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  • NOEL KING: All right, everyone.

  • Hello and welcome to Off Script, NPR's series of conversations between 2020 Democratic candidates

  • and undecided voters from across the country.

  • I'm Noel King.

  • And today, we are in New York City with Andrew Yang, who is an entrepreneur and presidential

  • hopeful.

  • Thank you so much for being here.

  • ANDREW YANG: It's great to be here.

  • Thanks for having me.

  • KING: And I want to introduce our two voters: Hetal Jani runs a nonprofit here in New York

  • City.

  • It's focused on education and mentorship.

  • She's 36 years old, and she's the daughter of immigrants from India.

  • Hetal, thanks for being here.

  • YANG: Where'd you grow up, Hetal?

  • HETAL JANI: Here in New York City.

  • YANG: Wow.

  • What part?

  • JANI: Queens.

  • Flushing.

  • YANG: My wife's from Bayside.

  • JANI: Oh, very cool.

  • KING: And John Zeitler is an attorney for an insurance company.

  • He lives in northern New Jersey, but like a lot of people, he commutes into the city

  • for work.

  • He's 48 years old, and he is the dad of twin boys who are 11.

  • Is that right?

  • JOHN ZEITLER: Yep.

  • That's right.

  • KING: Thank you for being here.

  • We really appreciate it.

  • Alright, so we're in New York's Flatiron district.

  • We're in a restaurant called Baodega.

  • YANG: I know.

  • So clever.

  • KING: You picked the place.

  • YANG: Well, I'm very wise, because this place is delicious.

  • It's got a very clever name.

  • Yeah, I hope everyone else is enjoying it as much as I am.

  • Baodega, New York City, 7 West 20th Street.

  • KING: People do seem to be liking the food.

  • How long have you been coming here?

  • YANG: Well, you know, I've only been here once, but enjoyed the food when I was here.

  • And so I need to bring my wife.

  • I actually came here without her.

  • Sort of a problem because my wife's a huge foodie.

  • Not a huge foodie.

  • Not like in terms of like consuming excellent food, consuming food.

  • KING: You owe her a trip.

  • YANG: I do owe her a trip.

  • KING: Alright, before we get to the hard questions, do either of you guys have any fun stuff you'd

  • like to ask Mr. Yang?

  • JANI: Yes, I saw yesterday an Ask Me Anything and you ended with a question about anime.

  • YANG: I didn't end on that.

  • It was somewhere in the middle, but go on.

  • JANI: Oh, sorry about that.

  • What's your go-to karaoke song?

  • YANG: “Don't You Forget About Meby Simple Minds.

  • The Breakfast Club soundtrack.

  • JANI: Yeah.

  • YANG: And thenWhen Doves Cryby Prince would be a close runner up.

  • KING: Can you give us a couple bars?

  • YANG: [singing] “How can you just leave me standing alone in a world that's so cold.”

  • It's like Prince himself is here singing.

  • JANI: “Purple Rain.”

  • KING: John, how about you?

  • ZEITLER: I noticed you rode your bike to the restaurant today with the baby seat on the

  • back.

  • YANG: Yeah, like with the baby seat, that's what he means.

  • Not like motorbike or something cool.

  • Yes, I did.

  • ZEITLER: Did you always travel around on the bike?

  • YANG: I do.

  • My younger son is four, so I still bike him to school.

  • And I relish that because he's gonna outgrow it pretty soon.

  • Like my older is turning 7, and he outgrew the bike seat a couple of years ago.

  • So I ride him to school in the morning any time I'm in town, if I have the time, and

  • I find it much more fun to get around in New York City on the bike than sitting in traffic.

  • Better exercise.

  • You know you have to try and get your exercise where you can.

  • KING: Do you wear a helmet?

  • YANG: I do.

  • KING: Thank you.

  • YANG: I'd be a very bad role model, and my sons have the little bike helmets too.

  • Very cute.

  • KING: Too many New Yorkers don't wear helmets, and it makes me deeply, deeply anxious.

  • YANG: You know, I am running for president; I have to be a good role model.

  • I can't have people being like, “Yeah I think I just saw Andrew Yang come by helmet-less.

  • I guess I don't need mine.”

  • Just like you don't need a tie.

  • Just kidding.

  • KING: Alright, I want to start us off by asking about your signature policy proposal: the

  • thing that has gotten you a lot of attention.

  • Many people will know it as universal basic income.

  • You call it the freedom dividend.

  • YANG: Yeah.

  • KING: And what it means basically is that every American adult, if you're elected, ages

  • 18 to 64, will get one thousand dollars a month from the governmentno strings attached

  • to do whatever they want with.

  • YANG: Yes.

  • No, it's actually 18 til death now.

  • KING: It's 18 til death now.

  • That's an update.

  • Right.

  • So

  • YANG: We changed that number months ago.

  • KING: A couple months ago.

  • You think that this is necessary for a reason.

  • Can you spend a couple minutes laying out why you think this bold proposal is so necessary?

  • YANG: I spent seven years running a nonprofit that I'd started that helped create jobs in

  • the Midwest and the South primarilyhelped create several thousand jobs.

  • And I saw that we are in the midst of the greatest economic transformation in our country's

  • historywhat experts are calling the fourth industrial revolution.

  • I'm convinced that Donald Trump won in 2016 because of the early waves of the fourth industrial

  • revolution where we automated away four million manufacturing jobs in Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania,

  • Wisconsin, Iowaall the swing states he needed to win.

  • And now that set of changes is shifting to retail.

  • Thirty percent of stores and malls are closing primarily because of Amazon, and being a retail

  • clerk is the most common job in most of the country.

  • The average retail clerk is a 39-year-old woman making between nine and ten dollars

  • an hour, so when her store closes there aren't a ton of options.

  • We're getting rid of call center workers, of which there are two and a half million

  • in the U.S. making 14 dollars an hour.

  • Soon, we will start replacing truck drivers, and being a trucker is the most common job

  • in many states.

  • There are three and a half million truck drivers, average age 49.

  • Ninety four percent men.

  • And there another seven million Americans who work at the truck stops, motels, and diners

  • that serve the truckers.

  • So if we do nothing, we are going to be in for much worse than Donald Trump's election

  • unfortunately.

  • The studies have a range of between 20 and 40 percent of American jobs subject to automation

  • in the next 20 to 30 years, which is not that much time.

  • And that's a lot of jobs.

  • I've seen it in the industries that I've worked in, and we have to get our acts together.

  • If we keep trying to respond to the symptoms and don't address the root causes, then our

  • communities will continue to suffer.

  • KING: OK.

  • Hetal, I know that in your job you think a lot about workforce development.

  • What questions do you have for Mr. Yang about a universal basic income?

  • JANI: Yes, I mean it's true that automation is taking away a lot of jobs.

  • Or I feel that automation is taking away a lot of jobs, but how does just providing a

  • thousand dollars a month to each individual solve that problem?

  • YANG: In many ways, it does not solve that problem, but your nonprofit works with women

  • of what age or children of what age?

  • JANI: High school students.

  • We're trying to grow up as well.

  • YANG: Yeah, so I ran a nonprofit for a number of years that I'd started.

  • And do you think that your nonprofit would have access to more resources if every American

  • was getting an additional 1000 dollars a month so the money ends up super charging not just

  • existing businesses but also spurs creativity, entrepreneurship, and risk taking?

  • Because if you feel like your survival is assured then you have a much higher chance

  • of striking out and trying to do something on your own.

  • It also supercharges nonprofits, volunteering, the arts culture.

  • Many...

  • NPR probably.

  • Like many of the things that we value but the market does not properly value, and I'm

  • willing to say that women and people of color actually fall into the same category that

  • the market will systematically undervalue.

  • And so if you say and I know this because I started a nonprofit and worked there for

  • a number of years.

  • Very proud of the work, and it continues to this day.

  • But you realize that most nonprofits are trying to address some of the ... some of the important

  • issues at the margins.

  • And you would need to fundamentally reconfigure the way our economy works if you're going

  • to truly get into the guts of that problem, and the freedom dividend or universal basic

  • income actually transforms the way of life for many Americans in a way that would make

  • us more able to solve the real problems.

  • JANI: So I mean how did you come up – I know your party slogan isMath” –I

  • mean how did you come up with a thousand dollars?

  • Because a thousand dollars here New York City or San Francisco is a lot different than anywhere

  • else, so as a nonprofit founder, twelve thousand a year would go far, but it wouldn't go that

  • far.

  • YANG: Oh, so twelve thousand dollars is not my number.

  • It was proposed by a guy named Andy Stern and then studied by the Roosevelt Institute.

  • So it was another proposal that had been vetted in various ways.

  • But it does make sense on many levels because twelve thousand dollars a year is right below

  • the US poverty line, which is approximately twelve thousand seven hundred seventy dollars

  • a year.

  • So it moves you up to that level.

  • And this is per adult, mind you.

  • So if you have two adults in your household, it's twenty four thousand dollars a year.

  • So it moves you up and gets the pressure off, but it doesn't serve as a full work replacement.

  • There is virtually no American who is like, “Oh, I'm gonna quit my job.

  • We got a thousand bucks a month.”

  • But that's not really true.

  • John here is like, you know, like not ready to pack it in for a thousand bucks a month

  • because you know you have a family like I do.

  • I would ... I can see over your shoulder so [inaudible]

  • YANG: So, it's enough to be a game changer.

  • Would make us stronger, healthier, less stressed out, mentally healthier, would reduce domestic

  • violence, reduce hospital visits, would dramatically increase the graduation rate, and many positive

  • social indicators.

  • But it's not meant to be a full work replacement, and it's certainly not meant to solve every

  • problem.

  • I will suggest though that if you extrapolate like what the second order effects are.

  • If you take a town of 10,000 adults in Missouri and then they're each getting 1000 bucks a

  • month, that's 10 million dollars in additional buying power every single month in that town,

  • which ends up going to things like car repairs, daycare, Little League sign ups, local nonprofits.

  • And so then, if you've lost your truck driving job and you're in that town, there's a much

  • greater chance that you can plug into existing opportunities because the local economy is

  • much more robust.

  • ZEITLER: But doesn't it … I mean it's funded by your VAT tax.

  • I mean, why not a wealth tax instead?

  • KING: Actually, do you mind if we just get a little bit of clarity before we go into

  • it?

  • So I think I'm going to put words in your mouth here and have you ask the question.

  • But I think what you want to ask isHow do you plan on paying for this?”

  • And I wondered if, before we get to that, I can just ask youCan I ask you to do

  • some quick math for us?”

  • YANG: Sure.

  • KING: OK.

  • How many adults in the United States would be eligible for this twelve thousand dollars

  • a year?

  • YANG: If you were to take a broad number about 200 million.

  • KING: Two hundred million times twelve thousand dollars a year.

  • YANG: 2.4 trillion.

  • KING: 2.4 trillion a year, this would cost.

  • OK.

  • John, I know you have a question about that.

  • Please go ahead.

  • ZEITLER: Sure.

  • So I think you said that you'd fund it with a VAT tax which would, I understand to be,

  • a tax you know broadly across you know consumption of goods versus a wealth tax which would be

  • a tax on the wealthiest Americans.

  • So you have this great, you know, kind of an income inequality in the country, and it

  • would make sense, at least superficially, that you sort of take from those who have

  • the most and even it out in the middle.

  • That would seem to point to a wealth tax so why that tax instead?

  • KING: And in your answer, I wonder if you could do this, would you just explain as well

  • what VAT tax is?

  • I think some of our listeners may be unfamiliar with that.

  • YANG: Sure.

  • I think I said this on the debate stage with Senator Warren.

  • So a wealth tax makes perfect sense in principle because you have this winner-take-all economy,

  • you have historic levels of wealth in the hands of a relatively small number of Americans.

  • And so I endorse the spirit of a wealth tax.

  • The problem is that when they try to tax wealth in France, Germany, Denmark, Sweden, and a

  • half dozen other countries, they ended up repealing it because it didn't generate the

  • revenue they thought it would.

  • And they had massive implementation and compliance problems.

  • And I believe the same thing would happen here if anything to a higher degree because

  • the wealthy in America are, I think, even more extreme in their tax avoidance practices.

  • ZEITLER: But I mean Warren has a 15 percent avoidance, you know, kind of factored in there.

  • So your assumption, right, that people are going to avoid their taxes ... also our taxes

  • are different than European taxes, and taxes is just kind of a problem to be solved right.

  • I mean couldn't you simply change the tax code?

  • YANG: Or even if you buy everything, like the amount of money that Senator Warren's

  • wealth tax projected to raiseeven in the most optimisticis less than a third

  • than of what like even a mild VAT would raise.

  • Even if you assume that her assumptions are right.

  • Zeitler: OK.

  • KING: Well, do you buy it?

  • ZEITLER: To raise what amount?

  • I mean you raise the same amount that you're suggesting?

  • YANG: Well, her VAT, as I understand it, raises

  • Or no, her wealth tax is projected to raise something like like 2.75 trillion over 10

  • years which is like 275 billion a year.

  • And the VAT I'm suggesting raises about three times that.

  • ZEITLER: But isn't a VAT tax essentially regressive in the sense that everybody is paying the

  • same tax, but if you're poorer, that dollar means a whole lot more to, you know, buy food

  • and you know essentials versus a dollar for someone who's a millionaire.

  • YANG: So yeah, there are three things, and you're a hundred percent right about everything

  • you're saying.

  • So the three things.

  • Number one: if you want to, you can tailor that where you can exempt consumer staples

  • and have it fall more heavily on luxury goods or certain industries.

  • Number two: we all know I'm trying to give every American a thousand dollars a month,

  • whicheven if you assumed a degree of impact in a VATwould increase the buying

  • power of the bottom ninety four percent of Americans.

  • But number three: the fundamental challenge we have in the U.S. is that we have this tax

  • system that is being gamed to incredible degrees.

  • So you have a trillion dollar tech company like Amazon that's now closing 30 percent

  • of America's stores and malls literally paying zero in taxes.

  • And so you have to look around and say, “OK, now that should not be.”

  • Most Americans can agree like you have a messed up system if that's the case, and then you

  • look around the world and say, “Well, what have other developed countries done to prevent

  • that from happening?”.

  • And what they've done is they've had a VAT which then gives every American a tiny share

  • of every Amazon sale, every Google search, every Facebook ad, every robot truck mile.

  • Because we're in an era of unprecedented technology and innovation; our data is now worth more

  • than oil, as an example.

  • And we're seeing none of that.

  • The companies that are seeing that value are Amazon, Facebook, Google, and these mega tech

  • companies.

  • And they're experts at not paying taxes in a current corporate income tax regime.

  • They're just too smart for it.

  • They'll say, “It all went through Irelandor “I just paid all my executives so much

  • stock that I have no earnings to report.”

  • And so we're chasing our own tail.

  • What we have to do is we have to actually get into where the money is, and that's where

  • the money is going.

  • KING: Let me ask you to define what a value added tax actually means.

  • There will be people who are just unfamiliar with this as a concept.

  • So I am used to you know paying taxes on my salary, payroll taxes at the end of the month,

  • half my money is gone.

  • What is a value added tax and how would it be different?

  • YANG: So a value added taxand again not my ideait's in use in over 100 major

  • economies around the world including Canada, Germany, France, the U.K., Sweden.

  • Most any country that you think of as being very progressive has a value added tax, and

  • it's a tax on value transfers which you can think of, as what John said, consumption,

  • sales.

  • One difference between a VAT and a sales tax is that it applies to the means of production.

  • So if I built a car for example, I would pay a VAT on every component of the car.

  • And so it ends up being like oxygen in your business processes where you can't escape

  • it.

  • That's one reason why other countries have put it into place.

  • And so then if you had an Amazon type firm there would be no escaping it for them either

  • because they would end up paying it during every link in the chain, and then we'd end

  • up with hundreds of billions in revenue as a result.

  • KING: So you ... you pay a tax on the steel that goes into the car.

  • Then you'd pay a tax on the frame that the car is made out of.

  • Then you would pay a tax on the steering wheel when it's added into the car.

  • Then you'd pay a tax on the seats when they added into the car.

  • You're saying that this is a tax that applies all through

  • YANG: Business process and the supply chain.

  • KING: OK.

  • And to John's point, and I'm going to put this in slightly elementary terms, but let's

  • say I'm a low income American or a middle income American.

  • Taxes are already killing me, and you're telling me there's this new tax, this VAT tax which

  • you want to institute so that you can pay for the freedom dividend.

  • And I hear, “Oh God this guy wants another tax.

  • He wants to tax me more.”

  • If I'm a lower middle income person, are you saying I'm going to have to pay more taxes

  • on food?

  • On clothing?

  • On ...

  • YANG: Well it depends.

  • I mean, if all you do is consume consumer staples, it's possible that you don't have

  • to pay more.

  • KING: Why not?

  • YANG: Because, again, you can tailor a value added tax so that it falls heavily on certain

  • types of consumption choices and not so heavily on others like you could exempt diapers.

  • You could exempt a lot of things that I think Americans would say, you know, that that we

  • need.

  • But the problem right now is that we're looking at each other and the biggest myth in American

  • life right now is that we don't have the money.

  • We're the richest country in the history of humanity: over 20 trillion dollars in GDP,

  • up 5 trillion in the last 10 years.

  • And so there is this incredibly untrue narrative.

  • And it's punishing us all or looking around and saying likeWhere's the money going?

  • Where is the money going?”

  • The money is going into the hands of a smaller and smaller number of companies and individuals

  • in this country.

  • And they're so powerful that they actually manage to keep real reform off the agenda.

  • And so that's where we have to fix it.

  • We have to go to it.

  • There's a saying where it's likeWhy did I rob the bank?

  • Because that's where the money was.”

  • That's what's going on right now in our society.

  • We have to go where the money is, and it's not each other.

  • You know what I mean?

  • It's not like if I tax the town dentist more like that's going to solve the problem like

  • that.

  • The problem is that you have literally trillion dollar companies paying zero in taxes.

  • KING: You're promising not to tax the town dentist more.

  • You're promising not to tax diapers.

  • What you're saying is: things would be exempt and you would figure out what's exempt.

  • YANG: Well, just any American listening to this right now is like thinking to themselves

  • if they know anything about me in the campaignthey're like, “Wow, a thousand

  • dollars a month sounds too good to be true.

  • That would be a real game changer.”

  • And if I am a family with two adultslike twenty four thousandand then I know my

  • son when they turn 18 or daughter, they get a thousand dollars a month, the entire thing

  • transforms that idea of citizenship.

  • And the wild thing is that we can totally make it happen.

  • There's nothing stopping us from making happen.

  • Alaska has had a dividend for almost 40 years already where if you go to Alaska you get

  • between one and two thousand dollars a year automatically for every family member.

  • So John, if you and your family moved to Alaska, you'd get eight thousand dollars next year.

  • It's been in effect for 40 years.

  • They love it.

  • Universally popular in a deep red conservative state passed by a Republican governor, and

  • they fund it with oil money.

  • And what I'm saying to the American people is technology is the oil of the 21st century.

  • We can fund this dividend, and that will make us stronger, healthier, mentally healthier.

  • And if we don't make this kind of move then we're going to be stuck looking at each other

  • and wonderingWhat the heck happened to our communities?” as the truck driving gets

  • automated, the malls close, the call centers get replaced, by bots and software, every

  • fast food restaurant you go into by 2021 is going to have a self-serve kiosk.

  • At least every McDonald's is going to have a self-service kiosk, food service and preparation

  • is the third most common job type in the United States.

  • The fact is we're already decades behind the curve; it has brought us Donald Trump.

  • And unless we get our heads up and start solving the real problems, they're just going to get

  • worse.

  • ZEITLER: Well, I actually really genuinely enjoy your clear eyed view of things.

  • You know, you're not afraid to take risks.

  • YANG: Thanks, John.

  • ZEITLER: You're not afraid to take a liberal stance and then kind of make these sort of

  • harder choices at times.

  • But I think you sort of see it as, I don't know, maybe this is my question: do you see

  • the world in sort of

  • Or America, at least, as divided between sort of winners and losers?”

  • You know the folks for whom, you know, whatever their privilege is, they wind up you know

  • they have the education and they have the job and therefore they have access to money

  • and then those who are sort of left out and you know do you see it that way?

  • And how do you kind of address that?

  • And how do you kind of convince the winners to see themselves equally with the losers?

  • YANG: That's so interesting.

  • Well, there certainly are winners and losers in American life today by our economic measurements,

  • and you can see again we're in this winner-take-all economy, where certain classes of Americans,

  • often in certain parts of the countryAnd that's one of the things that blew my mind

  • when I ran Venture for America because I'd never been to Missouri, Alabama, Louisiana,

  • western Pennsylvania.

  • and all these places.

  • And you go around you're like, “Wow, I feel like I'm in a different country.”

  • And the gulf between some of those places and, frankly, a place like Manhattanwhere

  • we are right nowdoesn't feel like a few time zones, it feels like a different dimension

  • or you know

  • ZEITLER: I grew up in Wichita.

  • I know exactly what you're talking about.

  • YANG: Oh, you did?

  • I was wondering where you grew up.

  • So you know what I'm talking about.

  • And so there's certainly this class divide that is becoming more pronounced, but I think

  • the regional divide and the urban-rural divide is becoming much more extreme.

  • And that is threatening to tear us apart, because rural areas are getting systematically

  • depleted and sucked dry.

  • Like the automation I'm talking about started in agriculture at the farms.

  • And when you go to many of these farmslike the notion you might have of this beautiful

  • family farm or whatnot – I mean it's gotten replaced by this corporate behemoth that's

  • like gobbled up like a dozen family farms and glued them together.

  • So the divide is more extreme, and the worst part is that we're being pitted against each

  • other often using various cultural markers that have nothing to do with economics that

  • actually should unify us all.

  • Because if you haveand you're an attorney ... I was an attorney for five unhappy months,

  • so you could say it's like, “Hey, I'm an attorney so you know I'm, I'm safe from these

  • changes that Andrew's talking about,” but you know that artificial intelligence

  • can edit contracts and legal documents better and more quickly, more accurately, more cheaply

  • ZEITLER: Or even if it's not me, it's you know, what about my kids?

  • Maybe I'm winning now.

  • But what does the future hold, right?

  • YANG: Yes.

  • So this becomes something where it should bring us all together if we presented in the

  • right way.

  • It's not immigrants.

  • It's technology.

  • And it's humanity that we have to preserve.

  • KING: Hetal, I've seen your eyebrows go up a couple of times during this exchange, and

  • I just want to ask, based on what you've been hearing, what questions do you still have?

  • JANI: Yes.

  • So, I mean, I had a couple of questions, which I guess you can choose which to answer.

  • But how do you know that the big companies are not going to push that cost, the tax that

  • they're going to be paying, back off onto the consumers without the freedom dividend?

  • How do you meanSure, we don't have to necessarily go into you know ... we can choose

  • how to spend it.

  • And you should be spending it on necessities, but you're going to make people choose, right?

  • You're also seeking to pay for the freedom dividend at the cost of other programs.

  • KING: I think we just need to explain that very briefly, and that's an important point.

  • If a family currently is getting welfare payments, SNAP food stamps, WIC, et cetera, and they're

  • getting seven hundred dollars a month in welfare, under your system, that would go away.

  • I get that solid thousand dollars, but that seven hundred dollars in SNAP and food stamps,

  • that's not mine anymore.

  • So I think what Hetal is asking is, if you're taking away people's welfare payments and

  • replacing it with a thousand dollars, is that enough?

  • Is that what you're getting at?

  • JANI: Right.

  • I mean people, you would ideally hope, and this is again kind of with the vision ... the

  • vision is great.

  • I love the vision, right?

  • But do people always make the choices that we need them to make in order to get to the

  • world that you're hoping to get to?

  • YANG: I think this is maybe one of the bigger misconceptions about me and the freedom dividend.

  • As I see it, the freedom dividend is like a foundation or a floor, and then you don't

  • stop building a house at the floor.

  • It's kind of a crummy house, you know?

  • So first, I would not want to get rid of any existing government programs.

  • I would never be the sort of person that says likeHey, there are millions of Americans

  • relying upon something.

  • Let's pull the rug out from under them.”

  • KING: I would still keep getting my payments?

  • YANG: So there is an opt-in.

  • The freedom dividends are universal and opt-in.

  • And if you do opt into the freedom dividend, then you do forego benefits that are from

  • certain programs that are cash and cash-like.

  • But if you love your current benefitsor let's say you're receiving eighteen hundred

  • dollars in current benefitsthen I would never touch it.

  • And so that's one thing.

  • And the other thing is that I'm not someone who says likeOh, we don't need to do all

  • these other things on top of it,” because a thousand dollars a month is just a foundation.

  • There's a lot of work to do on top of that and to the extent that existing programs are

  • doing that work: fantastic.

  • To the extent that we need new programs and organizations: all the better.

  • You know, what's driving me is that, to me, and I feel likeand please don't let me

  • project something that's inaccurate on youbut like I ran a nonprofit for seven years

  • and people were congratulating me and I was like, “You don't get it.

  • I'm just like scratching the surface of the problem I'm trying to tackle.”

  • So to me, we have to do so much more.

  • I would never suggest that a thousand dollars a month is going to do the work for us.

  • KING: You were hinting at something though interestingand I want to make sure that

  • we have that answeredwhich is, if you give people a thousand dollars a month cash,

  • they may not make the right decisions.

  • They may make dumb decisions.

  • What do you do about that?

  • YANG: Of course, some people will make decisions that I personally would disagree with, but

  • one of the things that never happens when Verizon or coke or Microsoft declares a dividend

  • which they do all the timeand we applaud them and say, “Nice job.

  • Like good management!”

  • They never say, “Hey, what are you doing with that money?”

  • You know what I mean?

  • Like we are the owners and shareholders of the democracy.

  • If you get the freedom dividend in January and you buy a big TV, like maybe I wouldn't

  • have bought that big TV, but you know, it's your decision, your resources.

  • And then hopefully you'll make itor not even hopefullyit's like you might make

  • a different decision in February.

  • The benefit to me of putting this sort of agency and autonomy in people's hands far

  • outweigh trying to direct it to very, very specific expenses.

  • But I will say again that we still need to do a lot of work to address the real problems

  • in our society on top of anything we're doing with the freedom dividend.

  • JANI: And that's kind of what I want to get at next is the issue of inequity, right?

  • So if they're not ... we're not mandating them, we're not prescribing how they spend

  • that money.

  • But then again, is a thousand dollars enough to really address inequities?

  • Or how are you looking to address inequities?

  • Yes, there's a lot of work to be done.

  • I haven't heard enough about what that is.

  • So what's the next work beside freedom dividend.

  • How do you address inequities in education, health care?

  • How do you actually address it?

  • ZEITLER: Housing.

  • JANI: Yeah.

  • YANG: Which one do you want me to tackle?

  • Really, which?

  • JANI: I'm focused on education, so...

  • YANG: Oh, so first the data shows that two thirds of our kid's academic performance

  • is determined by factors outside of the school.

  • So that's parental time spent with the children, words read to them when they're young, stress

  • levels in the household, type of neighborhood.

  • And educators know this where we're saying you know, “Teach our kids!” and they're

  • like, “Hey, I'm responsible.”

  • Or, “I can control about a third because I know that kid.”

  • Well you're a hundred percent accountable!”, and they're likeOK”.

  • So number one: if you put resources into the household, you're actually getting the kids

  • in a better position to learn and then helping the teachers be in a better position to teach.

  • So that's number one.

  • And to me that's foundational.

  • And that ends up balancing out more aggressively for communities that are starting in a lower

  • base, which tends to be unfortunately communities of color in this country.

  • Number two: the data clearly shows that a good teacher is worth his or her weight in

  • gold.

  • So, we should pay teachers more, and 12000 dollars a year raise would just be a start.

  • We need to retain and enlist better teachers.

  • There are so many teachers who are leaving the classroom because of burnout and the rest

  • of it.

  • Relatedly, we need more teachers.

  • Data also shows that having individualized attention: very, very positive for kids.

  • Having lower student teacher ratio is very, very positive.

  • So we need to staff up.

  • The fourth thing is we need to lighten the emphasis on standardized tests that right

  • now is making our teachers make these choices in the classroom where they know that's not

  • good for the kid but they're like, “Well, I'm going to get evaluated on this test, and

  • the kids are getting evaluated on this test, so let's head to this direction.”

  • And one of my boys is autistic, and so he's neurologically atypical.

  • And while that's relatively extreme, there are many atypical kids in our schools today

  • that are just getting beaten over the head with these standardized tests.

  • And you know ... and many of them are having their self-esteem crushed and their their

  • hopes for the future altered forever.

  • We invented the S.A.T. during World War II as a means to determine which kids not to

  • send to the front lines, and now we're using it every year like it's wartime.

  • And we're treating our kids like it's wartime every year.

  • So we need to de-emphasize these tests, and let the teachers actually do their jobs.

  • So that would be enormous.

  • We have to stop pretending that every kid's going to go to college.

  • Only a third of Americans are going to graduate from college, and that's relatively stable.

  • It hasn't gone up from 20 to 33 percent or anything like it.

  • It's gone like 30, 30, 30, 30 – it's relatively stable.

  • So we should stop presenting college as the end all be all to our high school kids in

  • particular and say, “Look, technical apprenticeship vocational programs are very, very, very stable

  • careers in many cases.”

  • Only 6 percent of American high school students are in vocational and technical and apprenticeships

  • right now.

  • In Germany, that's 59 percent.

  • Think about that gulf.

  • And there are many of those jobs that are going to stand the test of time.

  • It's very hard to automate away a plumber or an HVAC repair person.

  • Imagine having a robot do that.

  • Very, very hard.

  • So, so we need to invest.

  • And as usual, it's the harder thing.

  • Because even after I'm president, I say, “Alright, let's invest in vocational…” you can't

  • just conjure up like a shop and technical training in a school.

  • It's much easier to just have like some textbooks in that classroom.

  • It's cheaper, too.

  • So if you try and do the right thing by our kids, it's going to be a higher degree of

  • investment, but it's the right thing to do.

  • So these are some of the things I believe we should do in education that would help

  • alleviate some of the pervasive inequities.

  • KING: Do you want to go with the last question?

  • JANI: Go ahead.

  • KING: OK, we're going to shift topics in a second, but I wanted to ask you both.

  • You both had some very pointed questions about the freedom dividend, about the thousand dollars

  • a month.

  • Are you convinced?

  • Are you more convinced now than you were when you walked in here based on what Mr. Yang

  • has said and explained?

  • ZEITLER: I mean, if you're a little bit more subtle with a value added tax right and you're

  • excluding products and that sort of thing, I think it helps.

  • You know, I mean, I don't see why you have to trade ... make the decision between SNAPs

  • and getting the dividend.

  • It seems to me it should just...

  • Right because the wealthier person's – you know the person who doesn't need it ... I

  • mean in my little community, in suburban New Jersey, I just imagine that going into, “Well,

  • I can just buy a bigger house.”

  • It's a thousand dollars a month.

  • I can put into my mortgage, or my rent, or whatever and housing prices will just go up.

  • In this you know relatively ...er you know a desirable location can further kind of making

  • the price of entry more difficult for people to attain.

  • So if you can just kind of elaborate on that a little bit.

  • YANG: Sure.

  • You know what's great, John, is that, by the math, a thousand dollars a month makes a much,

  • much bigger difference to people who are coming from a lower base.

  • ZEITLER: Sure.

  • YANG: So, if I'm making twenty four thousand dollars a year and you give me twelve thousand

  • dollars additionallike a 50 percent increase.

  • If I'm making two hundred thousand dollars it's a six percent increase.

  • So if you're worried that it's just going to exacerbate the incredible inequality in

  • our society, by the math it will actually diminish it greatly.

  • And if you look at Alaska, where they're getting one to two thousand dollars a year for every

  • adult, it's significantly diminishing.

  • They're actually technically the least unequal state in the country, I believe, in large

  • part because the dividend flattens it all out.

  • KING: Alright, let me ask whether you are convinced by what you've heard today.

  • JANI: Sure.

  • I mean, I guess I just ... I'll sort of follow up to that.

  • Why not just set a threshold like people below this income or household income will get a

  • thousand dollars and people above will not?

  • Why not just do that instead of ... I mean, for someone like me, sure it could go a long

  • way, especially for student loans.

  • YANG: I would try and zero out some of those student loans anyway, by the way.

  • JANI: Perfect.

  • Yes.

  • YANG: So, you get to keep some of that money.

  • JANI: But yeah, I mean it would go directly to those kinds of costs, right?

  • I'm not going to go buy the next iPhone for a thousand dollars, but not everybody is going

  • to make that decision.

  • So it may continue to increase or it may further some inequities right?

  • Not because you want it to, but it just may happen.

  • Why not just set that?

  • YANG: So there's definitely a legit argument for some kind of income threshold.

  • I've been convinced that the benefits of universality are actually enough so we should head that

  • direction.

  • So, just to use the Alaska example again, everyone gets the oil dividend from the richest

  • Alaskan to the poorest Alaskan.

  • And so what this does is it gets rid of all stigma attached to it.

  • It makes it much more popular.

  • It seems fair.

  • There's no rich-to-poor transfer, and there's no monitoring requirement, which ends up lightening

  • the bureaucracy.

  • And there's no incentive to report that you made less money than you did.

  • So if it was depending upon individual income, you'd have a lot of people being like, “Hey,

  • you know, like how about let's … maybe let's not get married so that you can get the dividend?”

  • But I'll let you know that there would be some game playing, whereas if you just say,

  • Look: you're an American.

  • You get it turning age 18.”

  • And my system would end up extracting hundreds of millionslet's say billionsfrom

  • someone like Jeff Bezos.

  • So if we try and send him a thousand bucks a month to remind him he's an American, like

  • it's fine.

  • Like if someone is really at the top of society, we're going to be extracting a lot of value

  • from them as it should be.

  • JANI: In that value added tax, that's the ...

  • YANG: Yeah.

  • Because if you have a significant value added tax that, let's say, is even sharper on luxury

  • goods and then you have someone who's really wealthy in our society, we're going to get

  • a ton from them.

  • And then if you say, “Hey, you want your thousand bucks a month?”

  • You know it'll be trivial in the scheme of the value we're getting.

  • KING: Alright, we have been talking about the country's economic future, but I know

  • that both of our voters, John and Hetal, have some questions about climate change.

  • So you have put forward a very long and detailed proposal, about 50 pages, on what you would

  • do to solve the problem of climate change now, the problem of climate change now and

  • in the near future.

  • John, this is something that's been weighing pretty heavily on your mind.

  • I wonder if you can tell us why that is and what you'd like to know from Mr. Yang.

  • ZEITLER: I mean it's, you know, you hear everybody talking about it.

  • It's an existential threat and that's not just some little...

  • YANG: Turn of phrase.

  • ZEITLER: Yeah.

  • It's a reality.

  • KING: You have kids.

  • ZEITLER: It has to be addressed before everything else because we're just not going to exist.

  • You're going to have climate refugees, a kind of human catastrophe that's greater than the

  • history of slavery or the holocaust during, all of the Holocaust during the 20th century.

  • I mean it's a massive, massive problem.

  • So it weighs on me heavily.

  • Again, I feel like your thinking is very clear-eyed.

  • You know, it's bold and I appreciate the notion of moving folks to higher ground because we're

  • in it

  • YANG: We already have climate refugees in this country now.

  • ZEITLER: Yeah.

  • So, you do include nuclear in your plan.

  • You also are interested in investing in thorium and nuclear fusion, which I think is interesting.

  • KING: And which we'll have to have you explain.

  • ZEITLER: Yes.

  • So if you can sort of, you know my concern about nuclear is the long term nuclear waste

  • problem, where it sits around for 10,000 years it's sort of hard to ...

  • YANG: I'm happy to say that thorium decomposes faster.

  • ZEITLER: Yeah.

  • No, so I've been reading about it and it's remarkable, right?

  • I mean that's more on a human timescale.

  • But why continue to have traditional nuclear in the portfolio?

  • Why not sunset that very quickly and you know, move in toward sustainable and thorium research,

  • say?

  • YANG: So first I want to say there is no solving the problem of climate change.

  • I think that's what you'd said.

  • Like there is, you can't turn back time.

  • I mean, it's with us now.

  • It's already changing lives and destroying lives.

  • I was just in New Hampshire running for president.

  • I was just in New Hampshire and hundreds of coastal houses and buildings are already flooding

  • regularly.

  • They had a multi-million dollar shrimping business outside of Portsmouth that went to

  • zero because of warming waters.

  • It's already changing and devastating communities and ways of life around the country.

  • And we haven't seen the worst of it.

  • The last four years have been the four warmest years in recorded history.

  • July was the warmest month in recorded history.

  • I think you probably saw me on the big stage in Detroit saying, “It's too late.

  • It's like worse than you think.”

  • So it's too late to reverse climate change, like the Earth will warm.

  • Sea levels will rise.

  • We have to start trying to mitigate some of the worst effects.

  • So where to begin?

  • I mean I have a long plan, as you said.

  • KING: You have a very long plan.

  • But John is actually really interested in why are you, why do you want to remain reliant

  • on nuclear energy?

  • And you have proposed something that not a lot of people have heard, of which is this

  • thing called thorium, which you see as the way forward on climate and on energy consumption.

  • YANG: It sounds so science fiction-y.

  • KING: It does sound so science fiction-y, and I guarantee you a lot of our listeners

  • will not have heard of it.

  • Can you briefly just explain, what is thorium?

  • And why does it go part of the way toward helping with climate change?

  • YANG: So thorium is a next generation fuel for nuclear reactor[s], and it's superior

  • to uranium on many levels.

  • One is, it's not intrinsically radioactive on its own, so that's great.

  • Two, you can't make weapons out of it.

  • KING: Which is true.

  • That's a real thing.

  • And I mean you said it offhandedly, but I was researching thorium this morning and yes,

  • it is not used for nuclear weapons, yeah.

  • YANG: It does decompose more quickly, and so it has many benefits and the energy productivity

  • can be as high or higher.

  • And so, why haven't we done it?

  • I mean, we need to invest in these next generation nuclear reactors, and there's been a lot of

  • angst about proceeding in this direction.

  • To me, if we're in a crisis, which we are, then you have to consider every alternative

  • on the table, and thorium and nuclear has to be at least on the table in my mind.

  • If we get it right, it could be a tremendous boost in moving us towards more sustainable

  • forms of energy and reducing our reliance on fossil fuels and things that are speeding

  • up climate change.

  • So I'm excited about the potential.

  • Some of the people I've spoken to are also excited by the potential.

  • And this is the kind of bet that we would need to make if we're serious about trying

  • to wean ourselves off of fossil fuels without frankly dramatically changing the energy consumption

  • in this country, because we consume a lot of energy.

  • And I think we can get there, but we can only get there if we're willing to consider every

  • alternative.

  • ZEITLER: How do you challenge Americans to consume less energy and more specifically

  • you know, from what I've read, it's the folks at the top of the economic ladder that actually

  • you know burn the most fuel.

  • YANG: Well, you probably saw that Elon Musk endorsed me.

  • So I think we need to move to electric cars.

  • We need to try and lower people's carbon footprint to just do the things they do in everyday

  • life.

  • So that's investing in public transportation and electric cars and busesthings that

  • will enable us to do what we want to do, but just burn less fuel and make less of an impact.

  • KING: Hetal, I want to allow you to get a question in here.

  • JANI: How are you gonna... those who don't believe in climate change because there's

  • a lot ofHow are you going to reach out to those people?

  • YANG: I mean you probably know I have a “Mathhat, so you know I should probably wear a

  • Sciencehat someplace.

  • But I think there's a growing consensus around the urgency of climate change, certainly in

  • the Democratic Party.

  • The folks who don't believe in climate change – I think many of them have their heads

  • down in part because we're in a country where 78 percent of us are living paycheck to paycheck

  • and almost half can't afford an unexpected 400 dollar bill.

  • So if I come to you and say, “Hey, we need to worry about climate change.”

  • You have your head down, and you're like, “I can't pay next month's rent.”

  • Like, “Climate change is hokumor something.

  • So a lot of it is getting Americans' heads up.

  • And to me a lot of that is getting the boot off of people's throats so that they can actually

  • think more clearly and hopefully optimistically about the future.

  • Studies have shown that if you can't pay your bills, it has the functional impact of decreasing

  • your I.Q. by 13 points or one standard deviation almost.

  • So if you feel like there are a lot of Americans who seem more insular and negative and pessimistic

  • and less future-oriented, that's probably factually accurate.

  • Because so many of us are just so stressed out about meeting next month's rent and living

  • paycheck to paycheck that it's making us less rational and less optimistic.

  • JANI: But that's great for the people.

  • How about reaching across the aisle?

  • How do you do that?

  • YANG: Well I mean, I suppose that's what I meant is that, you knowWell so, I'm one

  • of only two Democratic candidates in the field that 10 percent or more of Donald Trump voters

  • said they would support in the general election, which makes me the best candidate to take

  • on and beat Donald Trump in 2020.

  • And the folks on the other side of the aisle – I'm clearly a Democrat.

  • Everyone knows that.

  • But the folks on the other side of the aisle see that I'm focused on trying to solve problems

  • that affect them and all of us that I'm not judging anyone.

  • That I'm saying look: the reality is we did blast away four million manufacturing jobs

  • in these communities many of whom ... many of which were in swing states or used to be

  • swing that went red.

  • And so they see that I'm trying to solve that set of problems.

  • There's even a group calledTruckers for Yang.”

  • Truckers are not really like traditionally a Democratic-leaning group, but they see that

  • I'm trying to solve their problems because I think there are problems.

  • You know, if we truly do blast away hundreds of thousands of trucking jobs, that's going

  • to be an everyone problem.

  • And so I'm already peeling off disaffected Trump voters, independents, libertarians,

  • some conservatives.

  • I also talk in terms of numbers and business, and a lot of conservatives are attracted to

  • that.

  • JANI: Yeah, I mean no.

  • I'm drawing a blank right now.

  • I guess I see...

  • Did you convince me?

  • YANG: Well, that's the question.

  • I have to say I feel a lot of pressure.

  • KING: On climate change, whether either of you is worth convincing.

  • So you are concerned about using nuclear as a form of energy and nuclear replacing coal,

  • for example.

  • Mr. Yang has explained, to some extent, that he sees nuclear as the way forward, that thorium

  • is even the safer way

  • YANG: It's a way forward.

  • KING: A way forward.

  • Are you convinced?

  • ZEITLER: Well, what about what about phasing out traditional nuclear in a much more expedited

  • pace?

  • YANG: If we succeed in developing these next generation reactors and traditional reactors

  • aren't necessary, then I know I'd be thrilled.

  • I mean if you can improve the, let's say, the composition of our energy infrastructure,

  • to me that's not like the lowest hanging fruit like fossil fuels and fracking and a bunch

  • of other stuff.

  • ZEITLER: Eliminating those first you mean?

  • YANG: Yeah, yeah exactly.

  • ZEITLER: Yeah.

  • No, I'm drawing a blank.

  • KING: Hetal, are you convinced?

  • I mean one thing that I point out, and maybe I'm throwing a question to you that you can

  • throw to Mr. Yang.

  • But one part of your policy proposal is simply moving people to higher ground.

  • Hetal, you work with a lot of low income people who do not have the luxury of saying, “I'm

  • going to pack up my apartment, and I'm simply going to move inland, upstate to the mountains.”

  • I wonder could you ask Mr. Yang a question about how this applies to, how moving to higher

  • ground applies to low income people?

  • JANI: Yeah, I mean that's really the question.

  • But yeah, I guess I see that you're placing a lot of importance on climate change.

  • That's great, but I still don't see the plan.

  • YANG: So the plan is a five part plan.

  • And you're right, I didn't go through the plan in detail.

  • I just talked about three issues.

  • So one aspect of it is move people to higher ground and that has at least two major components.

  • So when there's a natural disaster, who suffers?

  • Poor people, people of color, people who don't have the resources to protect themselves.

  • They might not have a car to get into to drive away.

  • And so first, put a thousand dollars a month in everyone's hands.

  • It makes us more able to protect ourselves if there is like a natural disaster that would

  • be beneficial to have an automobile or something like that, but then we need to invest tens,

  • hundreds of billions of dollars in making our communities more resilient to climate

  • change.

  • It's a situation where if you spend 10 billion now you might save yourself 50 billion later.

  • That's not really the American way right now.

  • The American way is to wait until you have to spend 50 billion, and then I mean, there

  • is one house that we have rebuilt 20 times as an example.

  • Not in the whole, but like in part, it just keeps getting damaged or destroyed.

  • And I think most Americans would say, “Hey, if it makes more sense for us to rebuild that

  • house someplace else and to the owner…”

  • So part of this is that many Americans, do not want to move.

  • And we as a country are not the types to be like, “Hey, we're gonna force you to move.”

  • Like, that's not really our style.

  • We did already relocate a village in rural Louisiana that has become uninhabitable because

  • of climate change, and their ocean level rose to a point where we said, “Hey, this is

  • not working,” and then we move them.

  • So we're starting to do it, and we need to do much more of that.

  • There is a lot of value if you can, in some cases, elevate certain structures or elevate

  • levees or just start preparing for higher sea levels.

  • So that's what move people to higher ground is.

  • It's not literal, it's not like everyone is going to go to the mountains, but it's let's

  • try and make our communities genuinely more resilient and prepare for what we know is

  • coming.

  • JANI: So when you say when you say you move them to higher ground ... we move them to

  • higher ground.

  • Who's “we”?

  • And then, you also said that if you give them the freedom dividend, they'd have resources

  • to prepare themselves.

  • YANG: Just every American can at least have some basic resources, yeah.

  • JANI: So are you expecting them to tap into their freedom dividend to also prepare themselves

  • or is there money in your plan for this?

  • YANG: Oh, there's a, there's a lot of additional money.

  • So freedom dividends: again a foundation.

  • And then we have literally hundreds of billions of dollars that we need to funnel to communities

  • to help make them more resilient and direct them.

  • And in some cases that could be like a town government coming together and saying, “Hey,

  • the best move might be for us to move this town.”

  • You know, it's not like an every person for themselves sort of situation.

  • The freedom dividend, though I will suggest that if you give an American a choice say,

  • Hey, would you rather I send you a thousand bucks a month to make you safer or there'll

  • be some government program to make you safer?”, most of them would be like, “Thousand dollars,

  • please.”

  • Because I'm pretty sure I could be able to use that to, you know, like put some boards

  • up or like do something that I know is gonna make me safer.

  • So it's a both-and.

  • I just want to solve the problem.

  • But you certainly wouldn't leave people on their own.

  • KING: I want to ... I'm being told that we only have five or 10 minutes left.

  • YANG: No!

  • That's terrible.

  • KING: It's terrible.

  • It is terrible, but there are a couple of questions that I do need to ask for NPR.

  • YANG: OK.

  • KING: You guys are welcome to follow.

  • One of them is actually yours.

  • But the impeachment inquiry being conducted by the Democratsdo you think this is

  • the right way to go?

  • Where do you stand on impeachment?

  • YANG: I think impeachment is the right way to go.

  • But I do not think that we should have any illusions that it's necessarily going to be

  • successful.

  • And

  • KING: In the Senate, you mean?

  • YANG: In the Senate.

  • And when we are talking about Donald Trump, we are losing to Donald Trump.

  • Even if it's in the context of talking about impeaching him, we need to take that opportunity

  • to present a new vision for the country that Americans can get excited about.

  • That's how we move the country forward.

  • That's how we'll win in 2020.

  • KING: All right, Hetal, I know you had a question about Mr. Yang's identity and what it's meant

  • on the trail.

  • YANG: Oh!

  • So cool.

  • JANI: So you say, “What's the complete opposite of [Donald Trump] other than an Asian

  • man who knows math?

  • Right?

  • YANG: Likes math.

  • JANI: Likes math?

  • Knows math?

  • It should be knows math too.

  • [Laughter] But how do you, being a South Asian, being someone of Indian descent

  • KING: You are.

  • JANI: Yes, I am.

  • So, you'd be the first Asian-American president.

  • I mean, what does that mean, first of all?

  • And then also Asian-American is such a big label.

  • YANG: Yeah, that's true.

  • JANI: You know, not every Asian has the same opportunities.

  • Vietnamese are different, Pakistanis from Indians, et cetera.

  • So how do you disaggregate that data.

  • But yeah, within your identity, what are you going to do to promoteAsian-American”?

  • YANG: I also grew up the child of immigrants, so I feel like you and I might have a lot

  • in common.

  • I'm certainly very proud to be the first Asian-American man to run for president as a Democrat.

  • And when I see Asian-Americans around the country, many seem excited about my candidacy.

  • At the same time, like you said, we're a very, very diverse community, with very, very different

  • sets of experiences.

  • And so I would never suggest that you know I can somehow speak for all Asian-Americans

  • or that my experience is representative.

  • But I do remember what it was like growing up in this country where I'd just be so pumped

  • to see an Asian of any kind on the TV, where I jump up and down and like, you know try

  • and get my … [laughter].

  • I mean, things have changed since then.

  • But it's given me a lot of joy and pride to think about an Asian child turning on the

  • Democratic debate and seeing me up on that stage.

  • And hopefully it gives them a sense that we're just as American as anyone else.

  • KING: I wanted to ask you, I wanted to ask you a question about your candidacy.

  • Nationally you're polling at about 2 percent.

  • YANG: A little higher than that.

  • KING: A little higher than that.

  • YANG: Come on!

  • [Laughter]

  • KING: John and Hetal, feel free to follow up on this.

  • I mean, are you running for president to win?

  • Or are you running for president to introduce ideas into the conversation?

  • Like our jobs are being lost to automation, and we need to start talking about unheard

  • of things like universal basic income, unusual things, new things like universal basic income,

  • like using thorium to make energy.

  • Are you running to win?

  • And do you think you can win?

  • YANG: Oh, I hundred percent can win.

  • KING: Yeah?

  • YANG: The prediction markets have me as the third most likely to be the nominee right

  • now.

  • I raised 10 million dollars in the last quarter, and all of our measurements are just going

  • through the roof.

  • So you'll see that we'll be there competing at the very highest levels the whole time.

  • One thing I will say is that this is certainly not a new set of ideas.

  • Martin Luther King championed universal basic income.

  • KING: So did Richard Nixon for a time.

  • YANG: Yeah, Richard Nixon, Thomas Paine.

  • So it's been with us for decades.

  • It's just now more vital than ever.

  • But I'm running to solve the biggest problems of our time.

  • I'm on the record saying if I thought these problems would get solved without my being

  • president, I would be pumped.

  • KING: If someone else could pull it off.

  • YANG: But it seems that the most effective way to make these solutions happen will be

  • for me to win.

  • And that is the plan.

  • KING: John?

  • Hetal?

  • Why don't you follow up on that?

  • ZEITLER: I don't know, I just, I still can't get around why you're so averse to a wealth

  • tax?

  • That still sticks.

  • I mean I understand that you, in principle and philosophically, agree with it.

  • Yeah but the idea thatyou're such a, you're a guy who's like, “Look, let's solve

  • the problem.

  • You know, let's come up with some really big ideas.”

  • And I just don't feel like, you know, “Well, the rich are just going to avoid the tax.

  • It's too hard.

  • We're not going to do it.”

  • That seems like, that doesn't seem like you.

  • YANG: Oh, you know, I like to consider myself very fact- and data-driven.

  • And so if a solution was tried in a host of other countries that I think of as pretty

  • smart countries, like Denmark and Sweden and France and Germany, and then they ended up

  • saying like, “This is actually so bad that we're going to repeal it.”

  • Like, I take that set of experiences as very compelling.

  • If you can't learn from other people's mistakes, then you're kind of putting yourself in a

  • tough spot.

  • But I'm philosophically not opposed to it.

  • And if I was president and it passed Congress and it's like, “Hey, it's wealth tax time,”

  • and I thought it would be somewhat effective, it's not that

  • I just don't think it's the best idea.

  • But you know, I see why everyone's supporting it.

  • Let's put it that way.

  • JANI: And I mean you clearly have great ideas.

  • That's why we're both here.

  • Love the ideas.

  • YANG: Oh, thank you!

  • I thought maybe you guys got picked out at random, be like, “Oh, we got stuck with

  • Yang.

  • I was hoping for another candidate!”

  • ALL: [laughter]

  • JANI: No, your ideas are great.

  • Like John said, clear-eyed, it's great.

  • But in the case that you don't become president, how are you going to continue to work on these

  • ideas to make sure that we're addressing everything we've discussed?

  • YANG: Well these problems are gonna be with us no matter what.

  • And I'm very confident I'll have a lot of work to do, whether it's as president or in

  • some other capacity.

  • But I'm a parent, like you are John, and I see the future we're leaving for our kids.

  • And I find it to be unacceptable.

  • And so I'm going to work my heart out to try and make it better.

  • KING: As we wrap, I'll just ask you lastly, would you be interested in commerce secretary?

  • YANG: No, I'm open to contributing in any of a range of roles.

  • You know, I've spent time with the other candidates, and there are many people I could work with.

  • KING: I thought you were going to laugh, but you didn't.

  • And I like that.

  • Alright, entrepreneur Andrew Yang, thank you so much.

  • Entrepreneur and presidential candidate Andrew Yang, thank you so much for being with us

  • today.

  • We really appreciate it.

  • YANG: Thanks.

  • I enjoyed it immensely.

  • KING: And I want to thank our voters, Hetal Jani and John Zeitler.

  • Thank you both for coming out today.

  • We appreciate it.

  • JANI: Thank you.

  • ZEITLER: Thanks.

NOEL KING: All right, everyone.

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