Galloway on 'Post Corona: From Crisis to Opportunity'

which is a perfect book for right now. Professor at n y use Stern School of Business, he has founded multiple tech firms. Great to have back with us and talk about his new book, Post Corona From Crisis to Opportunity. Scott Galloway, he is with us on the phone from California. Scott, So nice to have you here with us. How are you. I'm great, Carol, but I'm feeling especially good after that introduction. I could speak to Carol Master for hours in my car. Well,

I'm gonna hold it to you. Hold you do it because I really I do. I feel like you get us thinking. And there's so much going on in the world, um right now, where so much has happened to us, and I do wonder about what happens on the other side of it. So first of all, tell us about kind of your world right now. I mean you've been teaching, I'm assuming, I mean tell us about how you've been kind of taking everything in in this world that is well.

You don't like to say this out loud, that if you have, if you've been blessed with with health and the people you love are healthy, and you make a good living, and you have a nice home, and you're a little bit older, and maybe you know, have a fortunate to own real estate and owned stocks. The pandemic for a lot of those people has meant more time with their children, more time with Netflix. You get back

five to ten hours of commuting. The era of cleaner in your stock market portfolio isn't an all time high, So you know, that's both a good and a bad thing.

I would argue that COVID nineteen is more of an accelerant than it is a change engine, and some of the dysfunctional income and equality attributes of our economy have absolutely become the stoke in So I would argue a lot of the wealthiest people are living their best lives right now, and I think unfortunately it's taken a real toll on and maybe a little bit younger, not as economically well off, had jobs that were a lower income and more susceptible. So this is really a K shape

recovery on a lot of levels. I've talked with Peter atwater Over at William and Mary I totally. I think that is how we describe our time. You know in your book, Scott, you're right, and forgive me. I hate quoting someone's book back to someone the person who wrote it, but it's stuck with me. Whether the US is headed for a Hunger Games future or something brighter depends on

which path we choose post Corona. I do feel like we're at this interesting time where whether it's the health pandemic, whether it's racial inequalities and justices, there's so many things that are wrong right now, and I do wonder do we learn from it? Can we be smarter and do we come out better on the other side? And I wonder what do we need to do to come out better on the other side? Well, yeah, you know word

and I hope so, sister. The Chinese term for crisis is interpreted as the intersection between opportunity and risk, and there's two paths here, and I would argue it needs to you know, loosely speaking, the path to a brighter future involves, in my view, of re embracing capitalism. But capitalism, if you will, is full body contacts certain Darwinian harshness for corporations that duke get out, and that competition and that violence creates such incredible spoils that we can be

generous with people. We can afford to pay for social security that takes seniors, poverties poverty among seniors from eleven. We're gonna pay for medicare. I would argue that this crisis illuminates a very unhealthy feature, and that is we've decided that companies deserve more generosity and people are less protected in some I think the opportunity here is to realize we need to protect people and not companies. And

then the other word I would use as camaraderie. We need to rejoin hands with our brothers and sisters in Europe and recognize the value the North American Treaty, the Paris Accords, the World Health Organization, and just generally have more empathy for one another and try and see each other as Americans before we see each other as Republicans or democrats. Most crises have done that. I worry this crisis. It's not obvious that this crisis is bringing us together.

So re embrace the capitalism and camaraderie are the call signs to move to opportunity as opposed to the risk. I like this idea of reembrace capitalism because it's just interesting. I have conversations with my nieces who are younger, and they're like, capitalism is terrible and Carol, and I'm like, well, no, it's not. It can be very good. But I do

wonder how it got to be such a bad thing. Where, if anything, you created these incredibly wealthy companies, right, um, that sold a lot of stuff, but not everybody got to participate in that wealth creation. Well, I would argue that your what your nieces are saying, it's not capitalism when you have uh, you know, full by contact capitalism on the way up, and you privotize the games and in the airline industries and example, here's your free cash

flow to buy back shares. As the senior executives, compensation is based on the value of shares and then on the way down, you say we're in this together and you ask her a bailout. Capitalism on the way up

and socialism on the way down is coronism. And so I think, I think their right to be skeptical of capitalism where an older, middle class, mostly white, mostly college educated cohort is capturing gains and when they hit a tough time, they want to borrow money and time against future generations and out of control deficits and claim that we're all in this together on the downside. So I don't think what we're seeing as capitalism. Capitalism is not

an organic state. It has to rest on a base of empathy and i'll use the R word redistribution of income. And we seem to have found incredible empathy and generosity for these companies that we idolize and turn into people and then seem to be very harsh with people. That's not capitalism, that's crony ism. That's the hunger game. So what I would argue is they were not witnessing capitalism and it's best. Okay, So how do we We've got about fifty seconds and then I gotta do some news

and we'll come back. I told you. I could talk to you for hours. Um. So how do we how do we get away from this CRONIUSM. I mean, man, you look at Congress and that's what it's all about. Um and elsewhere? How do we remove it? And just

got about forty seconds. Uh So on a corporate level, I think the fastest thing we could do to reoxygenate the economy which to be fund the FTC and the d o J and go through every industry, whether it's big tech, big agg big pharma, and break them up and oxygen eight the economy and give small and medium sized companies the same fighting chance. They've always had to create two thirds of the jobs, and we've let big companies overrun government and overrun small and medium sized companies.

I think, cross individuals, I think we can need a greater sense of empathy and camaraderie for each other, whether it's national service where we all serve in the same uniform right out of high school. I think gap here should become the norm, not the exception, and find common cause so we see each other as Americans, as opposed

to Democrats and Republicans. So, Scott, what I do wonder is and one of the things you write about is kind of how we have you know, broken this contract, this agreement, that these promises that if you worked hard, you had talent, you know, anybody could do better and and and do well in our society. You know, my dad was first generation and he raised seven kids and it's pretty remarkable what he was able to do with, you know, parents that came over from Europe. So I

do wonder what's happened? Can we get back that contract? Yeah? So I think so. I think you zero in on what is the ground zero of some of the anger or whether it's protests, whether it's a disaffection or lack of confidence in capitalism. And that is, for the first time in our nation's history, at thirty year old man or woman isn't doing as well. It's his or her parents were at the age of thirty. And the question is, well,

why is that? And the good news is is that there's no excuse for it because the prosperity we have recognized over the last thirty years, whether it's GDP, slow but steady growth, market games, you know, the prosperity that is there. The problem is we haven't made much progress, and that I would argue that our tax structure, our

education system that's drunk on luxury. It seems like what we have said with our priorities, our tax policy, only letting in fewer and fewer kids to elite schools, turning into a cast system instead of the upput lubricant of the middle class. Of fields that we're saying to America that our priority is to take the top one percent and turn them into billionaires, as opposed to taking the bottom and giving them a shot at being in the

one percent. So we have to, I think, return to the notion that we have to fall back in love with the unremarkables. If you're born wealthy, if you're incredibly remarkable, there's never been a better time to be American. But America used to be a place where the unremarkables could have remarkable futures. I think it's about education. I think it's about tax policy where the top point one percent

don't pay the lowest tax rate. It's about universities like mine falling back in love with unremarkable kids and not bragging that we're rejecting our applicants and then forcing middle class households to go into debt. We've affected a a reallocation or transition a cap at one point six trillion dollars in middle class homes the universities. That is morally criminal. So yeah, I think we have to get back to this notion that America needs to fall back in love

with its unremarkables. The remarkables have killed it. Good for them, It's time to focus again on the other I am wondering on this Thanksgiving Eve. You know, is there hope out there? You know, do you see anything out there that does give you some hope that you know, we're not going to just keep talking about the problems, but we're actually going to have some form of action and make a change so that we do embrace the unremarkables and that we kind of, you know, raise up those

that have really been forgotten. I mean, I think about the political scene. To me, it makes sense why people were angry because there's been a lot of people left behind and forgotten. So do you have hope that we can that we will fix this and do better? Well, as you've probably discovered, Carl, I'm I'm a glass half empty kind of guy, but I think there's I think

there's enormous silver linings and healthcare. The people that have contracted, endured, and developed Antibiason the novel coronavirus will have never stepped in foot in a doctor's office a much less the hospital. We might be able to offer healthcare remotely that brings down costs and takes our healthcare system off its heels and onto its toes and starts offering great primary care

at a lower costs. We might, in my industry, be able to take advantage of remote remote learning and double our admittistrates, double to supply, and take education back to where it needs to be with much greater admittistrates and much lower costs. We might decide to leave a mission behind. We might decide to take that time we spend community and spend more time with our families are making money. There are absolutely nothing wrong with America that can't be

picked with what's right with it. And this is not the world we live in. This is the world we make of it. We're at a critical juncture here and it's up to us. Okay, having said that, I'd be remiss if I don't at least tap into all of the great writings that you've done about kind of our text base and those you know companies that we talk about ad nauseam, whether it's ads you know, Tesla, whether

it's Amazon, whether it's Twitter, whether it's Google. Um. What's the role that they need to play in all of this in your view, I think they're playing that role. I think their profits thinking. I don't think they look left or right. I think they look down and focus

on how to increase their earnings. I think the role is for government to provide the same level of scrutiny, whether it's antitrust or regulation, that we've provided against other companies and other industries, and that at some point the company becomes so powerful that the best way to oxygenate that sector is to do what we did with a T and T or the aluminum companies, of the old companies, going to break them off and then with and ten years, as we've seen with a T and T or the

spin of PayPal, those companies are worth exponentially more So. I think it's regulators that have to step in and say, all right, congratulations. Any trust is in a punishment, it's a reward that you have become. You are so good, you are now performing a fantaside on small companies prematurely euthanizing big companies which tend to be better employers of their taxpayers. We're going to break you up, and we're

gonna unleas incredible innovation. And if you want to see the markets go to new highs, break these companies up. We need to go through big tech, big form a big act and oxygenate the marketplace with any trust. Well, I have to say, you always leave us with lots of things to think about. And you know your book, you know, Ends with America isn't what it is but what we make of it. I mean, we as individuals also have a role right in all of this. Just quickly, you know, be the be the man or the woman

your kids think you are. U. This is an extraordinary time to reach out to people. People remember how you behave in a crisis. People will remember how you behave in this crisis. Make sure the people in your circle are healthy and happy. And then if you have, if you're blessed, reach out to people who will never know your name. This is that's Americans are the most generous people in the world. Let's let's live up to that. Yeah, the sense of community has never been as important. He's

got Thank you so much. Have a safe um and good holiday, Happy Thanksgiving and our thanks to Scott Galloway. He does always leave us with so much to think about, certainly for me, Professor at n y eu Stern School of Business. His new book post Corona From Crisis to Opportunity. Check it out, check out to the Algebra of Happiness. Whenever I'm a little lost to I go back and check it out.