Bismillahir Rahmanir Raheem. As-salamu alaikum. I am Professor Dr. Amina Mausam, Chairperson Department of Applied Psychology, Lahore College for Women University. I have did my PhD from University of Punjab Department of Applied Psychology and I am involved actively in research and training and mentoring of PhD scholars. While being the part of research, I have seen that there are many ethical issues concerned in the field of research related to psychology. So here today, I am facilitating you for the course which is named as Ethical Issues in Psychology. First of all, I would like to brief you what are being called ethics. From the beginning of our life, we are intended to see about anything in our life that what is going around us is either right or either wrong. We have been trained in a way to see connotation of life in a way which is being considered appropriate or unappropriate. While looking into the ethics, it could be broadened towards the whole sphere of human life. Now specifically looking at ethics these are those moral and philosophical systems which are embedded in us and they are particularly focused on the concept of right and wrong. This is not only related to the human life, in fact, in every aspect of our religion, our society's ethical and moral values, it shows us this code of conduct in different forms everywhere. Basically, our human competency believes in the fact that whatever we are doing, we believe in the fact that it is happening in the right or wrong way. And until we understand this process, if we do not understand this process, then we cannot give the result in the right way. Similarly, our professional values are the foundation of any profession and it is also very important to understand this system that any work is done professionally in the correct way. In the field of psychology, we all, as a student of psychology, as a mentor of psychology, are well aware of a concept and an organization, American Psychological Association. American Psychological Association's ethical principle of psychologists and code of conduct includes sections on different things, which includes clinical practice, education, research and publication. Now you see a time as such that at that time, no ethics existed. And by the time I felt the need for this thing, how we will ensure that something is going well in clinical practice, how we will see in education how we have to choose a mentor, how we have to take guidance, how we have to mentor the student in supervisor. In clinical competence, at what stage we have to appropriate referrals, where a clinician needs to be very carefully monitored in their dealing with a client that he is not being personal. So in a layman term, we understood these things. But APA made a proper ethical code of conduct through which it was ensured that who we are giving our publication credit due, if it's a supervisor, if it's a student, if it's a co-publisher, then who we will give the right due to. So we will talk about these things in detail in the future. But to see that the risk-benefit-based ratio in research, to see either we are going to harm any participant or not in this research, so this ethical code of conduct was very important, which is being done by APA. Now looking at specifically code of ethics, APA's ethical principle and code of conduct provide a common set of principles and standards. You know, the world is expanding, the research is expanding, the teaching is expanding, the clinical practice has been evolved over the years. And we just can't say that we will use one principle and one rule in different places according to the culture, according to the norms we use. Yes, we can do certain changes, but the basic, the very core principle of the ethics could not be changed. Like where we have to execute this thing in some way, we can't change this thing with our own will. There should be some proper grading system, there should be some proper evaluation system, there should be some process which is going to be very functional in a subtle manner for all the participants. So the code of ethics was very pivotal for us to be implemented. Ethics code and principle applies only to psychologist activities that are a part of their scientific, educational, and professional roles as psychologists. Meaning to say, Maybe we may be having to see something else, but when we talk about psychology, we are very much concerned that psychologists are for their stake, for their psychology community's stake, and for their psychology's discipline to ensure that they incorporate these principles in their profession in a better way. Now moving towards a step ahead, under the term of its charter, APA maintains a code of ethics and conduct which are updated regularly. Now why it is important that once they have been designed and now we are going to see that it's related to be, you know, upgradation after every back and forth time. Yes, it's very much important because, you know, the societies are changing, the norms are changing, the cultures are changing. Let me give you an example for that. Selfie disorder is there, you know? So these things didn't exist for 20 years from today. Now when we have to research on these topics, when we have to research on these areas, we need to update these code of ethics that where we can define the fine line between just a trait, an issue, a fashion, a norm, or a disorder. Right? In formulating this code, existing codes, society guidance, and changes in societal expectations of profession were considered. Because there was no such facility of internet, today society expects that every brilliant student will use the internet. So if we just restrict the usage of the internet to make a policy of it, then maybe it would be very difficult for us to ethically see that from where we start the fine line of disorder and where we are generally looking at children's aptitude. So, you know, according to society's expectations, rules to update is very much of pivotal importance. Now, goals of ethics in psychology. Ethics to have working areas could tap career. That is very much, you know, important to understand. Welfare and protection of individuals and groups with whom psychologists work. Very limited research in the beginning, which was being done on animals. So, it's very important to look after their stakes. If we are going to provide them any, you know, incentive, if you are going to provide them any intervention, any treatment, briefly giving you an example of hepatitis C virus treatment. Pakistan is currently a third leading country. And here, hepatitis C virus has different treatments. First, here is a treatment called a ribovirin regime. Then, salt, interferones. And then, their combination. And finally, after 20 years of research, the researchers get to know how much side effects they have. And they are again going back towards the ribovirin regime and interferones. So, interferones is again the popular one from where we started. And then, we move towards different treatments. And finally, we are going back to one. Now, in all these processes, it's very important to see and identify the risk-benefit ratio which is being given to the participants. Otherwise, if we don't look at this treatment for their welfare, then there would be certain issues. Similarly, if we look at vaccinations, education of members, students and public regarding ethical standards of the principle. Now, if we don't educate people about certain rules and principles, then we won't be able to tell them how to upgrade certain things with time. Now, another reason is to provide a framework for guiding the decision-making for all psychologists. How do we take a unanimous decision to implement something across the world? Right? And then, this framework allows sufficient flexibility for a variety of approaches according to their contacts, according to their culture, using different methods. And it reflects ethical standards applied to all. Like, we can change this culture-wise, but we won't touch the basic principles. Now, acting ethically can be affected by a number of individuals and groups, individuals as well as contacts. In this, we have to see confirmative resistance, peer-influence, contextual background, power, emotions of the participants, rule of social norms, organizational pressure, and group identity. We will discuss all of this in detail. As psychologists, we are very well aware of the fact that the importance of context and character both are affecting the behavior. Code of ethics therefore encourage all the psychologists to be mindful to their strengths and weaknesses in order that they are able to behave in most ethical ways. So, it's very much important that we understand that a psychologist has to follow ethics in overall practice, how mandatory and important it is.


We have one last video that we're gonna have a look at from Yo Samdi Sam, which is a reference to Looney Tunes, if you don't know. Very cool. I didn't realize that she also had the tooth gap. I saw something recently about like models, particularly female women, like trying surgically kind of create an artificial gap in the front tooth. Not because it necessarily makes them look more attractive, but it makes them look more noticeable. You know, when you have sort of a unique aspect to your face, people are more likely to notice and remember you. Really interesting. So you've got that going on Yo Samdi Sam, but this is five signs you have ADHD and autism or odd HD. Let's get into it, guys. We show that anywhere between 30 and 80% of autistic people also have ADHD. And the number seems slightly lower for the number of ADHDers who are also autistic, but that's still a pretty hefty chunk of overlap. The disparity between the two probably just means that ADHD is slightly more prevalent or maybe slightly more diagnosed on a population level. Weirdly enough, the DSM, which is the diagnostic manual for use by psychologists, doesn't actually talk about this at all. And the criteria for autism and ADHD within it do not overlap, despite the fact that there is a great deal of overlap between the two conditions, especially when it comes to things like... I feel like the reason for that is because you're trying to discern which diagnosis someone's having. I feel like that's an okay way of doing it. I haven't looked at the ADHD diagnostic criteria in a while, but if there is something that is in the ADHD diagnosis criteria, which does also cross into autism, then that would be an issue, I think. Things like executive functioning issues. Up until recently, you couldn't even get a dual diagnosis of autism and ADHD. If you had one, you couldn't be diagnosed with the other. Consequently, there is very little in professional literature about what it actually looks like when someone has both. How do they present? Luckily, we have the internet now and people from all over the world can share their lived experiences relatively easily. Woo-hoo! So you clicked on this video, maybe you have one diagnosis, but we're always kind of wondering about the other one. Maybe you don't have any, you think both of them kind of apply to you. So that's what we're gonna talk about today. Disclaimer, I'm not a doctor. I do have a psychology degree, but if you want real clarification, you probably should find a professional and not an internet person. Just think of this video as kind of like a starting point in your journey. Let's go. Hello, everyone. For those of you who are new, I'm Sam and I make videos about autism and neurodiversity related things right here on YouTube. After I was diagnosed with autism in my early 30s, I now know that I also have ADHD. It's really strange looking at like the, I feel like a lot of the top YouTubers tend to be late diagnosed adults, which I feel like is an interesting one. Yeah, it definitely makes me different, I think to a lot of creators because I was diagnosed when I was quite young, a 10. I mean, they spotted signs of me being autistic when I was quite a bit younger, but I was diagnosed when I was 10, so I've grown up knowing that I'm autistic. I feel like I have some different insights into life, I guess. The ADHD and the overlap is a really interesting topic because there's very little out there about what it's actually like having both because we don't really look like what people expect from one side or from the other side. So today I'm gonna go through- We do have a lot of stuff out there on all the ADHD. Maybe not YouTube videos as much, but there is a lot of stuff online. One thing that really worries me about advocates and creators is particularly when creators are talking about autism, but they're also ADHD as well. So there's traits from the ADHD also feeding into what they're talking about in terms of autism, which I think is something that you've gotta remember. If you're following someone who's autistic and ADHD, perhaps not everything's gonna apply to you. Not saying that don't listen to them, but you've gotta take into account that their lived experience is gonna be somewhere in the middle of autism and ADHD. There's obviously gonna be some things that they can discern from the other, but when you're learning from people, learning from their experiences, if they have a dual diagnosis, it might not always be very applicable to you. Like if you're just autistic, like myself, or just ADHD, there's gonna be a lot of differences between ADHD or ADHD and autistic, you know? It's always a good thing to keep in mind when you watch different creators. If you're interested in seeing my interview with her, we were talking about this idea of demisexuality. Over on the Forty Auty podcast, I do have an episode with you, Samdy Sam. If you are interested in seeing us chat to each other. I'm gonna go through five signs that you may, may have both. Number one, a constant conflict between apparently contradictory traits. You might feel inconstant in a conflict with yourself, which often results in becoming frequently frustrated with yourself. You may crave order and routine, but be unable to maintain it. You might get overstimulated as much as you get understimulated. And sometimes this might even happen at the same time or in a very short space of time, which can be confusing and frustrating for yourself and probably also for others around you. So these two sides... I say that the understimulation and overstimulation can also happen just for autistic people. Even just like their actual hypersensitivities. But also, depending on what your mental state's like, how are you feeling? What's been happening during the day? Who's sides of me are both fair. They're both part of me. But sometimes they have completely opposite desires and needs. And I think this can result in what looks like apparently hypocritical behavior from the outside, although it makes perfect sense when you know what you're dealing with. Like for example, needing everyone around you to be completely quiet and then making a lot of noise yourself. Number two, your traits might appear to... That is also an autistic thing. It's not just an ADHD thing. ADHD autism thing. It is also an autism thing. Verbal stimming, you know, it makes sense you can handle something. If you're quite a sensory defensive person, you might not find your own voice to be like a bad thing to experience. I don't know, there's sort of concept that I've come across that is all ADHD. And it was actually a podcast that I did with Matia Morey. And we were talking about all ADHD and sort of the difference between autism and all ADHD too. They were kind of describing this idea of having like cyclical energy, which can sometimes come across as bipolar. Obviously, you can apply that to burnout as well, I suppose. If you have someone who is kind of having periods where kind of your autism takes control a little bit more, I don't know, it's a weird way of talking about it.  So it characterizes you in that way. And then perhaps when you need to retreat and you need to be by yourself and things like that. And perhaps don't have as much sort of outward indirect communication. They might characterize you as being kind of the depressed aspect of it. It's interesting like how when you don't consider autism and ADHD as something particularly in women, it does happen quite a bit. The other diagnosis has kind of come up like BPD particularly, bipolar schizophrenia. So a lot of crossovers there. There's also crossovers with misdiagnoses with visual impairments, which is one of the recent podcasts I did with Paul Isaacs. That was a really interesting episode talking about like how differences in someone's sensory system that's not due to autism can sort of impact the way that people diagnose you. It's like one of the things that the first tell parents before going and getting an autism diagnosis so you gotta get a hearing test. Cause one of the things is that you don't necessarily respond to your name. If they don't respond to your name, they could be deaf. If they don't respond to your name, they could also be autistic. So there's a few sort of areas of misdiagnosis and crossover with other conditions as well, which can muddy the waters a little bit. Peer to balance each other out at times. I think that what can happen sometimes, not for everyone, but for many people, is that the opposing actions of autistic and ADHD traits can seem to balance each other out or maybe even conceal each other. My struggles weren't always obvious growing up. I only was diagnosed in my 30s because for example, the social awkwardness aspect of my autism often kind of gave in to the chattiness and sociability of my ADHD. So from the outside, I kind of just appeared as if I was shy at first and then took a little bit of time to warm up to people, but that wasn't what was happening inside. Both of those people were me, the person who does not want to talk at all in a crowd, but also the one who can't stop talking sometimes. Luckily now I have a YouTube... But the thing is as well, you also have something that's quite seen as quite an autistic trait, which is monologuing, when I present autistic people do that. I'd say that it tends to happen a lot more with all the ADHD that's just from my experience, but it's true. YouTube channel, which means I can talk at many, many people at once and never actually get overstimulated-ish. And while my brain is plenty chaotic on the inside because of my autistic need for order and routine and everything being correct and right, I try really, really hard to maintain a tidy house clear of clutter because of the visual stimulation that loads of clutter brings me. It stresses me out to the house that naturally have left to my own devices I would make.  You're right. And also like for both ADHD-ers and autistic people, having a stable routine and a structure to your day is beneficial to both. Number three, a larger variety then typical of special interests and or hyper fixations. Yes, yes, yes, yes. Another thing that we were talking about on the podcast on ADHD, kind of like with autistic people, our interests tend to be a little bit more stable, whereas ADHD-ers just seem to like grasp onto something new every like few weeks, you know? And they just become interested in it and then grasp onto something else and they become really interested in it. It's never really been something that I've experienced. Like I have a few very, very stable special interests that I have that don't change. One, exercise or sport. One of those, another thing would be obviously autism, psychology and philosophy. Love all that stuff. RuneScape, that's what I'm saying. My gaming sort of lounging kind of style of enjoying life or like TV shows. But I think TV shows are a bit more sporadic, although if it ends I will repeat it over and over again. Now, special interest is a topic that really varies from person to person, even within the autistic spectrum itself. But if you're also an ADHD-er, you may be more likely to have more intense special interests for a shorter time, you know, to use up the dopamine before switching to another one, possibly alongside longer running special interests kind of throughout your life that are more stable and less prone to being suddenly bored with it. There is a stereotype that autistic people can only be into one obscure or weird topic their whole lives, but this isn't exactly true. I found myself becoming extremely obsessed with many different things throughout my life so far while maintaining, I guess, an ongoing intense special interest in, for example, psychology. That's one of my ongoing special interests. I did a degree in it. But I also have these occasional micro fixations, which I guess is more like the ADHD hobby merry-go-round. You know, I'll get really into dressmaking for a few weeks. And that's a really intense period of obsession. I remember when... Yeah, I don't do that. I don't do that. And that actually happened. I struggled to sleep because of it because my mind was so busy creating patterns and constructing them and figuring out how to put the dress together and stuff like that. I was sitting there awake at night and my brain would just not turn off because I was so into this particular topic. The intensity of that didn't last long and now it's kind of something that's, well, that's cheap. Actually, it's in the cupboard behind me. So special interest is something that varies so much from person to person, but you may relate more to having lots of different ones or a mixture of lots of different ones and some ongoing ones than just one or many. I feel like as I've got older or maybe just because I have kids, like I don't really have the energy left for that kind of those intense bursts, but it still happens occasionally. Number four, different versions of yourself come out at different times and in different places. When I'm out of the house or when I was at school or working in an office, I believe that my autistic traits became a lot more noticeable. Out of the house, I'm getting some kind of novelty and stimulation. So the ADHD monster within is pretty satisfied because, hey, we're doing something new. We're getting out. We're seeing things. We're seeing people. But the things that I can't control out of the house is the sensory environment and it's a less predictable social environment too. And those are the things that my autistic self starts to struggle with. When I'm at home, in the environment that I have set up to be as comfortable for me as possible, my ADHD traits are far more dominant. Within the house, I control the sensory aspects as much as I can. So my autistic side is more or less appeased. But it's a familiar environment. It's pretty predictable. Dare I say, sometimes boring. So that's when the ADHD traits become way more noticeable to me when I'm struggling to manage daily life, keep things organized, or struggling to find that kind of novelty in a really familiar place. You see, this is interesting and this is why it is important to talk to lots or at least watch and learn from other people's, like a variety of people's experiences because this is not something that I would ever come with. I don't have experience of being ADHD and autistic. I feel great if I'm in my house. To be honest, it does, it can be bad. I experienced something similar, mostly with my anxiety and depression. If I do get out of the house more, I do talk to more people. My anxiety tends to be higher. My mood tends to be elevated. If I'm not doing as much and I'm sort of solitary, kind of isolated doing my own thing for a long period of time, my anxiety tends to lower quite considerably. My depression tends to get a bit worse. My mood tends to drop a little bit. So it's a weird kind of fine balance, I guess. So I can somewhat relate to that experience but perhaps from a different lens. So I was really good watching Sam. Tend to have some really, really cool kind of perspectives on things. And number five, you relate to people who also have both. This is something that is often really missed by the professionals is relating to other people. And relating to other people is a really important aspect of our humanity. And it's not very easily measurable but it's something less real because it can't be quantified. At a point after my autism diagnosis, I felt a little bit of kind of imposter syndrome because I was meeting more autistic people and I was a bit like, well, I'm not really like completely like them. I'm a bit different from them. And I feel like I am often, dare I say, a little bit too much for autistic people. I talk a lot and I get excited. And when I am being social, I want to be really, really social. So I do actually tend to have more friends who are just ADHDers. The irony is that these people are often too much for me. So I tend to find myself needing more downtime from socializing and more social recovery time than they do. What I'm trying to say is if you have a couple of friends who have a dual diagnosis and if you just find yourself clicking with them or if you think you have one diagnosis but you don't completely, it doesn't explain everything. You feel it's correct, it's not everything. Maybe that's a sign that you have both as well. And you know, neurodivergent people do tend to run in packs who do tend to kind of seek each other out consciously or unconsciously. So, you know, it's not so unlikely. So that was it. Five signs that you may have both ADHD and be autistic. Let me know if any of this resonates with you. If you have these similar experiences of being kind of in a conflict with yourselves, tell me about your inner conflict in the comments. Take care and I will see you next time. Bye. Thank you very much. That was your Sam de Sam. Five signs you have ADHD and autism. Do you feel enlightened by this video? Do you feel like it strikes a chord? Maybe you are also old HD. Who knows? There is also a possibility that you're ADD and autistic if you're not completely like decided on the whole hyperactivity aspect of it, like myself. I don't think I'd go for an ADHD diagnosis because I don't think it fits me. I might see if I'm ADD, I might be. Interesting. If you have enjoyed it, please go over to your Sam de Sam's channel. Go show them some love. Very big channel, probably don't need any more traction from my side of the YouTube space, but really great work, Sam. Always lovely to hear what you've got to say. If you have enjoyed this stream, you want me to do more of this kind of stuff. You can always subscribe, like the video, become a member for as little as 99 p.m. month. Get a little badge next to your name that levels up every month or so into different colors. I've set out my own individual member badges, which I'm very happy with myself about. I will at some point be doing members-only content. So you want to get it in on that. We'd much appreciate it. Much appreciate that. Really does help me out a lot.


Hey everyone, welcome to the live video. Losing the narcissist is a blessing in disguise. I know it's hard to see it in the beginning. When they leave you, it makes you feel like you're not good enough. It makes you feel so unlovable. It affects your self-esteem, your self-worth. It makes you feel like you're not worth anything. I know how it feels when someone does that to you. It's not nice, it can hurt for months, even years. You find it hard just to wake up in the morning and then it's even worse trying to get to sleep at night. It's like everything they said to you is just running for your mind.  I know how that feels. When you feel like it's never going to get better, you just lose all hope in yourself and it just looks like they've just moved on without you with someone else and they're so much happier and they just make you feel like they've just left you behind on your own because you're not good enough for them.  They want you to feel like you're not good enough, not just for them but for anyone. However you feel after they leave you, that's exactly how they wanted you to feel.  I get it you know.  It's the best thing that could happen to you. You might not see it right now but in time you will see it. I know I don't talk so much about my situation although a lot of people have asked about it. They've wanted to know what went on with me and the ex-narcissist in my life. I know most people think that after you leave a narcissist they just ride off into the sunset and they're so happy but that's really not how it is. They want you to think that's what's happening but if you could be a fly in the wall you would see what's really going on and you would realize that it's all a lie. It's just an illusion. All they do is lie. So yeah you know a lot of people they asked me about my ex-narcissist and I know really I don't talk about it much and I prefer to keep things general. I don't normally like to just you know bring up things from my personal experiences but if you all really want to know one of the ex-narcissists I was seeing she ended up addicted to drugs and the last I saw of her she was very miserable. She had no direction in life and then another ex-narcissist when I was with her I had nothing. I had no job at the time. I was going for a smear campaign my life was very difficult. I had no motivation and she was always abusing me emotionally doing everything she could to hurt me and then once she did all she could do she basically just left me to rot and she left and she made me believe that she was riding off into the sunset as they all do and I just felt like okay I'm just left on my own now.  I'm nothing. I'm not good enough for her. I'm not good enough for anyone. That's just how it made me feel and I know that's exactly how she wanted me to feel and then a few months later I found out about what a narcissist is and then I started to realize what I was dealing with and then a few months after that I started the channel. A few months after that I started in a full-time income from the Narc Survivor channel and I started coaching people, changing people's lives and now up until today where I've potentially changed millions of people's lives and I earn a good income from it now I'm able to have the things that I like. You know my life has completely changed and I know that I've changed many people's lives and if we're talking about ex-narcissist year you know that was definitely a blessing in disguise for me and I didn't realize it at the time. It might have taken a year or even two years until I started to realize that but it really was a blessing. It changed my life completely. You know she's not really doing much now. You know the last thing I've seen she's just she works in my local supermarket so you know it's amazing just how things change and like the illusions that they create you know they make you believe that they're riding off into the sunset and everything's so great for them when in reality that's just not the case. What they say to you and what's actually going on it's very different they want you to think that everything's going on great for them when it's just not true but the crazy thing about it is many of them no matter what is actually going on in their lives can actually think that things are going well for them. It's really crazy but it's it's like one of the ex-narcissists even though she was fully aware that I knew she was working in my local supermarket she was saying to me not long before that she was living her best life so you can see how delusional they really are and I'm not saying it's bad for anyone who's working whether it's in a supermarket or anywhere else but when someone's going around boasting about it and acting as though they're doing all of these big things and treating you as though you're beneath them it's really it's really strange because no normal person is going to be boasting about that or thinking that they're doing big things but that's just how these narcissists think you know that they're really delusional they live in this fantasy world and it's all just to protect themselves losing the narcissist really is a blessing in disguise it will change your life completely when you're with them everything's a struggle you're suffering from anxiety depression and then it's like when you finally lose them everything begins to change suddenly you start to get more energy you start to feel more alive you start to do the things that you used to do you have more time and energy to get to know yourself again you haven't got someone there who's constantly doubting you or making you feel bad about yourself I know it may not seem like it right now especially if you've just been discarded by the narcissist but it really is a blessing in disguise it will get a lot easier after a few months and you never know where you might be this time next year or the year after that so much can change when you're not around narcissist it allows you to grow and develop when whenever they're around you all they do is stunt your growth and they're not really riding off into the sunset as I've said before it may look like a sunset but they're actually riding off into the depths of hell really it's just an illusion they want to make you think that they're doing big things but they're really not just look at what they've accomplished in the last six months the last year that should tell you what they're going to accomplish in the next six months or in the next year so don't listen to what they're telling you you've spent enough time with them to know what you're really dealing with and based on what you've seen while you were with them in most situations they would even progress as much as they did while they were with you because while they were with you you were the main thing that was that were keeping them that was keeping them going and usually once they leave you it's all downhill after that they end up downgrading with someone who is barely even on their own standards or someone who's definitely beneath their their they exaggerated standard of themselves so don't listen to what they say I've seen it so many times what happens and for you it's it really is a blessing of disguise just think about when you were with them you only had a few good times and most of the time it was just arguments it was just them putting you down or calling your names so yeah I just wanted to share that message with you I hope it resonates I hope it helps you to realize the truth of what's really going on because they would love you to think that they've moved on and they're happy with someone else because they know that's what you wanted they know that you wanted a happy relationship with them so whatever they think you wanted they're just gonna make you believe that they've got that with someone else even though it's not even true all they can do is try to sell you a dream a fantasy just as they did when they first met you and nothing's changed now they're exactly the same as they always were if anything they only get worse as they age anyway I hope this message has helped you and do check out the new website www.knocksurvivor.co.uk and you can also check on my Instagram as well knock survivor YouTube and if you'd like to email me you can email me as well at coaching at knocksurvivor.co.uk thank you for watching have a good evening or morning depending on where you are and I look forward to seeing you in the premiers tomorrow


Welcome to Toffy TV, I am joined by John Blaine, the chairman of the Everton Shareholders Association and they're obviously part of the Everton Business Matters podcast as well which you can find on Blue Room, my man blank up one right and the other one stuttered along, I'm learning, John it's been an eventful week in terms of off the field matters obviously on the field. Internationally, we've got the Brazilian number nine which is great, we've got a shot on goal, a shot over there. But off the field, Farad Meshiri has increased his shares from 49.9% to 68.6% so what does it mean, John? What does it all mean? He's got more shares. There you go, thanks for watching. I guess it took about two and a half years now, February 2016 when we all woke up and my phone started burning off the hook about who's this guy Farad Meshiri who's just acquired 49.9% of the shares of Everton Football Club and then spends the next two and a half years being referred to as the majority shareholder when he's not or he wasn't but he is now. He is not. So he's crossed that 50% plus a share threshold so formally he controls the football club and what he's done as far as we can tell is he's exercised some of the rights that he agreed those two and a half years ago. So he agreed with Bill Kenwright, John Woods and Arthur Abercrombie to take some of their shares. He clearly took all of Robert Earl's shares two and a half years ago and that's what added up to the 49.9%. He's now taken, as far as we can tell, all of the remaining shares that Abercrombie had which I've got it written down somewhere. And when he did he have 9.10%. It's not a huge amount but some thousands of pounds each it's worth having. He's taken all of John Woods's remaining shares and he's taken some of Bill's, I think, two and a half thousand of what Bill had. So Bill's now left with just under 5% of the shareholding having previously had 25% a couple of years ago. And so we're seeing that the old guard from a shareholding perspective being eroded away. You might say two and a half years ago Robert Earl went in shareholding terms and now it looks like Abercrombie and Woods have gone in shareholding terms. Woods still sits on the board of course and I guess maybe round the edges he's got the odd share who knows. But in broad terms what does it really mean? It means that Fahad Meshiw's reaffirmed his commitment to the football club because he spent more money. And he's also saying that by the latest next summer he'll increase his shareholding again. So again he must have some arrangements in place that allows him to call upon those shares. In other words he's agreed a price with somebody and when he decides the time is right he'll say it's you Baz, I'll have those shares. Please now and he'll hand the money over. So it's all clearly rolling along in the right way. So we'll go again, the plan is for him to go to 77.3%. That's right, by July. And that gives people who are anorex loads and loads of time to try and guess where that might come from. There you go, loads. Just said by next July. So it could be obviously any time within the next few months. One would like to think that that at the latest because that's when they think the stadium will be sorted at the latest. I was going to come on to it but I'm no more. I will do in a minute. Just let me quickly ask you about the question that's on everyone's mind. And it's been all over Twitter and everywhere else. The two letters, Alasjr Ojmunoff. What's your... I've asked you this before but obviously... No, but development. This story, the thing with this story is obviously we've got USM Finch Farms. He's part of the football club. He's a sponsor. So he's obviously a business partner of far up and sharing has been for a number of years. It's just a business associate. He loves Arsenal and he'll never sell them shares. So it's not going to happen and blah, blah, blah. Sold his Arsenal shares. Then there was the spokesman saying, well, you know, he might invest in Everton but it's only if Farad wants his help, blah, blah. Which Keith had us quickly. He was like, well, he might not. He might just be advice. And then there was a story saying he was on a bike charlton. And that was left that. That was a crazy one. Then there's a story that he's looking at Rael Meshir or whatever in Spain at the moment or another thing. Perhaps Milan. But that was refuted as well. The Italian thing was refuted. So would it be better on the surface for him to not be part of Everton football club? But be part of Everton football club if you know what I'm saying. Clearly it's a story that won't go away for the people who are watching who don't know that the main USM company is chaired by Farad Meshiri. So they clearly are, as you called it, long-term business associates and all that good stuff. Clearly they've become friends over that time because he refers to them as my good friend and all that stuff. Within 24 hours of this happening, there was a quote that basically said, well, that's the Meshiri project. But of course, if my friend needs help, I will help him. So I guess your question is, well, what sort of help could he give? Money? Yes, that's good. And how best to help the football club with money? And there is a school of thought that would say, if you look at what's happened in other football clubs, the example has been, I guess, Man City, where you've got the owner of the football club also owns other businesses, which then sponsor that football club and then you run the risk of your afer or indeed the Premier League or whatever it might be, saying, is that a fair and equitable sponsorship? Is it just a way of getting round, a financial fair play or whatever? And the answer is, if there's no direct link, which there wouldn't be, wouldn't there? Then you might say, well, if Osmanov actually wanted to provide a big slug of money into the football club, that could be used by the football club for building stadia or buying players or whatever, then maybe bringing it in through sponsorship, you know, USM Goodison Park or USM Bramleymore or whatever it might be, is perhaps a better use of his money from our perspective, whether it is from his or another matter. From our perspective, then it is spending 100 million quid or more buying shares of Fahad Mishiri. Because what does that do? All that does is reduce the amount of investment that Fahad Mishiri has in the football club and shares it with Osmanov. And when we talk about this on business matters, and I think we did a little bit for the blue room and for City Talk yesterday, I think Paul often says, it's a bit disrespectful really of Mishiri to say we need Osmanov's money. Because we don't. Within the way the business is being run at the moment and the way Fahad himself has written down debt and consolidated debt and so on, what could we have done as a football club if we had another billionaire on the board? You might suggest not a lot. Because of the rules, the way the rules look. And then it would perhaps limit what you could do stretching the envelope of the rules. Because even if Osmanov owned 20-25% of the football club, you'd get more focus, wouldn't you, on what his businesses are doing from the sponsorship point of view. So it's an interesting one. There's no signs at all that Osmanov is suddenly going to pop up and buy a load of evidence shares. It would be interesting, of course, to be did. And I'm sure there's plenty of people out there whether they think they're in the now or just conspiracy theorists who think actually this is all just a front. And when it goes to 77% or more overnight, all those shares will be sold to Osmanov. So even if you fast forward and say that could happen, because never say never. But what would it mean? It would mean instead of a guy worth two or three billion owned in the company, we'd have a guy worth whatever he's worth at the moment, seven or eight billion. If I'm not sure if her play would still be there, we'd still want to build a stadium, we'd still have limitations on how he could use his personal wealth to enhance the football and so on. So Meshiri's personal wealth is enough, at the moment, to do what we need to do. And I don't know, but I doubt very much there's anyone out there right now thinking we've not bought players or we've not built the stadium or got planning applications in yet because Farhad Meshiri hasn't got enough money, have we? So let's hope that one day a relatively modest billionaire proves to be an inadequate one because that means we really are playing at a real top table sort of stuff. And there's football clubs less successful than hosts who have owners who are far wealthier than Farhad is. So it's a nice story. Every time we do something as a football club or Farhad does something as a football club in and around shareholdings and the like, Uzmanov's name will pop up and his representatives will say, no, I'm not doing that. But for many a long month or year they said we're not selling the shares in Arsenal. And within a couple of years both of them did. They were both in it for the long haul at Red and White when they were there. And they're not there now. And they're both out. I can't imagine if Uzmanov has anything like the passion for football that Farhad has that he'll stay out of it for long. And I guess if we wanted to get some closure on this we have to see him invest some money somewhere in a football club and yet like everybody else if that was us that would be terrific. I think it'll be mega fun sponsoring our shares for 500 million, the biggest share sponsorship ever. A year, because that's what that's ultimately what Manchester City does. It's that sort of thing that he can do if he wants to. You ask yourself why do these really, really wealthy guys want to do these sorts of things? Why does Uzmanov refer to it as that's Meshiri's project implying something else is his project? And they often do it for credibility. They do it just for their own passion thing that they're successful at what they do. They want to prove they can be successful elsewhere. And I doubt whether these guys have a problem of knowing that officially they have in no involvement but everyone knows they have really. And they'll get the cue and whatever that flows from I made that difference. But yeah, I mean Sport Pisa, it's who's next year's sponsor after them. Because that was a pretty average one wasn't it? A pretty par one and a mega one would make a huge difference. But you've got to look at that timeline. Farhad's done what he's done, two and a half whatever it is years in, a little bit more than two and a half. Now we've got another milestone which is next summer which is the 77% thing. And then you think where's the stadium fit into that timeline. Well that you've nicely brought me onto the stadium. So do you also see this share increase as the next step for the stadium? Or do you think it's irrelevant? It's irrelevant really. Oh it's not irrelevant? No it's not irrelevant. And if you want to do like the minutia of these things and say well here's all the things we have to do to get all the ducks lined up. I just slowed down today because the duck was crossing the road. Weird. Anyway by the way. Where was this? It was all along the ship canal where I lived. I was stuck in traffic and couldn't understand why. Eventually there was this bloody duck wandering around and we were all my mates because it was on its own. Ducks in a row. Anyway get your ducks in a row. Clearly if you do a swat on it in the sense of strength, weakness, opportunities and all that stuff from management textbooks you'd say well it's uncertainty around who actually controls and owns the football club. It's going to be an issue when we start borrowing money for the stadium and all those sorts of things. Whilst it's all fine and dandy to do a bit of propaganda that says and I think Greg O'Keeffe did some didn't he? Well even though we referred to him as my majority surholder when he wasn't in real terms he was because there's enough lost years to mean that 49.9 could always outvote and all that sort of stuff. The reality is that's not what people do when they're handing over hundreds of millions of pounds. They want to know what's certainty. And now there is certainty. Markets whether you're doing investments or lending money or whatever it might be, what they don't like is uncertainty. These little knots that are not quite tight enough over here and now it's clear that actually Farhad Meshiri can do what he wants. You can call as many general meetings or extraordinary general meetings as you want but when he slaps down his nearly 70% of shareholdings will do what he says. And therefore when they're sitting in negotiating rooms those people he's negotiating with be it for borrowing money for Bramley Moor or for trying to get other investment or whatever it might be, they know he is the man. We've known he's the man for a couple of years but now he's objectively the man. He controls the football club. So that's got to make it a little bit easier whether it's material or not. There's another matter really but it is on the... We've talked about balance sheets before profit loss and the thing. It is a positive on the side of the balance sheet for moving the stadium forward and it's knocked a negative off the other side. Excellent. Are you expecting... Obviously Bill Kennight done a radio interview yesterday. It was bumped into, wasn't it? Whatever it was and there's a couple of sound bites with the stadium. It's not there yet but the architects working hard and everything else. Are you expecting more information as we go forward now? Or did you expect to have heard something by now? When you speak to people and I think I've mentioned this before when I saw Masherry and I asked him and stuff and the thing... I don't know if we talked about this last time I was on but we're really about milestones aren't we when all things are said and done and the milestone that we're expecting is on our podcast yesterday and I think we concluded by the way in August 2022 the first game at the new stadium on the banks of Royal Blue Mersey we'll be Real Madrid 3-1 in the friendly or whoever is the biggest team around at the time but will it be 2023? That's the thing isn't it? And we've had the stadium slip already to the right so 2022 was already a year later than we thought originally. Up to now everyone I've asked who you might think should know or whose opinion would carry more weight than ours has said 2022 is still the plan. Doing the Blue Nose dinner last week and Joe Anderson was there and he got up to say some nice words about Ronnie but of course inevitably get asked about the stadium and he'd been with Fahad the week before and he said again yeah there's still aiming for 22 2022 that is so that would be great I don't think it would be a huge surprise to anybody if it slipped because just look at what's happening on the top Being ready for 22 means being ready say April May June 2022 If you're not ready in August as Spurs may find out it goes round to the next season If you do a project plan that's just going to be really really tight to make August 2022 Do you tell everyone 2023 because you know you can do that Do you under promise and then overachieve and I don't know whether there's some cuteness in that press release but it's said at the latest June 2019 Fahadal because that leaves you hanging doesn't it? You know the targets then but it doesn't mean it can't happen sooner so it would be interesting of the football club when they do make an announcement say something along the lines of we'll be in the new stadium at the latest for the start of season 23-24 which should tell us that with a following win we might make 2022 and certainly it's a 2-1 vote on business matters around that both me and Paul still hang out on 22 can be done and Roger still stuck at 5% so it's 95% unlikely as far as Roger is concerned but I still think it can be done but that again requires us to do stuff You need to get a spade in the ground Well yeah and that's the point I'm not an architect for crying out loud I'm not even construction or whatever but if we do a right to left plan that says it's got to be ready June 1st 2022 it's physically got to be ready when can you start building it to achieve that it's not going to say 3 years to build is it? No so it's not going to say 3 years to build can it be built in 2 years? Well okay I didn't realise you were an expert but if it can be done quite comfortably then we're really saying a spade in the ground by the summer or the spring and summer of 2020 and you can still be open for 2022 so we've got a long time we have still got a long time now deals you know and projects go late one day at a time so you can't just sit in your hands oh we've got loads of time but now we've got a programme director or whatever the role is for what Colin's doing Colin Chong he'll be reviewing everything won't he we've been smoking stuff lads thinking it's going to happen then or it can go faster than you really thought or whatever and you would like to think that Keith Harris and to actually do it you know Keith and Sasha and Denise are all on the Stain Development Company's Board you know Keith's only joined it in the last couple of days so again there's all those indications that it was starting to rev up we've got the Stain Development Director in place we've put the board number accountable for it on the Stain Development Company's Board which was just Denise and Sasha up to that point so yes we're just pent up waiting to be told things and I personally thought we would hear something during the international window which is now closed almost and maybe the club felt that as well and that's what the shareholding things about maybe we did have plans to say more who knows but certainly I expected us to hear stuff about the stadium on or around now and we haven't heard it yet and let's not forget when we do this we want to get bang for our buck don't we and we also perhaps want to avoid negativism as well because I would imagine if we announced the stadium timetable tomorrow the first thing some Sky journalist would ask would be what about Tottenham that's what they thought how confident and it detracts away from because I think just sticking what it looks like is what we want to see just nailing the capacity nailing the capacity thing anyone who wants to listen if you're listening trust in the board to make what they think is the right decision and then they can justify it please feel free to write to them and tell them it needs to start with a six but once it's done it's done we don't want it to just become a big issue because a wise man once said to me when we were arguing about commission whatever comes about John I'll pay too much and you'll get too little and the same will apply on the capacity whatever it is some people will think it's too big and some people will think it's too small but as long as that board have made the decision with the best available information in front of them and they're prepared to front it up then that should be fine and it will be a big one anyway I hope so it will let me just ask you in regards to the shares I'm sure I've seen a couple of people worried about the small share I've had some contacts so what would you what's your understanding of that or are you just off the opinion well this could have happened anyway it depends where you come from to be honest and clearly when events happen like they have then people tend to think in the moment don't they now I've got some shares in Everton and I buy them to make money it's an emotional purchase there's probably 30 I think it's about what I've told you before I think it's about 1300 shareholders who have one share each they've not done that to invest to make lots of money but there will be people out there who think well Farhad has been giving 5 grand a share to John Woods, Robert Earl, Arthur Abercrome how about me can I have 5 grand for my share sorry but I think that's very unlikely because there's a premium on the shares held in big blocks because they obviously result in you ultimately getting control if you look at the way the share holdings have changed since Farhad got here almost if you go back in time you say well say a year or two before he bought the shares he bought who owned the club and it's always been that around 80% thereabouts maybe sometimes a little bit higher sometimes a little bit lower but it's held by a limited number of shareholders I mean right now I think maybe 10 or 15 shareholders own 85% and the other 15% of the stock is owned by those almost a couple of thousand shareholders so you can say there's just over a couple of thousand shareholders but actually all he's doing is knocking out shareholders so you could argue that the position of minority shareholders hasn't changed at all instead of Robert Earl and John Woods and Arthur Abercrombie and Farhad Meshiri owning a big block of shares just Farhad Meshiri owns a big block of shares and the numbers are the same because he's just bought this so that doesn't change now clearly if he being Farhad starts then working his way down a list and saying well okay I've got my list somewhere who's next after Abercrombie and Arthur shares probably and so on and then you get into those who own less than 100 shares each then he can quickly potentially quickly get to the point whereby which is what people fear really when he gets over the legislated number then he has to buy everybody's shares which is whatever it is 80% or something now you can get into things like traded shares our shares are not traded so the rules can be slightly different and so on and I've got to make a man who's a senior partner and a big law firm so I'll go round the loop again with him which is what I did last time but the reality is there's not anything to do about it people just suck it up if you bought Everson shares to make a profit on then you probably will but why would he need to buy any more shares when he's got 77% why would he need any more now you could you've got a recent example for a good while Croncaid didn't think he needed more than 70% hence the Osmanog and what have you far had initially and then Osmanog we're never going to sell that 15 times 2 and then 30% but it did eventually and of course that allows Croncaid to sweep away all shareholders and he is 100% as those who've read what we say on the shareholders website and what I've perhaps said in other places farth had told me in the first time I met him and he reaffirmed it the last time I met him he's got no real intent to dilute the minority shareholders and the shares are still trading on or around 2 grand each so if you decided you wanted to buy a share if you don't have one already it would cost you about 2 grand for had been buying his off bill and the others for maybe 5 grand doesn't mean yours is worth 5 but there are rules around this so if he ever did go for the whole the whole lot then the minority shareholders would get typically what was a fair price based on what he bought the others for and typically once he goes over the threshold that allows him to buy all of them he has to treat the last 10% which would include Oslo I guess the same as he's treated those shares he bought in the previous year so the law would kick in but sorry if you think you're sitting on shares worth 5 grand each that cost you 2 grand each you're probably not and you'll suffer capital gains tax anyway I suppose like you say what's the point of him getting more once he's up to 77 he's quite clearly the main man he's quite clearly can do things he wants to do and buying or something or whatever isn't going to really make any difference there's objective reasons if you are going to invest your personal wealth in something we said this particularly on every business matter when Fahad started having his plans and rolling things out then why would a guy fund 100% of a stadium when he owns 50% of the club because any increasing value and risk and all those sorts of things are all on his shoulders and the upside is being shared by these other 50% when he gets to his 77% let's just round it and make it 75% he'll still only get 75% to the benefit of anything he does now the club doesn't pay dividends so it doesn't share profits with shareholders so none of those things are issues those monies are currently being re-invested in the football club because it's retained and we buy players or whatever I guess one day down the line it may be that we're making so much money like Man United do for the Glaciers for example that anything that is done as an investment and paid for by a limited number of shareholders ie one he's going to want to say well for every hundred I put in I want to get the full benefit of what comes out so yeah there is a reason why you might want all of it but it's a while away and it's a while away and the thing that people may be concerned about which he could do is obviously at the moment the monies he's lent to the football club consolidation of debt those sorts of things the auditors currently consider that to be equity but it's not really equity in an objective sense because it's still the same number of shares and so on if he converted that really into equity ie printed more shares so that he then ended up with a larger percentage of the football club right yeah yeah then that's when you start getting concerned about what the end game is but I would expect him and again he said he's not doing that I would expect him to tell people good time that's what he's doing I asked him how he's going to get his money back because he's sunk so much money in I'm not am I so guys he's put money in that he's got no real idea right now how he's going to get it back again and the answer is we're going to be successful and the valuation of the football club is just going to go stratospheric over time and we'll be from a valuation perspective up there where some of these other clubs are a billion dollar value or billion pound even valuations and then his investment looks well founded doesn't it and then obviously sponsorship deals are higher and everything it gets accelerated as a consequence I mean even players are worth more if they're playing for a certain club and if you look on online and things like transfer market or more more relevantly CIS and stuff in their algorithms exactly the same player would be worth more money if he plays for Man United because of the exposure and other things that go on so that's what we want to do we want to have an accelerant going on and where Masheri will get his money back is an increased valuation of the football club increased valuation of the football club is going to come from a new stadium and being successful both of which evident fans want so let's hope Farhad doubles his money makes it look like Bill sold at a ridiculous because I do think Bill sold at a price less than he could have got sold to the highest bidder but let's hope that everyone thinks crikey he got a good deal didn't he he only paid 150 million quid for that and look at it it's worth a billion now and of course it's what Croncaid does is you use that asset in other parts of your business so there's logic there and it results in his interest at the same as ours we want the football club to be successful and we want to win things what a lovely way to finish what a lovely way to finish but that's it isn't it that's the thing is that he's demonstrating his commitment to the club we're still moving forward he seems to be getting everything in place now we've obviously got Masheri we've got Brands and Silver doing their thing players coming in from Barcelona the stadium it does look very bright building momentum off on the field I guess Bill alluded to what we're doing off the field in that very cameo thing he did on talk sport you know there's unanswered questions an obvious question would be if John Woods has sold all his shits should he be on the board and I guess the answer is if he has the answer is no he shouldn't and therefore someone else is going to go on the board so that would be good because we talk about we want new blood we want to admit it's like the team at the end of the day it's like the squad isn't it it might be to some people speaking bad words but Martin has always talked about having the mixture of the vibrancy of youth but with the old hands and the old heads and the experience that are there as well because if these guys create the environment for these guys to really shine and that's what you need in a football team I know Hanson got it wrong once where you win now with kids you've got to have experience around you and so if we bring new blood because they're new to the football club to the board or they're just young bright things as well then we still need the experienced old hands the guys have been there done that seen the movie and all that and whether people like it or not that's where Ken Wright really comes to the fore because whatever you say whether we'd have done it differently or not for 20 odd years he's known what's going on and I think Jordan was talking on Talksport the Crystal Palace guy Sam and Jordan and he was saying the mixture of the ambition of Meshiri who is quite young well he's not old as a person but he's quite young to owning a football club isn't he? alongside someone who's got loads of experience that's fantastic and Bill can advise and guide but Meshiri can decide and that's what it's about and to be honest that's something I always personally thought Bill is a good figurehead but I didn't want him making he did money did he so we needed someone who's more ruthless business wise more money but I think Bill's a very good salesman of having a football club he's got a lot of football knowledge now whether people like that or not he knows he understands the business I was speaking to someone at the club this morning for something else and over the phone and you talk about that and you talk about Bill and he's ever turning this that and the other that means there's decisions that have had to be made in the past which he would find more difficult to make than a cold hearted businessman would because the businessman would just look at it look at the numbers look at this, that and the other, the risk without any blue tinted specks no blue blood, no nothing and just go yes or no Bill would always have to think of the consequences of the legacy the this, the that, the other when I used to watch the game and time kills deals so while he was going through that then perhaps the opportunity would come and go and that's the decisiveness thing and the conversation I was having this morning was around ticketing and ticket prices and the like where we still have what we do at the moment is very much more relationship based particularly I guess in things like hospitality and stuff like that where they'll have account managers who know your name and all those sorts of things but over across the park they'll have a shopping door they fill a hospitality lounge with 100 people for the next home game it's a different 100 people than from the last home game so the relationships change so I think the dream ticket is when you can mix those two things when part of the input to the decision is that emotional connection but it isn't how you make it so Bill can provide to I guess Farhad and Sasha and Keith Harris who are all not Evertonians at all that emotional input that how fans might react or that's not the evident way to use what Denise has been saying and try and get that balance right so not all decisions are made in a cold hearted very objective business sense but they're not also made in a very emotional sense either and sometimes when these things happen in business if you're over this way which might have been under Bill the pendulum has to swing too far the other way before you can find a good set point so I think board level John Woods has been almost like a silent partner I suppose people may have challenged in the past how much value he did or didn't add and I guess unless you were in the board meetings you wouldn't know so that could be unfair just because you're a quiet man publicly but you can't see can you a man who's got no shares at all assuming he has no shares at all can stay really influential at board level when actually none of the other board members except Bill have shares either so I suppose there'd be more an advice I think that's where Bill comes in for me it's Bill's the one I will provide that as long as we're moving forward I don't care no one does no one does but we also need to remember that we're a proud club with a long tradition and footballers are transient managers are transient and as some clubs are found owners can be transient so if you won't pick 140 years of heritage because you think you want the short term gain of winning things I'm not saying we shouldn't fall away you know what I mean oh no this project I'll finish with this one I'm going to go and do something else then that's like a manager changing and I think that's why Bill tooks along and I think that's why he perhaps ended up selling for a little bit less than perhaps he could have got because he sees in Meshiri someone who is here for the long term and Meshiri I think everyone would agree I hope anyway has demonstrated that that is exactly what he is about to be here today gone tomorrow and if that means we're cautious around decision making because in the grand scheme of things if this is a 25 year project the next 25 months you know a very small percentage of that but for the rest of us it's now now now I need it done now now now so yeah the clock's running and business matters is you can only give people time for so long of course again it's like players great potential but when do you stop saying it I'm quite happy with how it's going and obviously I'm also quite happy daddy said he wants the club to be self sufficient as well try to get to that stage where we are but that needs a big step if they want to throw money at it as well and get us players sustainability needs a big step but you need to it needs to be backed up by buying better players we've seen that this summer just paying that money for the charlots and people are going well you've come in and all of a sudden you go that's why have you paid that money cos look at that patient power that's done and then all of a sudden you're looking at them kind of plays and you're thinking well if meaner comes in and Bernard plays to his potential and Gomez and then we've got to all of a sudden that level of player takes that team up to another level well absolutely and it's that attention grabbing you know well done rejalison scoring for Brazil because there'll be people who've heard about Everton for the first time simply cos he's scored a couple of really good goals and blessing for doing it in blue as well done it in blue so Everton's marketing people Everton's marketing people as we speak let's hope they are, let's hope they're jumping on that and let's hope they're getting pictures of him with Neymar and bouncing it everywhere cos that's the best thing you can get it's the best advertising you can get he's played, he's scored and Neymar are doing the Al pigeon dance together and you know what better way to spread that and try it out do your all that's it John thank you very much for coming in and having a chat let us know what you think in the comment section below what are you thoughts on far-admissiari increasing his grip on the club shell we say are you happy are you a bit concerned I don't know why you'd be concerned and are you still secretly think are there some of us like doing the all-publicity stuff let us know what you think in the comment section below make sure you subscribe, take a second and if you want more videos join us on Patreon don't forget to check John and business matters out on the blue room and to follow John on Twitter John underscore B 58 there you go get on and give him a follow and have a chat with him I'll see you soon on Softly TV


Hi, I'm James. And I'm Anthony. And this is Words and Numbers. So, how are you doing, Ant? I'm well, James. I'd be a lot better if people would stop talking about the minimum wage. Yeah, well, now we're going to just add to it, though, right? Well, yeah. And this is interesting because we've gone through a period of what looked like experimentation with some cities raising the minimum wage, some states raising the minimum wage. And now the federal government wants to get in on the act by raising the federal minimum wage up to $15 an hour. Yeah, no.  The real shock here is that it's not election season and people are talking about minimum wage. Right, which raises the question, why would that be so? I mean, we know that it brings out the voters, but why now? Yeah, no, that's exactly the case, isn't it? Because, you know, election cycles come and go and every single time we get these arguments, but now all of a sudden it's just sticking around. So there's something that's keeping this in the popular imagination. And I actually think it's because the difference between the two parties has become so inconsequential that there are very few wedge issues left, something that differentiates them one from the other. And this one's kind of swimming out there. This one does, in fact, differentiate them to some degree. Yeah, it does seem to be a point on which they're consistently different. I have a hypothesis and it goes like this. What's happened is we've seen over the past couple of years, cities and states not just raise their minimum wages, but raise them a tremendous amount, right? Going from $7 to 10 up to 12 than 15, right? So you're talking about basically a 100% raise over the course of a small time period. And that magnitude of a raise is going to make it very clear to everyone what economists have been saying all along, which is when you raise the minimum wage, you hurt the very people you're trying to help. The lower educated, the lower skilled, the lower experienced workers, they get shut out of the workforce. So I think we're on the verge of seeing an experiment, right? And my hypothesis is that what the federal government is doing by raising the federal minimum wage, it's whitewashing the whole experiment because we're not going to be able to see differences now between lower and higher. Everyone's going to be at the same 15. Yeah, but there's a little more here, isn't there? Because, you know, I did a quick straw poll this past week knowing that we were going to talk about this this week. I asked people who I consider to be reasonably well-informed, reasonably intelligent, but by no means economists, right? They have no special insight into the matter. I just asked them what percentage of the American workforce they assumed was making minimum wage. Oh, this is great. Okay, so what got you numbers? It is. And at the low end, I got a couple of people that said 20%, and then any number of folks came in right around 30%. And over the years, what I've noticed is that 30% on this is the answer that people are just inclined to give. I have no idea why that is. But everybody just naturally assumes that roughly 30% of the American workforce is making minimum wage. And given the amount of breath wasted by politicians on this issue, year in and year out, you know, maybe that's a sensible thing for them to think. But we've got a bit of a surprise for you today, don't we? Well, it's an interesting observation bias, because I think what's going on is we keep hearing about the minimum wage.  And of course, the truth is not anywhere close to 30% of workers' minimum wage. Not even close. So what is the magic number here in the United States? Well, it's interesting because the magic number changes depending on how you want to measure it, right? Do you want to measure all workers? Do you want to measure just hourly workers? Let's start with minimum wage workers as a percentage of the total workforce. As a percentage of the total workforce, you're talking about 1.5%. Come again, Ian? 1.5% of the entire U.S. workforce earns the minimum wage. Well, surely this... Come on now, that's not 30%. No, it gets better than that because the largest chunk, if you break it down by industry, the largest chunk of minimum wage workers are in food preparation and serving. And of course, we know that people, at least people who are good and persistent in those industries, they earn lots of tips, right? This is what keeps them in the industry. And so the average food worker, food preparer, food server is earning actually far more than the minimum wage. Now, if we take them out of the mix, the number we're left with is about 1.5% of the workforce. What about when we think about it in terms of simply the percentage of people making minimum wage as opposed to those who work hourly?  You're about 2.5%, 3% maybe. So no matter how we cut this, we're not coming close to 30%? No, not anywhere close to it. It's a very small sliver of the population that earns minimum wage. All right, so if that's true, and we're here to tell you it is, right, we looked into the numbers, and these are government numbers, it's not like we're just making this stuff up, right, Ant? Oh, absolutely. This comes direct from the Census Bureau. Yeah, so we're not making things up today. We'll see what happens next week. But, you know, when we start to take a look at these things, and you realize that the perception and the reality are so completely at odds with one another, you've got to start asking some hard questions. Why is it that we talk about this to the extent that we do? Yeah, and this is a good question, and I think the answer has a lot less to do with economics than it does with politics. I mean, the economics on this is very clear. Politicians like to present it as economists aren't in agreement as to the effects of the minimum wage. We're extremely in agreement. In fact, it's one of the places next to trade that economists are in most agreement. Now, we'll disagree about who specifically is hurt, but almost universally, economists will tell you as you raise the minimum wage, you're going to get unemployment amongst the least qualified, the least educated workers. So it's got to be the case that if politicians keep pushing this, it's not about the economics. It's about the politics.  Because when you turn on the news and you see people wandering about holding signs, chanting in unison about the fight for 15, you always know something's getting somewhere when there's an alliterative phrase that people chant as they march, right?  Yeah, they're certainly getting people out. And the thing I like to... I talk to my students about this, of course, and when we get through the whole discussion of minimum wage, they'll look at me incredulously and ask, how is it that this is even an issue? And what I say to them is, it's taken me in a class three or four weeks to get you to the point of understanding why the minimum wage actually hurts people. But I can't handle that in a five-second soundbite if I'm a politician, but in a five-second soundbite, I can easily lie to you and say, vote for me and I'll put $15 an hour in your pocket. Well, it's the fight for 15 at. Yeah, lies are much easier to tell, apparently. Well, even if we don't have to go all the way down that road, because I can see why certain people would say, well, everybody should make a good wage, a fair wage and honest wage, and you and I would never disagree with that, actually. We think people should earn a fair wage. However, it's how one defines a fair wage. And we define fair wage as something along the lines of what you're worth in an open market. Yeah, that's absolutely right. If we're going to define fair, it should be the number that two people willingly agree to. But I think it's worth underlying as well. It is not the case that the minimum wage universally hurts people. There are a lot of people who are very nicely helped by an increase in the minimum wage. The problem is that the way it's presented is as worker versus business. And you've got this, you know, the stingy business person. We need the government to come in here and force him to pay more. And so the money goes out of the pocket of the employer, into the pocket of the worker. And that's actually not the dynamic. The dynamic is as you raise the minimum wage, you force the employer to let some of his employees go. And who does he let go? He tends to let go the people who have the least experience and least training, right? The marginal workers. And with the money he saves from not paying them, that's what he uses to pay the workers who remain. So it's actually not worker versus employer. It's worker versus worker. You're right. And let's be perfectly clear about this. An employer will let go the employee who is not worth $15 an hour. Oh, absolutely.  Or to make your bed? And the answer is largely none of it. I don't employ any people to do that. Why is that? It's because the price I would have to pay someone to do those jobs is greater than what the value of having the jobs done is. Therefore, I'll just do it myself. That same calculus is what goes on in the head of the employer. Right. And why wouldn't it? Right. Why wouldn't it? An employer strives first to have his business turn a profit. Right, exactly. And one of the things that people will say is, well, yes, but these employers, they're out to turn a profit. So the minimum wage is what prevents them from paying zero because that's what they'd really like to do, drive wages all the way to zero. Well, stop and think about that for a moment. There's no law requiring employers to pay more than the minimum wage. And yet, 99% of jobs in the United States pay more than the minimum wage. How can that possibly be if there's no law requiring it? It's because the thing that pushes wages up isn't the minimum wage. It's the value of the workers' labor. Right. And even the vast majority of hourly workers in the United States make more than minimum wage. Oh, yes. I mean, it's not just jobs. We're not being fooled and hoodwinked when we look at the data because all these people making big salaries are skewing the data. No, no, no, no, no. Everybody is skewing the data. When we're talking about somewhere between 1% to 3%, depending on how you cut up the data, clearly the perception and the reality are two completely different things here. Yeah, and I think that's worth mentioning as well that when we think about minimum wage, we picture on the one hand the poor workers who are working all these hours for nothing, and on the other hand the super-rich CEOs. And that's the image of the super-rich CEO is as much an outlier in reality as is the minimum wage worker in reality. The fact is, you know, half of businesses in this country have less than 500 employees. That's what the government classifies as a small business. It's even more ridiculous than that, right, because the average business owner pulls in the princely sum of $72,000 a year. Yes, that's absolutely right. So we're not talking about those fat cats down on Wall Street. We're talking about guys who barely make more than the median household income in the United States. Yeah, that's right. And basically a $75,000 job, that's a CEO of a small business, and that's about 50% of businesses in the country. And yes, there are CEOs who are making multi-millions, but there is rare in the CEO world as LeBron James is in sports, right? You'll get some LeBron James once in a while, but that's not the rule that's the exception. So what we end up with, oddly, are CEOs that make not nearly what people think. A group of minimum wage workers that's infinitely smaller than people suppose. Who's telling the truth here? Yeah, well, this is the fun thing. Everybody can look at this data, you just Google it, it's right there, it's for free. Anybody who's interested can find this with, you know, five minutes worth of work. But what you have to do is get up out of your chair and stop listening to the talking heads, whose job it is to earn money by selling advertising, which they could do if they're telling you things that you find extreme. Said the talking head. And on that happy note, that's all we've got time for today on Words and Numbers. Thanks for watching this episode. Leave a comment, let us know what you think about the minimum wage if you'd like, ask a question or two if you've got them. And if you like this episode, come on back every Wednesday around about 12.30, give or take, Eastern time for a brand new one. We'll see you next week. Until then, check us out at fee.org and at fee online on social media. And I guess that's about it for today. And so you have a sparkling week. Catch you next week. See you next week, James.


There are those that buy a good stereo and use it for years without ever changing anything. And there are those that buy a stereo and keep changing components year after year. For those in between, this video is made. The writer Juval Noah Harari wrote in my words that the urge for new things is the basis for the success of the human race, for it drives us to improvement and innovations. Or the urge should not lead to unwise decisions, just to follow a trend or audio-religion. I have seen this happen frequently over the 50 years I am involved with audio. I have seen people trade in their torrents of TD124 for one of the early direct drive turntables. I have seen people trade in nice tower speakers for satellites and central woofer, often wrongly called subwoofer. I have seen people trade in their dual turntable for the first-gen CD player. The motivation, usually vague but most likely to be the first on the block, or a fast belief in technical progression, and sometimes because of the ease of operation or to please the aesthetics committee. The last two reasons are relatively rational, the others are not. If it pleases you to buy a new equipment or accessories because of any reason but the rational one, that's fine with me, really it is. But if sound quality is your drive, how do you stay away from purchases that don't bring better sound? How do you stay away from the delusion of the day? First be careful with forms and the like. There are really good forms but there are also forms that form the kingdom of one connoisseur that wants to spread his dogma as wide as possible. There often is one truth based on his or her experience. That can be an interesting read but it cannot be your sole source of information. The same goes for reviewers including myself. We all have our own vision, but most of us have years of experience working with audio on a daily basis and a journalistic approach. Quite different are the influences that base their review on the fact that they got the equipment for free in exchange for a positive review. The same goes for people that work with companies that offer a percentage if someone buys the product via a special link and aren't open about it. Anyway, use the web and YouTube as much as you like but be aware of the pitfalls. If it's too good to be true, it usually is. A 99 euro streamer might perhaps occasionally be better than a 199 euro streamer but it certainly isn't as good as a 1000 euro streamer, often using the argument that since the output is digital it can't be different. I sincerely hope that this ignorance would end some day. Have it demonstrated in a high-fi shop for its easily debunked end. If your aim is to improve sound quality, go about it in a structural way. You're saying the chain is as strong as the weakest link still holds, also for a stereo. Always start with the source since a stereo cannot be better than what's put in. Garbage in is garbage out. From there on work your way to the loudspeakers and don't forget the cables. The best way is to try the equipment at your own place, using music you play when enjoying music as opposed to enjoying the stereo. Often when you order gear online there's a money back screen if you don't like it. As soon as it arrives, connect it and have it play 24x7 for a few days, if you can. Having a good relation with a dealer often is even better. He or she can save your time by suggesting good choices and lend you that choice to try at home. Ask the dealer if that gear already is burned in, if not, again have it play for several days. In all cases when returning the equipment or accessories it needs to be undamaged and in the original packing of course. Time to go more in depth. The first choice you have to make is if you go for separate components or want it all just integrated. When chosen wisely there need not be a difference in sound quality between the two. But going for separate components lets you improve further by replacing just one component. You then pay extra for the separate housings, power supplies and the cabling cost. You also get added operational complexity. The choice also had to do with the type of source or sources you desire. Do you want vinyl, cd or streaming as source? Two of them? Of all three. Vinyl needs a phono input on your amp and depending on your turntail that must be either MM or MC compatible. MM stands for moving magnet and MC for moving cartridge. The letter is mainly found at higher prices. It outputs a very low voltage and thus needs more amplification. MM cartridges start at low prices but the high end types need not offer less sound quality than the equally priced MC types. Some amps come with built in cd players while today many come with integrated DAC and or streaming functionality. If you want streaming, what system matches your listening habits best? Blue OS, DNLA, Sonos, Squeezebox, Roon and so on. Many manufacturers use DNLA since it is easily implemented by using a third party add-in and made their own via batch engineering of the app. Blue OS is only available in Blue Sound and NAD equipment. Sonos only works with Sonos equipment. Squeezebox today is freely available through Logitech Media Server but there is no longer official Squeezebox hardware in production. Which means that you must rely on third party gear. Roon works with over 170 brands of streaming products. It even works with Sonos, Googlecast and Squeezebox but it's not free nor comes free with hardware. Blue OS and Sonos don't need a separate server program running on your computer. They just need a shared volume on a computer or NAS. Blue OS can even work with a USB drive connected to the streamer so there is no need to have a computer or NAS running. Squeezebox and Roon need to have a specific server program on a computer or NAS. Logitech Media Server for Squeezebox is free. Roon Server is not. DNLA and the functionally identical UPnP AV also need a server program on a computer or NAS but there are many DNLA server programs available from several software suppliers. Some are free, others cost money. For music I love Minimus Server since it has far more metadata fields than most. There is a limited free version and a paid full version. Streamers that use the DNLA system might not always offer a gapless playback, meaning that for instance live concerts and Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band by The Beatles will mute shortly in between every track. Almost all current players have this solved but you better check. Even if you use an amplifier with built in CD player or streamer you can usually still connect an external CD player or streamer to it, or any other digital source like the digital output of your TV, DVD player, Blu-ray player or game console. In essence a music server is a computer that shares a volume or runs a server program to play up music to your stereo. But if you use that music server connected directly to the DAC or amplifier with built in DAC, you might be disappointed in the sound quality. See my video Choosing your digital connection for more information. If you want to connect a music server directly to the DAC, you should use a purpose-built music server, which is a computer that is optimized for that. See my playlist Audio Servers for Reviews. If you use a network connection to your streamer or network bridge, a normal computer use this server will already sound fine, although in a number of cases a purpose-built music server might further improve the sound quality. Regardless whether you go for an amp with or without integrated DAC, streamer and or CD player, it does need to be able to drive the loudspeakers properly. It is hard to define which amp is suited for a given loudspeaker on figures only. It has to do with the loudspeaker impedance and the amp capable of delivering current. See my video How many watts do I need? Years ago the quality of the amp was often related to the weight of it, since large transformers weigh a lot. New technologies like switch mode power supplies and Class D amplifiers have changed that clearly. As said, listen to the combination of the amp and the loudspeakers for some time, playing music you normally play. In the two part video How to listen part 1 and 2 I explain a good strategy to judge equipment. The most important thing with loudspeakers is the room and the placement in that room. In small rooms monitor loudspeakers on stands possibly supported by a subwoofer might be the best choice. It is easier to place compact monitor loudspeakers for a good stereo image while the subwoofer can be placed elsewhere. See my video loudspeaker placement long version and subwoofer placement and settings. In a larger room a floor standing speaker might be considered.  From the technical perspective an important consideration when buying loudspeakers is the impedance. It's never the 8 or 4 ohm specified. The impedance, the resistance to alternating current, varies with the frequency and that can have a great effect on the current the amplifier has to deliver. Especially at low frequencies some amplifiers have trouble delivering high currents and that's clearly audible. See my video what about loudspeaker impedance for more information. Don't underestimate the effect cables can have on the sound quality but be very selective. Start with the mains cables. If you try them and you should, replace the standard cords on all the devices you listen to with audiophile quality cables that per device cost about 3% of your stereo. So if your equipment have cost you €4000, spend €120 per power cable. Transfer them from your dealer or order them online with the option to re-intern them if you don't like the result. If you don't hear any difference, don't buy them. Even if you like the looks of those garden hose like cables. Get used to the sound of the power cables then after a while do the same with interlinks. Again after a while do the same tactics for loudspeaker cables. Use the same 3% per cable rule as the starting ports for the interlinks. Loudspeaker cables might cost more since you need longer lengths. Depending on the equipment, more expensive cabling might sound even better. The 3% is only an indication. Again be very selective when choosing accessories. There are very good ones like audiophile network switches, USB reclockers and loudspeaker isolators. But again, try them and send them back if you're not convinced. And don't try to correct the problem one accessory causes by adding another. In general, if you think you need two of the same types of accessories in series, use none of them. There are still things in audio that cannot be explained from existing technical knowledge. Although some think that measurements tell you all. There still is no technology known that explains why some wines are appreciated more than others. There also is no technology that can technically explain why violins by Amati and Stradivari sound so much better. It therefore is important to know how to taste wine, how to listen to violins and how to listen to stereos. I don't know much about wine and violins but in my videos how to listen part 1 and part 2 and tell about listening to stereos. All videos and playlists I mentioned are listed in the description below this video in YouTube. Just press more to see them. Which brings me to the end of this program. See you next Friday at 5pm central European time. If you don't want to miss that, subscribe to this channel or follow me on the social media so you will be informed when new videos are out. Help me reach even more people by giving this video a thumb up or link to this video in the social media, it is much appreciated. Many thanks to those viewers that support this channel financially. It keeps me independent and lets me improve the channel further. If that makes you feel like supporting my work too, the links are in the comments below this video on YouTube. I am Hans Beekhuyzen, thank you for watching and see you in the next show or on theHBproject.com. And whatever you do, enjoy the music.