السلام عليكم ورحمة الله وبركاته بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم الحمد لله والصلات والسلام على رسول الله وعلى آله واصحابه أجمعين والتبع is indeed due to Allah سبحانه وتعالى بلسنين وصفاتين على محمد صلى الله عليه وسلم we ask Allah سبحانه وتعالى to bless him, his family, his companions to bless everyone of us to grant us goodness and to accept all the supplications we will be making we are making during this month of Ramadan and beyond امين ساسر my brothers, sisters Yesterday we were speaking about سورة الفاتحة and I explained how important it is I will be continuing with the Surah but I need to recap for those who might have missed it Firstly, we will all call out to Allah We all have needs that Allah has placed We all have things that we want We must call out to Allah We must understand that Allah alone is the one we seek help from So, how do we call out to Allah نحن نحن نجد تسجيلة. لكل من يجب أن نتعلم ، those we know those we don't know. نحن نكتب المجموعة من الله سبحانه وتعالى. نكتب المساعدة المساعدة. نرى بلاسنة ومساعدة على محمد صلى الله عليه وسلم. وإذا كنتنا ، سيكون أفضل لدينا أجل دي ، فقط قبل أن نخبر الله سبحانه وتعالى. فالما أنت تجدت شرطة ، والما أنت تكون جيد في بعض المجموعة ، أنت تجدت بعض المجموعة ، أو حتى أنت تجدت من بعض المجموعة ، أن المجموعة تعتقد أو تكتب المجموعة. ثم ، بعد تكتب المساعدة من الله ، ونرى بلاسنة ومساعدة على محمد صلى الله عليه وسلم ، نحن now call out to Allah سبحانه وتعالى.  قطيعة رحم is a term used in the Hadith of the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم referring to the breaking of family ties. لن يجب أن نفعل دعاة where we are asking for the breaking of family ties. That's something that the Prophet صلى الله عليه وسلم has mentioned. It's a very powerful point. Many people forget about it because when we call out to Allah a lot of the times people just say Oh Allah, break that one, destroy this one. I don't want to see this one, etc. Let's not do that. You say Oh Allah, guide them, soften them and keep on making the dua and repeat it and keep on repeating the dua because that is definitely part and parcel of the plan of Allah سبحانه وتعالى. Repetition of a dua is very, very important. Repeated in the morning in the afternoon in the season of the season. When I say in the season I mean during the blessed days, the blessed nights and even outside of it. Don't wait and don't delay. Keep repeating it. Let's get to Surat Al-Fatiha. The Hadith in Sahih Muslim tells us that Allah سبحانه وتعالى responds at every verse of Surat Al-Fatiha and he has said I've divided the Surah into two. There are seven verses in the Surah. The first three belong to Allah. The other three belong to the human being, belong to the worshipper and the middle one is divided exactly half. So half for Allah and half for the worshipper. How? When we say الحمد لله رب العالمين all praise is due to Allah سبحانه وتعالى. Allah says my worshipper has declared my praise. When we say الرحمن الرحيم the most forgiving or the most beneficent the most merciful Allah سبحانه وتعالى says أثنى علي عبد which means my worshipper has declared my praise in a different way. I declared my praise. When we say مالكي يوم الدين which means owner of the day of judgment Allah سبحانه وتعالى says مجدني عبد my worshipper has declared my majesty my greatness and for my worshipper is whatever he wants and Allah keeps on saying for my worshipper is whatever he asks for. Right at the beginning according to one of the narrations Allah says I have divided صورة الفاتحة between myself and my worshipper into two and for my worshipper is whatever he wants. When the first verse is read again according to one of the narrations he says and for my worshipper is whatever he wants. When we say إِيَا كَنَ عَبُدُ وَإِيَا كَنَ استَعِينَ You alone we worship You alone we seek help from. Allah says this is between myself and my worshipper and for my worshipper is whatever he is going to ask me whatever he asks me. Imagine Allah سبحانه وتعالى is saying this is between myself and my worshipper which means him and I or him and you and for you is whatever you are going to ask for. What's the first thing you're going to ask for? The most powerful thing that you and I can ever ask for and Allah has instructed us to keep repeating this in every unit of prayer. It was enough for us to ask for it once and he tells us fine I've given it to you but in order to keep reminding us to say this is something you desperately need and you need to work towards it. I will give it to you but work hard to achieve it as well. That is إِهْدِنَ الصَّرَاطَ المُستَقِيمَ Guide us to the straight path. Wow. سبحان الله. قايدان is the most important دعاء and prayer supplication you could ever make. That's why we are forced we have to repeat that دعاء. Your Salah your prayer that is compulsory upon you five times a day it will not be accepted unless you have read سورة الفاتحة in it. Unless you have called out to Allah for guidance. Guide us to the straight path. Oh Allah. Guide us to the straight path. My brothers and sisters let's keep on asking Allah for guidance. And it's not good enough to ask Allah for something and you're heading in a different direction. Imagine you say to someone please take me to Canada. And suddenly you find yourself catching a flight to go to Australia. I mean where are you going? What did you ask for? When you had the chance you were not serious about what you were asking. You were not desperately asking for something and seeking for it. You were actually somewhere else asking for one thing and doing another. So when you ask for guidance be serious. You're reminded about this question that you're asking Allah or the supplication. You're reminded about it by its repetition. Every single prayer it's being repeated. This is Allah. سبحانه وتعالى اهدن الصراط المستقين. Guide us to the straight path. You see how the first three and a half verses Allah. And then يا كنستعين which means you alone we seek help from and here we are asking you for guidance. This is now all the other three and a half verses connected to the worshipper and what he wants we're going to give him. It's just one dua. One supplication. Guide us to the straight path. The rest of the verses are connected. The other two verses are connected to a description of what this particular supplication has in it. Guide us to the straight path. So what is the straight path? Like how when Allah says الحمد لله رب العالمين all praise is due to Allah Lord of the worlds. One might say who is the Lord of the worlds? So الرحمن الرحيم is a description of who the Lord of the worlds is. مالك يوم الدين is a description of who the Lord of the worlds is. So in the same way that part of the Surah was divided in order to describe Allah. This part is divided in order to describe what you're asking for. I want to be guided to the straight path. So what is the straight path? The path of those whom you have favoured. Subhanallah Amazing. Amazing. Amazing. سورات الذين أنعمت عليهم. The path of those whom you have favoured. You have bestowed your favour upon. غير المغضوب عليهم. Not those whom you are angry with. ولا الضالين. Not those whom who have lost the path. So Oh Allah, guide us to that path of those whom you had favoured. Not the ones you became angry with. Not the ones who lost the way. And then we all say أعمين. May Allah grant us the beauty of this and may Allah open our doors in a way that we actually appreciate. That for Allah to make us repeat a dua constantly it has to be the most important dua in existence. Because if you have guidance you have everything guide us to the straight path. You ask Allah for guidance in every aspect of yours. And this is when the Almighty would actually be pleased with us when we have called out to him. And we are trying to work also in the same direction. I want to move on in this beautiful series of supplications from Revelation. I move on to the supplications of the prophets of Allah سبحانه و تعالى. And I start off with this or it's the second thing. The first was سورة الفاتحة. I felt it was the most important. A lot of the scholars who've spoken about supplications from Revelation have started off with سورة الفاتحة and it's correct because Allah started the whole Quran with سورة الفاتحة. It was revealed more than once to Muhammad صلى الله عليه وسلم and it happens to be in the order of the Quran right at the beginning it's known as the opening. In سورة الفاتحة there are such powerful powerful words of supplication. In fact, if you're asking Allah to guide you to the straight path that is guidance. The first of it is guidance towards Allah guidance towards that which is correct. Guidance towards that which is upright. Guidance towards that which is beneficial. Guidance towards that which is going to be filled with contentment and happiness. So سورة الفاتحة in it. There are so many beautiful beautiful aspects that we would be achieving just by calling out to Allah. And when we get to the prophets of Allah remember I gave you the example in the first episode of this series where I said when you have a combination lock and someone's given you the numbers or told you look this number will work that number will work and you are busy trying all other numbers perhaps you might stumble across a number that may work in one of the locks or on one of the locks but if you're already told certain numbers rather use those numbers the chances of you getting through are far greater than if you were to start afresh and say words that have not yet been tested but still we are allowed to obviously call out to Allah in fact I want to give you good news. The good news is that Allah knows what you want to call out with or what you want to ask Him even if you haven't said it and even if you are unable to communicate it in the proper way Allah knows it because Allah knows what's in the hearts but He wants your tongue to bear witness He wants you to try He wants you to say something He wants you to engage in an act of worship known as the utterance the saying so that is why it's important to also try your best to say when a child wants something you know what the child wants but you want the child to say things sometimes so it's so cute isn't it and you say oh Allah imagine you're a big man you're a person who has a lot authority power wealth and you're calling out to Allah that's the height of goodness in terms of bestowment by Allah سبحانه وتعالى upon you it's amazing so my brothers and sisters the more you have in terms of the more humble you're actually closer to Allah because you have shown that whatever I have is not going to actually help me if it is not for the mercy of Allah so we call out to Allah سبحانه وتعالى always and this is why we look at the prophets of Allah they were chosen by Allah they were told that you are chosen but they still called out to Allah they cried to Allah you sit and look at the prophet peace upon him calling out to Allah he's the best of creation the most noble of prophets the highest of all totally amazing position granted to him by Allah سبحانه وتعالى that no one else was granted shall be granted and here he is calling out to Allah those words need to be studied by every one of us that's why we have an entire series for the whole month of Ramadan it's a month of dua it's not just the month of the Quran it's not just the month of giving it's also the month of supplication so when we speak about supplication from revelation in the month of Ramadan we have in it a lot revelation is from Allah the month of Ramadan supplication is for Allah the month of Ramadan and it's obviously for our benefit we calling out to Allah when we bring the two together we have a study of the dua that we should be engaging in in this month from the revelation that was also revealed in this month and it is the month of the study of the revelation so these are the prophets of Allah and I want to start off with the dua made by Adam عليه السلام the first of our species Allah created him Allah made him Allah told him I have raised you in rank above the others subhan Allah some became jealous you know Iblis became jealous what did Allah do Allah favors Adam عليه السلام by telling him here in this paradise and what was the paradise there are different narrations they say it was not the same paradise that we will be going back to at the end but it was a part of the paradise a special part of the paradise that was made in order for the fulfillment of what Allah wanted to achieve so some call it جنة الابتلاع which means it was the gardens you know جنة means a garden so it was the gardens of Eden those which الله سبحانه وتعالى had created in order for the testing of Adam special place but it was considered جنة so this is just an opinion there is another opinion saying no it was one and the same thing all these are opinions but it's interesting to mention them just to know however in essence we firmly believe that Allah created Adam he was in jannah you know we don't need to get into the debate about the way of the jannah and how and what but if you would like to know the opinions it's interesting and Allah told him one thing don't eat from this tree in fact لا تقرب هذه الشجرة you and your spouse don't come close to the tree so I remember someone asking me did Allah instruct him not to eat the fruit or not to go close to the tree and I said Allah instructed him both instructions it's like زينة adultery Allah says لا تقربوا زينة don't even get close to adultery why does Allah don't get close to adultery because it means everything that leads up to it is also prohibited may Allah safeguard us may Allah protect us so there is no point in a person coming to say well Allah said don't get close to it but he didn't prohibit it that's foolish the same would apply when it comes to Adam if someone says لا تقرب هذه الشجرة means don't get close to the tree but you know who said you're not allowed to eat from the fruit if Allah says don't get close to the tree not eating from the fruit is included in that so there are a hadith where Allah speaks about the fruit in fact the fact that Allah makes mention in the Quran later on فأكل منها they ate from it already shows that the prohibition included eating from it you were not allowed to eat from it but unfortunately for a reason best known to Allah in his divine wisdom Adam ate from it he committed a sin and الله سبحانه و تعالى he had it in this huge plan to show us humankind that when we falter what we should be doing in order for that الله سبحانه و تعالى allowed Adam عليه السلام to perpetrate this sin and immediately regret it so my brothers and sisters when you and I commit a sin and we are human we will, we have, we shall remember when you regret the sin it is a sign that you believe in Allah سبحان الله whatever you've done what no matter how old you are no matter what gender you are no matter where you come from your race whatever you have done against Allah's instruction if it makes you regret you still have a lot of hope in the mercy of Allah it's a sign of iman إذا صرتك حسنتك وسائتك فأنت مؤمن the prophet Muhammad peace be upon him in one narration says when your good deed makes you happy makes you calm makes you feel good and when your bad deed makes you regret then you're a true believer it shows that you believe in Allah that's why you're regretting the sin that's why you're feeling good about the good deed you did if you didn't regret it it means you've got no one you're answerable to so Allah سبحانه و تعالى loves it when you regret your sin you committed something you drank alcohol you had a bit of a drug may Allah save God all of us whatever wrong you've done immediately thereafter you say I shouldn't have done this may Allah forgive me I shouldn't have done this so you regret it you feel remorse that's what happened to Adam then he said a few words unto Allah in one verse Allah سبحانه و تعالى says that he taught him some words and in another verse Allah says تلقى آدم من ربه كلمات فتاب عليه you see the words were taught by Allah they were repeated by Adam عليه السلام and he said these words what were these words سبحان الله these are some of the most powerful words we all need these words ربنا ظلمنا أنفسنا وإن لم تغفر لنا وترحمنا لنكوننا من الخاسرين oh Allah oh our Rab you know oh our Rab ربنا oh our Rab what is the meaning of ربه رب is the one who created you in the first place and who has absolute control of every aspect of your existence he's called ربه all your growth depends totally on him your food your sustenance your health whatever you know he nourishes cherishes provides protects and cures et cetera that's ربه so that is Allah سبحانه و تعالى ربنا oh our Rab oh our Rab sometimes if you're alone say ربه ربه meaning my Rab and ربه without the yeah also refers to my Rab because in the Arabic language you are allowed to drop that yeah when it comes to ربه ربه so here he says ربنا ظلمنا we have oppressed أنفسنا ourselves we have wronged ourselves oh Allah we are the ones who perpetrated a sin we committed a crime we did something wrong we did something we were not supposed to do that is the meaning of ظلمنا أنفسنا و ظلم تغفر لنا and if you are not going to forgive us و ترحمنا and if you are not going to have mercy on us لنكونن من الخاصرين we are the ones who will definitely be the losers you're not going to lose anything we will lose that dua is seeking forgiveness of Allah it's the proper way of asking Allah's forgiveness it was taught to Adam عليه السلام by Allah it was repeated by Adam عليه السلام Allah forgave him as a result but he was sincere there was remorse and he did not do it again do we ever get a narration that says it's not there but I'm just saying for argument's sake that Adam عليه السلام went back to the tree he said it was so tasty let me go back and have some more never never it happened once it never happened again may Allah strengthen us I want to give you good news the good news is that we as human beings sometimes go back to the same sin that we've sought forgiveness from genuinely what happens then well if you sought forgiveness genuinely and you were really asking Allah سبحانه وتعالى and you really regretted it and you really promised Allah you're not going to do it again then that tauba or that seeking of forgiveness was accepted and Allah forgave you and your sin was wiped out completely and when you committed it again and after on without having planned it at the time that you sought forgiveness previously Allah will consider that a totally separate deed it's not something connected to the previous sin even though it was a repetition that's the mercy of Allah so keep asking forgiveness again and again and again no matter how many times you end up committing that sin every time it will be considered and looked at as something totally separate from the previous one because the previous one was totally wiped out you regretted it you asked Allah's forgiveness you promised not to do it again Allah wiped the sin out and there we go what great mercy of Allah so my brothers and sisters you see the supplication that we have for today is the supplication of Adam عليه السلام and Hawwah عليه الصلاة والسلام these were our forefathers the first of our species they also faltered don't lose hope when you falter many people ask me a question you know I think I've committed so many sins I think I'm beyond repair you're not beyond repair I think I've I've done so much I'm an evil person you're not an evil person the fact that there is a a flicker of that candle within and you want to come out that's enough you need to come out you need to seek Allah's forgiveness He will wipe out no matter what you've done the most powerful dua you could have after is to seek the forgiveness of Allah Oh Allah forgive me the sins I've committed those which I know those which I don't know and those that were major those that were minor may Allah Subhanahu و تعالى forgive us all so I'd like to repeat this dua ربنا ظلمنا أنفسنا وإن لم تغفل لنا وترحمنا لنكونن من الخاسرين Oh our Lord we have wronged ourselves and if you don't forgive us and if you don't have mercy upon us we will be the ones who will definitely be the losers Subhan Allah so Allah سبحانه و تعالى says we forgave Adam عليه الصلاة و السلام as a result the consequence was he had to come on to earth but the good thing is all his offspring including you and I were taught how to seek the forgiveness of Allah Subhanahu و تعالى imagine to this day we are taught how to seek the forgiveness of Allah had it not been for that act of Adam عليه السلام we would never have known how to seek the forgiveness of Allah or perhaps there would have been someone else who would have come and this is the way of Allah Allah knows we are human and Allah wanted to forgive us like Allah says in the Quran يُرِيدُ الله أن يتوب عليكم Allah definitely wants to forgive you but it's shaitan who wants us to go astray so we definitely would like to continue calling out to Allah you know when it comes to the messengers Allah سبحانه و تعالى صورة الأنبياء says إنهم كانوا يسارعون في الخيرات they used to do a lot of good deeds و يدعوننا رغبا و رهبا and they used to call out to us hoping and being fearful insha'Allah tomorrow or in the next episode we will be getting to the meaning of this verse that I just mentioned right now at the end of this episode but in the meantime I hope you've enjoyed today I hope we take lessons from today أقول قولي هذا و صلى الله عليه وسلم و بارك على نبينا محمد و السلام عليكم


I'm going to pray that you can't be destroyed. And I tell you this even though I believe in nothing. And I have nothing to pray to, but I will fight to block every step you take. I will fight to tear every chance you want away from you.  I will fight to starve you. I will fight to strangle you on the things you won't be able to reach. I have done it to you today. And that is why I shall sleep with you tonight.


Welcome yet again to another crisis conversation live from the Better Life Lab. I'm Brigitte Schulte, the director of the Better Life Lab, coming to you from my home office, my social distancing home office. Today it might be a little crazy. We have a hole in our ceiling, crazy mishap where it was raining through the kitchen ceiling. So I've got some coronavirus workers with their face masks on trying to fix the hole. So hopefully it won't be too loud. With that, let me just turn it over just very briefly to say this week we have another just kind of crazy situation where millions of more people have applied for unemployment insurance. So in the last three weeks we've got 16 million people out of work in the United States. And so we want to talk about that today. What does that mean? How do you how do you live when you don't have work? How much work shapes our lives? But also really explore, you know, what kinds of jobs are these? You know, so many of them are low wage and didn't have benefits and we're kind of crappy to begin with. And how do we make sure that coming out of this on the other side? How do we make decent work? Good work. How can we learn from this coronavirus in the long run? But then what do we do in the short run? So we'll have some stories from people. We definitely want to hear your stories, share your views. But let me at this point turn it over to Rachel Deutsch, who's our main guest this week. She's the supervising attorney for the Center for Popular Democracy, supervising for worker justice. So Rachel, you work so often so much with with workers. What are you seeing in the field?  What are you seeing? What does this mean for workers in their individual lives, but also for us as a nation? Yeah, the numbers are pretty astonishing, Bridget, you know, over 16 million people filing for unemployment in the last couple weeks. That's approximately one in 10 American workers. And I think the scary thing is that that really understates the impact on working families right now because there are, you know, in almost every state, the unemployment insurance systems are kind of overwhelmed, you know, they've been neglected for years. So the infrastructure is not great. We hear people all the time that they can't, you know, get through by phone. So when we have a digital divide that not everybody has access to filing online or encounters and technical glitches online that they're not able to get through by phone and file their claims that way. So I think the real scope of people who are seeking unemployment is probably much higher. There are also ways in which, you know, the federal government recently expanded eligibility for people who are self-employed or gig workers or folks who didn't have income in the sort of prior period are now eligible, but that piece hasn't really rolled out yet, right? So there are a lot more people who actually need income supports immediately and are not getting it. One other sort of sort of trend all name is that in some of the Southern states, the governors did not impose social distancing as early and so job losses are happening kind of later. And so we're seeing a real spike in the South in terms of unemployment claims. And then just, you know, this obviously isn't impacting people equally, right? There are people who can still telework, work from home like you and I are very fortunate to have that. The people who are really getting hit hard are people in the service sector and hospitality in retail, in food service. And those again are folks who experience the most instability, the lowest wages to begin with. So they don't have a safety net, they don't have incomes, they don't have savings. You know, the trend is to not know how many hours you're going to get in a given week and it's very, very hard to budget or save. And then the last thing I'll say is that in retail in particular, you know, it's the sort of January to March is the slowest period. And so for a lot of folks, they were coming into the coronavirus with, you know, lower hours than they even had during normal times and especially not well equipped to kind of withstand this gap that we're now seeing between job loss, income loss, you know, people who experience a loss in hours are still eligible for unemployment. Most people don't even know that, right? And so there's I think a real, a real crisis that's hitting a lot of people's family budgets right now. Yeah, you know, one of the things that struck me I was reading there's a piece in the New York Times and a historian, Patrick Wyman told the, he's quoted there, he says, crises like this reveal what is already broken or in the process of breaking in societies. And, you know, when you talk about so many of these jobs, they're low wage, they don't have benefits, they're, you know, low hours or unpredictable hours. You know, I would argue that that's already broken. How did we get here to the point where we're losing these jobs, but they're really awful jobs? How did we get to the point where we have so many awful jobs? Is this sort of the, in the last couple of decades, we've had this tradeoff between, you know, we're preferencing shareholders rather than workers and worker wellbeing? And does this give us an opportunity to rethink that equation? Yeah, I mean, I think shareholder capitalism and the sort of short termism that that drives is a very big part of this, you know, one of the areas that I spent a lot of time on is looking at schedule stability. And there's so much evidence there that employers actually benefit, right, over the long term, when they can retain their workforce, because people feel invested in have some amount of stability that there's a job, whether it's wages, benefits, or work hours that people feel like this is a job worth holding on to, right? And that increases their productivity, their, their expertise, you know, in the service sector, this is the shift that's needed is from seeing workers as disposable and a cost that you have to contain to being a key part of your competitive advantage. And so when you do invest in workers, you know, that's the customer service that is setting you apart from your competitors. But unfortunately, that's not the way that, you know, most of the companies in the sector, you know, have organized their, their labor budgets. Yeah. So yeah, I think that's, that's absolutely a big part of it that you need. Well, so, you know, you talk about sort of not looking at workers and seeing this sort of a labor cost at this point, let's turn it over to Caleb.  Tell us your story, tell us what happened once the coronavirus hit. All right. Well, first, thank you for having me on.  But after graduating college, I was looking for work as like a legal assistant or peer legal since I graduated in political science. But the year prior, I had started working at the mall at a retail store. And, and looking for, you know, that legal system position, I was able to finally pick up a full-time position at a shoe store in the mall just to kind of make ends meet until something came along. And, of course, both the jobs, they were low wage. The, the scheduling was a mess. It was kind of like, I kind of know what I'm going to be doing the next two weeks, but I also kind of don't. I just have to kind of bring things along as they come. I started working at the shoe store for about a week. And then on the 16th of March, the rumors started flying around that the entire mall was going to close.  And then the next day I wake up and in my shoe store group chat, we have the managers come in and tell us, hey, the store is going to be closed until the 31st. And my other store, they sent us in our group chat, hey, the store is going to close for 10 days based on the coronavirus will kind of give you updates. And then as things went along, you know, it was kind of evident that the other store was not going to open back up. And as the 31st came along, you know, nothing, they, the company, the shoe store company had basically just sent us an email saying, you know, you've all been temporarily furloughed. This does not mean that you've lost your job. Well, that's great. I'm still on your books, but I'm not getting paid leave.  I have a title in the name only. That's it. So, so what are you doing now? So you, you've had these two jobs, you're furloughed from both of them. Tell us what, you know, have you tried to apply for unemployment? What's, what's, what's going on? How are you making ends meet? Right. So I've applied for unemployment through Louisiana.  Or at least the state government, as I would say, the people are not, they're actually more in support of that. But yeah, so upon applying for the unemployment benefits, the state website is incredibly not user friendly. It's highly confusing.  So I think when we were talking the other day, the way you described it was, it was a hot mess. Yeah, yeah, a complete hot mess. In other words, I'm going to choose not to use on the air. But yeah, it's incredibly confusing, but I went and made a claim and I remember about a few days later, it emailed me back and talking about my weekly benefit and I'm looking and I'm like $51 a week. Okay. So $51 a week, that's what they that's what the benefit is. And how are you supposed to pay your bills and buy food and rent and $51 a week? No, I was, I mean, I'm like, okay, I'm grateful I got something. So I was like $51 a week is not any reasonable amount of what can be used to kind of help evolve for some people that that's an entire tank of gas for them. So I was able to finally call and speak to a live person and not the automated system. And she kind of walked me through and helped me with my application. I asked her, I said, why is it that my weekly benefit amount is only $51 when according to the website, it can go up to 247 per week. And she said, well, it's based on the wages that you've earned. And, you know, I'm like, okay, well, that's that's still kind of unfair, because that means I'm kind of caught in a gray zone. Because, like I said, the wages that they've seen have been from mainly from that part time job that I got a year ago, while I was still full time in college. So it's like, I get what you guys are saying by this is the wages that you reported, but it's also, you know, I've graduated. And this is a little unfair as someone who goes to work every day who does what they're supposed to do.  So Rachel, let me let me go back to you and some of the things that you're hearing from workers. You know, this is also where the federal government stepped in, right, and they have this emergency fund where they're going to have $600 a week available. So is this something that Caleb should be able to apply for and get? You're saying that that's it's sort of what we're waiting for the rollout, but is this something that should be able to help workers and who are in situations like Caleb's? Yeah, absolutely. The $600 additional weekly benefit is was really one of the the bright spots in the CARES Act, which was what Congress passed, you know, which was sort of by and large a corporate bailout, but had this one, you know, really good, several good pieces, but primarily the increase to UI benefits. And this is where we're seeing challenges with the implementation, right, because the UI systems are old, because they don't have enough people processing volume of claims. And so each state is sort of in a different place in terms of how soon they'll be able to start getting that additional $600 to people. And one of the things that, you know, we're really pushing for Congress to do now is to increase both the amount of money that's being sent to states to help them very quickly update their systems and increase their capacity to process claims. And yeah, I've been using sort of jargon, but UI means unemployment insurance. And we really just need to shore up the capacity of states to actually get this money into people's hands now, because their bills are not waiting, their rent is not waiting, right, and they need to be able to pay those now. I'll say one other thing, which is that, you know, there are a lot of people out there who don't the experience, you know, that we heard from Caleb about his challenges, you know, like navigating the UI system, there are a lot of people who need, you know, more support, whether it's because of, like, linguistic barriers, because they can't get online for a variety of other reasons. Our network is really trying to push out, you know, to figure out a scale program to actually help people get through to UI to help them successfully file claims, gather their paperwork. We know that, you know, the people who are most likely to file for UI and to receive benefits are people who are college educated, who are professional jobs, usually people who are white, and that people in the service sector who really need these benefits the most typically have the hardest time accessing it. And so if we're going to make this something that helps the people who really most need the money, we actually need to be intentional and thoughtful about how do we support folks to access the system, which was, as Caleb said, not set up to be very user friendly. Well, at this point, let's bring Violet in. Violet is another, she's a retail worker, she's worked in the beauty industry, and she's one of the workers who has wanted to work full time hours, has wanted to have a job with benefits and has not been able to part time work, no benefits. She has some health issues and with no health insurance, she's had to go to emergency rooms, she's got lots of medical bills, and now as of March 31, she's been sort of in a mass firing. And Violet, you were saying that trying to apply for unemployment insurance in Texas is almost like a full time job. Can you tell us, tell us what you're what you've been going through, what's it like for you to try to get some help for unemployment insurance? It's been truly difficult. Hi everyone, by the way. Yeah, it's been really difficult. I've been on the unemployment website trying to apply and calling since eight in the morning this morning. I've been doing it for the past two weeks. It's really difficult. And like Caleb was saying, all the information's on the site when you have to do, but there's no way to apply. There's no way to get through to anybody, to even a real person. It's always automated, unfortunately. So I feel like it's a nine to five job that I'm not even getting paid for it. And I'm calling them so much. In the past two weeks, I've called maybe 800 times. Wow. What's you saying that like there's one day that you that you logged like 400 times that you call 400 times one day. It's like mentally exhausting calling so much.  And there's no jobs out there right now. There's like supermarket jobs. You try to apply. So so how are you making ends meet, you know, while you're calling, where you're even trying to get unemployment insurance and looking for other jobs. How are you how are you managing? I'm making nothing right now. Thankfully, my brother, he does work for delivery service. So he's been doing that. And I just been assisting him doing that. That's really what at this point, what I'm doing since I have no income coming in, I did, you know, apply for food stamps and all that stuff and didn't got denied for some things and some other things I did. And so that's I've been buying food. So you did get did you get you got food? Food stamps. Yes, I did not get Medicaid or anything else, but I did get food stamps for sure. So that is helping me out a lot for now until I could get ahold of unemployment. And so, you know, you said that the unemployment, it's a it's a it's a website, but then you get to a certain point and it just sort of breaks down and then you have to call.  Are they doing that? You know, kind of, do you know, like, what's happening in the process to try to really connect the the money that's supposed to flow from the federal government so that it actually gets to the people who needs it who need it? Yeah, there's no reason for states not to sign on.  They are able to waive the one week waiting period and the job search requirements, which really don't, you know, shouldn't apply in this moment. And the DOL has already put out some guidance. So as far as I understand, you know, there are some states that have kind of moved more quickly. And one other thing I'll say, you know, specific to Texas, where Violet is calling from, employers can actually file claims on behalf of their laid off workforce. And I think that's something that we should be looking at in a lot of other states, right? The company knows who they've laid off, they know, they have all the information about their earnings and their socials and all of that, to the extent that we can have more responsibility on the companies that are executing these mass layoffs to, if not initiate the claims, then at least provide up front the information so that the state has an easier time verifying, right, and can more quickly process the claims. I think that's another sort of piece of the puzzle.  So, you know, we've seen massive disinvestment, particularly in, you know, Republican dominated states in just the UI infrastructure, and that is kind of coming back to haunt them right now. And so the federal government needs to, you know, step up support. And I think we're in a very, very bumpy period that is the result of policy choices that have been made to kind of starve the UI system over the last several years. You know, you talk about policy choices, you know, it's interesting when you look at some of how other countries who are also hard hit by the corona pandemic, although no country quite as hard hit as the United States with, you know, unfortunately, the largest number of cases now.  You know, can you talk about like, you know, could there be a different response in the United States where there, you know, is unemployment and firing and laying everyone off and going through this very kind of broken system? You know, is there a better way to do this? Yeah, I mean, I think there is some conversation right now in, you know, Representative Jayapal has put forward this paycheck guarantee act that would sort of look more to the European model of funneling wages through employers and keeping people employed. I mean, I think there's actually a real question as to whether that's even the best approach for people who work in low-h jobs in the service sector. They do not have health insurance through their job. They do not have benefits through their jobs, right? And so on the one hand, you have the unemployment system, which is failing people in this moment because of administrative challenges, but could ultimately be, you know, a better system for getting people their money during these crises. And then on the other hand, you have the idea of keeping people attached to jobs. And I think that that works very well when you're talking about people who have high quality jobs. It's, to me, a more open question about whether keeping people attached to low quality jobs where they had unstable hours, had no health care, had no paid benefits, you know, really allows us the path to reshape job quality going forward, right? So I don't know. I mean, I think there's a healthy debate happening about that question right now. Yeah. Well, let's go to the last person that we have coming to share their story. So Sarah, she had one of these high quality jobs. You know, she was able to work remotely, like you and I are very privileged to be able to do and work for a global education firm, Sarah, you know, and yet you also were out this week trying to apply for unemployment. Can you tell us, can you briefly tell us your story? Yeah. So a couple of days before April 1st, well, actually, I'll back up, I have two kids, a three year old and a one year old. So as soon as their daycare closed in mid to late March, I informed my work that I needed to immediately go on annual leave. My husband is overseas, so I've got to take care of them. And I assumed that I would be sort of protected and covered under emergency FMLA for people exactly like me who I want to work. My company wants me to work. But I can't because I have to take care of my kids and it's a full time job from 5am to 9pm. And so then a couple of days before April 1st, I was informed that the terms of my furlough actually were, you know, zero work and that I should file for unemployment. And there was a lot of back and forth about it. But, you know, ultimately it was a pretty painful outcome where, you know, Tuesday I put Moana on for my kids to sit there and watch while I tried to click through the Virginia unemployment website. And, and yeah, and I filed. And have you have you heard back from them or kind of what is your because you're the breadwinner for your family right now with your husband overseas, right? Yeah, yeah. So that adds a lot of stress. It's, you know, I've gone through the full range of emotions of anger and resentment and upset and sad and embarrassed and, you know, asking myself, is this somehow my fault? And so, yeah, I haven't heard back yet, which definitely adds to my anxiety. They're supposed to send me something in the mail, like in the snail mail that tells me what I actually qualify for. So I am waiting to hear back. You know, when we were talking the other day, Sarah, you were also saying that this was really the first time in your experience that you really felt kind of punished almost for being, you know, someone with caregiving responsibilities. You know, can you talk a little bit about that? Yeah, yeah. So I know, you know, I'm only a wee three years into this whole parenting thing, but never have I ever had trouble sort of like balancing both or ever felt like one subtracted from the other. And, you know, just being in the situation where I know, if I did not have kids to care for, I would be I would, I would be working right now and have my sanity and peace of mind. And but because I have to care for them, you know, I here I am unemployed. You know, so thank you, Sarah. You know, thank you, Violet. Thank you, Caleb. Thank you all for sharing your stories. Rachel, let's let's go back to you. You know, you were talking about really the larger question that's that's really in debate, like how do we create these, you know, better jobs? Or even in Sarah's case, where it is technically a better job, how do we create better systems and better structures that really take workers and worker well-being into account? You know, some people are calling this crisis sort of a once in a generation opportunity to really, you know, remake the structures. What, you know, in your view, what what needs to happen? How do we come out of this on the other side in a better place rather than the worst one? Yeah, I mean, I do think this is a real opportunity to bring together folks who have been on the one hand struggling for years and decades with unstable, unreliable jobs that don't provide security and that other folks, you know, like in Sarah's shoes, who sort of thought they had a good thing going and realized how quickly it could be sort of yanked out from under them and to come together to, you know, demand a new set of standards and a new safety net. I think absolutely part of the solution is, you know, not having employers be the source of all of our security, right? Because that's that's so precarious, right? We need to have Medicare for all.  And I think we also need to create some real baseline standards for job quality so that people are not one, you know, mis-paycheck away from eviction or, you know, enormous debt. We need to have, you know, $15 minimum wage and, you know, we need to have stable schedules. We need to make sure that people who want to work full-time have access to full-time jobs. Like, under-employment was a huge issue in this country before, you know, this crisis even hit. And then I think we also need to really think about the voice that working people should have, right, in their workplaces. And, you know, Caleb pointed out that there's been a lot of investment in destroying unions in this country. We need to reverse that. We need to think about other ways for workers to have voice, whether that's a seat on corporate boards. I think both workers and companies would benefit from having the folks that are on the front line of making their companies successful be part of some of these bigger picture questions around how to design work. Yeah. Well, listen, and, you know, we have, like, one minute left. We've got Elaine Meyer who wrote into the chat. Can we bring Elaine in really for a really brief point? And then we'll wrap and let everybody get back to their days. Elaine, are you there? Hi. I'm here, yes. Thank you. Yeah.  So, yeah, can you share your thoughts? Yeah. So, basically, here in Illinois, it's been a little confusing because, as I understand it, the CARES Act gives freelancers some access to benefits. But when I go to the Illinois Department of Revenue site, they're telling us to wait to apply. And it's confusing as to when we'll actually be allowed to apply. So, for me so far, I'm lucky in that I'm actually living with my parents right now, so I don't have the rent pressures that some people do. But I do have health insurance premiums. And it just feels like a big issue for us and also kind of seems like maybe an opportune moment. Like I said, my comment to transition from like what you guys were saying, tying insurance and leave to employers to tying it to or to making it more universal. Yeah. Thank you, Elaine. So, back to your point, Rachel, is this an opportunity, as you're saying, to make the case for some might call it portable benefits that to have everything so tied to a worker has really been, has gotten us to this point where the coronavirus has really shown the cracks in the system. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, it is not working. And I think it's also important to sort of call out that this is part of what drives a gender gap and a racial wealth gap. Like we've seen the service sector that's being so hard hit and where job quality was so low, that's a place where predominantly people of color are working and predominantly women. And so we have to make a decision about kind of moving into a more equitable economy. And if we don't, we're going to see this crisis continue to just break us apart, you know, along lines of that have already disadvantaged people more, you know, some people more than others. All right. Well, listen, thank you so much, Rachel. Thank you so much for being here and sharing your perspective and your work. Thank you so much for all the work that you do. Caleb, Violet, Sarah, and Elaine, thank you so much for being part of this and sharing your stories. Thank you to all the participants. I also want to thank the Better Life Lab team, my producer, David Shulman, the New America Events team, really grateful for all of you for helping us put these conversations together where we can come together in this kind of crazy fast moving crisis and see if we can make sense of how this is disrupting and changing our work in life, but also look for opportunities for how we can make it better. So next week, please come back. We'll be talking with frontline healthcare workers, many of them who are living far from their families, how that's disrupting work in life, and they're also seeing these very frontline disparities that you're talking about, Rachel. We'll be talking more about that. So I hope that you'll all come back and join us and be part of the conversation as we all try to figure out what to make of this and how to make it better for the future. So thank you all and wash your hands, stay safe, and we'll see you next week.


Good afternoon everyone and a warm welcome to our audience also on the live stream Which is webcast on we form org This is the issue briefing on corruption and anti-corruption an issue. That's very close to the forms agenda it's actually one of our 10 global challenges and As you know the form is concerned with issues like competitiveness and growth and corruption place an important role here it's a it's a big hurdle to growth and I'll with that I'll pass on Oh, no, let me first introduce the panel of course because we have a very very distinct panel here today And true to the forum's multi stakeholder approach. We do have all important sectors represented to my immediate left is Elaine Desenski she is a senior director with the World Economic Forum and Has been heading the efforts of the World Economic Forum in anti-corruption for several years in particular the partnering against corruption initiative patchy To her left is Steven Allmond Who is the global chairman after of Deloitte who will share the the business perspective on corruption here? Further to the left is dr. Cobas de Svart who's the managing director of transparency international who will share the view from the civil sector perspective and All the way to the left is mr. Anchor who is the secretary general of the OECD the organization for economic cooperation and development and Without further ado, I'll hand over to my colleague Elaine Desenski. Thank you very much I thought I would start with a bit of the context around the corruption conversation here in Davos I think when we talk about corruption from the forum perspective We see it as one of the key elements to unlocking global growth and this is really a good place to start It's it's about corruption as a Moral issue, but it's also about corruption as an impediment And as I think about the the many topics that come up over the course of this this week in Davos whether it's trust in leadership What to do about fragile states? Thinking about geopolitical risk and the uncertainty right now in the economic system Inevitably there is some sort of link back to corruption as a core driver of this instability And I think that's an important element of where we go around this conversation in the future We have a very interesting opportunity during this week in Davos to meet with CEOs from all over the world 25 of whom came together yesterday as part of our patchy vanguard community to talk about what corruption means to them dealing with it proactively within their industry sectors within their organizations in some cases and what they can do collectively to start changing the Dynamics in the marketplace to bring about something closer to a transparent and level playing field And so this is really the core of the conversation with the business community Which also drives a conversation with our international partners with governments with NGOs around a Real collaboration and as George mentioned this idea of having a global Challenge a list of global challenges within the forum Including corruption is is quite important and signifies that in fact This is an institutional priority, but it reflects the membership of the forum as well And the need to really be thinking about some creative solutions in this space So one of the key issues that that will be moving on in the next year as we further develop the anti-corruption agenda is a partnership to really put forward some strong recommendations and implementation based on the agenda of the v20 and the g20 dialogues on the anti-corruption and this is important because the g20 v20 process is what we think is the closest to Achieving an aligned global agenda across business government including civil society and in fact the partners here on the press Diast have all been involved in this process of creating a set of recommendations that we think will have great impact around the anti-corruption arena It includes topics like beneficial ownership collective action Working with small and medium-sized enterprises and really building out the capacity in both the public sector in the private sector To deal with some pretty thorny issues. So as we move forward this year, we're going to be launching this partnership Around this b20 process and we think that that's going to lead to some really interesting opportunities to implement a very strong agenda around anti-corruption Thank you Elaine Steven over to you. Thank you. Thanks very much as I'm here to represent the business community Let me start with a very simple Statement which is this in the fight against corruption Government and business are on the same side or they certainly should be because for companies Corruption adds hugely to the cost of doing business in enhancing systems and controls recruiting staff with subject matter expertise Encountering corruption and in training other staff for governments Corruption has a massively negative impact on really key investment programs in areas like infrastructure health Education all of which should drive social prosperity and social progress Whereas corruption actually drives exactly the opposite social inequality and instability as Elaine just alluded to and and governments need business to Get involved in those major investment programs. The risk is that business Where they feel that the risk where they're dealing in markets where corruption is rife Are likely to reduce their investment and look elsewhere for business opportunities and job creation opportunities Where they are concerned that the risk of Sanctions or even worse the risk to their reputation their most valuable single asset Outweigh the potential economic benefits of investing in that particular market So I think we're all agreed that corruption is is bad for business is bad for Governments is certainly very very bad for society as a whole So we do need business and government to get on the same side and be very vocal about it Elaine just alluded to the G20 B20 effort. I was on the B20 effort in 2014 and we did come up with three well a number of very simple Recommendations for the G20 Three of which I'll just elucidate which is designed to level the playing field for business investment And that was one simply harmonize the existing legislation and provide incentives to business to self report when they try and transgress when they fail to comply second Get all the G20 companies to sign up to the principles Adopted by the G8 relating to beneficial ownership and transparency about shell companies, which perhaps Cobis will Pick up on and thirdly Similarly get all the G20 company countries to sign up to either the OECD Anti bribery convention or the UN's equivalent the convention against corruption but it's not just about adequate legislation and Enforcement although that is very important and it's not just about Companies complying although that equally is very important. I think we need a new approach to combatting corruption where the relationship between business and government moves from one that is often seen as Being adversarial to one that is very much rooted in working together and this needs real commitment You know we've set out recommendations for government, but it also needs real commitment from the business community We need more CEOs to take personal ownership of this issue really be passionate about it engage their executive teams and be passionate about in their communications with all of their own people which says quite simply that any any corrupt activity is simply incompatible with their company's values and will not be tolerated now business leaders also need help from government and civil society in in Getting getting ahead of this, but they can help each other, which is why I think the Forums partnership against corruption vanguard initiative is really so timely and so important bringing together CEOs to exchange knowledge share best practices just come together Collectively and with their supply chains to help build capacity Level the playing field as I said and establish hopefully fair market conditions for all stakeholders Thank you Stephen for sharing these insights from the business perspective Over to you Cobus. What do you say? What are the main issues from a civil society perspective? What's trend and strengths parents international most worried about at this point? Thank you very much. I'll share three remarks with you firstly To significantly deal with the majority of national level corruption around the world will take many years if not many decades However to deal Significantly with the majority of all international corruption around the world is something that's achievable within a few years It is exactly the technology that today facilitate corruption Internationally worldwide that are also the kind of technologies that can be used to fight that corruption That's a very different world that we were in ten years ago And that's why on an international level It is the lack of political will that remains the major obstacle in fighting corruption the technologies that allow the illicit flow of illicit financial flows that prevent the exchange of tax information that make public registers of Beneficial ownership difficult are also the technologies that facilitate them So it's in this context that I go to my second point Where the work of the B20 and a G20 become particularly important because those are currently The strongest instruments that we have to move these issues on international corruption and let me talk briefly on beneficial ownership the secrecy that accompanies The hiding of the real owners of companies around the world is indeed a massive problem if you look at the World Bank They studied three hundred and two hundred and thirteen biggest anti-corruption a grand corruption cases over the last 30 years in the absolute majority of those Secret companies was the vehicle used to facilitate corruption Financial action task force looked at 32 biggest cases 28 of those used Secret companies to facilitate corruption the problem is massive and if you think about it There's nobody I believe in this room today That will get on a commercial airline if there's no list of the passengers and if there's not basic security on the luggage and Yet, we allow secret companies to undermine our economies To bring instability to our economies around the world without doing any basic due diligence on that It seems ludicrous, but that is the situation. We still find ourselves in Currently this brings Economic benefits to some of the rich world, but it brings economic Instability to them in the medium to long run and its impact on the developing world is devastating indeed It has to be tackled lastly What are the things that can immediately be done particularly in terms of beneficial ownership three points firstly? International cooperation and exchange of information there. I think the B20 and a G20 are moving Secondly, it should become a requirement across the world that all companies that bid for public contracts Must have public registers of their beneficial owners this will arguably on my continent Africa deal with a Very large section of public contracts that are either under suspicion of corruption or suffer from corruption in an instant way and thirdly We would like to see public registers of beneficial ownership across the world It has been shown that this is possible This is much more cost-effective and there are no reason for any company That is looking for a level playing field to not support that so hopefully We've seen some movements over the last 18 months with governments Moving in that direction. It is not good enough to have Registers of beneficial ownership of all them being in the public domain and will continue to push for that Thank you very much. Thank you very much for this powerful call for action. Mr. Do you share copas to Swartz optimism on the on the B20 and G20 agenda? Yes, and also it's not about optimism or pessimism. It's about activism We just got to get on with it, you know and and sometimes we'll get it right Sometimes we won't we just got to get on with it just persevere And and well was it the classic said try it try again, you know if at first you don't succeed so And this is this is a learning curve. This is not a science. It's an art And you know OECD foreign bribery report analysis of the crime of bribery of foreign public officials Well, we just put this one out. It's 15 years of the anti-bribery convention which I'm the depository at the OECD with the and So 427 concluded cases of bribery against foreign public officials It shows the companies are still engaged in corrupt transactions at the highest level interesting in more than half of the cases Corporate management was involved. So the myth of the rogue Employee is debunked, you know, that means this is goes up all the way The report highlights we cannot take a one-dimensional approach to combat in corruption Focusing just on companies or just on government and here I'd like to say that the Stephen Almond's comment about this is you know takes two to tango as absolutely both to create the problem, but also to resolve it therefore now and now The focusing here that it's the supply and the demand, you know The the whole logic of the anti-bribery convention was created on the basis that supply will you know You deal with supply or take care of the thing now Every single country in the world has at least one company that is doing transnational business and Therefore everybody subject to the same temptations to the same problem. So everybody should participate on both sides of the of the aisle And also, you know, if we had to focus on one issue because we don't have the manpower We don't have the knowledge or we don't have the body. What do you do with it? Well two-thirds of the case this corruption occurred in public procurement Opportunities so it's not the only case, you know permits licensing all sorts of interactions between governments and Authorities and the public May lead to some kind of corruption, but it's in public procurement where it happens The most or at least where we've identified it the most so focus on that We're also putting enforcement and implementation at the heart of the work on anti-corruption We will launch an OECD trust in business project Precisely focusing on how to close the implementation gap between the actual conduct of business and The governments and the the rules and standards that we put forward. So how do you make it happen? These rules and standards include among others Our anti bribery convention, but also the work of the G20 and the B20 here We have invited our Sherpa who is the one in charge of taking the message to the G20 But also working with the B20 with all our directorates so that We can support the B20 to then the B20 input into the G20 on this particular issue The next round of country reviews by our working group on bribery will focus on enforcement not just on the Legal framework, but whether this is actually happening First the legal framework fine, then you got you know best practices But then are you working on sanctions? And of course we still have Many countries that we have found to be chemically pure because they are you know nothing happens there Or maybe they don't have the political will then if they are chemically pure We should clone them But if it doesn't happen that they're chemically pure that just don't have the political will we should push them by the way There's a lot of emphasis on Naming and shaming, but there was a suggestion in one of our meetings that we should also have naming and flaming because we should encourage a proper Best practices and best behaviors and we should you know Reward the companies that actually have these best practices that have Compliance officers and that are worried about this and the governments that are doing it Like like the Colombians who have this ombudsman about corruption, you know this this this should become best practices and we should take a look at that and then Somebody said like instead of whistleblowers trumpet blowers Because you know whistleblowers for the bad things trumpet blowers for the good things, you know, so again stress the positive incentives also, but also I say also the other the bad stuff also we have to keep in the books so The question of beneficial ownership Well, I think Cobas made the point very well and so did everybody else about why this is very critical Well, let me tell you another dimension with beneficial ownership. We'll never know who pays taxes doesn't pay taxes Multinationals don't pay taxes among other things because nobody knows who owns them or who should be asked to pay the taxes And we still have beneficial ownership black holes and some of the most developed of our own countries, okay? In the United States in the UK, etc. We have problems of beneficial ownership And we should address those first before we are going around Demanding from third parties or third countries or developing countries to come and you know to join the fray We should preach by example and we should be a you know in that sense impeccable Now in terms of joining the convention. We've been trying to encourage You know the of the large emerging economies China is not yet a member India is not yet a member Indonesia is not yet a member, but many of the others are members already and we of course Welcome them to to join but beneficial ownership absolutely. It's only critical And let me just finish with one more Area where Transparency and where the combat against corruption is already starting to produce results on the tax area We have 124 countries on a global forum on Exchange of information. We're now moving to automatic exchange of information and lo and behold 37 billion euros have already been received in the coffers of the countries That would not be there were it not for this effort to go for the transparency And last but not least the BEPS project base erosion and profit shifting Where we already said beneficial ownership one of the elements transfer pricing etc. In order again to make it possible For multinational companies to pay their fair share. So all invited 23rd of March OECD annual integrity week where we're gonna get all Representatives of all of society all the stakeholders to join us To take the effort further. Thank you. Okay, wonderful. Thank you I think this was a wonderful overview of the different perspectives on the matter And I think there's a lot of common ground as we learned we'll open the floor for questions now for the benefit of our Online audience if you could state your name in the organization that we have a microphone available. So please John John Halpern Associated Press this question has to do with international organizations Which do business by procuring the services or goods of Companies businesses work with governments etc and the organizations themselves enjoy some privileges and immunities I'm just wondering on the one hand They're under pressure to appear to be transparent on the other hand airing their dairy Their dirty laundry is bad for business in the sense of dampening donor donations Can lead to political complications when you need deals made etc in terms of political deal-making I'm just wondering in that situation. What do you see as the levers for improving that situation? And getting the more than it just seems like there's only maybe a few governments out there that truly have the the wherewithal or the The desire or the ability to pressure the organizations to be more transparent to truly be more transparent and reveal what they found What kind of leverage if you agree with that assessment when what kind of leverage do you think there is to improve that? Dynamic, thank you. Thank you, John. And if you could just pass the microphone on I think we have a second question from the gentleman there David Sarota with international business times. I have really two questions one is the question of how you define corruption in Is corruption defined as large campaign contributions? That are disclosed in a place like the United States in exchange for public contracts For instance, does that count as corruption? If not, why not? And my second question is about transparency There's an issue in the United States about transparency in a particular form of public contracting around pensions private equity firms say that they will not want they don't want to release the terms of their Deals with state governments. I know KKR is works with for instance transparency international KKR has threatened state governments if state governments disclose the terms of their agreements with Private equity companies and there have been allegations of corruption in awarding of those contracts I'd be curious transparent what about transparency international's work with KKR and also the general idea of how can there be? transparency to fight corruption When companies say that they need a lack of transparency to protect trade secrets and so-called commercial secrets Thank You David Shall I ever go at the the first and the last comment? about Companies efforts and barriers around transparency, which I think are really good Questions and it is very complex But I think there are some very good examples of collective action From the business community in fact, I think the partnership against corruption initiative that I Reference to my comments actually had his origins in the extractive industries that originally got together and said this is not something We should be competing about because it's a shared problem and So I think and there are a lot of other sectoral efforts where Leading CEOs have just come together and said let's let's work together to find solutions to dealing with these issues about Transparency I said this is not something we should compete on but it does come that equally you do get to pressures where those same companies Get to Get to concerns that are we being so transparent that actually we're going into areas where we do compete And and where do you strike that balance? So there's no easy answer to that But I think there I think collective action is a good way forward to find a way find a path as I said earlier for for companies to learn from each other and also from the government point of view We touched on it one or two of us touched on this idea of providing incentives to companies to reward good behavior to provide so to provide some mitigation where companies do Acknowledge their shortcomings and do self-report that there is some recognition not not Absolving them from the the their wrongdoings But some recognition for their willing for the strength of their compliance programs in the first place that I'll enable them to find The issues and then the strength of their character in coming forward and and answering another idea So there were some references to public procurement programs. So another idea that came out of the B20 was perhaps Cobas talked about the beneficial ownership side, but also making it a condition of Any company that wants to bid for either for a major infrastructure project to to demonstrate and Meet a sort of kite mark standard for their compliance programs or Alternatively, if they don't have such a program actually they get docked Marks in there in the assessor in the evaluation of their bids But these are all short steps on you know what is going to be a marathon So they're good questions, but those are some some suggestions of steps towards solutions Thank you very much Steven and I think there were questions about the campaign contributions I think co was this one was directed at you so please if you could answer that one Maybe a two-fold answer firstly starting with definition Broadly speaking corruptions the abuse of entrusted power for private gain But what we've seen over the last couple of years in particular is that the forms that corruption Can take are indeed much more varied And particularly when you look at the financial crisis and you look at a whole global financial system a lot of this would not have been classified as corruption, but were actually practices that Buy their very nature Undermined the public good and and for that one needs to have a look at that again In terms of how and who we work with we've got an approach that we have a critical But constructive engagement with all stakeholders and that's very simple from the premise If we were to say we will only work with companies or governments that have no problems I think we will live in an island somewhere this this is indeed a journey of transparency and and here I can give you one example What would be a big game changer in the world is if we had a neutral Complete list of all political exposed persons in the public domain To get from where we are today where this is a highly politicized areas who's classified as peps who's not To where you have complete neutral list That road to transparency is indeed similar to what needs to be tackled when you look at Campaign financing when you look at issues of pension fund transparency What is very clear is that it is irreversible that we're gonna get there the question It's where we get there in five years in ten years in 20 years time one of the most critical ones is indeed the issue of how money in politics Have eroded public confidence in political systems, and that's why if you ask me is that one that I think is of particular Importance. Yes, and there the US example has shown that mere transparency is not enough on it either Thank you We've never been told by anybody not to publish anything. We know so I Just would like to say that we have published anything we we had intended to publish and The the only problem is we we wish we would have had more But so I'd like to start from there, but there are many many angles The question of trust here is critical And and and a lot of the loss of the trust comes precisely because there's this Perception that these things are not a level playing field the taxes. This is big. That's a big issue and it's a form of theft and Yeah, that means you take a few pennies from every single citizen Because they're gonna have to pay more taxes because you didn't or because a particular company didn't or All the all the small and medium enterprises of a company of a country are gonna have to pay more because the large Multinationals don't pay taxes. So when we're talking about beps is not about pointing fingers at anybody You want to encourage companies to invest you went but you want also everybody to put their fair share We are insisting as much on avoiding double taxation as an avoiding double-known taxation Okay, so, you know, it's it's very important that we make this clear This is not about you know Avoiding or not. It's about everybody doing, you know, what they have to do doing their fair share We created the system individuals avoid taxes at their own peril because they're violating the law Companies avoid taxes because they're using a system that we created over the last 80 years to avoid double taxation So what they do is legal meant not be right, but it's legal. So that is why this second challenge is much more difficult Because we have to change the rules not just, you know, change the practices.  Well, it's it's like, you know, in many it's difficult It's it's in many codes and practically every single code Both domestic corruption as well as foreign corruption But it's also one way where you see when there is Corruption is much more than just taking money home in your pocket For your own bank account You mentioned a case of at least distortions of You know campaign contributions. Copas mentioned you're talking about the last campaign cost with a billion or something like that And then the court the Supreme Court came up with Authorization that the packs and the super PACs could put up, you know, enormous amounts of money Not for a candidate for for cost.  It's a void of it's about avoiding capture It's about avoiding capture, which you just said it is not just about contracts It's about policy You know policy or policies that would favor a particular group That were generous, you know in the campaign So it's not just about taking money home. The other question is about financing democracies How many political giants, you know have fallen because they didn't take a penny home But they wanted to finance the campaigns. They wanted to finance their parties through, you know, some indirect inappropriate way In, you know, that's very important now Let me just I have to say also Every donation every penny of donation is public in the U.S. And every penny of contracts is public. Therefore, there it's at least a little, you know, easier to look at both sides And denounce it if there's something else The the the question of, you know, contracts and pensions are particular issues. I think the question is how does one With better information with greater transparency But also, you know with greater awareness of the question was going on and how that actually affects The public In the broadest sense And you know, I think this is what we're all yeah In fact, we won't be able to to cover all of these particular issues at this press conference Sorry to step in but I'm being told That we might have just time for one last question with brief answers So I understand the gentleman in the back has a question Has been answered that's even better. That means we can close on time. Thank you very much for for tuning in Thank you very much for for coming and thank you Particularly to to this great panel. I think it was a great discussion and you can you can go to w wwvforum.org to watch the live stream You can later download it and you can follow us on social media for additional information on patchy and the patchy vanguard Thank you very much


So it's 8 in the morning getting ready for my villain tour with Taste Hungry. We're gonna go taste some big reds in the south of Hungary. They're picking me up early the morning. Let's see what it looks like. Okay, no problem. It's 18th century. You still have the largest German community in Hungary. We made it to the region for big premium red wines in the south of Hungary. Our first stop is at Showshka. Let's get ready to taste some wines. Oh, gotcha. Always get it, always get it, always get it. First visit is in the books. It's on visit number two with lunch. I think this is the third or fourth time I've been here in the last couple years with a taste hungry tour. Let's eat some food. Oh, game stew. Okay, say hello. Hello. See if it sounds different here. Hello. Yeah, it does. Small press houses, maybe they're all owned by another winery. There's so much small wineries that you can live your whole life here and you will never drink the same wine. Family run sellers, let's see how the wines are. This is a shillier. It's just a deeper color rosé. It's on the skins for a longer time. You're gonna see a darker pinker color. It's a little bit meatier. It's a little more gastronomic.


Stephen Curry has missed almost 9,000 shots over the course of his NBA career. He has missed approximately 6 out of every 10 three-pointers he has attempted. And yet he is widely considered the best shooter in the history of the game. The question is, why is he the best shooter of all time? Is it his footwork, his shooting form, his hand-eye coordination? Sure, all of these traits play a role. But there are plenty of players with these traits. So then what is it that makes Stephen Curry the GOAT? It's for two reasons. Number one, his commitment to the unseen hours. And number two, his consistent next-play mindset. He never lets a previous miss affect his next shot. He misses a shot? Next play. He misses another? Next play. He wipes the slate clean after every shot and always believes his next shot is going in.