8: Andrew Yang - The Dangerously Different Candidate the Media Wants You to Ignore: Difference between revisions

'''[00:00:08] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:00:08">Hello, you found The Portal.</span> <span title="00:00:10">I'm your host Eric Weinstein, and we'rehere this evening a little bit later than</span> <span title="00:00:13">usual with my friend andpresidential candidate, Andrew Yang.</span> <span title="00:00:17">Andrew, welcome.</span>

'''[00:00:20] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:00:20">Oh my God. </span> <span title="00:00:21">Thanks for bringing the energy.</span> <span title="00:00:22">You've just come fresh off this rally.</span> <span title="00:00:23">MacArthur park.</span> <span title="00:00:24">You're indefatigable, the Energizer bunny.</span>

'''[00:00:27] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:00:27">Yes. </span> <span title="00:00:27">We just had a six thousand person rally,seven thousand, eight thousand, I lost</span> <span title="00:00:33">track.</span> <span title="00:00:33">I was counting manually.</span> <span title="00:00:34">No, I wasn't, but,</span>

'''[00:00:41] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:00:41">It's math, well we're trying.</span> <span title="00:00:43">We're trying.</span> <span title="00:00:44">So we don't want to keep you up latebecause we want you super charged charge</span> <span title="00:00:47">for tomorrow.</span> <span title="00:00:48">So let's just dig right into it.</span> <span title="00:00:50">Um, Andrew, I'm remembering that we werehaving this dinner at, uh, Zazi, uh, in</span> <span title="00:00:55">San Francisco-</span>

'''[00:00:56] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:00:56">And you were impressing the hell out of my wife and myself, and I</span> <span title="00:01:00">said, that guy's going places.</span> <span title="00:01:02">She says, how candy is it?</span> <span title="00:01:03">These are different times.</span>

'''[00:01:05] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:01:05">Oh, thank you... </span> <span title="00:01:05">[inaudible]</span>

'''[00:01:11] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:01:11">I mean uh, our campaign is growing by leaps and bounds by all of the</span> <span title="00:01:16">measurements you would ordinarily measurea presidential campaign, crowd size,</span> <span title="00:01:21">fundraising-</span>

'''[00:01:25] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:01:25">The Yang Gang is absolutely fanatical.</span> <span title="00:01:27">Trust me, I encounter themall the time on social media.</span>

'''[00:01:29] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:01:29">Well, I love the Yang Gang. </span> <span title="00:01:30">Thank you yang Gang.</span> <span title="00:01:32">Uh, yeah.</span> <span title="00:01:33">The excitement is palpable and I love it.</span> <span title="00:01:37">I mean, everywhere I go now people willjust say like, I support you and give me a</span> <span title="00:01:43">fist bump.</span> <span title="00:01:43">And, uh, uh, and certainly when wecampaign, I mean, now we, we draw crowds</span> <span title="00:01:49">of either hundreds or thousandsdepending upon where we are.</span>

'''[00:01:52] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:01:52">It's amazing. </span> <span title="00:01:53">Now, let's just dig into it.</span> <span title="00:01:55">We're in this totally bizarre situation.</span> <span title="00:01:58">I don't think the institutions havefaced up to just how dire our situation-</span>

'''[00:02:03] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:02:03">is. </span> <span title="00:02:03">When I go outside, for the most part, thephysical world is still humming along, but</span> <span title="00:02:08">everywhere else you can see the signs thatsomehow the superstructure that undergirds</span> <span title="00:02:13">the simple physical realityhas really been fraying.</span> <span title="00:02:16">Am I wrong about that?</span>

'''[00:02:17] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:02:17">No, I agree with you, you know, and, and in many ways, if you're</span> <span title="00:02:21">just living life not plugged into, um, allof the institutional decay, then you can</span> <span title="00:02:26">just go out and the sun's shining and thebirds are chirping, and, you know, um,</span> <span title="00:02:30">like you said, the physical world isstill more or less sound, uh, barring the</span> <span title="00:02:34">occasional heat wave and, uh,unseasonal, uh, weather pattern.</span>

'''[00:02:39] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:02:39">So, the way I see it, effectively, what you have is a world of</span> <span title="00:02:44">institutions and you have thewrong people in the institutions.</span> <span title="00:02:48">In fact, what's happened is somehow thatthe institutions were built in an era</span> <span title="00:02:52">where things were growing rapidly.</span> <span title="00:02:54">The growth pattern changed a heck ofa long time ago, almost 50 years ago.</span> <span title="00:02:59">And so for what they've done is they,these institutions have selected for</span> <span title="00:03:03">people who can continue to tell storiesabout growth and to kind of play games.</span> <span title="00:03:09">To keep the illusion that everythingis still humming along as if it was the</span> <span title="00:03:14">fifties and sixties, but thathasn't been true for a long time.</span> <span title="00:03:17">How far off am I?</span>

'''[00:03:19] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:03:19">Well, that's what the numbers say, and I'm a numbers guy where if you</span> <span title="00:03:22">look at the economy of the seventies youhad a certain level of buying power among</span> <span title="00:03:27">the middle class in certain split interms of the gains from the economy among</span> <span title="00:03:32">different parts of society, and then thelines started to diverge starting in the</span> <span title="00:03:37">seventies and now they'reincredibly divergent where you have</span> <span title="00:03:41">middle-class incomes essentially unchangedduring that time, and then people at the</span> <span title="00:03:45">very top level absorbing more of more andmore of the gains and the winner take all</span> <span title="00:03:50">economy.</span> <span title="00:03:50">But we all pretend like it's stillthe seventies, uh, and you can see the</span> <span title="00:03:56">disconnect in the lived experience of mostAmericans and most of the country where</span> <span title="00:04:01">they're starting to catch on that thingshave changed, and I mean, it's dark, it's</span> <span title="00:04:06">dark.</span>

'''[00:04:06] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:04:06">Well, it's incredibly dark and it's worth laughing about, I think,</span> <span title="00:04:08">for that reason, because if we don't havea sense of humor about it, we're not going</span> <span title="00:04:12">to be able to easily do the work.</span> <span title="00:04:14">So I think whistling past the graveyardand gallows humor, definitely there's,</span> <span title="00:04:18">there's a place for that.</span>

'''[00:04:19] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:04:19">Well, I, you know, I, I naturally, um, I suppose people have said</span> <span title="00:04:24">to me that I have a very dystopian pointof view, but I tend to present it in a</span> <span title="00:04:29">positive, upbeat manner.</span>

'''[00:04:31] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:04:31">I think you're trying to get us through a bottleneck that you and I</span> <span title="00:04:34">both know is coming, and that, in essence,I mean, one of the things I'm very</span> <span title="00:04:39">concerned about with you is that I don'twant you to promise the world that you</span> <span title="00:04:43">know how to do this.</span> <span title="00:04:44">I want you just to say that I'm the bestperson to handle whatever's coming next</span> <span title="00:04:48">because nobody knows what to do.</span>

'''[00:04:50] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:04:50">Well, certainly I would never claim omniscience so that I'm going to get</span> <span title="00:04:53">everything right.</span> <span title="00:04:54">I mean, I make mistakes all the time.</span> <span title="00:04:56">Just ask my wife, she'd be like, Hey,you screwed up just the other day.</span> <span title="00:04:59">Uh, uh, but, uh, we, you and I weretalking before the cameras started</span> <span title="00:05:04">rolling, that I think it's going to be avery dark time and the goal has to be to</span> <span title="00:05:08">try and survive the darkness, um, and nothave it produce existential level harm,</span> <span title="00:05:16">uh, and I believe that I can assist inthat regard, but I certainly would never</span> <span title="00:05:20">say that I have all the answers or thatif I'm president, I, everything's going to</span> <span title="00:05:24">work right.</span> <span title="00:05:24">Because the fact is, uh.</span> <span title="00:05:27">There, there are two things that I'vethought about, it's like, there's the way</span> <span title="00:05:30">the president makes you feel-</span>

'''[00:05:32] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:05:32">And then there is actually solving problems on the ground, and right</span> <span title="00:05:37">now, our experience of the presidencytends to be around the feeling.</span> <span title="00:05:43">Like if Donald Trump does somethingirrational, it really does not affect my</span> <span title="00:05:47">day to day existence, except for the factthat I see all the news reports and I'm</span> <span title="00:05:51">like, Oh, that guy, what's he doing?</span> <span title="00:05:52">Um, you know, and thesame is true in reverse.</span> <span title="00:05:54">Like if, uh, Barack Obama did somethingdecent and human, uh, it made me feel</span> <span title="00:05:59">good.</span> <span title="00:06:00">Didn't necessarily, uh, you know,like change my commute, or anything-</span>

'''[00:06:07] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:06:07">Um, and so there's, there's the way it makes us feel, which I believe</span> <span title="00:06:11">I can assist with just about immediatelyfor anyone who, you know, uh, wants</span> <span title="00:06:15">someone who seems, um, solutions oriented-</span>

'''[00:06:22] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:06:22">Yeah. </span> <span title="00:06:22">Data friendly and genuinely wants tojust try and make people's lives better.</span> <span title="00:06:25">I think that that would make people feelbetter, but then there's the reality of</span> <span title="00:06:28">trying to solve the problems from theperch at the top of the government-</span>

'''[00:06:33] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:06:33">And that's a very different process.</span> <span title="00:06:36">I mean, I'm locked in on this idea of afreedom dividend in part because I think</span> <span title="00:06:41">it's the most dramatically positivething we could do, that we could actually</span> <span title="00:06:44">effectuate in real life that would improvepeople's lives, that we can actually get</span> <span title="00:06:49">done.</span>

'''[00:06:50] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:06:50">Now, I am both positive and negative about it, as you probably</span> <span title="00:06:54">remember.</span> <span title="00:06:55">What my belief is, is that wehave two claims as Americans.</span> <span title="00:06:58">We have a claim as a contributor to theeconomy, and we have a claim as a soul</span> <span title="00:07:03">because we happen to live here, and, um,as a soul, we have certain rights as a</span> <span title="00:07:09">human being, just as a member of society.</span> <span title="00:07:12">The weaker of the two is as a soul.</span> <span title="00:07:14">But that claim still exists and in somesense, what you're calling the freedom</span> <span title="00:07:19">dividend or universal basic income speaksto the idea that there are these two</span> <span title="00:07:24">competing claims.</span> <span title="00:07:26">Um, and you, you don't want to get rid ofthe incentive structure that allows people</span> <span title="00:07:30">to, um, you know, take a dreamand turn it into something, and-</span>

'''[00:07:35] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:07:35">I love the dream. </span> <span title="00:07:35">I love work.</span> <span title="00:07:36">I love entrepreneurship.</span>

'''[00:07:37] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:07:37">Yeah. </span> <span title="00:07:37">And this is-</span>

'''[00:07:40] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:07:40">So, I think that there's a theory that there's sort of a series of</span> <span title="00:07:44">economic theories that haven'tyet actually been developed.</span> <span title="00:07:48">And I think one of the things that'sreally important to me is that we retake</span> <span title="00:07:52">the institutions because what we've doneis we've selected for people who've used</span> <span title="00:07:57">very simplistic models that have had ahuge effect on transferring wealth, but</span> <span title="00:08:02">have not actually mirroredour, our problems.</span> <span title="00:08:05">We've selected for the people whohave, really don't tell the truth.</span> <span title="00:08:09">And I'm very worried how, let's talk aboutyour, your, uh, your first term in office,</span> <span title="00:08:14">which is going to happen.</span> <span title="00:08:16">Who are you-</span>

'''[00:08:17] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:08:17">One twenty-one, inauguration day.</span> <span title="00:08:19">It's going to be a blast.</span> <span title="00:08:21">You're going to be there, Pia is going tobe there, Yang Gang's going to be there,</span> <span title="00:08:24">we're going to have a giant party in DC.</span>

'''[00:08:25] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:08:25">Wait, wait, wait, wait a second.</span> <span title="00:08:26">Getting ahead of us.</span> <span title="00:08:28">Who are you going to staff your governmentwith if you're going to have the same</span> <span title="00:08:31">problem that everybody has, which onceyou've caught once the dog catches the</span> <span title="00:08:36">car, then what?</span> <span title="00:08:38">You've got all of these institutions whichhave selected for economists who don't</span> <span title="00:08:41">tell the truth, who, who've selected forsociologists, who are friendly to the</span> <span title="00:08:46">institutions and hostile to our people.</span> <span title="00:08:49">What do we do?</span>

'''[00:08:52] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:08:52">My team is going to be a blend of different people with different</span> <span title="00:08:56">experience sets from differentindustries, even different ideologies.</span> <span title="00:09:01">And I think you need some people who areDC insiders, who have relationships on</span> <span title="00:09:08">Capitol Hill if you really want to getthings done because you're talking about</span> <span title="00:09:11">possibly the most institutionalizedtown in our society.</span> <span title="00:09:16">And so if you get there and just like, I'mgoing to staff it with outsiders, then no</span> <span title="00:09:19">one's going to get anything done.</span>

'''[00:09:21] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:09:21">Yeah. </span> <span title="00:09:21">Like you're not gonna get anything done.</span> <span title="00:09:23">You're just, you're just going to befighting with the system all the time that</span> <span title="00:09:26">they're going to be like these antibodiesthat treat you like, uh, this hostile</span> <span title="00:09:31">agent, and then they're going to justmake your life miserable, at every turn.</span> <span title="00:09:35">I mean, that, that's justthe way organizations work.</span> <span title="00:09:37">It's the way cultures work, um, and so youneed to have a blend of people that are</span> <span title="00:09:41">like, look, Hey, I get it.</span> <span title="00:09:44">Uh, I'm a new figure and you're concerned,um, and one of my principles is that I</span> <span title="00:09:51">don't fault people for theincentives that have formed them.</span> <span title="00:09:55">And, but by this, what I mean is likeif you show up in DC and there's someone</span> <span title="00:09:58">who's been part of the fabric of DC fortwenty plus years, and they are, um,</span> <span title="00:10:06">someone who've been throughadministrations right and left to sort of</span> <span title="00:10:10">survive the whole thing, and their goal isto just keep that function going and make</span> <span title="00:10:14">sure they get to retirement and whatnot,like, you can't blame that person for</span> <span title="00:10:19">being part of that system because that'swhat their incentives have been for years</span> <span title="00:10:24">and years.</span> <span title="00:10:25">And so when you don't want to do is youdon't want to get there and be like, I'm</span> <span title="00:10:27">going to like turn everything upside down.</span> <span title="00:10:29">I'm going to like, attack everyone.</span>

'''[00:10:30] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:10:30">Well, the immune system will just actually, you know, the</span> <span title="00:10:32">macrophages will descend on you and-</span>

'''[00:10:36] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:10:36">You'll never get anything done.</span> <span title="00:10:37">So that was one of the answers that I wasdying to hear, which is, I'm going to have</span> <span title="00:10:41">to work with the infrastructurethat's already there.</span> <span title="00:10:44">But then there's the second part of it,which is that I actually need to see some</span> <span title="00:10:48">people permanently ejected, called out,chastised, who have been this class of</span> <span title="00:10:54">people misadvising our governmentthroughout the eighties, nineties, early</span> <span title="00:10:59">part of this century.</span>

'''[00:11:00] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:11:00">Well, and that's the dark part for all of us.</span> <span title="00:11:02">That we sense that there is reallylimited accountability in DC.</span> <span title="00:11:05">Like, you can give bad advice and screwsomething up and you keep your job, but</span> <span title="00:11:10">you know, your think tank's still there.</span> <span title="00:11:12">Like, no one goes back and says, Hey,your white paper, it turns out it was, uh,</span> <span title="00:11:16">completely mistaken, you know, like that.</span> <span title="00:11:20">That's not the way that town works orthat you know, many, um, government</span> <span title="00:11:26">institutions work.</span> <span title="00:11:27">Um, so that's the, the challenge, is thatyou have to try and make changes within</span> <span title="00:11:33">this incredibly institutionalizedenvironment, uh, and so you need a</span> <span title="00:11:39">combination of peoplethat are well-intended.</span> <span title="00:11:42">You bring them in and say, look, thisis going to feel like brain damage.</span> <span title="00:11:46">You're going to come in-</span>

'''[00:11:47] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:11:47">And you're going to be like, especially if you come in with a</span> <span title="00:11:49">background like you and I might have from,uh, technology or entrepreneurship where</span> <span title="00:11:54">you look up and you'd be like, wait,you have how many people doing what?</span> <span title="00:11:57">And you're not allowed to do what?</span> <span title="00:11:59">You know?</span> <span title="00:11:59">It's like the story of like healthcare.govwhere like the website didn't work in part</span> <span title="00:12:03">because they hired a giant consultingfirm and they had all these bureaucratic</span> <span title="00:12:06">processes and then when the websitedidn't work, you know what they did?</span> <span title="00:12:09">They hired a bunch of Maverick SiliconValley types and threw the red tape out</span> <span title="00:12:14">the window and then did a repair job.</span> <span title="00:12:16">Uh, so the, the goal has to be a bring inpatriots who understand that they're not</span> <span title="00:12:22">going to have like an enjoyable, um, timetrying to turn the battleship, but that if</span> <span title="00:12:28">they turn the battleship three degreesto the right, they can do more good-</span>

'''[00:12:34] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:12:34">Than if they were in another environment where they turned it, you</span> <span title="00:12:37">know, like-</span>

'''[00:12:37] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:12:37">Andrew, I think we're in a much more revolutionary situation and in</span> <span title="00:12:41">part to energize people.</span> <span title="00:12:43">I mean, what we're talking about is arevenge of competency, rev, a revenge of</span> <span title="00:12:48">genius or revenge of people who actuallyknow how to do things and care enough, who</span> <span title="00:12:56">are ready and want to be mobilized andwant to be called up, who've been sitting,</span> <span title="00:13:00">you know, with major league skillsin, in, in, in the minors or worse.</span> <span title="00:13:05">And the fact is, is that what theinstitutions have done have inverted the</span> <span title="00:13:08">competency hierarchy.</span> <span title="00:13:10">I mean, you know, there's a guy that Idon't understand named Brad DeLong who was</span> <span title="00:13:15">part of the group that brought in NAFTA,and they help to sell this idea that free</span> <span title="00:13:20">trade was good for everybody.</span> <span title="00:13:22">And then years later I hear, Oh, youknow what free trade actually is?</span> <span title="00:13:25">There was an esoteric version, an exotericversion, the exoteric version we put on</span> <span title="00:13:29">display for everybody.</span> <span title="00:13:30">We always knew that the, in the esotericversion that was shared in the seminar</span> <span title="00:13:34">rooms, that it was a social Darwinistwelfare function that rewarded you by the</span> <span title="00:13:38">cube of your wealth.</span> <span title="00:13:40">And I'd just sit there with my jaw on thefloor thinking, what did you just say?</span> <span title="00:13:45">And then he says like, I don't understand,maybe we hurt people in Ohio, but we</span> <span title="00:13:48">helped a lot of Mexican peasants.</span> <span title="00:13:50">And I'm thinking, so you think thatthe American voters who you've called</span> <span title="00:13:54">jingoistic and, you know ultra, ultranationalists are going to be very happy</span> <span title="00:14:00">that you've, you've denigrated theirpatriotism and now what they have to show</span> <span title="00:14:04">for it is, is that there are Mexicanpeasants who are significantly better off,</span> <span title="00:14:07">which, I mean, who doesn't wantMexican peasants to be better off?</span> <span title="00:14:10">But, for fff sake.</span> <span title="00:14:13">I mean, this is, this is a classof people that needs to lose.</span>

'''[00:14:18] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:14:18">Yeah. </span> <span title="00:14:19">And a lot of them are goingto lose in my administration.</span> <span title="00:14:22">Like I'm not a generallyvindictive person-</span>

'''[00:14:28] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:14:28">Yeah, exactly. </span> <span title="00:14:29">It's the kind of thing whereit's like, Hey, guess what?</span> <span title="00:14:32">You had a lot of influenceand authority, uh-</span>

'''[00:14:35] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:14:35">Over an era. </span> <span title="00:14:35">It's over now.</span> <span title="00:14:36">Like, no, you know, not going to undulytry and make your life miserable or</span> <span title="00:14:41">anything, but, you know-</span>

'''[00:14:42] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:14:42">Well, exactly. </span> <span title="00:14:43">There's nothing vindictive.</span> <span title="00:14:44">It's just, I don't want to watch the AlanGreenspan Show or the Larry Summers Show</span> <span title="00:14:50">or the Paul Krugman Show.</span> <span title="00:14:51">I don't really need, there's no reasonthat these people get to be in every scene</span> <span title="00:14:55">in every decade ad infinitum.</span>

'''[00:14:58] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:14:58">Yeah. </span> <span title="00:14:59">Again, like I said, there's really noaccountability for being wrong, and so if</span> <span title="00:15:03">someone presided over an era where, youknow, there was epic mismanagement, you</span> <span title="00:15:08">know, we still are askingthem what the heck they think.</span>

'''[00:15:17] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:15:17">Can I hit you with another one?</span> <span title="00:15:18">That's really comical for me?</span>

'''[00:15:20] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:15:20">Um, I watch the graphics that have your name in it, in relationship</span> <span title="00:15:26">to the other competitors, and I know whothe networks are afraid of, and they're</span> <span title="00:15:29">afraid of you.</span> <span title="00:15:30">They'll, they'll do a linear perspectivegraphic and you'll be the guy on the very</span> <span title="00:15:34">far end and then thepresenter will stand in front</span>

'''[00:15:38] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:15:38">Well, I don't think you should be bringing it up.</span> <span title="00:15:39">I think the job is for people like me tobe bringing this up because they've been</span> <span title="00:15:43">playing this game, with like Ron Paul,with Bernie Sanders, and I, I don't know</span> <span title="00:15:48">if you're familiar in magic withthe concept of a magician's choice.</span>

'''[00:15:54] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:15:54">So a magician engages in a trick with magician's choice.</span> <span title="00:15:57">Let's say that I want you to choose, um,C out of A, B, and C, so I give you the</span> <span title="00:16:04">option.</span> <span title="00:16:04">Pick two.</span> <span title="00:16:06">And you pick A and B, and Isay, okay, I'll take those away.</span> <span title="00:16:08">So now we'll look at C, or if you pick Aand C, I'll say, okay, we'll take one of</span> <span title="00:16:13">those two and we'll, we'll throw a B away,now, which one do you, so eventually you</span> <span title="00:16:17">think you've made a decision, but in fact,the whole game was, is that the magician</span> <span title="00:16:21">was pushing you without your knowledge.</span> <span title="00:16:23">This is what I-</span>

'''[00:16:25] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:16:25">This is what I think, it's media companies choice.</span> <span title="00:16:28">And we've got a situation where my feelingis that the more the Yang Gang can find</span> <span title="00:16:35">and this, this goes for Tulsi Gabbard orwhoever else might be sidelined by this</span> <span title="00:16:39">game.</span> <span title="00:16:40">My feeling is is that what you're on rightnow is the equivalent of pirate radio.</span> <span title="00:16:44">This is samizdat for the Americanpeople, and we should be-</span>

'''[00:16:48] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:16:48">It's one of the reasons that we need to make sure that these</span> <span title="00:16:51">channels are opened to the very peoplethat the DNC doesn't want running or the</span> <span title="00:16:57">networks don't want running.</span> <span title="00:16:58">And the thing that I hate is, is thatwe're in this William Tell situation where</span> <span title="00:17:03">we've got to run against our own party.</span>

'''[00:17:06] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:17:06">Yeah. </span> <span title="00:17:07">Well, you know, again-</span>

'''[00:17:08] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:17:08">And you may not want to say that, and I understand why, but I'll</span> <span title="00:17:12">be damned if I'm going to listen to asituation in which you were, you're shut</span> <span title="00:17:16">out of airtime and you're pushedoff to the side of the graphic.</span>

'''[00:17:19] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:17:19">Thank you Eric. </span> <span title="00:17:20">And I can say that, uh, this man is thehead of pirate radio for the 21st century,</span> <span title="00:17:27">certainly one of the high chiefs of it.</span> <span title="00:17:30">Um, and to me, again, you know, you havethese institutions with certain incentives</span> <span title="00:17:37">and certain relationships, and they'regoing to be naturally protective of the</span> <span title="00:17:43">folks that they think are on the insideand be naturally very, uh, leery or the</span> <span title="00:17:48">people that they think are on the outside.</span> <span title="00:17:49">But one of the themes of this era is that,uh, there are more of us on the outside</span> <span title="00:17:55">that are catching on, and that thestranglehold that media companies had on</span> <span title="00:18:01">our attention, um, hasweakened significantly.</span> <span title="00:18:06">It's one reason why someone like me cando so well in this environment or that</span> <span title="00:18:11">someone like you can become thisindependent intellectual voice that</span> <span title="00:18:14">doesn't need to, you know, like get aCNN contributor contract or whatever.</span>

'''[00:18:19] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:18:19">That was very funny. </span> <span title="00:18:20">One of the members of the Washington Post,which you know, says that democracy dies</span> <span title="00:18:25">in darkness, that's their tagline, but oneof them said that everything you, Eric,</span> <span title="00:18:29">you have to say that's new isn't true.</span> <span title="00:18:31">And everything you saythat's true isn't new.</span> <span title="00:18:33">So it was like remarkably, there'snothing I can possibly contribute to the</span> <span title="00:18:36">conversation.</span> <span title="00:18:37">It's just-</span>

'''[00:18:39] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:18:39">I mean statistically, it's pretty hard to imagine that it's a</span> <span title="00:18:41">perfect-</span>

'''[00:18:44] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:18:44">Yeah, and the only stuff that hasn't is wrong.</span> <span title="00:18:46">So, um, what I'd love to do is to talkabout some, some sort of new ideas, um, to</span> <span title="00:18:53">undergird some of the economic things thatyou and I have traditionally talked about</span> <span title="00:18:56">more before your meteoricrise, so let's dig into it.</span>

'''[00:19:01] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:19:01">Okay. </span> <span title="00:19:02">So one of the things that Pia-</span>

'''[00:19:03] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:19:03">Also I want to say that I quote this man all the time, I've learned</span> <span title="00:19:06">a great deal from him and his wife, uh,and that he's one of the most profound</span> <span title="00:19:13">economic thinkers that I've encountered.</span> <span title="00:19:15">And I've met a lot of fucking people.</span> <span title="00:19:16">So, I just wanna-</span>

'''[00:19:17] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:19:17">You're very kind, sir. </span> <span title="00:19:18">And one of the things that I would say isthat even when I disagree with you, even</span> <span title="00:19:22">on your signature stuff, that the wayI really view you is is that you're the</span> <span title="00:19:26">candidate who is most open to newideas, and you're always up for a good</span> <span title="00:19:31">discussion, a good argument, and you'll gowith whatever's best, and I find that you</span> <span title="00:19:35">are as close to non-egoicas anyone I've met running.</span> <span title="00:19:38">I mean, you really are, seem tobe running out of compulsion.</span>

'''[00:19:42] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:19:42">Yeah. </span> <span title="00:19:42">Well, you know, uh, I, I don't haveany native desire to be president.</span>

'''[00:19:47] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:19:47">I didn't felt that you ever did.</span> <span title="00:19:48">And it was one of the reasons Ilove the fact that you're running.</span>

'''[00:19:51] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:19:51">Yeah. </span> <span title="00:19:51">I think my, one of my main qualificationsto be president is that I just don't</span> <span title="00:19:57">socialize that much in the sense of likeif you have me around a bunch of fancy</span> <span title="00:20:02">stuff, like it reallydoesn't do anything for me.</span> <span title="00:20:05">Like, you know, as president, I wouldlove to do away with a lot of the-</span>

'''[00:20:09] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:20:09">Like the ceremony, like it seems like, um, like it's</span> <span title="00:20:13">counterproductive.</span> <span title="00:20:15">Um, and no, I, I ha, I happen to thinkthat might help me do a better job.</span>

'''[00:20:20] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:20:20">So let's try to geek out on a couple of ideas that Pia and I've</span> <span title="00:20:23">been playing with, see what you think.</span>

'''[00:20:24] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:20:24">Yeah. </span> <span title="00:20:25">I love it.</span>

'''[00:20:25] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:20:25">Okay. </span> <span title="00:20:26">So one of the things that we've beenthinking about is some people start</span> <span title="00:20:29">talking about the difference between theshareholder economy of the past and the</span> <span title="00:20:34">stakeholder economy of the future.</span>

'''[00:20:36] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:20:36">Um, there are other issues about the dignity of work and, um, what</span> <span title="00:20:42">happens when machines replace you?</span> <span title="00:20:44">You can't necessarily defend yourselfeconomically, but you still have a reason</span> <span title="00:20:48">to get up in the morning and do something.</span>

'''[00:20:52] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:20:52">Amen. </span> <span title="00:20:52">Now, the thing is, uh, we've been thinkingabout this paradigm from object oriented</span> <span title="00:20:58">programming, which is the differencebetween is-a versus has-a.</span> <span title="00:21:03">So, if a Lamborghini can play a, an FMbroadcast, uh, through its speaker, you</span> <span title="00:21:10">could technically find out that by somedefinition, the Lamborghini is a radio.</span> <span title="00:21:17">But that seems absurd.</span> <span title="00:21:18">It's much more sane tosay that it has a radio.</span> <span title="00:21:22">Just the way it has a transmission.</span> <span title="00:21:24">We make this error, I thinkwhen we talk about workers.</span> <span title="00:21:28">We say that person is a worker, they area brick layer or, or a teamster, you know?</span>

'''[00:21:35] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:21:35">And that what we need to do is to readjust our model of an economic</span> <span title="00:21:40">agent to a has-a model.</span> <span title="00:21:42">And so the idea is that you may havea breadwinner, and you also have a</span> <span title="00:21:47">contributor, and you also have a consumer,and therefore what it is that we do all</span> <span title="00:21:53">day long in the face of the, of theautomation that may or may not get here in</span> <span title="00:21:56">dribs and drabs or come as a wave, wedon't know, that we need to have a model</span> <span title="00:22:02">of humans that recognizes a need to beactive in the economy whether or not the</span> <span title="00:22:08">marginal product of our labor issufficient to take care of our family.</span>

'''[00:22:15] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:22:15">Okay. </span> <span title="00:22:16">So that's, that would be the kind of aresearch program that we would love to try</span> <span title="00:22:20">to see undergirding a new economy thatrecognizes a much richer concept, uh, of</span> <span title="00:22:27">an agent, um, but without it, I'm worriedthat, that, you know, the, the sort of,</span> <span title="00:22:32">the power of that Chicago-style thinkingpushes us back into humans as widgets.</span>

'''[00:22:37] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:22:37">Well, humans is, widgets is predominant, uh, and you can see it at</span> <span title="00:22:41">every turn, where even if you ask a kid,what do you want to be when you grow up?</span> <span title="00:22:44">It's, you know, they'll say, I want to bea fireman, astronaut, baker, a scientist,</span> <span title="00:22:50">whatever it happens to be.</span> <span title="00:22:52">And by the numbers, we are more workobsessed now than we perhaps have ever</span> <span title="00:22:57">been, um, and trying tobreak up our identities-</span>

'''[00:23:02] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:23:02">Into several aspects where you take a trucker who's on the road away</span> <span title="00:23:08">from his family four days a week andsay, you know, your a dad, you're like a</span> <span title="00:23:14">consumer of, of hunting gear or you know,like you, um, there's more to you than</span> <span title="00:23:22">being a trucker when theyhave shaped their life-</span>

'''[00:23:26] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:23:26">Around being a trucker. </span> <span title="00:23:27">Because you know, it's literally, you'rebehind the wheel for fourteen hours a day.</span> <span title="00:23:33">You get out, you sleep at a rest stop.</span> <span title="00:23:35">I mean, these are all consuming types ofexistences that are filled by hundreds of</span> <span title="00:23:41">thousands of american men, andyou know, 94% of them are men.</span> <span title="00:23:46">So, you know, it's not like, Oh, he justthinks they're all men, it's like, come</span> <span title="00:23:48">on.</span> <span title="00:23:49">94% of them are.</span> <span title="00:23:51">Uh, and so if you were to go to thatperson and then try and have them adopt a</span> <span title="00:23:55">more holistic identity when they haveessentially shaped their entire existence</span> <span title="00:24:00">around, uh, their role in this real life,uh, like almost circulatory system, where</span> <span title="00:24:09">it's like they're piloting this bloodvessel that has a bunch of, um, Home Depot</span> <span title="00:24:14">crap in the back or whatever the heckthey're transporting on like a daily</span> <span title="00:24:18">basis.</span> <span title="00:24:19">Um, having them have other aspects oftheir identity that they value to a point</span> <span title="00:24:26">where you could remove the work componentand they would, you know, be cool with</span> <span title="00:24:31">going home, and, um, spending time withtheir, their families, um, is pretty much</span> <span title="00:24:39">the opposite of the way ourcivilization functions right now.</span>

'''[00:24:42] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:24:42">Well we saw these deaths of despair, uh, discussed by economists</span> <span title="00:24:46">in, in the, you know, the heartland ofAmerica, we saw this demographic, um,</span> <span title="00:24:52">crisis that happened when the SovietUnion fell apart with, um, you know, the</span> <span title="00:24:58">mortality crisis.</span> <span title="00:25:00">Uh, all sorts of people were dying ofalcoholism, heart attacks and stress.</span> <span title="00:25:04">So this is a really serious thing we haveto figure out about the restoration of</span> <span title="00:25:09">human meaning and dignity asdifferent from employment.</span>

'''[00:25:13] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:25:13">You had something like a dozen disenfranchised taxi cab drivers and</span> <span title="00:25:18">limo drivers kill themselves, uh, youknow, last year, like one of whom killed</span> <span title="00:25:22">himself in front of city hall.</span> <span title="00:25:24">I mean, like did his self-destructioncaused meaningful ripples in our society?</span> <span title="00:25:29">No.</span> <span title="00:25:29">Most people watching this andlistening to this right now.</span> <span title="00:25:31">It's like, Oh, that shit happened?</span> <span title="00:25:32">Like, you know, like, but there's thissort of self destruction is happening all</span> <span title="00:25:37">the time, and most of them are just menquietly drinking themselves to death in</span> <span title="00:25:42">their homes and thenyou know, they're dead.</span> <span title="00:25:44">Uh, but-</span>

'''[00:25:46] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:25:46">Well, I love the idea that you're talking about compassion for men</span> <span title="00:25:49">because one of the things that I'm findingis that it's very tough to talk in a, in</span> <span title="00:25:54">a, in a world that is currently exploringthis idea of toxic masculinity from some</span> <span title="00:25:59">place that it might've been reasonablydefined in blowing it up past, uh, past</span> <span title="00:26:04">that point.</span> <span title="00:26:05">It's a very dangerous thing to see a worldthat sort of thinks that, you know, all</span> <span title="00:26:11">straight, white guys are okay when infact, many of them are very vulnerable</span> <span title="00:26:15">and, and-</span>

'''[00:26:17] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:26:17">By the numbers. </span> <span title="00:26:17">Right.</span>

'''[00:26:18] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:26:18">You know, and yeah. </span> <span title="00:26:19">It's so, uh, the, and this is one of thethemes that when you talk about trying to</span> <span title="00:26:24">define people, um, by different aspects oftheir life that might have work as one of</span> <span title="00:26:32">them, but like others, the fact is, Ithink men struggle more with breaking up</span> <span title="00:26:38">our identities, um, then women do.</span> <span title="00:26:41">Because if you were to say to a woman, uh,Hey, you're a parent, you're, you know, a</span> <span title="00:26:45">sister, you're, um, a nurse, you're like,all of these things, I think they would be</span> <span title="00:26:50">more ready to embrace some of the non-workaspects of their identity, in part because</span> <span title="00:26:56">of the cultural load that is placed ondifferent types of people in our society.</span>

'''[00:27:01] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:27:01">Yeah but I think they're facing a big one coming up, which is that</span> <span title="00:27:03">you're going to have a huge cohort ofmillennial females who pretty much would,</span> <span title="00:27:10">would love to be in a situation withmeaningful work, but also with a family</span> <span title="00:27:14">raising children of their own.</span> <span title="00:27:16">And there's, first of all, isn'tnecessarily a supply of guys who can rise</span> <span title="00:27:23">to the, I mean, you know, it doesn't haveto be traditional households, but a lot of</span> <span title="00:27:26">it is going to be male, femalebreadwinner, somebody stays at home, it</span> <span title="00:27:30">might be the woman who's in the workforce,might be the guy staying home, whatever.</span> <span title="00:27:33">The fact is a lot of these families aren'tgoing to form because we're not in a</span> <span title="00:27:38">position to say, I can afforda thirty year mortgage.</span> <span title="00:27:42">I can see enough stabilityin my future, I can-</span>

'''[00:27:45] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:27:45">Yeah, and that's part of the thing is that these challenges face us all</span> <span title="00:27:49">in different ways, and it's really, to me,counterproductive to disastrous, to single</span> <span title="00:27:55">out a particular subset ups andbe like, Hey, you've got it wrong.</span> <span title="00:27:58">You're okay.</span> <span title="00:28:00">You know, that's a legitimate, uh, youknow, like thing to be upset about that is</span> <span title="00:28:05">not, I mean, like if, if someone, um, isstruggling, like it ends up reaching, uh,</span> <span title="00:28:13">different groups in different ways.</span>

'''[00:28:15] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:28:15">And you can't say it's like, Oh, your struggles are somehow more, um,</span> <span title="00:28:19">valid than others.</span> <span title="00:28:21">So just to, to, to wrap around thisthought, so I think that the division of</span> <span title="00:28:27">our identities intolike work and non-work-</span>

'''[00:28:30] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:28:30">Uh, it's one of the greatest things we have to overcome.</span> <span title="00:28:36">And by the numbers, if you lose your joband you're a man, um, you tend to have</span> <span title="00:28:44">relatively, uh, self-destructive patternsof behavior manifest, um, relatively</span> <span title="00:28:52">consistently and quickly, where unemployedmen volunteer less than employed men</span> <span title="00:28:57">despite having much morefree time, as an example.</span> <span title="00:29:00">Uh, substance abuse tends to go up,uh, in very self destructive behaviors.</span> <span title="00:29:04">A lot of time spent on the computer goesup, which, so that's a combination of, um,</span> <span title="00:29:10">gaming and some other things, uh, and-</span>

'''[00:29:14] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:29:14">And porn, I'm sure is, you know, I didn't, I mean, I kind of implied</span> <span title="00:29:18">it and, but I was thinking it-</span>

'''[00:29:20] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:29:20">No no no, look, this, this is a free radio station, effectively, and</span> <span title="00:29:23">we're going to be able to say that that'sone of the things that may be deranging</span> <span title="00:29:26">us.</span> <span title="00:29:27">We don't know what its effects are.</span>

'''[00:29:29] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:29:29">Yeah, no, so, uh, and that women have struggles obviously, but the</span> <span title="00:29:36">struggles take a different form in termsof, and the numbers show that women are</span> <span title="00:29:42">more adaptable to non-work idleness inthat they will not share the same patterns</span> <span title="00:29:48">of self-destructive behavior that men do.</span> <span title="00:29:50">Now, of course, women obviously, you know,hate to be unemployed, but the, that, the</span> <span title="00:29:54">thing that I joke about that's sort oftrue is that women however, are never</span> <span title="00:29:57">truly idle in the sense that they alwaysfind like, um, like, like ways to be, um,</span> <span title="00:30:05">productive contributors in a way thatmen struggle with, in many respects.</span>

'''[00:30:07] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:30:07">So kin work for example, where you're working for your family,</span> <span title="00:30:10">taking care of elderly parents, your kids,somebody else's kids, these things are</span> <span title="00:30:17">part of the fabric of civil society.</span> <span title="00:30:19">One of the questions I have is, shouldwe talk about coming up with some new</span> <span title="00:30:23">financial products that get women themoney they need during the period of their</span> <span title="00:30:27">life when they might needextra help in the house?</span> <span title="00:30:30">When they, when the binds that come fromcaring for elderly parents or children are</span> <span title="00:30:36">starting to knock them out of theworkforce and trying to figure out how to</span> <span title="00:30:39">make some kind of creative structure tohelp, um, shift the burdens to times of</span> <span title="00:30:47">their life when they can better afford it.</span> <span title="00:30:49">What do you think about that?</span>

'''[00:30:50] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:30:50">Yeah, so just to sort of show the other side of the coin, so men</span> <span title="00:30:54">volunteer less if they're unemployed thanemployed, even though that doesn't make</span> <span title="00:30:57">any sense in terms of their free time.</span> <span title="00:30:59">Uh, women show higher rates ofvolunteerism and going back to school when</span> <span title="00:31:04">they have, um, more, more time.</span> <span title="00:31:07">Um, so it's just that the numbers showclear patterns of, like, different</span> <span title="00:31:10">responses to, um, non-workrelated time or or idleness.</span> <span title="00:31:18">Um, but I, I'm with you on the factthat right now trying to map everyone's</span> <span title="00:31:22">economic prospects to the, the market, themarket's valuation of our wages, uh, has</span> <span title="00:31:30">all sorts of, um, distorting effects, and,uh, tend to, what you're suggesting that</span> <span title="00:31:36">we should just start putting money intopeople's hands at various points in their</span> <span title="00:31:39">lives.</span> <span title="00:31:40">I mean, that's really one of theunderpinnings of the freedom dividend.</span> <span title="00:31:44">You know, my universal basic income-</span>

'''[00:31:46] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:31:46">Yeah. </span> <span title="00:31:46">It's like you put 1000 bucks a month intopeople's hands and then, um, that would</span> <span title="00:31:51">allow us all to make different types ofdecisions, uh, really from almost day one</span> <span title="00:31:56">of our adulthood.</span>

'''[00:32:02] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:32:02">Let's try a few other things that I think might be interesting.</span> <span title="00:32:04">One thing that, uh, wins presidentialcampaigns that we don't talk much about is</span> <span title="00:32:09">demographers.</span> <span title="00:32:10">Demographers are sometimes asked, Tell mesome group of people that we don't know</span> <span title="00:32:16">about as a voting block thatnobody's figured out how to speak to.</span> <span title="00:32:21">And I think I have a couple of these thatare candidates and I'd like to bounce them</span> <span title="00:32:24">off-</span>

'''[00:32:27] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:32:27">Well then, okay. </span> <span title="00:32:28">So the first one that I have, you know, sothese are things like soccer moms was one</span> <span title="00:32:33">from years past, or exurbs between ruraland suburbs where people didn't realize</span> <span title="00:32:39">that there were intermediate places.</span> <span title="00:32:41">So here's one that I think ishuge that hasn't been identified.</span> <span title="00:32:44">Parents of super smart kids that have somekind of a learning difference that causes</span> <span title="00:32:50">them to wildly underperform in school.</span> <span title="00:32:54">This is something that makes mecrazy because I think it's all over.</span> <span title="00:32:57">Once you start seeing it,you see it everywhere.</span> <span title="00:33:00">Parents are tearing their hair out-</span>

'''[00:33:04] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:33:04">And there's just this maddening loss of human brilliance that is</span> <span title="00:33:09">flushed down the toilet.</span>

'''[00:33:13] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:33:13">Um, well, um, I often refer to these as kids with learning</span> <span title="00:33:18">superpowers, and I talk about teachingdisabilities, which is the more dangerous</span> <span title="00:33:24">version of this, that because peopledon't fit into the notion of what can be</span> <span title="00:33:28">educated by one teacher teaching a room ofthirty people to make the economics work,</span> <span title="00:33:33">um, my belief is that, and I'll come upwith a name for it for you, but I want to</span> <span title="00:33:39">talk to all of the parents who are leadinglives of despair, saying, why is my kid</span> <span title="00:33:44">wildly underperforming and Iknow how smart this kid is?</span> <span title="00:33:47">Why are we doing this to ourselvesand why will no one speak to it?</span> <span title="00:33:51">This is, by the way, this is me andit's been in my family for four or five</span> <span title="00:33:55">generations.</span>

'''[00:33:56] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:33:56">Well, yeah. </span> <span title="00:33:57">I'm very public about the factthat, um, my older son is autistic-</span>

'''[00:34:01] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:34:01">And that when, um, we put him in various environments, I mean, there</span> <span title="00:34:07">were very, very sharp struggles.</span> <span title="00:34:09">Uh, and to me, atypical is the newnormal, like neurologically atypical.</span> <span title="00:34:14">And you're right that as soon as youstart seeing it, you see it everywhere.</span> <span title="00:34:19">And that the facts show thatit's incredibly commonplace.</span> <span title="00:34:25">And at this point, I think most American,um, families have someone other in the</span> <span title="00:34:30">family or someone in their social circlesthat resembles the description, um, that</span> <span title="00:34:35">you just put out there of this group.</span> <span title="00:34:38">To me, a lot of it is thatour institutions just aren't,</span> <span title="00:34:43">aren't well designed for people withdifferent learning profiles or different</span> <span title="00:34:47">approaches to the world-</span>

'''[00:34:47] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:34:47">And yet these are very often the people who are going to found</span> <span title="00:34:50">new fields, who are going to find newdrugs for us, who are going to think in</span> <span title="00:34:53">such different a- uncorrelated fashions,that these are very often the people that</span> <span title="00:35:01">I value the most, and, you never knowwhether the thing's going to work out</span> <span title="00:35:07">because the kid every, every yearis sustaining more and more trauma.</span> <span title="00:35:12">Whereas these other kids, it's like,you know, I remember looking at the</span> <span title="00:35:15">neurotypicals is as if, if I was likeCinderella, watching all the other sisters</span> <span title="00:35:21">go to the ball and I wassitting there scrubbing dishes.</span> <span title="00:35:23">Like what?</span> <span title="00:35:24">You know, every conferencewas, Eric is underperforming.</span> <span title="00:35:27">Eric can't meet his potential.</span> <span title="00:35:28">Eric [inaudible].</span> <span title="00:35:29">You know, at some point it's just like youdon't realize how much damage you're doing</span> <span title="00:35:33">to maybe as much as afifth of the country.</span>

'''[00:35:36] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:35:36">Well, someone described it as a, like you're getting regular, low grade</span> <span title="00:35:40">psychic beating.</span>

'''[00:35:44] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:35:44">And, and that's something that you obviously wouldn't wish upon</span> <span title="00:35:47">anyone, much less little kids.</span>

'''[00:35:50] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:35:50">Yeah, and by the way, the, the autism thing, you know, I don't know</span> <span title="00:35:54">whether your child is high functioning or,or not, but it's certainly the case that a</span> <span title="00:36:00">lot of us have the idea that we almostdon't want to deal with people who aren't</span> <span title="00:36:03">in some sense on the spectrum or havingsome kind of ability to focus and to, um,</span> <span title="00:36:09">work with abstractions.</span> <span title="00:36:11">Very often I think of, you know, I, I'm ontop of this, I'm colorblind and I always</span> <span title="00:36:16">make the point that Isee camouflage better-</span>

'''[00:36:22] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:36:22">Stop it. </span> <span title="00:36:23">That used to happen.</span> <span title="00:36:24">I used to dress myself before I let mygirlfriend, now wife make these decisions.</span> <span title="00:36:30">I would make terrible decisions.</span>

'''[00:36:31] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:36:31">I'm just kidding, you look great.</span> <span title="00:36:33">Yeah he looks great, I'm sureI have something to do with it.</span>

'''[00:36:35] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:36:35">Um, so that, that, that would be one group.</span> <span title="00:36:38">Here's another one that Ithink is really important.</span> <span title="00:36:40">Now, I know that you are the child ofimmigrants and that, you know, I'm of</span> <span title="00:36:45">course married to an immigrant.</span> <span title="00:36:47">Um, the temptation is for us to sort of bevery defensive of our immigrants because</span> <span title="00:36:53">we have some forces at the moment thathave become very jingoistic, and I think</span> <span title="00:36:59">that that's right.</span> <span title="00:36:59">But I also think that we have to recognizethat there is a story about immigration</span> <span title="00:37:04">that's very unpleasant and ugly, whichis how Americans have used immigration to</span> <span title="00:37:11">redistribute wealth amongst ourselves,and effectively the immigrant is used as a</span> <span title="00:37:17">tool of re redistribution, then people getangry or protective of the tool, and one</span> <span title="00:37:23">of the things that I think, that's veryimportant, is, is that a huge chunk of</span> <span title="00:37:28">America is highly xenophilic.</span> <span title="00:37:31">They like foreigners, theylike traveling abroad.</span> <span title="00:37:33">They like food, music.</span>

'''[00:37:35] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:37:35">You probably read, uh, Righteous Mind by Jonathan Haidt.</span> <span title="00:37:38">You're probably friends with John, right?</span>

'''[00:37:40] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:37:40">Yeah. </span> <span title="00:37:40">I figured.</span> <span title="00:37:41">Okay, continue, cause thisis what it reminds me of.</span>

'''[00:37:42] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:37:42">Okay. </span> <span title="00:37:44">The thing is, is that xenophilicrestrictionists are a good chunk of this</span> <span title="00:37:48">country.</span> <span title="00:37:49">If you do a poll, and you allow forall four boxes xenophilic, xenophobic,</span> <span title="00:37:53">restrictionist, expansionist, xenophilicrestrictionism is a giant cohort.</span> <span title="00:37:59">Nobody speaks to it because if you sayanything about restrictionism, the media</span> <span title="00:38:04">will instantaneouslylabel you a xenophobe.</span> <span title="00:38:08">Can we at least distinguish the idea ofthe immigrants as souls, like ourselves,</span> <span title="00:38:15">who have been an important part of ournational tapestry, together with the fact</span> <span title="00:38:21">that very often they are used asinstruments of transfers of wealth?</span> <span title="00:38:27">And-</span>

'''[00:38:27] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:38:27">And that we should be angry at our fellow Americans who</span> <span title="00:38:30">cynically use immigration and hide behindthe immigrant to take money from one</span> <span title="00:38:35">sector and put it into their own pockets.</span>

'''[00:38:37] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:38:37">Or you should not be angry at someone who's angry about the, uh,</span> <span title="00:38:41">immigrants.</span>

'''[00:38:43] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:38:43">Because, because there is something, like you said, it's like, you</span> <span title="00:38:46">know, in some ways someone can have a verylegitimate grievance about the fact that</span> <span title="00:38:49">there have been these, uh, instruments of,of wealth transfer that have been imported</span> <span title="00:38:56">into our midst.</span>

'''[00:38:57] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:38:57">So I call these the Americans who redistribute our wealth, uh,</span> <span title="00:39:00">immigrant entrepreneurs, right?</span> <span title="00:39:02">And the ideas that, if they could usepuppy dogs to redistribute our wealth,</span> <span title="00:39:07">they'd use puppy dogs becausenobody can be against puppies.</span> <span title="00:39:09">Right?</span> <span title="00:39:10">And so it's a very cynicaluse of the Statue of Liberty.</span> <span title="00:39:13">Something that's verydifficult to talk about.</span> <span title="00:39:16">But it's something that I've been talkingabout for a while because I think that</span> <span title="00:39:19">I'm, I'm so far in the xenophiliccategory, it would be comical if somebody</span> <span title="00:39:24">decided I actually had a problem.</span> <span title="00:39:25">So I, I've been bold and I haven't reallyhad the problem, but most Americans feel</span> <span title="00:39:30">very uncomfortable talking aboutimmigration because they have two</span> <span title="00:39:33">different feelings.</span> <span title="00:39:34">They one, have a really good feeling aboutthe person that they know who happened to</span> <span title="00:39:37">come from Uganda or India, and they havethe sense that something is wrong with the</span> <span title="00:39:41">story.</span> <span title="00:39:42">We're going to have to disentangle it andrestore something that makes us feel good</span> <span title="00:39:46">about it rather than uncomfortable.</span>

'''[00:39:57] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:39:57">You know, part, I'm the son of immigrants who loves, uh, this country.</span> <span title="00:40:02">He loves that immigrants have been anincredible source of dynamism, but, uh,</span> <span title="00:40:08">you know, you can't have openborders and unrestricted immigration.</span> <span title="00:40:13">I understand the sentiment where peopleare struggling with, um, the fact that our</span> <span title="00:40:19">country has brought many people in eitherintentionally or unintentionally, uh, in</span> <span title="00:40:24">ways that are changing, uh, our economyand society in ways that in like, some</span> <span title="00:40:32">people have legitimate, um, problems with.</span>

'''[00:40:37] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:40:37">Yeah. </span> <span title="00:40:37">I just think, I think we need to beable to have an open conversation about</span> <span title="00:40:40">difficult topics aroundthis and pull them apart.</span> <span title="00:40:43">And the fact is we need, we need peopleto feel comfortable that it's okay to feel</span> <span title="00:40:49">uncomfortable as long as you're trying toexplore it with-- The current president,</span> <span title="00:40:53">for my money, gets way tooclose to jingoistic sentiment.</span>

'''[00:40:57] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:40:57">And that's one of the natural reactions is that if the current president</span> <span title="00:41:01">says one thing, then, you know, the rightthing to do is say the exact opposite.</span> <span title="00:41:05">But then the nuance gets lost and thenunfortunately we end up falling into,</span> <span title="00:41:10">these polarized camps</span>

'''[00:41:11] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:41:11">That's why I feel like, we have, it's so important not only to defeat</span> <span title="00:41:14">the current president, but also to defeatthe kleptocratic center of, uh, of our own</span> <span title="00:41:20">party as well as the regressive left thatproposes as the progressive left, and then</span> <span title="00:41:27">to take care of the constituents that arecurrently all over the spectrum in a new</span> <span title="00:41:33">world, and this is one of the things Ilove about your slogan, which is not left</span> <span title="00:41:37">or right, but forward, right?</span>

'''[00:41:38] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:41:38">Yes. </span> <span title="00:41:39">That's the slogan.</span>

'''[00:41:40] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:41:40">Yeah. </span> <span title="00:41:40">And that that thing is, is thatit's moot, it's a question of-</span>

'''[00:41:43] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:41:43">It also happens to be the truth.</span> <span title="00:41:44">It's not just like-</span>

'''[00:41:44] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:41:44">I know, that that's the thing.</span> <span title="00:41:46">It's moving out of Flatland, like we'vebeen, we've been given this smorgasbord of</span> <span title="00:41:51">bad options and just say, Hey, Idon't think I want to dine from there.</span> <span title="00:41:54">I think these thingsare available off menu.</span> <span title="00:41:56">Do you mind if I, if I, you know, like forexample, Starbucks I think will sell you a</span> <span title="00:42:01">short cup of coffee, but theywon't put it on the menu.</span> <span title="00:42:03">You have to know that to ask for it.</span> <span title="00:42:05">So I like to think of you as the guy whosomehow knows that there are things that</span> <span title="00:42:08">aren't on the menu.</span>

'''[00:42:09] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:42:09">I am animal style at In-N-Out.</span> <span title="00:42:12">I am, Andrew Yang is animal style.</span> <span title="00:42:15">Uh-</span>

'''[00:42:17] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:42:17">I agree that I can change the political conversation, uh, in a way that</span> <span title="00:42:22">many Americans find veryexciting and productive.</span> <span title="00:42:25">Uh, because 25% of Americans arepolitically disengaged, including, I'm</span> <span title="00:42:29">sure, some people watching this, um, andI believe it's up to 48% self-identify as</span> <span title="00:42:34">independent, which is almost twicewhat identify as either Democratic or</span> <span title="00:42:37">Republican-</span>

'''[00:42:37] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:42:37">I'm so close to identifying as independent.</span> <span title="00:42:40">I, I can't stand my own party, but myfeeling is I have to stay there and say,</span> <span title="00:42:44">Hey, we're out of control, in orderto save the structure, because I, I-</span>

'''[00:42:50] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:42:50">Well, the two party system, I mean, I agree.</span> <span title="00:42:52">That's why I'm why I'mrunning as a Democrat.</span> <span title="00:42:54">In part it's like, well,you have these two parties.</span> <span title="00:42:56">Maybe you can turn one of them into like ahighly functioning party with great ideas</span> <span title="00:43:01">and the rest of it, I mean, that'slike an easier solution than-</span>

'''[00:43:04] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:43:04">Look Andrew, what I really want to do is I want to ret- I want the</span> <span title="00:43:07">insurgency that you and I have been sortof a part of, this loose collection of</span> <span title="00:43:12">people who are thinking completely off themenu, to start retaking our institutions.</span> <span title="00:43:19">We always had heterodox people of highcaliber who are, you know, effectively</span> <span title="00:43:25">heretics housed inside the Harvards andMITs and Caltechs, and I think we've</span> <span title="00:43:32">gotten rid of that kind of-</span>

'''[00:43:35] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:43:35">Or they are there. </span> <span title="00:43:36">Then they're scared shitless to, like,say the wrong thing or else they'll get-</span>

'''[00:43:39] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:43:39">Well, do you remember the time, you remember that situation where</span> <span title="00:43:42">MIT turned over Aaron Schwartz?</span>

'''[00:43:53] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:43:53">It's like everybody knows that, but you're not allowed to do it in</span> <span title="00:43:55">public.</span> <span title="00:43:55">So screw that.</span> <span title="00:43:57">You know, we had this situationwith this guy, Aaron Schwartz-</span>

'''[00:44:00] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:44:00">No. </span> <span title="00:44:00">Did you?</span>

'''[00:44:03] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:44:03">Yeah. </span> <span title="00:44:03">You know, and this guy almost certainlywas a pretty pure hearted human being who</span> <span title="00:44:10">was fighting the good fight.</span> <span title="00:44:11">MIT is supposed to shelter those people,and instead they cooperate, you know, in</span> <span title="00:44:17">turning them over.</span>

'''[00:44:17] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:44:17">As soon as you get the institutional incentives in a particular</span> <span title="00:44:19">direction, and like, I mean, this isnot near, and this is just like recent,</span> <span title="00:44:24">because in recent memory, but you know, Istuck up for Shane Gillis, this comedian</span> <span title="00:44:28">that, um, had said-</span>

'''[00:44:30] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:44:30">I saw that, and the the idea that, you know, you were in a</span> <span title="00:44:32">position to say, look,I'm the candidate, uh-</span>

'''[00:44:36] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:44:36">He personally actually, yeah, and so if anyone should be offended, it's</span> <span title="00:44:39">me.</span> <span title="00:44:39">And so I think he shouldn'tlose his job over it, well-</span>

'''[00:44:42] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:44:42">Well, this is the thing, the quality of mercy, or forgiveness or,</span> <span title="00:44:47">um, just recognition, uh, that thereshould be space for remorse and</span> <span title="00:44:53">redemption, this is what makes so much ofthe intolerant left, feel cult-like, and I</span> <span title="00:45:00">thought what you were doing was youwere showing the best aspects of a truly</span> <span title="00:45:04">compassionate left.</span>

'''[00:45:05] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:45:05">I was trying to be a human being.</span> <span title="00:45:07">You know, like you looked at it andbeing like, well, like is that a job?</span> <span title="00:45:11">Losing a fence?</span> <span title="00:45:12">But then the fact that NBC ended up firinghim was entirely consistent with our</span> <span title="00:45:19">corporate incentives, because if you lookat it and say like, well, is this person</span> <span title="00:45:22">that we've invested a lot in that'ssome, a revenue generator for us?</span> <span title="00:45:25">No, because he hadn'teven worked for one day.</span> <span title="00:45:28">It's like our corporate incentives to canhim and thoughts like, you know, put an</span> <span title="00:45:32">end to any controversy or advertiser orwhatnot, that would be troubled by it.</span> <span title="00:45:38">Yeah.</span> <span title="00:45:38">So it's like, so if you'd asked me, it'slike, Hey, do you think he's going to be</span> <span title="00:45:40">fired, I'd be like, Yeah, he's almostcertainly going to be fired because that's</span> <span title="00:45:43">what the corporate incentives [inaudible].</span>

'''[00:45:44] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:45:44">Well I understand that, so one of the things that I'm really</span> <span title="00:45:46">interested in doing-</span>

'''[00:45:47] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:45:47">But it, it still made me sad. </span> <span title="00:45:48">Like I was like, Hey, this would beunusually, uh, human and forgiving if they</span> <span title="00:45:54">decided to-</span>

'''[00:45:55] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:45:55">Well, they lost a teachable moment because one of the things</span> <span title="00:45:58">that's going on is that so much of theinformation economy is very, very marginal</span> <span title="00:46:04">in the sense that you'realmost producing a public good.</span> <span title="00:46:06">So for example, I slapads on my podcasts, um-</span>

'''[00:46:12] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:46:12">What I'm trying, well, what I'm trying to do is I've tried two</span> <span title="00:46:14">new models, one of which I'm callingreverse sponsorship, where I shout out</span> <span title="00:46:19">some great company, uh, which doesn't knowthat I'm going to say something positive</span> <span title="00:46:23">and maybe they become sponsors, maybethey don't, but the other one is</span> <span title="00:46:26">risk-vertisers, where people get to knowme over long periods of time, and the hope</span> <span title="00:46:30">is that you're going to say, look, you'renot going to catch me being horrible and</span> <span title="00:46:35">bigoted and all of these things, butI might say something dangerous, like</span> <span title="00:46:38">something that I just said aboutimmigration, and will you make sure that</span> <span title="00:46:42">you will not run away from me during theperiod where the mob descends and the</span> <span title="00:46:47">frenzy is at its worst?</span> <span title="00:46:49">Right?</span> <span title="00:46:49">Because if we don't fix the economicmodels, we can't have deeper discussions</span> <span title="00:46:54">because everybody's going to runaway at the first sight of trouble.</span> <span title="00:46:57">And so part of what we're trying todo ultimately with the advertising-</span>

'''[00:47:04] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:47:04">I mean, I love it. </span> <span title="00:47:04">It's like leave it to you to tryand solve that kind of problem.</span>

'''[00:47:08] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:47:08">Alright, I've got some other things that I want to talk about in</span> <span title="00:47:10">demographics.</span>

'''[00:47:12] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:47:12">So, so, so let me first say, I am a parent of a neurologically atypical</span> <span title="00:47:18">young person.</span> <span title="00:47:20">Um, I agree with you that I think thatmany of the people who have a different</span> <span title="00:47:23">perspective, are going to end up beingcontributors in highly distinctive ways.</span> <span title="00:47:28">I will say that even kids who are notgoing to be contributors in highly</span> <span title="00:47:32">distinctive ways still deserve schoolsthat can support and accommodate them.</span> <span title="00:47:37">Um, and, that to me, these kids are like,the shorthand I use is that they're spiky.</span> <span title="00:47:44">You know, it's like you have, um, veryhigh capacities in some respects or a</span> <span title="00:47:49">different point of view, and thenreal challenges in other respects.</span> <span title="00:47:52">And so if I send you into a socialenvironment where there are thirty kids</span> <span title="00:47:57">for one teacher, you're going tohave a terrible, terrible time.</span> <span title="00:48:01">And you know, and, andthat's 100% predictable.</span> <span title="00:48:03">And so if then you have like a criticalmass of people that resemble this, uh,</span> <span title="00:48:08">then you should try and design aninstitution that takes that into account.</span> <span title="00:48:12">Um, and I feel so deeply for familiesthat struggle with this, like you struggle</span> <span title="00:48:17">with, it sounds likeyou've experienced it.</span>

'''[00:48:19] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:48:19">I have struggled with it. </span> <span title="00:48:20">And you, and Pia, you know, and me andEvelyn, like we have an unusual level of</span> <span title="00:48:25">ability to try and, you know, managesituation, um, and I meet single moms</span> <span title="00:48:31">around the country who have, you know,autistic or, um, neurologically atypical</span> <span title="00:48:36">kids that don't have the means and theylive in a part of the country that does</span> <span title="00:48:40">not have like a lot of resources inplace for kids that are different.</span> <span title="00:48:44">And, it breaks my heart.</span> <span title="00:48:46">Like it, the fact that there are all ofthese kids that are heading into these</span> <span title="00:48:50">schools that are getting, um, you know,more than low grade psychic beatings.</span>

'''[00:48:55] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:48:55">Oh my God, this is why I leave my, my DMs open on Twitter, and this</span> <span title="00:48:59">is one of the number one things I do itfor, is people write to me and they say, I</span> <span title="00:49:02">know you're really busy, but I just wantto tell you, nobody had ever spoken to my</span> <span title="00:49:06">situation.</span> <span title="00:49:07">You're proud of somethingI'm always ashamed of, and-</span>

'''[00:49:10] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:49:10">I guarantee you I'm not the first presidential candidate with autism</span> <span title="00:49:12">in the family.</span>

'''[00:49:13] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:49:13">And the fact that I'm on the first talking about it is, to me, long</span> <span title="00:49:17">overdue and ridiculous.</span> <span title="00:49:19">Uh, and-</span>

'''[00:49:20] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:49:20">And you know, and I get, I get some of the same messages that you</span> <span title="00:49:23">get, but you know, like I want to actuallytry and solve the problem for those</span> <span title="00:49:27">families.</span> <span title="00:49:28">I mean, it makes me feel glad that theyfeel spoken to and that they realize</span> <span title="00:49:31">they're not the onlyones going through it.</span>

'''[00:49:32] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:49:32">I want to see, I want to see more money going to figure out how do</span> <span title="00:49:36">we diversify the classroom of the future-</span>

'''[00:49:39] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:49:39">So that the load isn't born by people who don't fit the economics</span> <span title="00:49:43">of the teaching model.</span>

'''[00:49:44] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:49:44">Yes. </span> <span title="00:49:45">And part of it is that, um, that we regardthe education of our kids as a cost, and</span> <span title="00:49:49">so then the city then is like, well, Ican't afford to have like a teacher for</span> <span title="00:49:54">your, uh, neurologically atypical kid, um,and so what we have to do is, talk about</span> <span title="00:49:59">inverting the model, is you have to lookat the education of our children as an</span> <span title="00:50:04">investment.</span> <span title="00:50:05">Uh, and then you say, what's that?</span> <span title="00:50:07">Like, these kids require, you know, likeX and Y, and then we should make that</span> <span title="00:50:12">investment with the certainty, and I shareyour confidence in this, that you have a</span> <span title="00:50:17">couple of those kids do something highlyatypical and remarkable, then that pays</span> <span title="00:50:23">for whatever, uh, support, or,teacher, or infrastructure-</span>

'''[00:50:27] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:50:27">This is an underground movement.</span> <span title="00:50:28">I mean, I just had a, a very well knownprofessor, uh, reveal to me that he</span> <span title="00:50:35">couldn't read papers, in his field,I mean, he just can't read, you know?</span> <span title="00:50:39">And he has to figure out whatthe paper is likely to be saying.</span> <span title="00:50:43">There is such a weird world of,of, um, unexpected achievement.</span>

'''[00:50:50] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:50:50">And this is the demon, the demon that we have to, um, slay anyways is</span> <span title="00:50:56">that, um, the negative externalities arenot being encompassed within the budgets</span> <span title="00:51:01">of various institutions.</span>

'''[00:51:03] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:51:03">But, but then also where foregoing all of the potential positive</span> <span title="00:51:08">value creation or generation from properinvestment in our human capital, um, and</span> <span title="00:51:15">another dimension too, and this is neitherhere nor there, but I was just with Dean</span> <span title="00:51:18">Kamen in New Hampshire and he wastalking about how the FDA, like all their</span> <span title="00:51:23">incentives are just to likeregulate the shit out of anything.</span> <span title="00:51:26">And then I said to him, I was like, youknow, what they should start measuring is</span> <span title="00:51:29">the foregone utility of keeping somethingaway from, uh, from people, like if you</span> <span title="00:51:34">had something and-</span>

'''[00:51:37] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:51:37">Yeah. </span> <span title="00:51:38">He had like, he had like this prostheticlimb that he was trying to give to vets,</span> <span title="00:51:41">and the FDA was making it really hard forhim to do so, and he was like, are you</span> <span title="00:51:44">kidding me?</span> <span title="00:51:44">I'm trying to give limbs toVets who've been amputated.</span> <span title="00:51:50">And so by your making it hard for me todo so, like you multiply like all of the</span> <span title="00:51:55">limbless Vets who aren't getting a limb,like, you know, it's like, so if you had</span> <span title="00:51:59">that as like an actual measurement forthe FDA, it's like you need to have these</span> <span title="00:52:04">companies internalize the negativeexternalities of things like pollution and</span> <span title="00:52:08">the rest of it, but you almost need likeour institutions, like our schools and our</span> <span title="00:52:12">regulatory agencies to start trying tosomehow capture the potential gains from</span> <span title="00:52:19">investing in our kids or allowing acertain innovation into the market.</span> <span title="00:52:24">Like the, the, the big problems are thatour measurements are really primitive.</span> <span title="00:52:28">Uh, and, um, it ends up, and you end upwith binary incentives where, uh, you lose</span> <span title="00:52:36">a lot of the value, and so you end upbeing like, Hey, don't have a teacher for</span> <span title="00:52:39">your kid, so your kid's gonna, you know,just end up, um, sidelined and sidelined</span> <span title="00:52:46">is like a euphemisticway for saying destroyed.</span>

'''[00:52:49] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:52:49">I know. </span> <span title="00:52:50">One of the things I wanted to do at somepoint, um, I actually ended up talking to</span> <span title="00:52:54">the Heritage Foundation of all peopleabout this, was the idea of national</span> <span title="00:52:59">interest waivers so that we could havea Skunkworks with very light regulation</span> <span title="00:53:04">hanging off the sideof every large company.</span> <span title="00:53:08">And the idea is that you would put someportion of a company, you could put some</span> <span title="00:53:12">portion of the company outside where therules were effectively different because</span> <span title="00:53:16">you needed people to take massive risks,to be able to move super fast, to be</span> <span title="00:53:22">dealing with highly nonneurotypical people.</span>

'''[00:53:24] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:53:24">And this is one of the things that drives me nuts about the political</span> <span title="00:53:27">conversation is like, you get like, theyget like yelled at for a particular, it's</span> <span title="00:53:31">like, Oh, you made amistake, dah, dah, dah.</span> <span title="00:53:32">It's like you kind of need to have anenvironment where you're going to accept a</span> <span title="00:53:36">certain level of mistakes, particularlywhen you're talking about, um, large scale</span> <span title="00:53:40">society-wide investments, where like, ofcourse, you can't get that stuff right.</span> <span title="00:53:44">And, you know, it's like, and that, theproblem is that the political incentives</span> <span title="00:53:48">are for everyone to try andavoid like a negative headline.</span> <span title="00:53:51">Um, or something that, that's-</span>

'''[00:53:53] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:53:53">Look, a lot of us are very disagreeable, very difficult to deal with.</span> <span title="00:53:57">And, you know, I saw you pick up, uh,endorsements from people like Elon Musk,</span> <span title="00:54:03">you know, which is, then I hear his, hispersonal life being criticized, I was</span> <span title="00:54:08">like, I don't really care.</span> <span title="00:54:10">This guy is responsible for how much-</span>

'''[00:54:13] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:54:13">How much adva- right, how much innovation?</span> <span title="00:54:16">If he's got a few foibles,let's give him some privacy.</span> <span title="00:54:19">Let him be in peace and just recognizethat we're getting an unbelievable deal</span> <span title="00:54:24">and yet this desire to somehow stamp outoutliers, I mean, outliers are essential</span> <span title="00:54:31">to the American project.</span>

'''[00:54:33] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:54:33">Yes, I could not agree more. </span> <span title="00:54:35">And you know, I, I'd consider myself, it'spretty funny Eric, cause I, you know, um,</span> <span title="00:54:41">I think I had, uh, in many ways, like ahighly conventional, uh, upbringing, um,</span> <span title="00:54:49">that helped.</span> <span title="00:54:50">Like, I feel like I'm sort of a hybridwhere, uh, to the extent that I was highly</span> <span title="00:54:56">contrarian or dissimilar, you know, it'slike, I, you know, I've, I came up through</span> <span title="00:55:02">a series of institutions in an era where,um, you know, I think I learned to adapt.</span> <span title="00:55:09">Um, but then I look at my boys and I thinkto myself that, um, you know, that, that</span> <span title="00:55:15">their way of life is going to bevery, very different than, than mine.</span> <span title="00:55:18">I'm sure yours too, cause wecame of age in a different era.</span>

'''[00:55:20] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:55:20">Well this is true. </span> <span title="00:55:21">I mean I was just talking about thisactually breath, Bret Easton Ellis sitting</span> <span title="00:55:24">in that chair that, um, you know, I grewup as part of this free range, uh, world</span> <span title="00:55:30">largely before Etan Patz got kidnapped andthe milk carton kids changed everything.</span> <span title="00:55:35">Uh, I worry about the sort of, we weretoo free range and these kids are too</span> <span title="00:55:39">sheltered, that we haveto find some new new mix.</span> <span title="00:55:42">But I want to get to another issue.</span>

'''[00:55:45] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:55:45">Let's do it. </span> <span title="00:55:46">And then we'll, we'll close it out.</span> <span title="00:55:48">Um, I want to talk about somethingwhich really makes me angry and excited.</span> <span title="00:55:55">I think that America has, withoutquestion, some of the finest sources, um,</span> <span title="00:56:01">educationally forbrilliance in STEM subjects.</span> <span title="00:56:05">And we've pretended for a very long timethat Americans are not good at STEM, that</span> <span title="00:56:10">we are disinterested in STEM, that STEMcareers are fantastic when many of them</span> <span title="00:56:15">are pretty shitty, and that we don'trecognize that the entire STEM complex is</span> <span title="00:56:22">suffused with bullshit.</span> <span title="00:56:24">Because the model, the economic model forinvesting in basic research went belly up</span> <span title="00:56:30">because the, the universities were builton a growth model that was unsustainable.</span> <span title="00:56:36">And I want to stop lying.</span> <span title="00:56:37">So one, I want to start recognizing thatwe have high schools that have more Nobel</span> <span title="00:56:43">prizes than all of China, that we areusing Chinese labor and other Asian</span> <span title="00:56:49">countries, uh, not just because we areexporting education as a good, but because</span> <span title="00:56:54">we have a cryptic labor market in basicresearch where we pretend people are</span> <span title="00:56:59">students when they're actually workers.</span> <span title="00:57:01">We pretend that we're importing them toeducate them, but actually what we're</span> <span title="00:57:05">trying to do is use apoverty differential.</span> <span title="00:57:07">We have our own people who are reallyfantastic because they're not very</span> <span title="00:57:12">obedient, and instead people preferobedient people coming in who are, are</span> <span title="00:57:18">here on temporary visas, thereforethey have to follow orders.</span> <span title="00:57:21">The entire National Science Foundation,National Academy of Science complex is</span> <span title="00:57:26">bizarrely suffused with nonsense.</span> <span title="00:57:29">And because of this, we can't actuallyhave the national academies adjudicate</span> <span title="00:57:33">what's true because they arethe prime offender of this.</span> <span title="00:57:36">How do we get back to asituation which we can recognize.</span> <span title="00:57:40">That we have a Stuyvesant or a Bronxscience, you know, or far Rockaway or any</span> <span title="00:57:45">of these unbelievable high schools thatare turning out people who desperately</span> <span title="00:57:50">want to do STEM subjects.</span> <span title="00:57:52">They're not being paid when they finallyget their degrees at an appropriate level.</span>

'''[00:57:57] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:57:57">They've been secretly studied by our science complex because</span> <span title="00:58:00">these career paths are known to be crappy,and we have completely suffused this with</span> <span title="00:58:06">a mis-description so that nobodycan actually fix any problems.</span>

'''[00:58:11] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:58:11">That's an incredible, uh, description.</span> <span title="00:58:15">And to me, the lack of proper resourcesfor basic research, for things that ended</span> <span title="00:58:22">up being foundational for manyof our current industries.</span>

'''[00:58:25] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:58:25">It's the biggest bargain in the world.</span> <span title="00:58:26">It's just the future you're investing in.</span>

'''[00:58:28] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:58:28">It's just right now we're so, uh, brainwashed by market-driven thinking</span> <span title="00:58:33">that if there's not some short-termprofitability tied to it or there's no</span> <span title="00:58:37">drug company funding it, or so, somethingalong those lines that, uh, and this is</span> <span title="00:58:42">something that thegovernment, historically.</span> <span title="00:58:45">Has been the leader in where it said, youknow what, we can lay the foundation and</span> <span title="00:58:50">create paths for people to be able to dobasic research, the benefits of which will</span> <span title="00:58:56">be unclear.</span> <span title="00:58:57">They may not exist.</span> <span title="00:58:58">They may not materialize for decades, butit's similar to what we're talking about</span> <span title="00:59:02">with the neurologically atypical kids, isthat like a few of them pay off and then</span> <span title="00:59:07">the payoff can be, uh,unfathomably significant.</span>

'''[00:59:11] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:59:11">Well we call this long vol.</span> <span title="00:59:12">investing in hedge fund land, where mostthings don't work out, but a few that do</span> <span title="00:59:17">pay for all of the losers.</span>

'''[00:59:19] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="00:59:19">Yup. </span> <span title="00:59:20">Yeah.</span> <span title="00:59:20">And right now the, the, yeah.</span> <span title="00:59:22">The, to me, this is a role where, uh,historically the government has led and</span> <span title="00:59:27">you need a government willing to makelongterm sustained investments that, um,</span> <span title="00:59:33">may only pay off way down the road and maynot pay off, but you still need to be able</span> <span title="00:59:39">to make them.</span>

'''[00:59:39] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="00:59:39">Well, I also, you know, the, the, the other weird part of this is</span> <span title="00:59:42">that by using our own people and letting,uh, in particular China know that it can't</span> <span title="00:59:49">operate a relatively totalitariangovernment over there and have the benefit</span> <span title="00:59:54">of freedom over here with a pipeline forall of our innovations to immediately go</span> <span title="00:59:59">back over there, china needs to be inducedin some sense to understand that they</span> <span title="01:00:05">can't get by without givingtheir people freedom.</span> <span title="01:00:08">And what they're right now doing is,is that they're using our freedom and a</span> <span title="01:00:11">periscope by which they can seeeverything that we're doing.</span> <span title="01:00:15">And if we actually cut that off, I knowthat the universities are going to scream</span> <span title="01:00:19">bloody murder, but what's going tohappen is China's going to have to start</span> <span title="01:00:22">investing in its, in the right of its ownpeople to give the middle finger because</span> <span title="01:00:27">irreverence is the secretof American ingenuity.</span>

'''[01:00:31] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="01:00:31">Yeah. </span> <span title="01:00:32">Yeah.</span> <span title="01:00:33">You know, this reminds me of a joke that,uh, they told an artificial intelligence,</span> <span title="01:00:37">which is, How far behind isChina, uh, than the US in AI?</span> <span title="01:00:41">And the answer is 12 hours.</span> <span title="01:00:43">And you say, you know, obviously theywake up and then they see what we did.</span>

'''[01:00:47] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="01:00:47">I can't tell you how fantastic it is.</span> <span title="01:00:50">They have you come into the studio.</span> <span title="01:00:51">You're coming off of thisbig rally in MacArthur park.</span> <span title="01:00:54">I know that it's late for both of us.</span> <span title="01:00:56">You're welcome anytime to come back.</span> <span title="01:00:58">I'd love to continue theconversation when you're next in LA-</span>

'''[01:01:00] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="01:01:00">I would love this too, man, this feels to me like half a conversation.</span> <span title="01:01:04">We're going to have to have thesecond half at some other time.</span> <span title="01:01:06">So if you enjoyed this convo, let Ericknow and then, um, hopefully he'll have me</span> <span title="01:01:11">back.</span> <span title="01:01:11">And if you'd like to join the Yang Gang,you should know we are very, very cheap</span> <span title="01:01:15">gang to join.</span>

'''[01:01:17] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="01:01:17">Well, our average donation is only $25.</span> <span title="01:01:19">So, um, our fans are even cheaper thanBernie's, which no one even knew could be</span> <span title="01:01:23">a thing in politics, but here it is.</span> <span title="01:01:25">Um, but you get $25 times enough peopleand you wind up putting up very, very big</span> <span title="01:01:30">numbers, and you'll see like, we'realready into the eight digits as a</span> <span title="01:01:34">campaign, um, and we can take this wholething, we can contend, because a lot of</span> <span title="01:01:39">people watching this right now, you're,you're ignoring politics as usual.</span> <span title="01:01:43">We can actually have a different sort ofpolitics that takes real thinking, real</span> <span title="01:01:47">ideas, real solutions, and brings themto the highest levels of our government.</span> <span title="01:01:51">It just needs enough Erics and Pias andyou all watching it at home to say, uh, I</span> <span title="01:01:57">prefer this, um, to the stuff I'm gettingthrough the, the cable TV networks-</span>

'''[01:02:02] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="01:02:02">Well, Andrew you know one of the things I think that's been great</span> <span title="01:02:04">about watching your meteoric rise is thatyou are outside of control without being</span> <span title="01:02:09">out of control-</span>

'''[01:02:11] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="01:02:11">And that having a kind of a mature person who's not easily bought or</span> <span title="01:02:15">swayed is, uh, speaking in a way thatnobody knows what he's going to say next</span> <span title="01:02:19">has been hugely positive for theentire process, so thank you very much.</span>

'''[01:02:22] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="01:02:22">Well, thank you. </span> <span title="01:02:22">You know, the, the only, uh, um, the onlycurrency I answer to is, is, um, ideas and</span> <span title="01:02:30">humanity.</span> <span title="01:02:31">Like you, you know, you put a good ideain front of me or, um, a good person, I</span> <span title="01:02:35">listen.</span>

'''[01:02:35] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="01:02:35">Well, you've been that way since before, uh, all the success.</span> <span title="01:02:38">So we, we wish you continued success, andwe'll have you back here the next time</span> <span title="01:02:42">you're in LA with a little bit of time.</span>

'''[01:02:44] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="01:02:44">I would love that, brother. </span> <span title="01:02:45">Thank you.</span>

'''[01:02:45] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="01:02:45">Alright. </span> <span title="01:02:45">Thanks.</span> <span title="01:02:46">You've been through The Portal with AndrewYang, presidential candidate for 2020 and,</span> <span title="01:02:51">um, telling us to makeAmerica think harder.</span>

'''[01:02:54] Andrew Yang:''' <span title="01:02:54">Yes. </span> <span title="01:02:55">This man is going to make youthink harder all the time.</span>

'''[01:03:36] Eric Weinstein:''' <span title="01:03:36">Alright. </span> <span title="01:03:39">Be well everybody</span>