of their [45:50] money off of selling our personal information to data brokers it's part of the reason why there are [45:56] infinite websites right now uh so-called data brokers that just sell our personal information including [46:03] where we live what our phone number is where we've worked um i don't really feel very free when i'm [46:08] terrified about my own safety because there's a you know company that's literally making money off of [46:13] selling my personal information so there are certain uh incentives under capitalism that actually do [46:19] infringe upon our civil liberties and our rights so that that's one thing that i want to note but the [46:24] other thing i want to note is how free do you feel if you're on the precipice of financial ruin if you can't [46:32] afford uh paying for a medical emergency that you're experiencing what do you do when you don't have health [46:38] insurance which tens of millions of americans right now don't have because of the exorbitant prices [46:43] associated with it how free do you feel if you're a wage worker who has not experienced your real [46:51] wages increase in literally decades wages have not kept up with inflation so how free do you feel [46:59] when you want to leave your job but you can't because your health care benefits are tied to that work [47:06] or tied to that job i mean freedom again is an interesting way of framing it because i would venture to say [47:11] that there's a significant portion of the population in the united states significant portion of workers [47:16] in this country that do not in fact feel free in fact have experienced the precarious nature of a [47:22] capitalistic system that forces them to work endlessly if they're lucky in a full-time job if they're unlucky [47:29] in several part-time jobs that they cobble together with no benefits just to make ends meet let me give [47:36] you 30 seconds because i want something with that i'll just say i think that there's a bit of a definitional [47:40] game that that's very often played with the the word freedom freedom obviously has two separate [47:44] meanings isaiah berlin talked extensively about the difference between positive liberty and negative [47:48] liberty what you're talking about are things that people need and things that people want and that [47:52] is not the same thing as liberty i'm talking about what people need people need health care i i don't [47:56] disagree that people need health care but to characterize that as a freedom is a very different thing [47:59] if the goal of the government is to provide you the opportunity to seek things right then then that is not the [48:07] same thing as the government providing those things to you directly nor is it the nor is it [48:10] the same thing as the government seizing that thing from one person and giving it to you here [48:14] to proceed to characterize it as freedom is a real mischaracterization again i'm happy to [48:17] discuss whether or not we should change the programming here but i think that the the sleight [48:20] of hand that's played by equating freedom of speech for example or freedom from being murdered on [48:25] the street uh or or freedom to to dispose of your capital as you see fit to characterize that in the same [48:31] language they would use to discuss why you need a house uh that's that's it's it's a difference in [48:36] kind it's apples and oranges yeah so let me just quickly okay guys i want to ask you a question go [48:41] ahead go ahead because uh you know this idea of taking something from one person giving it to a you [48:45] know the redistribution issue which i think oftentimes is uh framed inaccurately you know when we talk about [48:53] redistribution of wealth i mean look at the amount of money that gets invested by our federal [49:00] government in the form of research and development whether we're talking about pharmaceutical [49:04] companies or even companies like tesla the seed money from tesla did not come from private investors [49:10] in fact the same year that obama's administration invested in the failed solyndra project they [49:16] also invested the same amount into tesla and guess what tesla ended up being a massive success [49:22] the only downside to it though is that now you have elon musk who's whining and crying about [49:26] having to pay his fair share of taxes when during the pandemic he became for a brief period of time [49:32] the richest man literally in the world right so we i agree with you about subsidies by the way right [49:39] so welcome to libertarianism so look but look those investments need to be made that research and [49:46] development needs to take place because private investors are not willing to take the risks necessary [49:51] it's true that is that is fundamentally the federal government's research and development [49:56] is what led to the internet i mean it's a huge part of it the fact that the government is a grab bag of [50:01] cash does mean that the government will eventually invest in some things that are worthwhile it also [50:05] invest in an awful lot of enormous piles of crap right the fact is if you don't bear the risk of the [50:09] downside you're going to make a lot of bad investments we got a few more questions and i want to get [50:13] through and we've got four and a half minutes so anna you had said earlier comment about education that [50:18] people can choose to send their kids elsewhere we are an organization that firmly believes in education [50:24] choice and we've got a lot of kids in this state and others that are sentenced to underperforming [50:29] schools solely by virtue of their zip code we tell families in this commonwealth that's your school we [50:37] would never tell them that's your supermarket that's your doctor that's your dentist you get to choose [50:42] because and a lot of that to be blunt is because of the collective bargaining agreements with tenured [50:47] teachers and how much you pay can we really get to educational choice because a lot of these [50:51] parents can't afford to send their kids somewhere else can we really get to that real education [50:56] choice given the current state of collective bargaining in this commonwealth and in this [51:01] country to a large degree yeah absolutely i'm going to say something that's incredibly unpopular [51:05] with this group and that's totally fine the best education in the world currently takes place in [51:10] finland they have the top education model and they have completely banned private education i would do the [51:17] same okay so uh first of all finland is not the united states and there's a frequent attempt uh [51:25] that it does happen a lot where people will take something that has worked in sweden or something [51:28] has worked in norway or something that's worked in finland they'll say what if we just take that [51:31] import it here and it'll work exactly the same way and it typically does not work the fact is that [51:36] that finnish americans make more money in the united states than they do in finland for example they [51:40] have longer life expectancies in the united states than they do in finland this is true of swedish [51:43] americans it's true of nordic americans life expectancy in finland is much higher than the united [51:47] states no you're correct hold on hold on 78 years which is by the way comparable to cuba [51:52] anna hold on a second you're correct the life expectancy in finland is longer than life expectancy [51:56] in the united states that's not what i said i said the life expectancy for finnish americans is [52:00] longer in the united states that is an apples to apples comparison as opposed to comparing completely [52:04] different populations and that's kind of my point okay the fact is that the united states has an [52:08] incredibly diverse population and that diverse population encompasses an enormous number of people [52:12] who have very different beliefs about how education ought to be done to suggest that any [52:16] national standard of education is going to not only please all of those people but prove to be [52:20] successful in such a wide variety of circumstances for some 330 million people we've tried this with [52:25] a gradual not gradually radically increasing federal education budget over the course of the last 30 [52:30] years and what we've got is failing public schools all over the united states except in specific local [52:35] areas where there have been attempts to take back control locally i'd love to see more locale [52:39] more localization and frankly i'm quite pleased that if covet had one decent effect it was more people [52:44] taking their kids out of the public schools okay i want to we got two minutes and so i don't before [52:51] i get in trouble so let's let's go real quick um and this might not be a quick one but so we've we've [52:57] had this discussion in this country and a member of congress has called for and and many others have [53:02] universal basic income um and her comment was we should institute a basic universal income for those [53:10] unwilling to work would that be supported in this country would that be supported yeah um i think [53:16] on a broad level the answer is no although i think that as time goes on and people become more [53:20] dependent on government then the answer is probably getting closer to yes uh the should should it be [53:24] supported in this country the people who are unwilling to work should be paid not to work [53:27] absolutely not i don't see why the government should be incentivizing people who don't want to [53:31] work and have no excuse not to work not to work um i mean look i this is an opinion i have a different [53:41] view of humanity and i think most people want to live lives um with purpose uh so i think most people do in [53:48] fact want to work i i mean for me universal basic income is not the end-all be-all of dealing with [53:55] the economic issues that people are having uh i know that there's been a lot of focus on that uh because [54:00] of andrew yang and his presidential run and his you know demand that people get at least a thousand [54:06] dollars a month i don't think that that's going to solve the issues um i think that uh we have deeper [54:12] problems that we need to deal with um and just throwing money at something in the form of a universal basic income [54:18] is not going to solve that issue uh but if we decide okay maybe we're going to experiment with [54:24] this on top of providing a much more robust social safety net uh then maybe we're having a conversation [54:31] but to me the issue of uh ubi is is less less interesting okay final question we're almost out of [54:37] time um i'm gonna go they can't go over too long because then i get the hook um we've talked a lot about [54:43] where we're going and a lot of pessimism and a lot of concerns what gives you hope right now what gives [54:50] me hope is the younger generation and just how fired up they are about uh experimenting with different [54:57] solutions uh finally we have a generation that's looking at what's being done in other countries [55:02] what's working what isn't working uh we're now seeing more worker co-ops being developed in fact [55:09] there are as many as a thousand worker co-ops in this country about 500 of them are in the startup [55:15] phase but that is exciting news because now we're seeing companies being formed with workers actually [55:22] owning the means of production we're not talking about you know the federal government owning the [55:27] means of production we're talking about actual workers making decisions democratically within the [55:32] workplace i think that's the right way to go about it i love that it's being experimented with [55:37] among uh younger workers and i think that's the right way to go ben what gives you hope uh what [55:41] gives me hope is the fact that because this is such a diverse country and because what we are actually [55:46] watching in real time is is one of the great sorting features that we've seen in american public life [55:50] in quite a while right we're seeing people like me move to florida we're seeing people who are in blue [55:54] states want to stay in blue states and what that's going to lead to is more diversity in terms of the [55:59] the attempted policies and that in turn i would hope would lead to a couple of things one better [56:04] empirical evidence as to what works and what doesn't and two i would really hope that it would [56:08] lead people to look at the federal government and say this is just something that cannot control the [56:12] entire country at once with one giant rubric of rules we have to let california be california and [56:17] we have to let texas be texas and we have to let florida be florida and if we can't agree to do that [56:20] when we are going to be locked in a never-ending battle for supremacy and things are going to get [56:24] very very very ugly before this is over i think that the the great threat to the country right now [56:29] is the widely held belief that the solution is not at the local level and it's not at the state level [56:34] that it is all at the federal level and what we ought to be arguing about each and every day [56:37] is how much money and what sort of regulations we ought to pursue for 330 million people the longer [56:42] that continues the more we're going to decide we don't actually want to be part of that body politic [56:46] that the the rewards being part of that body body politic are not worth the risk of people you [56:50] oppose taking control of that giant gun that is the government and pointing it at you so i'm really [56:55] hoping that that some form of subsidiarity is going to return and that there will be some governmental [57:01] figures who are willing to sort of reestablish the checks and balances uh and and localism that [57:06] were the hallmark of the republic at the beginning and should be the hallmark of it again look i've [57:09] enjoyed this conversation um please thank anna and ben for being with us it certainly was a lot of fun [57:18] and thanks thanks to all of you for coming out appreciate it thanks good evening everyone this is alex [57:29] helper from the pa chamber i'd like to welcome our online attendees to the exclusive virtual speaker q a [57:38] with ben shapiro and anna kasparian just wrapped up a an interesting robust passionate discussion [57:47] we're live here in hershey pennsylvania known as the sweetest place on earth i will say when we [57:52] announced our speakers for the dinner i think some of our guests questioned whether that name would [57:58] be put to the test with this group but uh i counted at least 10 times when the word agree or in agreement [58:07] was used which i think is is encouraging uh you also talked however anna about the incentives that [58:15] are built in that uh almost encourage polarization uh i know gene asked you at the end of what gives you [58:22] hope but uh talk about how you see uh the trend in terms of polarization in our country and and where you [58:32] think things are going well i mean i wish i had a little more hope in regard to the polarization but [58:39] i don't see it really getting any better i can say that among um leftist circles uh certainly when it [58:46] comes to the issue of labor uh there's a lot of talk about how listen if you want to organize in the [58:54] workplace you got to understand that you're going to come across uh people who share certain economic [59:00] interests with you but might be different culturally might be different religiously might have you know [59:06] some uh characteristics or behaviors that you might consider unsavory but at the end of the day [59:12] we're all workers and we need to work together right those are the kinds of conversations that give me a [59:16] little hope in regard to polarization but those are happening on a very macro micro level on a macro level [59:24] what we're seeing you know on the you know throughout the country is just more and more of the divisiveness [59:32] and you know i really enjoyed the conversation with ben today um you're actually a lot better in person [59:40] i'm gonna be honest than i expected and i i think that more of these conversations really need to [59:45] happen i'm happy that the um pa chamber invited me um and was so incredibly friendly and polite [59:51] considering how different my point of view is that was a nice compliment that was my strategy [59:55] i said no i set the bar super low you know and then if i surpassed the bar by like that much [1:00:01] then that's that's where it lives but no obviously it's an enjoyable conversation when you get a [1:00:04] chance to actually address the issues and see where where there's clarification and where there's you [1:00:09] know disagreement i think that's just as important as where there's agreement you know my i'm [1:00:13] friendly with dennis prager and one of dennis's favorite phrases is that he would prefer clarity to [1:00:17] agreement i sort of agree with that yeah so you know i think it's important that there are places [1:00:21] where we agree and i think a lot of that happens on sort of the big issue level like we should be [1:00:26] able to have conversations there shouldn't be bribery to corporations there shouldn't be subsidies [1:00:30] right like a lot of those things we actually agree on i think when it comes to the implementation [1:00:34] then obviously there's some pretty wide points of differentiation and clarifying those i think is [1:00:38] is really important because that does help get to solutions i find that that clarity is is the [1:00:42] is really a deep prerequisite for coming to any sort of agreement and right now politics is this [1:00:49] this kind of ugly game that's played where you pick big terms and you argue over big terms without [1:00:53] defining the terms and so instead of getting to some sort of solution you just argue over the terms [1:00:56] and it turns out you're arguing right past each other at least half the time we got a great question [1:01:02] beforehand about historical context and ben you earlier said you know the the world did not start [1:01:07] spinning when you were born and i think both of you have talked about history are students of [1:01:12] history we feel right now that that you know the country has never been more polarized you know [1:01:17] politics is so dirty but we have times yeah that's our history when things have been bad we had an [1:01:23] election in 1800 when when the candidates couldn't say meaner things about each other we obviously had [1:01:28] the civil war are we truly in a uniquely polarized time or does it just feel that way paraphrasing the [1:01:35] question from the audience take this first or you well you know when i think about some of the [1:01:41] scarier moments recently in in politics like what happened on january 6th um what kind of grounds me [1:01:48] is the fact that we've had some pretty terrible times yes in our nation's capital in the past uh there [1:01:52] was uh notoriously a kkk uh protest that took place in our nation's capital um and so it they didn't storm [1:02:01] the capitol but still uh there's a bombing in the senate building in the 70s right that's true yes and [1:02:05] that's the other thing i mean i think about it not just the senate building i mean bombings were common [1:02:10] occurrences in the in the 1970s and so i know that that's a weird way of looking at things like wow [1:02:16] things are really bad now but they were also really bad in the 1970s my point is that things can get [1:02:21] better right you look at some of the awful things that have happened in history and what i like to do [1:02:26] is look at what the solutions were to get past it but also to help me ground myself when i'm kind of in [1:02:33] a moment of panic right to not kind of lose it and try to um overreact or over respond to some of the [1:02:39] things that i disagree with or some of the things that might be a little terrifying so i i'll say [1:02:44] that on the one hand i'm optimistic because of that because obviously we've had some pretty horrific [1:02:49] circumstances in american history ranging from you know the actual enslavement of a large segment of [1:02:53] the population to the subjection of that same population to the the evils of jim crow uh to the to [1:03:00] the the you know upright the unrest of the 1960s and 1970s to the great depression we've been through some [1:03:05] pretty rough times um but i will say that a lot of those particular fights were over i would say much [1:03:12] more significant issues than the issues that we're having right now i mean the civil war was fought [1:03:15] over the great universal evil of slavery a lot of the fights that we're having right now seem to be [1:03:20] over over issues that in any sort of sane world would be i think less telling like it's it's kind of [1:03:26] it's kind of amazing what people are willing to go to war over right now uh and i think that that does [1:03:30] speak to a lack of of common purpose and common principle uh there's a feeling for me historically that since [1:03:35] the end of the soviet union uh one of the one of the sort of areas that that at least brought [1:03:39] americans together was at least we're not the soviet union right we we have our problems but at least [1:03:43] we're not the soviet union we can unite around that uh and and when the soviet union went away it turned [1:03:46] into okay so what do we want to be and there's some pretty wide disagreement over what we want america [1:03:51] to be i think that there's a trope in politics that actually isn't true which is that all of us sort [1:03:56] of want the same end point we just have different ways of getting there i don't think that's really true i [1:03:59] think many of us have very different end points for what we look for do we want a redistributive [1:04:04] society versus a society that's more oriented toward you know private rights do we want a [1:04:08] society that's more oriented toward free speech or one that's more oriented toward achieving proper [1:04:12] proper public policy at the expense of free speech these are really serious battles so maybe maybe the [1:04:16] battles are more serious than than you know they seem on the surface we've got a question here uh for [1:04:22] anna before we get to that though just a question i have anna you mentioned um being invited by the [1:04:27] chamber even though policy differences no doubt um ben do you get invited to speak to to groups with [1:04:34] whom you have strong policy disagreements uh or other similar experiences for you no that's that's [1:04:40] pretty rare um if i get invited to media outlets uh even that is is somewhat rare i mean there's i i will [1:04:47] say that again i don't think that the incentive structure is quite the same there is a real career [1:04:51] risk for people on the left to have me on because there's almost a secondary boycott that then occurs [1:04:55] for some people and i don't blame them i mean they're there i have friends who are on the left [1:04:59] and and who will say they can't have me on their show because they're afraid of the blowback that [1:05:02] will then occur if they have me on the show now i think that that blowback probably won't materialize [1:05:06] i think in many cases it's just people who don't want to do it because they just don't feel like it [1:05:10] or they overestimate how much blowback it'll be or how tough it'll be um but for some people it's [1:05:15] it's very real and it does exist um look when i speak on college campuses i'm typically invited by the [1:05:21] in-house conservative group on college campuses it's typically not the administration who's like we [1:05:24] definitely need this conservative to come in and talk to our students yeah i mean first let me [1:05:29] just say you're welcome on our show i appreciate that that would be fun yeah that would be a good [1:05:32] conversation um yeah i mean i i can't think of a left-wing equivalent of the u.s chamber of commerce [1:05:39] or the pa chamber of commerce uh but i do think that opening up these types of conversations is [1:05:44] important um so yeah there you have it i appreciate that um question here from uh chris mcgowan appears to [1:05:51] be a captain in the u.s army so uh captain mcgowan we we appreciate your service a question directly [1:05:57] for anna and i'll just read it out i was an economist this is this is chris i was an economist before [1:06:05] joining the army and my understanding is that progressives don't want to socialize the economy [1:06:10] but just the public goods sector of the economy things like prisons police health care military fire [1:06:16] departments that belong in the pr in the public sector according to economists um am i correct [1:06:23] chris is asking or do you actually want to socialize the entire economy oh well i i i don't [1:06:31] want to socialize the entire economy um now let me just note that i don't speak for all socialists in [1:06:38] fact there's a lot of disagreement among socialists about uh how they would like society to appear so let [1:06:44] me just be clear about what i support and what i would want i think there are certain sectors of [1:06:49] our economy that should be decommodified uh including health care education um you know i'm pretty open [1:06:55] about that on the programming that i do uh but in terms of uh markets i i have a i i don't have a problem [1:07:04] with private companies i do have a problem though with the uh power dynamic uh among the the way that i [1:07:13] would classify it is you know you have two classes you have the capitalist class you have the working [1:07:18] class right and so the power dynamic is just completely off right now where the working class has [1:07:25] no power um i'd like to change that so that's why i'm so excited to see uh the emergence of worker co-ops [1:07:31] within the united states i think that's the right way to go um the other way historically that uh labor has [1:07:38] found solutions in this country is by organizing and forming labor unions um and ensuring that you [1:07:44] know they had the power structure necessary to do general strikes which uh applied pressure to fdr [1:07:50] and led to the new deal i think that you know that's what i was talking about regarding not having [1:07:56] to reinvent the wheel um but yeah i think that there are opportunities for private companies that i'm [1:08:02] totally fine with but certain things i do consider to be human rights including health care including [1:08:07] education and there shouldn't be a profit motive and by the way including our justice system we [1:08:12] shouldn't have private prisons um i don't consider private prisons i'm i'm sorry prisons a human right [1:08:17] but i do think that you should take the profit motive out of the prison system because private [1:08:22] prisons have not worked out so well for society so far i mean so obviously i don't i don't consider [1:08:27] profit motive a dirty word in fact i think the profit motive is is one of the single greatest things that [1:08:32] has ever happened to humanity is when people began to realize that that innovation was going to [1:08:37] create greater wealth for them and for the people who actually got their products this is one of the [1:08:40] things that has progressed humanity just enormously since the beginning of the 1800s the profit motive [1:08:45] is a wonderful wonderful thing it is not it is not a negative thing now it depends on what you're [1:08:50] talking about though um wasn't a wasn't a positive thing in texas with their privatized deregulated [1:08:56] power grid which led to 210 texans dying because they didn't want to spend the money necessary to [1:09:01] weatherize their equipment so there are certain areas where profit motive is in fact a dirty word [1:09:06] well so i want to clarify no i mean when the state is involved with profit motive then you have a [1:09:10] real problem the state paying for power for example or when you have the state driving regulations [1:09:15] toward for example green energy and subsidizing particularly less effective forms of energy [1:09:20] because they have an incentive in order to do so that is not paid off for by the risk they take [1:09:24] that also drives some really bad incentive structures but profit motive is a general rule listen i agree [1:09:28] that there are certain places where i'm not in i'm not particularly interested in profit being the [1:09:32] main driver of human activity however the notion that that using profit motive is sort of the all [1:09:37] purpose it's a dirty word it's a bad thing and and if there's a profit motive involved this is what [1:09:41] makes it bad as opposed to bad administration or bad running of a company they're good companies [1:09:44] they're bad companies it ain't the profit motive that makes themselves profit motive is universal to [1:09:48] human behavior because people prefer to see the receipts of their labor when it comes to unionization [1:09:53] obviously we have wide differences on on unionization uh i think that the the law is extraordinarily biased [1:09:59] since the nlra uh against the the so-called capitalist class i don't think the capitalist class exists in [1:10:06] opposition to the worker class i don't think that my workers uh you know the people who work for my [1:10:11] company exist in opposition to me i think that i you know i i really don't know many people who run [1:10:17] businesses who are out to quote-unquote exploit their labor and treat them like garbage i don't think that [1:10:22] that is something that they wake up seeking to do i think that in fact what the what private business [1:10:26] has done is drive competition for labor in ways that non-private industry has never done public [1:10:32] companies are public publicly owned companies uh particularly nationalized industries are not [1:10:39] famous for treating their workers extraordinarily well uh the the notion that private companies treat [1:10:44] their workers horrifically and that all labor is exploitative except if you work for the government [1:10:49] which doesn't have any incentive to treat you well at all because you obviously can't do anything [1:10:52] it's the government uh is is i think wrong i'm not opposed to unions so long as they're not kneecapping [1:10:57] people or so long as they're not forcing anybody into a labor arrangement they don't wish to work [1:11:00] under um but the notion that the the labor arrangements ought to be general on behalf of people [1:11:04] who have not voluntarily signed up for the labor arrangement seems to me skewed yeah i mean i'm just [1:11:09] saying uh you know in my opinion uh well let me just note that as an employer right it's not that you [1:11:19] you have to be awful to your employees but you have a fiduciary responsibility to your shareholders [1:11:26] to return you know to provide a return on their investment that's literally like it's baked into [1:11:33] the system that's true and so as a result i mean what's the most expensive uh cost within a business [1:11:39] it's always labor it's always labor so when we talk about exploitation right exploitation always makes [1:11:44] it seem like you're actively brutal and awful to your employees which in some cases that does happen [1:11:50] but it doesn't even have to get that far the whole point is to extract as much labor for the lowest [1:11:57] possible price that can only happen in order to increase profits and provide a return of investment [1:12:02] to your shareholders that's just the way the system works that's wrong it's an economic fallacy that [1:12:06] there's an impoverishment of workers that goes on under a laissez-faire capitalist system in which [1:12:11] companies are actually competing for a commodity labor is a commodity when you have companies that [1:12:15] are competing for the same labor the price of labor goes up this is one of the great fallacies of [1:12:19] marxist theory is that there would be a general impoverishment of workers that would lead to the [1:12:23] workers of the world rising the fact is the living standards in industrial countries have been [1:12:27] rising steadily into that living standards in non-industrialized countries non-capitalist [1:12:31] countries have been crap for nearly all of human history wages have been stagnant since the 1970s [1:12:36] so the argument that you know these companies are competing for labor it's a cute argument until [1:12:41] you take a look at the actual data what happened what happened what happened to labor between 1800 [1:12:47] and 1970 and has the government grown smaller or larger since 1970 well i mean it's well it's [1:12:52] interesting that you bring up that time period because the largest expansion of the middle class [1:12:56] happened following the new deal and the new deal uh redistributed wealth and you know by the way [1:13:02] certainly gave a lot more power to the worker in the workplace since the night that's been rolled [1:13:06] back since since the 1970s the notion that the middle class has been destroyed as a fallacy the [1:13:11] middle class has largely become the upper middle class nearly 50 percent of americans can't afford [1:13:14] a four hundred dollar emergency i think it pains me to interrupt this discussion because it is [1:13:18] fascinating i know we started off by saying i heard the word agree 10 times but we brought you here [1:13:24] specifically for these discussions because you don't always agree but uh so fascinating and i just want to [1:13:29] thank thank you can i just say i i really really love this because i love getting into these debates [1:13:35] and like i get into these debates oftentimes with my in-laws you know they are cuban from florida [1:13:40] and like my husband we always end up fighting because he's like you can't talk to my family members [1:13:45] like that i love that i get to do that that's fine there's like no hard feelings so thank you i really [1:13:49] like enjoyed it it has been a pleasure we want to thank uh anna kasparian ben shapiro for joining us here in [1:13:56] hershey pennsylvania for the pa chamber dinner thank you to our online attendees for joining us and i [1:14:02] hope everyone has a wonderful evening thank you so much thank you so much