Transcripts For CSPAN2 Books About The U.S. Economy 20240713

Hidden in plain sight and why it could happen again. You remember the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission investigating the causes. You decided not only with democrats but the republican appointees. What did you see they didnt . Looking at the housing system and dodd frank im sorry fannie mae and freddie mac for quite a while before i got on the commission. So i have background on what was happening in the housing sector. So i was looking for the commission to look into what happened with fannie mae and freddie mac and the role they played in the housing crisis and ultimately the financial crisis and the commission was not interested in that and they wouldnt look at it to the degree that i tried to interest them. I was just told i was given all kinds of signals that something they would do so i decided i would dissent so the differences with the other republicans came from the fact that my view our responsibility on the commission was to make sure the American People understood what happened in the crisis to be outside the partisan differences that we just were not agree with anything the democrat said and they didnt want to indict the Bush Administration so i felt i had to speak with the independent voice. So to vote for that commission in the late stages of that inquiry but in your book you have a lot of unconventional views but this focuses on the housing and Mortgage Market in the United States when and why did the Us Government get so heavily involved in the Housing Market cracks back when the government attempted to assist banks to make loans by guaranteeing the loans and to assure one ensure them and then fannie mae was established late 1938 also part of the new deal to provide liquidity to banks and then to get liquidity for the mortgage. So it was all very helpful to indoor one induce more home sales in the United States. That was the beginning. The government got much more involved in the fifties when they started adjusting the fha standards in order to improve housing in the United States or increase the amount of housing with a desire to help the economy. Because once the government started using housing to improve the economy and the American Peoples view of their government, then political from what it was before it was simply a question to make sure the market. This stretches across republican and republican administrations to encourage accounting activity. Where did you see the more recent turning point in this development . The key turning point from my perspective was 1992 when congress adopted the Affordable Housing goals under a great deal of pressure at the time the below Median Income has credit for mortgages in many activist supported those in pressured congress to do something to provide much more credit to those groups and then adopted the Affordable Housing goals. These goals are only applicable to fannie and freddie and when they bought mortgages from other originators to make sure 30 percent were made to people at or below the Median Income. To require a certain quota was given to the department of housing and urban development at that point and over that time between 1992 in 2008 they gradually ratcheted up the requirements to add new requirements those that of all mortgages that are below the Median Income and by 2008 it was 56 percent in the Bush Administration. Its not partisan it was done under clinton first and then under bush the whole idea was carried through. And designed to encourage americans to save money and then to ensure middle income people can have a home and an asset of this kind. There something wrong in night on in general that they should be able to buy a home in america. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that homeownership should be encourage but the problem with the system to force fannie mae and freddie mac to lower those standards for those that could not sustain the mortgages by the year 2008 more than half of all mortgages in the United States are what we would call subprime mortgages and of those 76 percent are on the books of Government Agencies which shows clearly it was the government that created the demand. Now what happens when underwriting standards decline its not those that bought homes could carry those homes but when they fail they affect all of the people around them all of those go down so what the American People should understand what they dont really understand today when those standards are reduced to show other people that cannot sustain the standards dont have the proper credit relationships are the down payment and unable to keep the mortgages. We have a couple that intersected with fannie and freddie and what they have done and the congressional and political push to encourage more homeownership and when thes combined fannie and freddie were there with the vehicle to do all this. What happened then with fannie and freddie with the existence with lawmakers that led to where we were in the crisis . The person who ultimately became the president of fannie mae jim johnson was a political operative. Realizing fannie mae was under stress because it had a strong government franchise it would have to sustain over time if fannie mae and freddie mac actually became supporters of low Income Housing that would give a strong backing in congress with this superior franchise position to get support from the government to make quite a lot of money. Even though they were started by the government. They were privatized in 1968 and given authority to buy governmentbacked mortgages to enter the conventional market with a regular mortgage that made them profitmaking institutions and then became a publicly traded company on the New York Stock Exchange one of the largest institutions in the United States at that time but the because as they grew bigger the dangers were always that somehow the government would move against them with a great deal of push in the Bush Administration for fannie mae and freddie mac and from their point of view especially fannie was much more political to avoid more regulation they have to rely on the democrats of congress they were very focused to make sure fannie and freddie supported low Income Housing. Even though they were beginning in the two thousands to find those mortgages would cause them to suffer tremendous losses they could not go to head to say we will not comply with the quotas anymore because it drives us out of business and we will fail we couldnt do that because they could no longer support them in the Bush Administration to put them under much greater regulation 2,032,004 and 2005 to become successful so they were caught in a vice to keep the democrats on their side and on the other hand in the Affordable Housing requirements gradually driving them to insolvency. I read economist eloquently but i never heard a more eloquent statement succinctly summed up the economic world than george bush in 2008 when he said if money doesnt listen up and this will go down. [laughter] so tell us. But that was short and to the point and appreciation for the fact to understood what needed to be done. And was always surprised when i was surprise. That i spoke to him and if i didnt have the right relationship with the president then its my fault. So one year before the crisis to get to know the president and work with him. And to understand the markets so the conflict he dealt with as anybody we believe in the United States of america to build responsibility for your own losses. But from day number one he understood the Financial Markets were about the economy and jobs. So i was coming to him and i did not have to self him he would back me up and say listen hank we will get through this. It wont look good. This will be politically unpopular but we will do what it takes and sometimes almost like my mother to me. And then to get more sleep. So it seems to me right up after the election probably felt barack obama was more knowledgeable and interested in what was going on is that a Fair Assessment . And it certainly gave me more anxiety and was now president obama was engaged in that support for what we needed to do. But i am quite grateful to john mccain because i have real respect for him because let me tell you the election six weeks away there is no way in my judgment have gotten it if john mccain came out against it. To hold the populist card we would have been left defenseless. So i am increasingly grateful the way he handled himself during this period to say i just had a few hours of sleep. And with that threat. But that was when he came back that was quite a scene to interrupt the campaign to come back and Michelle Davis who was with me today and then said to me about john mccain coming back. And so she was afraid. [laughter] she got me on the flight on the way down. So as it turns out, again, it was a couple days of anxiety but john mccain spent time with the House Republicans and he did his part and even after we got the t. A. R. P. And to criticize the things he has done which is very unpopular but on one level that sometime after the election and this may be slightly exaggerating but i recall 93 percent of American People oppose the bailouts 60 percent oppose torture. [laughter] so 70 percent were looking at something much worse so to explain to the American People this wasnt for wall street it was for them. And to have thes consultations with obama. [laughter] for both the president and the members of the administration what they really didnt anticipate how tough it would be on the economy. But from the message you were giving them, i would ask what you expected because i did not expect them. I knew that there is a scene in the book talking about denver tachy to meet long on been burning key to meet with congress. And then as warren said the numbers were freezing up. So i knew with the certainty of this would be turned down because when you have companies it is uncertain with the shortterm funding most say i cannot handle all the funding you would like so what does the prudent company do . That congress had not sees jet in their district so i knew with a certainty it would get worse im not sure it would be 10 percent unemployment but it would be bad. And i knew that if they didnt do something it would collapse and then they couldnt find themselves and could not pay for the inventories and let employees go. And then we have armageddon. And then to have this terrible situation. And we will be in deep do do. And its really hard to give credit for the disaster that you never saw or could see days to sit on the front porch in charlotte with my grandmother and tell me stories about her use in the thirties when she was living in connecticut and the story she told me was that she was very proud because her children could wear a new suit shoes every year but a lot of kids didnt get new shoes or even have shoes but the shoe factories had shut down during the depression and fathers lost their jobs or was it enough to provide shoes for the kids i can see there was something wrong all they had to do was open the factory and then kids would have the shoes. She said it doesnt work that way when it was the intellectual puzzle of the Great Depression the factories are there the workers are there but for some reason it isnt happening that magneto problem the system isnt working it was a puzzle to me i dont want to pretend i was inspired from age six to study the Great Depression but when i came back and graduate school i found that to be the holy grail the most important puzzle that economist have and to spend a lot of time researching. That is our firm paradox to go down in history. You were fed chair for a little while and coming to the senate and put on a committee that was called the sleepy Banking Committee with sarbanesoxley wasnt a lot on their agenda that my wife and i lived in zip code 44105 which doesnt mean much to you but the first half of 2007 there were more foreclosures than any zip code in the United States of america and it seemed to me at least intel bear stearns there wasnt all that much more attention from the fed with the housing issues because the housing crisis with a whole lot of reasons it was predatory lending and obviously what was happening with manufacturing. So why was the government overall not cognizant all over the country . Ohio was in the middle of this. With foreclosures every year all over the state from appalachia to innercity why did we not see that as a country how serious that was . I spoke about foreclosures a number of times before the crisis my concern was that some are probably unavoidable but in some cases it seems like there wasnt enough effort being made to modify mortgages to find a solution that people would stay in their homes. We were concerned with the Housing Market beginning to slow as early as 2006 talking about foreclosures in the subprime mortgages. But we did worry about those excellent communities. And i heard those statements but also i would say that Consumer Protections to stop predatory lending and those responsibilities and the authority the fed ha had, particularly prior to you and not casting aspersions on any fed chair, but i thank you are more into then your predecessors. But i began to hear from people in cleveland and other cities that Consumer Protections with predatory lending the any other regulator was there for us. You are use to the word predatory which is critical i talk about that at length in my book i have to go back because some of this extends back to the nineties. That are not blaming anybody in particular but in that deceitful lending. And that legitimate subprime lending is just a very Good Development because it allowed people of more modest means and minorities to counteract the redlining to get into a home to participate in the American Dream and quite honestly one of the reasons there wasnt a more aggressive effort for subprime lending was the fear of cutting that off with a very strong decision between predatory lending that was already illegal it was a question of enforcement. Versus subprime lending to be a different type. Going from a different angle i dont think the key fed staff that were captured by the firms they regulated that they perceive to be in their own career or financial interest but open to the arguments it should not be excessive in the competitive Market Forces to some extent teacher poor lending practices i work in the institution where lobbyists are omnipresent with a different environment from regulators. You may remember after dodd frank past the chief lobbyist for Financial Service industry now it passed they will go lobby the regulators. I met a place in the senate where lobbyists come at you regularly over time in part because your regulators tend to hear from the most elite in society its easy to preserve the union and then think is that i have to get my Public Opinion passed. And with pope francis with the parish priest it doesnt strike me that way so it just seems to me the fed is less likely to be aware of the pain of how many regulators know people with their homes foreclosed on and to see that and understand that. That Federal Reserve system and there is one in cleveland but they report to us about what was happening in cleveland and well before the crisis there was a philosophical perspective that the Financial System should be less regulated to be more dynamic. But certainly greenspans view that banks have sufficient capital that you didnt have to watch them to carefully. I didnt have to be too burdensome. 8 million American Homes were foreclosed on during the great recession. But they didnt all disappear. The wealth gap in America Today is bigger than it has been in 100 years were at the top one tenth of 1 percent the homeownership rate is the lowest level in 50 years and it continued to go down 11, 12, 13 and 15 until it bottomed out in 2016. I was sitting there in 2016 watching donald trump when this populist insurgent campaign at the time the economy with a high Dow Jones Industrial average. Wall street is doing great. But america is angry and on the left Bernie Sanders is doing well with this populist message so it seemed like housing would be a fruitful way to focus. So basically i started with the question 8 million americans lost their homes, we lost our wealth, where did it all go . Who took it . The homewreckers. One of the things i think about with Home Ownership is the typical american wants to do a lot of equity in their home. So when you lose a home or your family loses a home that you cannot leave to your child or grandchild, that is a significant wealth depreciation event. But that will happen intergenerational impact. Homeownership is the only way most people can save money. We follow the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission<\/a> investigating the causes. You decided not only with democrats but the republican appointees. What did you see they didnt . Looking at the housing system and dodd frank im sorry fannie mae and freddie mac for quite a while before i got on the commission. So i have background on what was happening in the housing sector. So i was looking for the commission to look into what happened with fannie mae and freddie mac and the role they played in the housing crisis and ultimately the financial crisis and the commission was not interested in that and they wouldnt look at it to the degree that i tried to interest them. I was just told i was given all kinds of signals that something they would do so i decided i would dissent so the differences with the other republicans came from the fact that my view our responsibility on the commission was to make sure the American People<\/a> understood what happened in the crisis to be outside the partisan differences that we just were not agree with anything the democrat said and they didnt want to indict the Bush Administration<\/a> so i felt i had to speak with the independent voice. So to vote for that commission in the late stages of that inquiry but in your book you have a lot of unconventional views but this focuses on the housing and Mortgage Market<\/a> in the United States<\/a> when and why did the Us Government<\/a> get so heavily involved in the Housing Market<\/a> cracks back when the government attempted to assist banks to make loans by guaranteeing the loans and to assure one ensure them and then fannie mae was established late 1938 also part of the new deal to provide liquidity to banks and then to get liquidity for the mortgage. So it was all very helpful to indoor one induce more home sales in the United States<\/a>. That was the beginning. The government got much more involved in the fifties when they started adjusting the fha standards in order to improve housing in the United States<\/a> or increase the amount of housing with a desire to help the economy. Because once the government started using housing to improve the economy and the American People<\/a>s view of their government, then political from what it was before it was simply a question to make sure the market. This stretches across republican and republican administrations to encourage accounting activity. Where did you see the more recent turning point in this development . The key turning point from my perspective was 1992 when congress adopted the Affordable Housing<\/a> goals under a great deal of pressure at the time the below Median Income<\/a> has credit for mortgages in many activist supported those in pressured congress to do something to provide much more credit to those groups and then adopted the Affordable Housing<\/a> goals. These goals are only applicable to fannie and freddie and when they bought mortgages from other originators to make sure 30 percent were made to people at or below the Median Income<\/a>. To require a certain quota was given to the department of housing and urban development at that point and over that time between 1992 in 2008 they gradually ratcheted up the requirements to add new requirements those that of all mortgages that are below the Median Income<\/a> and by 2008 it was 56 percent in the Bush Administration<\/a>. Its not partisan it was done under clinton first and then under bush the whole idea was carried through. And designed to encourage americans to save money and then to ensure middle income people can have a home and an asset of this kind. There something wrong in night on in general that they should be able to buy a home in america. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that homeownership should be encourage but the problem with the system to force fannie mae and freddie mac to lower those standards for those that could not sustain the mortgages by the year 2008 more than half of all mortgages in the United States<\/a> are what we would call subprime mortgages and of those 76 percent are on the books of Government Agencies<\/a> which shows clearly it was the government that created the demand. Now what happens when underwriting standards decline its not those that bought homes could carry those homes but when they fail they affect all of the people around them all of those go down so what the American People<\/a> should understand what they dont really understand today when those standards are reduced to show other people that cannot sustain the standards dont have the proper credit relationships are the down payment and unable to keep the mortgages. We have a couple that intersected with fannie and freddie and what they have done and the congressional and political push to encourage more homeownership and when thes combined fannie and freddie were there with the vehicle to do all this. What happened then with fannie and freddie with the existence with lawmakers that led to where we were in the crisis . The person who ultimately became the president of fannie mae jim johnson was a political operative. Realizing fannie mae was under stress because it had a strong government franchise it would have to sustain over time if fannie mae and freddie mac actually became supporters of low Income Housing<\/a> that would give a strong backing in congress with this superior franchise position to get support from the government to make quite a lot of money. Even though they were started by the government. They were privatized in 1968 and given authority to buy governmentbacked mortgages to enter the conventional market with a regular mortgage that made them profitmaking institutions and then became a publicly traded company on the New York Stock Exchange<\/a> one of the largest institutions in the United States<\/a> at that time but the because as they grew bigger the dangers were always that somehow the government would move against them with a great deal of push in the Bush Administration<\/a> for fannie mae and freddie mac and from their point of view especially fannie was much more political to avoid more regulation they have to rely on the democrats of congress they were very focused to make sure fannie and freddie supported low Income Housing<\/a>. Even though they were beginning in the two thousands to find those mortgages would cause them to suffer tremendous losses they could not go to head to say we will not comply with the quotas anymore because it drives us out of business and we will fail we couldnt do that because they could no longer support them in the Bush Administration<\/a> to put them under much greater regulation 2,032,004 and 2005 to become successful so they were caught in a vice to keep the democrats on their side and on the other hand in the Affordable Housing<\/a> requirements gradually driving them to insolvency. I read economist eloquently but i never heard a more eloquent statement succinctly summed up the economic world than george bush in 2008 when he said if money doesnt listen up and this will go down. [laughter] so tell us. But that was short and to the point and appreciation for the fact to understood what needed to be done. And was always surprised when i was surprise. That i spoke to him and if i didnt have the right relationship with the president then its my fault. So one year before the crisis to get to know the president and work with him. And to understand the markets so the conflict he dealt with as anybody we believe in the United States<\/a> of america to build responsibility for your own losses. But from day number one he understood the Financial Markets<\/a> were about the economy and jobs. So i was coming to him and i did not have to self him he would back me up and say listen hank we will get through this. It wont look good. This will be politically unpopular but we will do what it takes and sometimes almost like my mother to me. And then to get more sleep. So it seems to me right up after the election probably felt barack obama was more knowledgeable and interested in what was going on is that a Fair Assessment<\/a> . And it certainly gave me more anxiety and was now president obama was engaged in that support for what we needed to do. But i am quite grateful to john mccain because i have real respect for him because let me tell you the election six weeks away there is no way in my judgment have gotten it if john mccain came out against it. To hold the populist card we would have been left defenseless. So i am increasingly grateful the way he handled himself during this period to say i just had a few hours of sleep. And with that threat. But that was when he came back that was quite a scene to interrupt the campaign to come back and Michelle Davis<\/a> who was with me today and then said to me about john mccain coming back. And so she was afraid. [laughter] she got me on the flight on the way down. So as it turns out, again, it was a couple days of anxiety but john mccain spent time with the House Republicans<\/a> and he did his part and even after we got the t. A. R. P. And to criticize the things he has done which is very unpopular but on one level that sometime after the election and this may be slightly exaggerating but i recall 93 percent of American People<\/a> oppose the bailouts 60 percent oppose torture. [laughter] so 70 percent were looking at something much worse so to explain to the American People<\/a> this wasnt for wall street it was for them. And to have thes consultations with obama. [laughter] for both the president and the members of the administration what they really didnt anticipate how tough it would be on the economy. But from the message you were giving them, i would ask what you expected because i did not expect them. I knew that there is a scene in the book talking about denver tachy to meet long on been burning key to meet with congress. And then as warren said the numbers were freezing up. So i knew with the certainty of this would be turned down because when you have companies it is uncertain with the shortterm funding most say i cannot handle all the funding you would like so what does the prudent company do . That congress had not sees jet in their district so i knew with a certainty it would get worse im not sure it would be 10 percent unemployment but it would be bad. And i knew that if they didnt do something it would collapse and then they couldnt find themselves and could not pay for the inventories and let employees go. And then we have armageddon. And then to have this terrible situation. And we will be in deep do do. And its really hard to give credit for the disaster that you never saw or could see days to sit on the front porch in charlotte with my grandmother and tell me stories about her use in the thirties when she was living in connecticut and the story she told me was that she was very proud because her children could wear a new suit shoes every year but a lot of kids didnt get new shoes or even have shoes but the shoe factories had shut down during the depression and fathers lost their jobs or was it enough to provide shoes for the kids i can see there was something wrong all they had to do was open the factory and then kids would have the shoes. She said it doesnt work that way when it was the intellectual puzzle of the Great Depression<\/a> the factories are there the workers are there but for some reason it isnt happening that magneto problem the system isnt working it was a puzzle to me i dont want to pretend i was inspired from age six to study the Great Depression<\/a> but when i came back and graduate school i found that to be the holy grail the most important puzzle that economist have and to spend a lot of time researching. That is our firm paradox to go down in history. You were fed chair for a little while and coming to the senate and put on a committee that was called the sleepy Banking Committee<\/a> with sarbanesoxley wasnt a lot on their agenda that my wife and i lived in zip code 44105 which doesnt mean much to you but the first half of 2007 there were more foreclosures than any zip code in the United States<\/a> of america and it seemed to me at least intel bear stearns there wasnt all that much more attention from the fed with the housing issues because the housing crisis with a whole lot of reasons it was predatory lending and obviously what was happening with manufacturing. So why was the government overall not cognizant all over the country . Ohio was in the middle of this. With foreclosures every year all over the state from appalachia to innercity why did we not see that as a country how serious that was . I spoke about foreclosures a number of times before the crisis my concern was that some are probably unavoidable but in some cases it seems like there wasnt enough effort being made to modify mortgages to find a solution that people would stay in their homes. We were concerned with the Housing Market<\/a> beginning to slow as early as 2006 talking about foreclosures in the subprime mortgages. But we did worry about those excellent communities. And i heard those statements but also i would say that Consumer Protections<\/a> to stop predatory lending and those responsibilities and the authority the fed ha had, particularly prior to you and not casting aspersions on any fed chair, but i thank you are more into then your predecessors. But i began to hear from people in cleveland and other cities that Consumer Protections<\/a> with predatory lending the any other regulator was there for us. You are use to the word predatory which is critical i talk about that at length in my book i have to go back because some of this extends back to the nineties. That are not blaming anybody in particular but in that deceitful lending. And that legitimate subprime lending is just a very Good Development<\/a> because it allowed people of more modest means and minorities to counteract the redlining to get into a home to participate in the American Dream<\/a> and quite honestly one of the reasons there wasnt a more aggressive effort for subprime lending was the fear of cutting that off with a very strong decision between predatory lending that was already illegal it was a question of enforcement. Versus subprime lending to be a different type. Going from a different angle i dont think the key fed staff that were captured by the firms they regulated that they perceive to be in their own career or financial interest but open to the arguments it should not be excessive in the competitive Market Forces<\/a> to some extent teacher poor lending practices i work in the institution where lobbyists are omnipresent with a different environment from regulators. You may remember after dodd frank past the chief lobbyist for Financial Service<\/a> industry now it passed they will go lobby the regulators. I met a place in the senate where lobbyists come at you regularly over time in part because your regulators tend to hear from the most elite in society its easy to preserve the union and then think is that i have to get my Public Opinion<\/a> passed. And with pope francis with the parish priest it doesnt strike me that way so it just seems to me the fed is less likely to be aware of the pain of how many regulators know people with their homes foreclosed on and to see that and understand that. That Federal Reserve<\/a> system and there is one in cleveland but they report to us about what was happening in cleveland and well before the crisis there was a philosophical perspective that the Financial System<\/a> should be less regulated to be more dynamic. But certainly greenspans view that banks have sufficient capital that you didnt have to watch them to carefully. I didnt have to be too burdensome. 8 million American Homes<\/a> were foreclosed on during the great recession. But they didnt all disappear. The wealth gap in America Today<\/a> is bigger than it has been in 100 years were at the top one tenth of 1 percent the homeownership rate is the lowest level in 50 years and it continued to go down 11, 12, 13 and 15 until it bottomed out in 2016. I was sitting there in 2016 watching donald trump when this populist insurgent campaign at the time the economy with a high Dow Jones Industrial<\/a> average. Wall street is doing great. But america is angry and on the left Bernie Sanders<\/a> is doing well with this populist message so it seemed like housing would be a fruitful way to focus. So basically i started with the question 8 million americans lost their homes, we lost our wealth, where did it all go . Who took it . The homewreckers. One of the things i think about with Home Ownership<\/a> is the typical american wants to do a lot of equity in their home. So when you lose a home or your family loses a home that you cannot leave to your child or grandchild, that is a significant wealth depreciation event. But that will happen intergenerational impact. Homeownership is the only way most people can save money. We follow the Dow Jones Industrial<\/a> average only 20 percent own stock the average american only has 4000 in the bank. We are a paycheck to paycheck society were most of the money goes to things like transportation clothing and food housing is the biggest expense even that goes back into with the equity to pass on to children or enjoy a healthy retirement or go to our landlord and they will enjoy that. So when you say homeownership is at the lowest rate in 50 years you talk about the disposition of peoples ability to live the American Dream<\/a>. According to the senses the average homeowner in this country is worth 100 times more than the average renter. But 200,000 but i live in the city of San Francisco<\/a> but rents are going up and to be misplaced but im sitting there with my 30 year fixedrate mortgage paying less than my friends are renting and im saving money god forbid if i have a medical event that requires me to dip into that equity your i cannot afford to send my kids to college or want to retire i may have that ability. Part of the story of homewreckers deals with mortgages. How did you get into researching about those . I was mostly interested in a failed California Bank<\/a> called indy mac. That was the first big bank to fail in the housing bust. It was the biggest bank to fail since the Great Depression<\/a>. The government ended up holding this disaster of a bank and this was a bank famous not only for reverse mortgages but ninja loans that were popular during the boom standing for no income no job no assets no problem. Disneyland loans there was you could make 90000 and they would approve it without paperwork that was indy mac and when the Housing Market<\/a> fell they went bankrupt and the government was holding and there was a dramatic run on the bank people were pushing and shoving on the streets of academe one pack on pasadena. And then Steve Mnuchin<\/a> who was treasury secretary stepped in to buy the bank from the government for nothing. We agreed to pick up 90 of the tab and i got records to the information act that revealed week paid more than a billing dollars. To foreclose on people. He foreclosed on more than 100,000 people including 23000 seniors. I have this bank foreclose on 100,000 people, homeownership rate other record, one by the treasury secretary who poses with large sheets of bills almost like a doctor evil kind of picture from the worlds richest Apartment Building<\/a> in park avenue, its a great story for generalists. But also, you mentioned the reversed mortgages like i happened upon some of the core i was kind of pulling this string is a journalist and i became interested in these private equity funds that had bought this after foreclosure and i found house thousand South Los Angeles<\/a> where the guy who was living in the house was renting from one of these refunds happened to be owned by the best friend of donald trump, thomas burke about 30,000 home after the bus. I knocked on the door of his house and for the guy who came to the door was dying of cancer and sick with aids and facing a rent increase. I was like oh my lord, so like a good reporter, i listened to the property record. What happened before for 180,000 in 2013, thats when i found the house had been owned by the same africanamerican family that moved west from mississippi during the great migration had finally been able to buy this house in 1973, 1963. The very hear that california banned discrimination and that was the year they were finally able to become homeowners and they had been foreclosed on by steve nugent because of one of these reverse mortgages. Now i had this house that didnt just involve one member of Donald Trumps<\/a> inner circle, this family whose whole wealth was in the home, he involved two of them. And as i continued to pull this string, i found this house had been bundled into a mortgage by j. P. Morgan chase now where there was 514 million lien on this 834 squarefoot bungalow in south l. A. And subsequently publishing the story in 2017, tom ferrick, toms best friend looked out of the country, he was another one of toms friends, the chairman of blackstones Company Invitation<\/a> homes owned 80000 homes and in the same house that was the hopes and dreams of this family foreclosed on by steve nugent bank the house bought by Donald Trumps<\/a> best friend, they raised the rent on the guy who stick with aids, bundled into a mortgage by security that reminds of it is sold to another one of Donald Trumps<\/a> best friend and now they take out another mortgage and pulled more while out of the house. Now theres a billiondollar one. I should write a book about these people. [laughter] thats an article, thats complicated. Yes. At september 2014, sociologist Mary Ann Cooper<\/a> the how economic sessions exacerbate inequality in the United States<\/a>. Heres a portion of the event. For the past few decades, inequality has been on the rise and security has been on the rise. We now have a hollowed up in across, families are losing jobs, losing homes. That story is mostly told through statistics. Okay tax records and job report and they conclude that right now, we have inequality and insecurity by some measures, things havent been this bad since the Great Depression<\/a>. Its a dramatic conclusion but i felt like it was coming across and statistical table and chart so meticulously documented. I felt like somebody needed to go and talk to people about how they are coping with it. Under these numbers are people who live up trend in everyday life. We know more are insecure, we know on their own to cope with it but we dont know how they are coping and we also dont understand how between the haves and havenots in our society. It changes the way we manage inexperience security and insecurity. As you say, theres been long trends toward economic insecurity and further income disparity. Income ands security for many families, that was happening and then thousand eight happened in a recession. We start by talking about the Overall Economic<\/a> trends, what is happening in the u. S. Economy . Out of the recession affect us . Its a big story. There are also books and articles. Three of the most important things that have happened for families is the decline of middle income jobs from a shift in risk which i can explain and growing inequality. So it used to be that our economy was based on manufacturing. Today, its based on service. About 80 of jobs are in the Service Template<\/a> in comparison to manufacturing jobs, service jobs pay less they come with fewer benefits and much more in. Then on top of this, workers no longer have the leverage they once did to collectively bargain for better wages and working conditions. After world war ii into the 1950s, a third Unemployed People<\/a> represented by unions and we reached a New Historical<\/a> low, only 11 of workers are represented by unions. That has an effect, workers cant collectively bargain to get a better deal, this is eroded a commitment to fair pay. Even if you werent in a union, union sector. Employers respected that. It increased wage for the unions. We got a double whammy here. The other thing that occurred was called the shift in risk. Theres been a rewriting of the social contract between employers and employees that used to be based on mutual protection. That means employers give people wages and benefits and people worked hard and use their talents to build the company. What happened is that increasingly rent has been by corporations or individuals and their families. Thing about the movement from pensions to 401ks. They are on their own and ready for retirement and miscalculations they would make. All these things together got off to where the types of jobs are created the middle class are harder to hold on to. Its tough rather than it used to be. Families are really experiencing that. The question is, how tough . Depends on where you are in relation to all this. All of this very insecurity, you have the rise in income inequality. There are some highly educated and highly skilled workers who are doing really well. They still have for the good jobs. They play out for different families in different ways. You interviewed over 50 families over a long period of time. The information detailed, youre not just able to describe how these families are living and what the situations are but in great detail, how they feel. Why they feel, how they feel which is a sociologist, he taught me. Its what we are always looking for the under reason. How did you conduct the interviews . How did you get 50 families to invite you this deeply into life . They wanted to understand this more personal and emotional side of it. I did interviews so i went out and wanted to find families, which middleclass important interviewed them about the obstacles in the lives. I wanted to add something to that. I followed a Smaller Group<\/a> of families around in an indepth way. Like really followed them around . Like really followed away. You want here and you went there. Yes. I was in the car when they pick up the kids, went to soccer games, everything up to nothing. The hardest part about doing this is recruiting the families. Because specifically, it hard for people to do research so if somebody asks you, please say yes. It is really hard. For example. What was extra hard is that i needed to know what income level someone was in. You dont walk up to a stranger and say how much do you earn . So i had to figure out another way of doing this. Then i met lori was looking at a cashier, are starting this product and he seemed really nice and she taught my problem, i knew since she was a cashier, she probably made. I asked to interview her and she invited me along her son literally game. What you know about the leak but i learned more than i ever wanted to know but they are really long games. Its really long. [laughter] sometimes they are not so bad when they lose because that means you can go home. [laughter] the parents are dying for something to talk about. They are. [laughter] so i was in the stands with her and this was an allstar team from the working class family, her son was on the team and im trying to get a lay of the land and a kid hit a foul ball and it goes into the parking lot by the opposing teams car and they said they hope the park doesnt get hit because their fancy cars and i noticed there were bmws and suvs, i asked where they came from and they said it was from a community, and affluent community. I knew in that moment that on the baseball field before he was a miniature version of the story i was trying to tell. So i drove home with laura, she has a beat up minivan, a crack in the window and i thought, i wonder what it would be like if i were in one of those suvs during driving home with one of the suvs families. Thats when i realized because i could tell from the town they were from from what level the family trust. The next few weeks, i understand all this stuff. [laughter] next time youre at a baseball game and you see someone sitting there, it might be a researcher. [laughter] not another parent. [laughter] i got turned down a few times but a lot of people said yes. That formed the core of the family that i ended up working with. You are watching tv on cspan2. We are highlighting author talks about the u. S. Economy. All of these programs are available to watch in their entirety on our website, booktv. Org. Up next from 2017, Washington Post<\/a> reporter amy goldstein, but the effects of a 2008 recession on james folk wisconsin were a General Motors<\/a> factory was closed. June 2008, when they announced General Motors<\/a> would shut down production eventually here, Unemployment Rate<\/a> was fivepoint 4 . In 2009 a few months after the last of these jobs disappeared, unemployment shot up to over 13 . So on the job loss, you are a winner. Or a loser. [laughter] beyond that, i had a sense that i wanted to tell the story of what this big recession had done but it was important that i find a place that had not been part of it. I didnt want to find myself writing about inoculation of economic decay. I wanted to show what one that economic time did. So flint michigan was an old story and i wanted to find a place for economic trouble was new. Obviously, the assembly. Here had been drinking a little bit and more of a couple of decades but they always got a new product. This closing was a very different think that nobody in town had ever experienced. That was very appealing to me, but i was happy but very appealing to me as a place to potentially do this writing, talking to people about what was happening in the community. I had the sense that no place is exactly like everyplace but as much as possible, i thought it would be interesting to find a community write about where the pattern of job losses matched pretty well the National Pattern<\/a> of jobs that went away in this great recession. If you think about what happened nationally, the largest portion of jobs disappeared in the manufacturing sector. That was james bell. A lot of the jobs were lost were jobs that were paid pretty well but had not required a lot of Higher Education<\/a> to get. I was james bell. Mark meant that women lost jobs. That was janesville. I thought this was a community that had a number of the qualities and jobs the other people around the country but understand and could identify with. I also have a sense that it might fit nicely into the truth of history. I remember the first time i found a Youtube Video<\/a> for speech that done Center Barack Obama<\/a> gave in the assembly. In february 2008. I dont know if you remember him coming. I remember the first time i listened to the video think the promise of janesville was a promise of america. That line gave me goosebumps because i heard that Youtube Video<\/a> a couple of years after the Assembly Plant<\/a> closed, and irony by them to let the president ial candidate who became president was doing. Janesville had been part of the sitdown strike in the 1930s and the Assembly Plant<\/a>s have been part of the domestic war effort in world war ii when the plant stop making vehicles and started turning out artillery shells and of course, parker had been from here and have their own big moments in history. I just like that super history. Of course, before i knew anything about this community, or had met anybody here, i have the sense that i might find interesting politics. I just thought there might be Something Interesting<\/a> about an old town represented by scott walker and the state governed and represented by paul ryan and the state led by scott walker. So i tried to bring all of my reporting to think about what might be a good setting and i decided i was going to make an exploratory visit to janesville. I first came here in july of 2011. I arranged to meet people, a couple of people in the room here who are part of a first visit i met on those couple of days i was here and the very first person i met in town, i set up a meeting with them was stan, and oldtime reporter by then, had left the newspaper and was on a different radio show and the one hes on now and working as an educational consultant. He had an office at the headquarters and it renovated now obviously into offices. We talked and talked for couple of hours, we talked about the history of the window from about what it was like when he was here growing up as a boy, we talked about the assembly appointment was happening now and we just talked for probably two or three hours nonstop. Finally, he said to me, would you like to seek the plant . I said of course i would. So i got in the car this man had never known before. [laughter] we drove down center avenue and turned left on delevan and there was the. It obviously was huge, i have never seen it before. This big still, 8 million square feet closed plant. As we were approaching, stan said something that day that surprised me. He said i hate to go by this. I said like . It surprised me. Stan is a pretty tough character, a veteran reporter, he calls himself a cynic, i tend to agree. [laughter] he didnt strike me to be hesitant to go through something in time. He told me his father had worked at the plant as a boy, remember how proud his mother was his General Motors<\/a> wages but him by his chevy. When this man had just met that date set that to me, i thought theres something here in this community about the relationship between this closed plant people sense of work and sense of what life ought to be like it wasnt anymore. So i kept coming back. For a lot of years. Now i have met and spoken with many people in town, many people can fit even into a book that has a lot of people in it. That really where my gratitude comes in because i learned from all of you right met with and what i tried to do is get to know people in town, obviously i dont know all of you but i tried to get to know people who have various vantage points in this commander. People who work at the Assembly Plant<\/a>, suppliers, people who were teachers who tried to figure out how to help kids, families help were hurting about me and i wanted to understand how this looks and wants of peoples perspectives. I was slow to figure out who was going to be the main people in my foot. I felt the i couldnt pick, funny you talk about characters, these are real people. But they are also book characters. [laughter] i felt i couldnt really pick who was going to be the main characters in this story i wanted to child until i understood what were the choices that different people make. Our range of choices and forgot who might be good examples and those kinds of choices. In 2011, obviously two and a half years after the Assembly Plant<\/a> shutdown, i knew from the beginning that i would need to go back in time and tell the story from the moment the announcement happened, but this was going to be changed. I knew i would have to find people to talk to who could go back a couple of years with me and explain what life had been like before i showed up on the scene. I also had the sense that i needed to understand the history of this commander. Renee said, i spent a lot of time Reading Historical Society<\/a> because i wanted to understand what the industrial past of janesville had been. I wanted to understand whether pride in work that was done here came from. I wanted to understand what the identity expectations of janesville work so i could understand what it felt like when things were changing. So i did a lot of historical work. One of the things that struck me when i started showing up in talking to more and more people was not on the plant closed, theres a lot of disbelief and denial that it was for real. I shut up two and a half years after it stopped here. I kept running into people who said just wait, its a matter of time before it comes back. Does that sound familiar to you . I said well, why was that . Is Assembly Plant<\/a> started making tractors in 1919 and started making chevrolets on valentines day 1923 and every time a product went away, another product eventually shut up. There was no expectation, no experience with it not happening again. When you begin to see was that people make choices about what to do next, as i sometimes thought about it, what traces the people made when the best choices and jobs were gone. People began to make choices in a lot of cases, i found it took a while to settle into what they were going to do. Up next in our review of fathers on the economy doctor sanjay, coauthor of the book, the body economic. In 2013, discussed the impact of measures following recession have on mental and physical health. In the u. S. , we see spikes overall but they are heterogeneous. Its not across all cities. Even similar cities facing massive unemployment and some cities we seek suicides spikes and others we dont. It seems to relate strongly to a certain set of programs that ill talk about. Those social programs are the answer to a major question which is why an appointment doesnt always correlate, weve talked correlation but not causation. Precisely why we want to investigate correlation. In the u. S. , Unemployment Rate<\/a>s very closely to suicide rates. In places like sweden and finland, and 1990s, they have their own crisis. The site rate declined. How do we explain this . What are they doing . Is it because they are so robust . My friends would like to think that but its not true. Turns out, they investigate a slew of different programs they are exposed to. Montana programs seems to be particularly effective at preventing recession associated with suicide are Closing Health<\/a> related problems. Its not, i have to admit, nothing to do with healthcare insurance. After spending at all, these programs are part care and curtis. When someone becomes unemployed, they get unemployment checks but only on the condition and enroll in this program. This program, heres the stick part, involves a person to assist them, to actively working with their firms were also required to participate in order to find parttime unemployment and integrate them into the workforce. It turns out that preemptive spending on these programs results both in net economic stimulus and an downstream cost. Then the question of what of swedish, maybe its like the european thing so a number of us have worked on a multisite end of the u. S. Including detroit where people were randomizing the standards programs, whatever look off on your own and get benefits. Good luck to you or this kind of program. All of the cities continent, the same results in town, reducing health outcomes, its a side effect in this program. We were seen it implemented across the u. S. And in much of the u. S. , the economic correspondence for countries in the uk, they had a recession around the same time underwent a program and they were recovering and turning into a triple digit recession. This ended for us around the time mr. Westrick when we started planning in terms of our recovery. Grandpa same time, the ims issued a working paper, major policy document and a Public Statement<\/a> from the chief economist, which basically 400 pages that said this. Its a fascinating document if you can get trigger rhetoric. What amounts to is the following. All the advice previously, based on an assumption and the assumption is, for every dollar of Government Spending<\/a>, how many dollars you get back . They assume the number was 1. 5. In a footnote earlier documents, you can find the reason for. 5 is because of nice round number and thats about it. Four different groups including us calculated recessions and said drink recession, how many dollars to get back . You invest in food stamps or topsecret programs, how much do end up estimating in the economic getting back terms of net growth . Is actually greater than one, you get back about the dollar 70 for every dollar you invest. They look with the same number. The irony is that germany figured this out a while ago. While they were recommending this, they calculated a number of a multiplier for themselves decided to undergo stimulus internally while recommending the opposition brief. Texas figured out a long time ago, drink prices in the 80s, california massachusetts baylor texas which they found and remembered. So we see this manifesting out as changes in Government Spending<\/a> in our recession have correlated to the changes in recovery over time across a number of countries. Of course, this begs the question of, are we just going to spend forever . Multipliers often go below, 1997 would have been a good time to cut back on a variety of Government Spending<\/a> and argues for a data driven approach, deciding when to undergo spending increases and what to spend on. Number of people have concerns, anytime in the program, welfare would be people will be fighting it presently cheating the system and so on. All the editor of the journal, american journal of economics that there is essentially no data to support this. Quite a bit of data was the opposite. For example, food stamps and offer assistance, people, as recovering. Furthermore, this multiplier in programs like food stamps are particularly high because the people who are eligible for food stamps are often not spending on other things when they are unable to get food stamps. People can either spend on their heating or on food. During periods where they are able to get food stamps, people stimulate the economy much more. Even if you dont care about Public Health<\/a> just as a account, the net result is a deficit reduction. It is however, important to recognize its difficult to find funding during these periods. Medicaid and other programs are classically programs where you have less of a tax base during the recessionary. Because more people are unemployed. How youre going to fund this. In the spending for is there a better way as well . Some of us have been working on this International Initiative<\/a> which the goal is simultaneously to fund the types of programs we need when we have the least amount of money and at the same time, discourage the types of things that led to recession. We all know that risky investment letter to our recession but very few participated in insisting investments. The idea is a small fee,. 005 , based on the old idea of attacks that onto highest risk, the fund and others we dont put in our accounts, this fee seems incredibly small but when you transact hundreds of millions of dollars in the raising of the order, factor even more, the stock market volatility encourages heavy transaction. Thats because of this will affect many natural increase as people are undergoing and engaging the highest transacti transaction. The reason why i would want such a system is not while we pay the unique time, its not that unique. If you got periods of recession, certainly over the last several years or decades, having had recession this large but we have had recession. Somewhat surprising when we are not in our recession. If you look at the number of crashes taking place in the last few decades. The crisis of 1995. It strikes me that we have a variety of commodities. Ill end by saying essentially, what ive learned from understanding data if you were to adopt this mantra social and Economic Policy<\/a> from it might be better in these shocks and we have quite a bit of data to understand what they have thrust. Book of the u. S. Economy continues with author and financial journalist, who appeared on our monthly call in program indepth. April 2019. In this segment, she describes the relationship between initial institutions and the u. S. Government. Now that we have this 100 year history, 100 plus history that youve written about, has there been a cost to the taxpayer . There has been a cast to the taxpayer and also the loader. When you talk about a major banker who can influence policy and also make, in the cases of Jp Morgan Chase<\/a> jimmy diamond was someone who was on class and director of the new york board is actually head of Jp Morgan Chase<\/a>. He happened to be in the height of the financial crisis when it first occurred, director of the new york fed from the wall street located this system. Heres one of the people who at the time was secretary who had been, when i came in to him from a lot of relationships coming in but he was a new york fed president of the time and became the treasury secretary under obama the turn of the year after that crisis. You have all these individuals who effectively have the ability to direct policy and money coming out of washington to their own institutions which are public institutions. They trade on stock exchanges, monitoring of the Federal Reserve<\/a> because one of their day jobs is to be the regulatory answer, the oversight body to these banks. They are monitored and yet, there individuals have such a tight relationship with the central political powers of the country that they are able to get money effectively to themselves when they need in far greater figures and individuals are able to galvanize to do that. As a result, many close from taxpayers to benefit them. Not just when theres a crisis but even from the standpoint of a legal act, repealed in 1999, it had been in place since 1933, specifically to protect the deposit and taxpaying public and voters from any kind of weird products and speculation the banks can do. Thanks could choose all sorts of things but if they lost the bet is on thing, on their shareholders, on their private partners to prepare. It wasnt on people. That was repealed in 1999, then you have this merging of people deposit peoples cash, people with mortgages and institutions that could be doing also some stuff with that. They do bad to be with it and come to the government for help. The fact that they had all of these deposits was they could say we have them. Atm machines are going to work, people are going to get their money back unless you give us all these other things. A different way of taking money from taxpayers because they influence the policy that allowed them to have all the deposits. Multiple thought was, they are extracting either influent and when things go wrong and through rules surrounding their businesses from taxpayers. So wash tweets to you, could you explain how someone so brilliant and economically astute, you, and Economic System<\/a> that always failed tremendous human and Economic Cost<\/a> or dissolve into a dictatorship. Support progressivism socialism. Is that true . Are you a socialist . I support the qualities because if you think about how economics divide into the needs of Society Money<\/a> that comes from society helps society and how the government are used to appropriateness funds, i think about things like how expensive healthcare is for people in this country. Having about how expensive it is for student to go to a university. And, with 50, 60, 70000 works of debt, which means they cant be the kind of participant in our economy if it could have been without so much debt. I went to school, i started up in Public Schools<\/a> and i went to Community College<\/a> and ultimately went to State College<\/a> in private nyu for private education. I paid for all of it along the way. I could pay for all of it along the way because i was earning by working was enough to allow me to afford rent on tiny places at the time. Now thats an impossibility. I was looking at the economy as a whole and think we think its better for an economy to be more thoughtful or more people in order for them to contribute foundational drop most parts of the economy in an easier way, i think about how we also have firefighters and post offices and Police Officers<\/a> and a whole host of other rents in our Society Government<\/a> to help more in society than just their shareholders for banking institutions. I look at in a Healthy Society<\/a> thats helping economically and educationally and physically if they are protected. Society which has a lot of money goes into it. Supposedly to protect everyone from of the country all of those things to me are good. But i support from economic standpoint and financially as for within that, not to list the countrys Financial Health<\/a> and be failed to the extent that they work by the country by taxpayers or the extent they are the Federal Reserve<\/a>. I look at an economy as being holistic in that respect. In todays current political environment, capitalism point . In general, we are a capitalist nation. We do strive nation to do Business Activity<\/a> that creates product and fickle in different ways from either to the people involved in crating them for society for peoples futures. I dont think it is going away but i do think using wall street as an example, the financial crisis as an example in the fact that our Federal Reserve<\/a> has 4 trillion of assets on our books after an emergency situation, since it happened in 2008 and still subsidizing larger banks from their tremendous sums of money. I think that capitalism has to recognize that putting too much money in one place theres actually a cost for the general Financial System<\/a> or general economy is not necessarily a good decision. The good news to be more divisive, we have rules in place that do that into the collapse that we are reeling from in terms of these policies. I think those need to be reinvigorated to protect everyone. Before protocols, the fed, is a third type necessary . Question number one. Then i will follow up question. With the third is in terms of providing subsidy to thinks is not necessary. I think the fact that the fed can raise or lower Interest Rate<\/a> and terms of monetary policy, it can be equally done within the treasury department. The fact that the fed is in a way that allows private members of the bank, but ultimately does provide credit and takes meetings with the heads of wall street because they are the primary shareholders in the fed. As a historic shareholder, they created the fed. The fed is today, theres a major flaw and how it was created and how it exists, it exists ultimately to benefit its members. It says its too help the greater economy and greater public. The reality is, if you look at the actions, their personal when is a situation Large Institution<\/a> is in trouble or necessity to help j. P. Morgan chase or somebody who has an institution as part of the history and fabric of how it was created and was benefited and continues to benefit from this subsidy not just the fed but all the hardest things in their respective countries. I think that is a flaw. Office on the u. S. Economy includes the former chair and president of the u. S. Export import. Freetrade agreement impacts on the economy and workers. Politicians practice, some people went something and we did a bad job in this country of taking care of people who lost jobs. Peoples lives were disrupted, their selfesteem, communities were emptied out and we didnt do a good job we did a bad job of acknowledging that many economists million and a half job seeker, some jobs get lost by trade even if its 25 its nothing compared. Unless you are one of those 25000 people. A lot of that was concentrated in places like ohio, wisconsin michigan. Every four years, they have something in common. Here we are at miami beach, it is not a surprise that the human population is in miami, florida but has been and cuba policy has to do with darker feet of people in this country. Geography is a lot training issue politics and many people on both coasts have all the benefits of trade, we havent had a firsthand experience over and spend an harder release disrupted many lives. Thats one of the things i want to talk about the book. I want to give you all the answers because i dont want to ruin the ending. Another thing is we have a lot of talk about trade deals like the partnership usmc china deal, trade deals are not about jobs. They are about labor rights, intellectual property dispute resolutions, a lot of things. An example, the partnership was the agreement between the United States<\/a> and other countries or the pacific. 5000 page document. I would not recommend what it does not read like a novel. The word jobs appears six times. Two of the six times because as the name of the japanese labor department. There are four references to jobs and 5000 pages there are 11 transient actually. Theres not a lot to you look at nasa was designed in 1994, jobs had nothing to do with it. Trade is about jobs, experts about jobs but not trade deals. Link one of the things were looking at now im happy to address this in the q a, we have wanted to work with partners, i remember being at home in italy if there were a number of filmmakers. You look at the devastation of world war ii the United States<\/a> formed things from him later and organization of the corporation devoutly. Wto was not, all of these things were ways we can Work Together<\/a> to make sure something is horrible as world war ii never happen again. Your inner. Now where we are pursuing a policy in the United States<\/a>, much more unilateral. Coffee shops, take our view or not. Its a very different way and with operated close to 70 years. Its a style of the program but a sample refused in the past to get things done. Let me give you a couple products. Use the iphone in this book. [laughter] how many steps in it . Fifteen . [laughter] the reason i put the iphone, bilateral trade deficit. Something our president is obsessed with. The iphone was designed in the United States<\/a> about the rare mineral used for the country the democratic republic of congo. The chipset measures the steps comes from the netherlands. The gyroscope that makes, you can turn it this way or sideways and its always proper from switzerland. The biggest impediment in korea the class, which i frequently crack comes from new york. So this would not have existed without global trade, without trade movement, we would not have an iphone. It is assembled in china and as a result, its considered by the world, chinese import. It comes to the United States<\/a>, apple is proprietary. It cost about 230, across the 1000, 100. Of the 230, 8. 46, something less than 10 actually goes to china. Yet, the full 230 fine, 16, 18 billion a year of off trade deficit with the iphone and get, very small part comes from china. Its not a very good way to look at bilateral trade deficit, which is assessed with. I have a barber in washington and i lived there eight years, i took a picture and i put on twitter, ive run a substantial trade deficit with armor on an annual basis. He buys nothing for me. Im okay and he seems perfectly fine with that as well. We cant get on a trade deficit. You put 20 or 30 of gas in your car, cut 20 or 30 worth of gas. We get a lot of products from china, helped to keep inflation down. Yet, china has not been a good actor. Yes, china takes advantage of the roles, yes, they overly subsidize their Favorite Companies<\/a> but they are not really a felon. We as a Global Community<\/a> need to find ways to put them in line but this fixation, this obsession about bilateral trade deficit is wrong. If you look at the china deal, the state of the union will listen to and they will hear how this is the best trade deal right done, i cant think of too many to describe it but it is a purchase agreement. We got close so concerned about the bilateral trade deficit thats what the deal is. Having run the bank, im all for an expert, its a good thing but its not what i trade deal is about. Give us a better understanding of some of those kinds of issues. If you missed any of these other programs on the economy or want to watch them in their entirety, visit our website booktv. Org. Our archives by using the search box at the top of the page and search economy and books. Change since cspan began 41 physical. Our mission continues. Provide an unfiltered view of government. This year, primary election coverage, president ial impeachment process and now the federal response to the coronavirus. You can watch all of cspans Public Affairs<\/a> programming on television, online or listen on our free radio app. Be part of the National Conversation<\/a> through cspan daily washington internal program or through our social media fee. Cspan, created by private industry. Americas cabletelevision company as a Public Service<\/a> and brought to you by your television provider. Indepth on book tv. Once a month for the past 20 years, book tv has invited an offer to join us to discuss his or her books and take your phone calls. Unfortunately, due the","publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"archive.org","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","width":"800","height":"600","url":"\/\/ia802900.us.archive.org\/35\/items\/CSPAN2_20200411_032300_Books_About_the_U.S._Economy\/CSPAN2_20200411_032300_Books_About_the_U.S._Economy.thumbs\/CSPAN2_20200411_032300_Books_About_the_U.S._Economy_000001.jpg"}},"autauthor":{"@type":"Organization"},"author":{"sameAs":"archive.org","name":"archive.org"}}],"coverageEndTime":"20240716T12:35:10+00:00"}