Both left and right, it's attacked over the issue of inequality, so-called wage stagnation. You know, middle class is shrinking, the middle class is dying, the middle class is under attack, and the system, the system is structured against the middle class, against the working class, against people who, back against average Americans. And this is a theme that both Republicans and Democrats have, and they have, they plan this theme constantly, constantly. And maybe the best representative of this on the right is Tucker Carlson, and Tucker did a video on this last week, it's a short video, in the context of Trump's taxes, Trump's tax, you know, the $750, supposedly, the Trump paid one year on taxes. So I know many of you are eager to have me say something good about Trump, something nice, not good, nice about Trump. So I will say something positive about Trump in this segment, so stay tuned, get excited, maybe you can do a super chat with lots of money to support the show, given that I'm going to say something nice about Trump, God forbid. All right, let's listen to Tucker, and know Tucker's approach to this issue of taxation. As you probably heard today, the New York Times obtained some details from some of the president's past tax returns. There are a couple of headlines from that story, only one of them appeared in the paper. First, it turns out Donald Trump was not, in fact, beholden to Russian business interests, or for that matter, to that dastardly Vladimir Putin. We don't really know any of that yet, and we might never know, but we certainly don't know that yet. There's still more stuff that's going to come. For years, they told us that he was. Now we know they were lying. You'd probably guessed that already. The second takeaway from the piece is that in some years, Donald Trump paid a strikingly low effective federal tax rate, probably lower than the rate you are now paying. Trump's accountants took advantage of the many provisions in our tax code to make that possible.  In fact, it's all the universal among the affluent who earned their money from investments rather than from salaries. No, the affluent who own their money through investments rather than their salaries. That is so dishonest, Tucker. The most wealthy earn their money from investments in a traditional sense of this passive money sitting out there, passive portfolios sitting out there and they just get income and dividends and stuff like that. And that's all they do. Is that what the richest man in the world? I don't know, Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos and even Juan Buffett. Is that what they actually do? They just sit and they passively get their money from investments? Or is the investment a reflection of the productive work that they make? That is Juan Buffett invests as a productive activity and manages those investment in ways that benefit all of us. In ways that increase the productivity of American businesses. Isn't Jeff Bezos the founder, the CEO of the company in which he has investments? Yes, most of his wealth is in stock, but is that just an investment? Or is it a form of compensation for the work that he does? So this idea of salary versus investment, that's true. That when you get a straight salary, you have, it's more difficult to deduct stuff, to find exclusions, to find ways in which to reduce your tax burden. It's true that if you run a business or if you particularly real estate, there are ways through all kind of loopholes and exclusions and deductions and benefits that the tech coast provides you to shield income from taxes. But that's not the difference between investment and salary. What he wants you to imagine are rich guys sitting at home and the money just flows in from investments and they're passive. They don't produce anything. They don't create anything. And from those investments, they somehow get to deduct all kinds of things and they pay a very low income tax rate. That is not true because if you get your money from capital gains, dividends or interesting income, that is taxed like salary. Now, some of it is taxed lower than salary in terms of rate. But in terms of your ability to deduct and exclude and take out, there's very little, very, very, very little.  Really, it's disgusting and you know better, you know better. You're just being dishonest here. Should the president have used these conventional tax loopholes to his own benefit? Yes, absolutely. So here's the good thing I'll say about Trump. He's got a good accountant and he's got the right attitude. They're taking your money and they're giving you legal ways to shield so that you take, so they take less. You got to use the legal shields as many as possible, as much as possible. And not to mention, by the way, yeah, Christian makes this point. I've made it in many shows in the past that the way they view taxation, for example, when they say Juan Buffett makes an effective tax rate below his secretary, that is a straight out lie because Juan Buffett's income is taxed twice. First is taxed as corporate income. Then it's taxed as personal income. Dividends are not deducted from taxes. Income, income from dividends is not deducted from taxes. So it's double taxation. And you have to take the effect of corporate tax rate into account, into account. Somebody asked me if I'd do an interview with Norm Chomsky. No, I would never do an interview with Norm Chomsky. Norm Chomsky is one of the most evil intellectuals in the world and I will not have such people on my show. I debate leftists all the time, all the time. I debate leftists all the time. On stages all over the world. You can look up, you unbroke, debate, socialists and all kinds of leftists. So, all right. So, yeah, there's double taxation. Capital gains is a form of double taxation. All of these are double taxations. And your investment was taxed when it was income. Now it's taxed again as investment. In a sense, it's almost triple taxation. So the whole thing is so dishonest, so dishonest. We'll leave that question to the professional hyperventilators on the other channels. They're probably talking about it right now. In fact, of course they are. But far more interesting is this question. Why does our tax code remain so obviously, so grotesquely unfair? I don't think the tax code is necessarily unfair, but there's no question that the tax code is grotesque. There's no question that the loopholes, the set-asides, the provisions that help real estate but don't help another industry or that provide sudden deductions, but not other productions. For example, the charity. Charity is deductible, but other things are not, other expenditures are not. Provisions, mortgage payment, interest on mortgage is deductible, but rent is not. Why? Why should rentors? Not get to deduct their rent. Why should mortgage people who use mortgages get their mortgage subsidized? Why? So I agree it's grotesque, but don't forget, it's still true that over, I think over 50% of government income comes from the top 10% owners. So it's still true that an overwhelming amount of taxes are paid by the so-called rich. Indeed, in spite of the fact that Europe is often viewed as more socialist. The United States has a more progressive tax system. We tax the rich higher at higher rates. We get more of a revenue from the wealthy from the top 10% than any country in Europe, any country in Europe. So it's not unfair. Well, it is unfair, but it's not unfair in a sense of benefiting the rich. The rich pay way too much taxes. It's unfair in that the government is trying to manipulate our behavior. It's unfair in that the government is trying to incentivize us to do as the central planners want us to do. And that is wrong. That is wrong. It's worse than wrong. That is evil. I am an advocate for, since we have taxes, a postcard, simple, flat rate, no deductions, no exclusions. Everybody pays no matter what your income level. And everybody pays the same in terms of the percentage. Now, I think consumption tax would be even better, but from an economics perspective, but given that we've already got an income tax and we're not going to give it up, what we need is flat, simple, no deductions, no exclusions. And by the way, the corporate tax should be zero because corporations don't exist. So all corporate taxes are basically paid by a little bit by shareholders, mostly by customers, some by employees. It's a, it's a disgusting, hidden tax. All right, here we go. Billionaires should not be paying a lower rate than you are. Almost no billionaire pays a lower rate than you do. I mean, again, real estate has some really attracting tax provisions, but almost nobody else pays a lower rate than you when you take into account corporate taxes. Paying no matter who they are, no matter who the president is. Double and triple taxation. The main problem with America right now is that a shrinking group of people controls a growing share of our nation's wealth and power. Note that there's no difference between Taka Carlson and between the left. They both believe that the number one problem in our country today is inequality. Now I wrote a whole book about this with Don Watkins, while with this is a fallacy, a complete and utter fallacy. But it really is grotesque, talk about grotesque. To see Taka Carlson, who's supposed to be on the right, basically repeat Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, talking points. America is lopsided and it's getting more lopsided every year. That makes our country unstable. Lopsidedness is why a dozen left-wing tech oligarchs can decide what you're allowed to say and think. No, that has nothing to do with that. It's the fact that it's their platforms and it's the fact that they invested the money, they competed away the competition, they succeeded. Are we against success? Are we against the one area in technology where we still have a little bit of freedom, where we still have a little bit of capitalism? We want to do away with that as well, Taka. It's why young people seem so hopeless and nihilistic, why so many of them are not starting families. It's why some of them are breaking things in the streets. It's why your grandchildren will almost certainly earn less than you do. None of that is true. None of that is true. Look, and we're going to, there's a whole framing of the debate being done these days about the fact that over the last 30 to 40 years, wages have not gone up, that we have had stagnation, that the middle class is shrinking. This is all false, all false, all the consequence of distorted bad statistics, all the consequence of perverse economic studies. And really this dialogue, the storyline became real with Piketty, French economist who has claimed that the middle class and the working less are losing wealth, they're shrinking, that inequality is exploding. None of that is actually right. No, it's true. The very wealthy are becoming wealthier faster than any of us, but everybody is getting richer, even with our crippled economy, even with the roll of government ever increasing, even with the little bit of freedom we still have, household incomes have gone up since the 70s by 80% inflation adjusted. If you consider the fact that households have shrunk. So if you look at household, if you look at income per household member, not per household per household member, 80% increase in income. That's not stagnation. That's not everybody's stopped. Everybody's stuck. That's not to blame for all the problems that we're seeing, including the political problems, complete misdiagnosis of the problem. Tucker, you are the problem. I'll get to that in a minute.  You will be putting these ideas into the head over the last 10 years. You and your leftist colleagues, the middle class is indeed shrunk in the United States, middle class jobs have shrunk and the number of people categorized as middle class has shrunk. You know why? Because the group of people defined as rich has grown dramatically. The number of people defined as poor has not grown. The number of people in the middle class has shrunk. And the number of people who are defined as rich has expanded by the same amount of middle class shrunk. Now is that a good thing or a bad thing? I want the middle class to shrink if everybody gets to become rich. So is the problem today in America that people are too wealthy? And of course, is that what Tech is telling us? And of course it's true that a lot of middle class jobs have disappeared. Those good manufacturing jobs and what have they been replaced with? Those horrible service jobs like computer programming, that it's much more fun than manufacturing, earns a lot more money and you're no longer in the middle class after a few years, you're in a rich category because you're making six figures. It's just the way people use economic statistics, the way they distort them on left and right. Tucker is shaping the way people think about the world. It's shaping people's experience of the world. If people are constantly told that they're being screwed, that their life sucks, that whatever problems they have are caused by the rich, by inequality, by others, then you're creating a culture of energy. You're creating a culture of resentment. You're creating a culture where people will vote for Trump or a socialist. What is going on today is our intellectuals, including Tucker Carlson in this and our politicians. Left and right, but historically, traditionally left.  That's straight out of socialism. This is why, again, I say Republicans need to be defeated. Now, hopefully not in the Senate, but they need to be defeated because this kind of a public and this kind of right, I mean, who needs it? I'd rather have the socialists talk about socialism. The leftists talk about inequality. If now both right and left agree on all this stuff, we are truly, truly lost. And by the way, it's also why Donald Trump got elected four years ago. Americans feel that something was profoundly wrong with the way our country was structured. There is something profoundly wrong with the way our country structured, I'll get to that. Suddenly, it didn't feel like we were all in this together. It seemed clear that the people in charge were in it for themselves. So to fix it, voters went outside the system. All right, that's enough of talk up. Now notice the other thing he does, which they all do, leftist and right, they want you to forget the distinction between economic power and political power. The people in power are running things. The people in power are screwing you. But the people in power for him are the people who have economic power and the people who have political power. And he doesn't want those separated. But there is a fundamental difference between political power and economic power. Economic power is fundamentally voluntary. It is about voluntary transactions. You gain economic power by satisfying consumers. You gain economic power by hiring good employees and paying them wages commensurate with their productivity. You gain economic power by providing value and engaging in win-win transactions. Political power, on the other hand, is the power of the gun. It's the power of coercion. It's the power of force. No voluntary participation. They don't ask you what you think about the laws. They don't ask you whether you want to pay your taxes or not. They don't ask you how to spend your money. That's political power. And the two are fundamentally different. What we need is to dramatically restrain political power. There's no problem with economic power, but we need to constrain, restrain political power. And if you restrain political power, you have freer markets, you have more capitalism, you have more wealth, you have richer people, and you have a higher standard of living across the board and the standard of living in the United States has gone up dramatically over the last 40 years, in spite of all the problems, in spite of all the interventions, in spite of everything the government does. Now people don't feel it. They don't feel it because they're constantly told they shouldn't. What we need today, what I call the new intellectual, would be any man or woman who is willing to think. Meaning any man or woman who knows that man's life must be guided by reason, by the intellect, not by feelings, wishes, wins or mystic revelations. Any man or woman who values his life and who does not want to give in to today's cult of despair, cynicism and impotence and does not intend to give up the world to the dark ages and to the role of the collectivist brought. All right, before we go on, reminder, please like the show. We've got 163 live listeners right now. 30 likes. That should be at least a hundred. I think at least a hundred of you actually like the show.  There you go. Start liking it. I want to see that go to a hundred. All it takes is a click of a thing, whether you're looking at this. And you know, the likes matter. It's not an issue of my ego. It's an issue of the algorithm. The more you like something, the more the algorithm likes it. So, you know, and if you don't like the show, give it a thumbs down. Let's see your actual views being reflected in the likes. But if you like it, don't just sit there, help get the show promoted. Of course, you should also share and you can support the show at your own book show.com slash support on Patreon or subscribe star or locals and show you support for all for the work, for the value. Hopefully you're receiving from this.  So, yes, like, share, subscribe, support, like, share, subscribe, support. There you go. Easy. Do one or all of those, please.


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La Citan Hill by Grand Central Market in downtown LA. So you may notice that I'm actually not drinking a margarita right now. I am drinking a shot and a beer because it seems appropriate to this place. This is not a restaurant. I've only shot restaurants up to this point. And this is a bar, a dive bar. And they do not serve food. They allow outside food in. They have a beautiful patio, but they do not serve food. So I will be trying the margarita for science, but for now, I'm doing a shot and a beer. So I don't actually know how long this place has been open, but the bartender told me somewhere between 50 and 60 years. Did I mention they open at 11 a.m. and 10 a.m. on the weekends? Now it is pretty light here. It's Saturday, it's about one o'clock, so it's not that busy, which is perfectly fine with me. It's a great way to start the day. Cheers. I do have to work later, so I have to pace myself, but I'm gonna allow myself to have a little bit of fun before then. Can I please get a margarita on the rocks? Thank you. You're the queen. Mm-hmm. For every single person that orders a margarita, do you juice fresh when you're like four deep at the bar? Every single one? Wow, that's commitment. Yes. Do you do gave nectar? You just do tequila, triple sec lime juice. It's gonna be good. Thank you. Thing in beauty. No garnish, no straw. And it tastes exactly the way you think it would taste. Plenty of lime juice to punch through the triple sec in the Grand Marnier. This is a fantastic margarita. Come here. I've been here before. Every time I come here, I ask myself why I don't come here all the time. It's fantastic. Try this again. Fabulous. This is where margarita's supposed to be. And in an ideal setting. This is great. Let's go back tomorrow. If you liked it, hit like. If you wanna see me drink more margaritas, subscribe, because I'm gonna drink every margarita in the city. Sorry to have you multitask.