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Language: en
and it's interesting because you talked
about you know it's hard to leave
America because America is still the
king of innovation and this is where
people want to come and there's a
cultural tradition of celebrating people
that do great things historically why do
you say that because this I think is why
I'm bringing it up this has changed tell
me about it well I think that this um
disparity in wealth that arises from
successful
entrepreneurism and the majority of
Americans if you look on an inflation
adjusted basis over the last 10 years
have not seen their incomes rise and so
going back to my original Point
happiness is driven by changes in income
so when we got social media when we got
I mean look there was always media but
now there's like so much more access I
get to see what Kanye West is doing
every day I get to see the plane that
Kim Kardashian is flying in I get to see
what Justin Bieber like how much he's
spending on his new Lamborghini like
there's an element now of insight that I
have as a um a citizen that I never had
um and we always had ultra wealthy
people in capitalist societies they were
always people who have outsized returns
someone who figures out how to make a a
Golden Goose can start making more
golden geese and more golden geese
before anyone else figures out how to
make Golden Goose and so they get this
outsized return they get this incredible
outcome in a capitalist system but I
always look at Jeff Bezos because he's
like like so so many people have such a
negative view of the guy but the guy
gave us this ability to get whatever we
want tomorrow at a fraction of the cost
of what I was paying even at Walmart
it's unbelievable it's unbelievable like
the technology and The Innovation and
the investment that they made they kept
reinvesting every dollar they made and
people thought they were crazy because
they were never making money and he's
like I'm going to keep investing I'm
going to keep investing and he created
this infrastructure that has unlocked
value for everyday consumers that people
can buy stuff and have access to a toy
for their kids for $8 and it shows up on
your doorstep tomorrow or lower priced
food or like this thing that you
wouldn't otherwise be able to buy
because no stores in your neighborhood
sell it this incredible unlock um in
prosperity that's a definition of
prosperity for individuals but he's
boned for having $160 billion and
hanging out on a yacht like mle said we
should be celebrating this dude he's a
superhero what he did what he did for if
if what he did wasn't valuable he
wouldn't be worth 160 billion there was
no cronyism this guy didn't go in and
steal wealth he didn't go in and like
steal a mine and pull all the diamonds
out of the mine and you know prevent the
local people from accessing the diamonds
this guy built a business he innovated
and that's what has happened countless
times in the United States over the last
years and the reality is that
individuals don't necessarily pay
attention because now we're all used to
Amazon we're all used to our iPhones so
the change and benefit we're getting
it's taken for granted I think but my
income isn't going up as an individual
I'm not making more money but this guy's
got $200 billion that's unfair I think
the world is made up of halves and have
knots everyone thinks that they're a
have not relative to some other
have and everyone is a have to some
other have
not that simple fact is what drives all
social policy all of politics all of the
economic all of the economy everything
because it goes back to my point about
desire if I'm a have not relative to
someone else's have I see what they have
that I don't have I want to tax them I
want to get them I want to compete with
them in the market if I am an
entrepreneur I want to go get the market
share they have I want to get a
politician to take their stuff away from
them and if I'm a have and there's a
have not trying to get me I want to vote
for a politician that's going to protect
my assets and I want to vote for a
politician that's going to give me
freedom to continue to have stuff and I
don't and I'm G to have conflict with
the person that that is a have knot that
says that they want to have what I have
because it's my thing it's not their
thing I worked hard for it I deserve it
so that Dynamic is what drives all of
this and I think it goes back to the
point earlier about um government
spending the have knots vote to get what
the haves have or to take stuff away
from the Haves and then the government
is the agent by which we can all
accumulate our power to exercise that
action that's where government programs
come from and the Hales are viewed as
bad by the have not particularly as it
relates to individuals with wealth when
individuals are not seeing their income
grow and so um today unfortunately I
think successful entrepreneurs are
viewed cast in a negative light
generally um you know Elon has gotten
very like socially active he's got very
politically
loud but he's an incredible entrepreneur
um who's built these amazing cars that
everyone wants and he's got this
platform for communication wants every
be to access without restri whichi and
his entrepreneurism is not cated it's
viewed as a threat it's viewed as
something I this guy has stuff he has
power is what politicians see has power
with this open platform he has success
with his car company that the other car
companies don't have so they want to
pass legislation to hurt him he has
wealth that individuals don't have so
they hate him he's viewed as a
right-winger because he doesn't agree
with my policy and he has the ability in
the the megaphone to be able to say that
because he's wealthy so he's he's
negative he's he's an evil character now
largely um so I think that's what we've
kind of seen this um and if you go back
to the
50s I mean look throughout throughout
American history we've had
like some folks that we've boned but
there was a lot of cronyism in the early
days I don't think there's as much
cronyism today I think that there's just
a lot of have have not dynamics that are
driving
this okay so how does that play out
because this strikes me as something
that if it goes too far Lenin the bad
guy had a very useful quote which is if
you give me uh one generation of young
people I will completely change the
world meaning that whatever values and
beliefs you inculcate them with will
completely um become their entire
worldview and so if we raise not one not
to three four I don't know how many
generations of people that vilify the
successful well then people aren't going
to Aspire to be the successful so how do
you think this plays out I could argue
both sides so I could say that we head
down a socialist tunnel if we're not
careful where we want to make sure that
everyone has equal outcome which is what
Malay warns
against when the reality is equal
opportunity everyone has access to
participate is what really drives
success and drives
equality and as long as there are some
young
people that will step out and build
businesses and innovate and build new
technology and participate we do have
enough of that spirit in the United
States still so I'm very optimistic
about like us
entrepreneurism um I could be worried
about the loud voice of the mass saying
we need to re revolt and return to a
equal outcome we need to get to an equal
outcome Society
um and redistribute all the wealth and
redistribute all the assets and
redistribute all the access and so on
but
um I think that there's still enough
young people that succeed through
entrepreneurism that they can become
beacons and lights for the you know for
for making sure that folks don't fall
that way we need to shine light and
support and um and applaud so I I don't
have a great answer for you on this
because I think you could see things go
either way I mean I think generally I
have this worry that we're this very and
this is a broader scope point that we're
at this very weird like intersection of
choosing between like the Dark Ages in
the enlightenment which I've said on my
show like do we want to stop Innovation
because we're fearful of Technology
because we're fearful of progress
because we're fearful of the downside
because we don't like entrepreneurs
because we don't want people to
accumulate wealth because we hate
success because we want the government
to do stuff for us and not individual
companies that's the Dark Ages and if
that wins the day why would that be the
Dark Ages so well I'll just say another
thing about this one of the ways that
this gets supported is the absence of
empiricism fact data because as Malay
points
out all the data shows that
entrepreneurism that capitalism is
better than socialism he said this the
data is there Economist will show you
you're not going to compel someone
that socialism is better unless you
leave out all the data that supports
that capitalism is better okay so you
have to have an absence of
information I'm G this get I can wax a
little too philosophical here because
I'm it ends up going on too much of a
tangent but I do think that there's this
element of human beliefs that allow us
to do incredible things like we have to
come together and believe in something
as a group to accomplish a mission to to
build something like we all get together
and like let's build a house I believe
in the vision of that house so I'm going
to build that house with you takes more
than one person to build that house we
all have to work together so the belief
allows us to accomplish the building of
the house but that also then opens up
room for humans to believe in things
that aren't empirical that aren't
supported by data that maybe I'll take
us down a different path and so we can
believe that the data is right and good
or we can ignore the data and believe in
something else and so I do see a lot of
alarming Behavior things that worry me
particularly on media and from
politicians where they say things that
aren't true and then people believe them
that's what happened in the Dark Ages
and it like whether it's the monarchy or
the church at the time or
whatever group was in power they told
people something that they were told to
believe that allowed them to maintain
their status and then we ended up saying
no the Sun revolves around the earth the
earth doesn't revolve around the sun
despite the data that this crazy guy is
talking about ignore the crazy guy his
data is wrong what we're telling you is
right that's the Dark Ages we ignore
emperis and we ignore fact and we don't
make progress and the enlightenment is
that we get into a more positioned
rational thought mode where let's use
data to make decisions let's look at the
performance of a government program to
decide whether or not we want to keep
doing it let's look at the results of
this experiment let's make sure that
data guides us let's make sure that we
have a principled rational thought about
discussion about what we should do and
that's not what we hear from politicians
I don't hear anyone standing up there I
mean I think Viv probably did the best
job of this like he actually came out
and gave facts about and figures about
the size of some of these government
programs and what they were doing and
this the success or failure of them mle
has shown this there's an there's a
there's a world where we Embrace
technology where we say we're not going
to be fearful of loss but we're going to
embrace the risk because the upside is
worth it we can go to the Moon we can go
to Mars we can cure cancer some people
will die but we can do it we just have
to be willing to do it we can look at
the data and iterate and iterate and be
successful or this stuff is bad you know
this technology is bad this idea of
capitalism is bad the celebration of the
entrepreneur is bad and I think that's
like this like moment this Crossroads
that we are at and we have I don't think
it's like we just go one way or the
other I think we have that choice every
day but I think like we should really
take a hard look at like are we
launching new science new technology
supporting Innovation supporting
entrepreneurship supporting free markets
and allowing the individual that has the
Brilliance and the ability to narrate
and the ability to bring people together
to succeed or are we saying let's sty
that let's shut it down let's use false
facts and falsehoods and the absence and
regulation and you know all this other
stuff to kind of keep things from
progressing and we have this moment
where like there's you know there's this
crazy set of things happening right now
in
science most people don't understand it
they don't get how crazy it is but like
we are understanding how to reverse
aging in every cell in our body
and um there are several multi-billion
doll private companies doing
this there are several multi-billion
dollar private companies building fusion
reaction systems to create unlimited
energy at effectively free production
cost coming from ocean
water either of those two things happen
Humanity's trajectory changes completely
we could live forever or whatever we
could live for hundreds of years we
could have infinitely free energy and
going back to your earlier point with
infinitely free energy I could actually
make gold out of dirt um so that system
does start to exist when energy costs
decline we have ai uh we have this
ability for all of human knowledge to be
encapsulated in a device that I can keep
in my pocket and it can answer any
question for me and do anything for me
using knowledge work and I can spend all
my time pursuing my vision of the future
and creative Pursuits and things that
I'm interested in doing without all the
tedium of dealing with data and dealing
with knowledge and dealing with labor
because machines can do that for me now
there's all these kind of like moments
that were kind of like just coming up
this curve right now yeah and every one
of them there's an effort to sty them
with regulation there's an effort to
denounce the technology as being too
risky it could kill us all it's too
dangerous we shouldn't be doing Fusion
we shouldn't be doing AI we shouldn't be
doing you know or we need to be doing it
carefully uh which means the government
has to come in and control and regulate
it which means that all of the
Innovation is going to be styed that's
the Dark Ages right that's where we miss
out on all of this upside and I think
we're not like accustomed to taking risk
anymore as we were when we were Pioneers
in the west in the United States because
the people that were pioneers in the
west in the United States had nothing to
lose they had nothing that a backpack a
satchel and a horse and a wagon and an
ax and they made their way Oregon Trail
style and they got a piece of land and
they built something today we have so
much to lose I got two cars in a
Suburban driveway I've got you know my
my kids uh I've got my IRA I've got
stuff so I don't know if I want to take
the risk of dying from this new thing I
don't know if I want to go to like you
know going to Mars is cool but I don't
know it's interesting I think that part
of what's at play here is ideas so I
think ideas what people often think of
as culture and momentum those are the
two things that really matter and so
when I I I am a default optimistic
person and I'm becoming a little bit
more optimistic in in the narrow acute
moment that we're living in now but if
you would asked me a year ago I was
getting pretty pessimistic about the
direction we were going from an
authoritarian perspective Elon didn't
own Twitter yet people didn't seem to
want any freedom of speech we were just
coming out of Co where I thought people
acted like Psychopaths it was just
bananas in terms of people giving up all
of their freedom in exchange for safety
it was just it was a very strange time
um and when I think about the ideas that
have people in their grips the ideas are
not necessarily um the ideas of old so I
I will say that um he's a very controver
controversial figure now but it's
somebody I have tremendous respect for
which is Winston Churchill now he grew
up a man of means but despite that he
was so in the grips of a set of ideas
around the greatness of England and uh
Britannia that he was so for people that
don't know his story he has a really
fascinating moment in World War I where
he fights and fights and fights to get
into politics finally gets into politics
gets assigned to forget the name of the
place but it was a naval station and he
ends up messing up massively and it
completely destroys his career and
everybody this is World War I remember
the guy that's later going to be famous
for World War II is like I'm done I no
longer have a career I've made a an
extremely big public mistake um and but
he doesn't go wallowing in it instead he
goes I want to immediately be put on the
front lines of World War I and I'm going
to earn my way back into the government
and so they put him on the front lines
of arguably one of the most gruesome
bloody wars ever this is trench warfare
and he said to his mother it matters so
much to me to have a reputation for
physical courage meaning I'm not I'm not
brave at a desk where you know it's like
quite easy to be brave I'm I'm getting
shot at and I'm brave and so he used to
do like all these like really dangerous
um uh they were just like routine sort
of you walk the perimeter thing and
people didn't want to go with him
because when he would get shot at he
would just stand there and people like
what are you doing and he's like by the
time they've shot at you you either got
hit or you didn't and so he's like now
the danger you know it's passed and so
he just had this attitude of like I'm
not going to be cowed I know what we're
here for I'm going to get this done I'm
going to lead I'm going to show people
what it's about that is a guy who had
everything to lose but what he was
focused on was somehow someway the idea
got planted in his mind that What
mattered was self-respect and when I
look back in history and look very much
these could be the blinders the
rosecolor glasses that I wear about my
own life but so I grew up middle to
lower middle class and my parents were
just like all right we can't give you
money in fact I graduated college with
debt can't help you there but my dad was
obsessed with kids you're going to learn
work ethic and so from the time I was 12
I worked in a door Factory then a paint
factory then a paint Warehouse like just
doing all these
horrendously uh physical labor jobs that
I did not enjoy in the slightest and my
dad just kept saying but you're going to
know how to work when other people don't
and you need to respect that and you
need to understand how that's going to
serve you and so of course that ends up
I remember one of the earliest uh we we
got a video this but it somehow got lost
to the sands of time um Quest starting
nent of course everything is hard and I
had learned how to drive a forklift back
in uh the paint Warehouse days and when
all of our equipment show up we realized
I'm my God we don't have a forklift we
have no way to get this equipment off
this truck and we're all like oh
everyone else was looking around saying
how are we going to do this and I was
like guys I'm actually a certified
forklift driver and they're like what
and so we borrowed a forklift and I was
able to get all of our gear off the
truck and I looked in the camera and I
said Dad wax on wax off you told me that
all these skills would come in handy one
day and so but that set of ideas drove
me and it was the desire to get good at
things that I wasn't good at to earn a
reputation for being the hardest worker
in every room that I was in and so all
of those things end up paying off and
then I remember when I first got on
camera I was telling people all the time
hey you should go out work for free uh
learn something exchange instead of
trying to optimize for money optimize
for knowledge and connections yes and I
would just get lit up oh Tom like these
people are just being taken advantage of
of course you say that because you're
rich and I was like hold on do you know
how I got rich like I wasn't trying to
maximize my dollar I was trying to
maximize knowledge and connections and
so there I can feel that a spirit has
changed in some way and that people are
no longer in the grips of the same ideas
that I was raised with that it was just
the water in the 80s to be the hardest
working person in the room to strive for
more to like pick your biggest dream and
go for it to celebrate people who were
successful and to like my whole life
until it actually happened I was the
temporarily embarrassed Millionaire
right yeah I'm broke today but I'm not
going to be broke forever and so that
whole Spirit has has been exchanged for
what you laid out earlier yeah like
people just expect correct so that
worries you that worries me to no end
and my default stance is that this is a
pendulum that swings and it only swings
based on pain and it will keep going in
One Direction until it is absolutely
intolerable and we will swing back right
and the reason that I do this show is
that the what you need is not just pain
you need pain plus an idea and so when
you have a good idea hopefully if you
have somebody that can articulate that
idea well that you don't have to be in
as much pain before you change course
but yes when I look at Trump Biden as
the nominees for 20124 I'm like oh yeah
th this is a group of people who need
enough pain to go this is ridiculous
yes yeah I mean there's also like what
do we you could ask yourself what do we
celebrate like in the
early 20th century mid 20th century we
celebrated people working hard we
celebrated entrepreneurs and scientists
having
breakthroughs if I ask you the question
today what do you think we celebrate
[Music]
today victimhood
unfortunately victim Hood you've had it
hard
celebrity yeah but that gets a bit of a
mixed bag
but
yes so I think that's the that that's
the Ator for
you and um if that's what we pronounce
if that's what we celebrate that's what
we
manifest the problem is like I think the
the the folks who do
get recognized like it used to be movie
stars were like great
success
um business you know business tycoons
were LED
laed um now it's a celebrity who did a
lot on
Instagram and the problem is that's Out
Of Reach for everyone like it this it
that's what everyone aspires to is
everyone like I think that was the
number one thing out of a recent survey
coming out of high school is like what
do you want to be when you grow up
social media
influencer because that's what we
celebrate um and I think that the the
challenge then is like well people that
are building businesses in other ways
people that are making stuff scientists
it it becomes a very hard thing to kind
of relate uh very obvious things as to
why we're not really seeing people
pursue those interests because it's not
really what we celebrate as much
so yeah so my hope is that we can begin
to
celebrate some um creation Innovation
risk-taking people that are bold uh
success people that pull it off like
when I look at Elon Musk I get it like I
get why some people don't like his
politics fair enough I mean it's uh
there's a bit of a sort of boyish
troll nature to his uh his ongoings on X
but uh at the same time he is he is the
greatest entrepreneur of Our Generation
as far as I know there might be somebody
that's done even more but holy hell and
up I'm thinking of Bezos right along
side of him Bezos is amazing but when I
look at the way that Elon has been able
to replicate it in just wildly different
companies it's it's pure insanity and
doing it from an engineering standpoint
is really really breathtaking