Facing American Poverty and Global Supply Chain Issues

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How what about Nadella show I got tonight. He is a Protestant minister, social activist, Yale Divinity School professor whose latest book is called White Poverty. How exposing myths about race and class can reconstruct American Democracy? Please welcome to the show. Reverend Doctor William Barber.

Sir A a pleagub The booty's called white poverty. I'm holding hell about everything. He's that white poverty. You, sir, are famously not twhite. Well, so why write white poverty?

Well?

Actually, I come from Caucasian Black and tuscarro and descended.

Oh wow.

So, and my people are free people in eastern North Carolina A lot of those community and so in some ways this book is me, and so to deny any part of my reality would be to deny myself. But here's the problem. I'm concerned about the way we measure poverty in this country is not only a lie, but I can say on this show it's a damn lie, sir.

You can do more than that if you are Okay, Okay, okay, we got plenty more roots room for that.

I only use the ones that are approved by the Bible.

Okay.

So, but we say we use official poverty measure says that poverty if you make above thirteen thousand dollars a year, you're not poor. If you make about thirteen thousand dollars a year, you're not poor.

You're kind of in the lower lower middle class.

When was the last time they adjusted.

Well, it's been since the sixties really in some ways. And so what happens with that is we marginalize poverty and then we racialize it. Whenever we have a a brief discussion about polity, because we're very seldom have it in the news in political arenas, we put up a black woman with the on welfare, which racializes and demeans black people, but then it dismisses tens of millions of white poor people.

You right, this sixty sixty.

Six million of the one hundred and thirty five million poor and low Watt people in this country. Sixty percent of black people are poor low well, that's twenty six million, thirty percent of white but that's sixty six million, forty

It makes no sense.

In the richest nation in the world, we have over one hundred and thirty five million poor, low wage people, over forty one percent of our population, and over fifty percent of our children, and it's unnecessary. So white poverty says, we're not playing the game any.

Let's not look at this through the prism of race. Let's look at it through class. And do you think that that division was a purposeful one?

I think so.

And to expand race, you have to deal with race in America. But what you cannot allow someone to do for something this serious where two hundred and ninety five thousand people are dying a year from poverty and low wage, how many two hunred nine five thousand, eight hundred people a day are.

Dying, are dying from what they would consider probably prod.

Is the fourth leading cause of death in the country, higher than respiratory disease.

It even impacts respiratory disease because if you're low wage and you're living in an area, chances are the pollution and the toxes probably higher where you lift all of those things.

And so here we have something that's the fourth leading cause of death, eight hundred people a day. When seven people died from vaping, it was a congressional hearing, it was presidential level.

Right.

Imagine if eight hundred politicians were a day.

Oh I have well, I can't do that.

But my point is how everybody would be just up and our eight hundred middle class.

One hundred thousand people, that's clearly epidemic.

Right. You just talked about crime.

That's a crime that's a former part and especially when it's unnecessary, it does not happen.

And entrenched, it seems in a lot of communities. It's just it's a cloud that never lefts Well.

The thing about it is John is in every community. See, that's the point we're making in the book. Whether it's Appalachia where I met women in West Virginia who have to sell tacos on Tuesdays, so they have a community fund to help women deal with their monthly issues. Or whether it's out in eastern Kentucky where I met black and white coal miners who watched the minds be taken over by multinational companies that moved the union rights out of it, or whether it's in the Delta, it's everywhere.

They're trying to raise the tave in fifteen. I mean, the fight is everywhere you go. There's a huge fight about trying to bring it to fifteen. And it's going to kill all the jobs.

Which is a lie. Three Nobel Peace Prize economists said it wouldn't kill jobs. In fact, would put more money in the economy and it would actually expand jobs.

But here's the thing. We had.

Fifteen in a union proposed in twenty twenty eight. Democrats and every Republican stood against fifty five million people, fifty five million people who make fifty two million people who make less than a living wage of fifteen dollars out Now here's the thing. In sixty three, the March on Washington called for a raise of the minimum wage to two dollars, which, index with inflation, would be over fifteen to day.

Really yes, and.

People forget The March on Washington sixty three was titled.

For jobs and justice, and justice it wasn't just about black civil rights. It was about a broad, inclusive, just feel democracy. And so here we are in this reality and people are hurting everywhere. There's not a county where you can work a minima's job and afford a basic two bedroom apartment and waiters and waitresses.

On minimum minimum wage.

Not a county in the country.

Not a county in the country couldn't.

If you had a minimum wage job. There's not a county in this country where you could afford it.

To, not a federal federal noe, you couldn't.

And this is the working pour.

This isn't you know.

I think in the country there's a sense of it's an entitlement mentality. That's why there's a certain character flaw that keeps you there. These are people that are working.

The entitlement is and in the politicians that keep raising their wages and giving corporations tax breaks, but they won't help the working people. That's the entitlement rank. So and we're talking about during COVID. COVID did not exacerbate poverty.

The germ somehow discriminated. But we did access to get well.

Three hundred and fifty thousand people died during COVID so far, one storey said. Study said from the lack of health care. And if you don't face this job, this is the point of the book. We have to face this, we have to look at it. We had fifteen presidential debates and the last election forty percent of the adult population in poverty, eight hundred people dying a day. Not one debate was focused on it. We've not had an Oval Office discussion.

I think why don't politicians value what is an incredibly large population in many different I'm sure in swing states, So why don't they do? Poor people need better lobbyists. What is it that can be done to get a politician to listen?

Well, I think that what we're saying now is we just had a study. I asked her to be done as a part of our movement Waking the Sleeping Giant, and this is what we found out. That all of these numbers also tell us that poor, low waste people now represent thirty percent of the elector in.

The country, thirty.

And over forty percent in states where the margin of victory was less than three percent, and it's Texas where's less than five percent.

So what we're.

Saying to poor and low waste people of every race is time to mobilize your vote. There's not a state where if twenty percent of poor, low wage voters that didn't vote, fifty seven million voted, thirty million didn't then the last election. But if twenty percent that didn't vote moved, they could change every election. And in most states Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Florida, it's less than four percent. So what we're doing is

If people even listen to them, do they even? What is the response been when you reach out to our political class.

What's the response been, Well, because we've been lied to so much, you know these at first they said, well, it's not that big, and then we prove that it's actually one hundred and thirty five hundred four men, and then they don't expect that people are going to organize. You know, in a democracy, you have to engage in agitation, legislation, litigation and voter participation.

So what we're saying, the poor and.

Low waite vote, let's use this power, right, And so we're having this gathering before the conventions. We're gonna touch fifteen million poor and lower wage voters with the facts on where people stay in a non partisan where they stand on the issues, and say let's mobilize and we because.

That's the true swing vote.

So Linda Lake, who's a major poster, says, the truest, most powerful, biggest swing vote right now is poor and lower waged people. And you know, John Folk often asked, men, you and I have talked about this is does our current society required things be like this?

This was the real Crux sedition.

And what this book says is, well, it's kind of like putting your hand in an electric socket that's connected. It requires that you get shot because you put your finger there. You don't have to do it. But if you keep doing things the way you are doing it, you're going to get shot. So if you keep paying less than a living wage, if you keep denying people health care, if you keep giving greedy, wealthy folk two trillion dollars tax cuts, but you won't even spend the

It is actually, I believe.

Criminal a form of a policy violence to continue down the road.

And doesn't it weaken the system as a whole. You know, you could almost make the case that if the system is requiring a permanent, entrenched underclass, and it makes itself ripe for instability. And I'm wondering, is there a way to change the mindset because the mindset in America is there is a moucher class. These poor people are mutures and they're taking resources from me. I work hard, they get poor people get healthcare, they get food, they get

It can, but one of the first things that we believe we have to do, and we talk about Maral fusion organizing is First of all, we should be examining every policy, not by the color of a president's hair, or how many porn stars he touched, or how.

Or what's the gate of his walk.

Does the policies you propose do they line up with a staflishing justice? Do they line up with providing for the common defense and promoting the general welfare? Do they line up with our deepest marligious right. Secondly, we must expose the level of death that's happening, because this is not benign. Thirdly, we must make sure that folks see at all that it's not one group of people we've been lied to so much about. This is an anomaly, This is just a small grid. We cannot allow this

And then yes, isn't that isn't that America?

First? Isn't that making America great again? Like if you hollow out a country, how can you expect it to be strong? Wouldn't that be the absolute acme of strengthening a country from the bottom up as opposed to the top down.

You would think it would be.

But if you've got people that are still living when they first wrote the Constitution and said even poor white men that didn't own jobs or they didn't own land couldn't vote. If you have people with that kind of mentality that this should be an exclusive democracy, that an inclusive. But listen, the numbers tell us though they're more of us. The thing is, you can't be lazy in a democracy. You got to fight like heaven.

I mean, the count.

I mean, and what we're trying to show people. The numbers are now. Listen.

Wisconsin marginal victory twenty thousand vote number poor low wage voters didn't vote. Over a million didn't vote. Didn't vote. Michigan ten thousand votes. The number poor low ways vote a million, Pennsylvania forty thousand votes determined the president number poor low wage voted two million, North Carolina one hundred and sixty thousand over a million. So it's not a big lift. And the number one reason though we did a study called Waking the Sleeping Giant, that poor low

White poverty abound.

Now.

Welcome out to the Daily Show.

My guest tonight is a global economics correspondent for The New York Times and author of the new book How the World Ran out of Everything Inside the Global Supply Chain. Please welcome Peter Goodman. So, how the world ran out of everything? During COVID we ran out of toilet paper, baby formula, computer chips. We had cars that were ready to run, but no computer chips. What the happened? And did we fix it?

We have not fixed it. I'm sorry to say. The vulnerabilities are still there. What happened was a reveal of something that had been there for decades. We are dependent upon this really improvised, ad hoc rickety supply chain.

It's really a bunch of supply chains.

We've been devoted to this kind of reckless, ruthless form of deregulation.

And during the pandemic.

Just as we were in our darkest hour of need, it buckled, and yeah, we ran out a lot of stuff.

When I was reading your book, I kept asking myself the same question, which was, why don't we just make this shit here?

Yeah?

Why aren't we making all of the shit here? Well, but you you answer that, but explain, explain it. Explain to me again.

We could make more things here, and there's a movement to make more things here, and that's helpful. It's in the margins. But we're not going back to self sufficiency. Look, if there was no trade, you and me wouldn't be having this conversation. We'd be out trying to feed our families with bark or whatever. Right, And you know I'm not that good at growing food.

I'm sure you're not either.

So here we are.

We're dependent upon a gold I.

I did lose a tomato in the wind last night on my rooftop.

Garden, but good luck with that.

Yeah, I don't want to try to feed my family through my own labor. So we have trade, and we've got a lot of jobs in this country that are upon a global supply chain. And it's been a consumer of bonanza we've just done a very poor job cushioning the people who've lost jobs. We don't need to throw out globalization, we need to reconfigure it. We need sensible regulations. We need working people to get more of a piece of the action so we have a more reliable supply chain.

You tell the story in the book about one company that is trying to make these glow in the Dark toys, even has a contract with Sesames Trade, and he wants to actually use American manufacturing, but can't find American manufacturers to do it right.

I mean, he calls around these are these I follow this one container from a factory in China to the west coast of the United States and then across the continent to Starkville, Mississippi, where his warehouse space. He couldn't find somebody to make the molds for these products unless he paid twelve times as much as the price in China.

It was the path of least resistance.

You follow this path, this container ship from China all the way to Mississippi and literally this is this is the path it takes.

I mean it is.

It's a harrowing journey.

And as an American that buys a lot of stuff, yeah, I'm going, holy shit, I didn't know that all this happened. I just pressed click and then it shows up.

Yeah, well then it worked.

Yeah yeah.

Do I do we need to buy less dumb shit? I know that's like not the most intellectual question. Do we need to buy less dumb ship?

It's a legitimate question.

Look, I rode for three days with a long haul truck driver from Kansas City to Dallas and back.

That sounds like my worst nightmare.

It's everyone's worst nightmare, which is why we don't have enough truck drivers. And the best part of that moment, we're somewhere in Oklahoma and this truck driver looks out the window and he says, people just buy too much the word you just use. And we could we could do well thinking more carefully about what we buy and what we need. But let's face it, like we're going to keep making stuff, We're going to keep consuming stuff.

I had before reading your book, I had always kind of seen China as this aggressor that has taken American jobs and manufacturing. And do you feel that's the case. Is that an accurate portrayals I think what you painted the picture so well in here was that it's American business executives, right, that are saying we can make more money. It's not the American worker that's saying this, it's the executive.

Factory jobs moved to China because publicly traded corporations governed by the imperative to lower their costs and produce lower priced products, but fattened their margins as well.

They sent production to China.

They were encouraged to go there by the investor class, and it worked out really well for them. And look, this is an old story, right, Chinese labor was brought in to build the railroad. Talk about the States, Yeah, and the Walmart going to the People's Republic of China. That's just a continuation of the old story of basically undercutting American labor unions, undercutting American working people. These are decisions, you know, the hollowing out of our factory towns that

In Congress, It's.

Not always portrayed that way, right, you know, it's portrayed as there's China taking our economy.

Right.

But what we have a big debate coming up Thursday night. Trump in correct me if I'm wrong, But Trump puts some tariffs on China, and Biden has kept a lot of.

Those, has advanced them, has advanced that.

What can we expect when this question comes up Thursday night? Where do they stand on?

You know, I don't know how much nuance there will be in that debate, but let's face it, there are.

Very few things I think, well, yeah, yeah.

There are not many things that garner agreement in American policies, but one of them, unfortunately, is the sort of cartoonish depiction of China as this job killing juggernaut without any of the details that we've already discussed. I mean, I think in terms of the differences between these two candidates, Donald Trump is a threat to the global supply chain. He's proud to be a threat to the global supply chain.

Now.

Biden is also bashing China. This is a bipartisan initiative, but it's a much more nuanced kind of industrial policy. It's less about containing China's rise. I mean, Trump is really about let's have a cold war with China. Biden is more let's embrace industrial policy. Let's try to make electric.

Vehicles in the US. These are some significant difference.

I was in Vermont this weekend performing I eat a lot of ice cream in my life. I wanted to go see the Ben and Jerry's ice cream factory where.

It all started.

These were two men in nineteen seventy eight who started making ice cream out of a gas station. And then, as I kind of dug into it, I was also reading your book. It's kind of a perfect tie in, I realized, Oh, they sold the company to Unilever in year two thousand and all of a sudden, these two men who really care about keeping things local, who really cared about social issues. It felt like the big evil corporation was constantly pushing back against them and was constantly

I mean, you know, the people who benefit from the status quot would have us believe that regulating in taxiing and enforcing anti trust laws, we might as well, you know, be advocating Venezuela style, you know, I mean, it's just nonsensical, right, Capitalism needs markets, Markets need regulation.

They can't function with that.

But in terms of what we can do, you know, consumers are not going to save us from the vulnerabilities in the globally comty.

We're busy dealing with y So I can I can keep buying plastic shit from my four year old daughter on Amazon.

I'm not turning you in. I mean it's gonna take anti.

Trust enforcement, labor mobilization so that working people get a piece of the action, so they're less likely to quit their jobs in the middle of a pandemic. I mean, you know, Henry Ford, problematic character Newer a thing or two about making things in the supply chain, you know, he said explicitly as he raised wages for workers in twenty fourteen and was called a communist by some. He said,

Right And that's where we're at right now.

It feels like normalcy is built on this idea that huge numbers of people have to do dangerous jobs away from their families, with little control or understanding about their schedules, and they just have to suck that up for the benefit of our sort of just in time, ruthlessly efficient that turns out not to be so efficient global economy.

You personally that I can steal from you? What can I do? What do you do? What any habits of yours that have changed since researching and writing this?

Yeah, I mean I try to give my business to people who are actually in control of their businesses. I mean, if you're mostly transacting with big companies that are answerable to Wall Street, then you're ultimately transacting with entities that are thinking about shareholder interests a bubble. They can't afford to be kind to their workers necessarily because their competitors aren't.

But it helps to know that my fourteen dollars strawberries at the farmers' market is probably going to better use than the nine dollars strawberries at the Amazon.

You need to boltop somewhere else, exactly.

These are the celebrity prices that I get.

Look how the world.

Ran out of?

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