A 31 Point Response to Young Turks Nonsense

I ran across this video the other day. Sadly, at the time of this writing, it has over 100,000 views, but we should be thankful that's well below the 3.7 million who subscribe to the channel. Still, even at 100,000 views, it's quite likely that there are tens of thousands of people who watched this video and believed there was actually something of value said.

But those people are woefully mistaken. In this brief seven minutes, there was almost nothing said that makes the slightest bit of sense when held up to scrutiny. On the whole, this video provides no substance, no logic, and is nothing more than a bunch of whining that the world doesn't match the image that they want it to. And they're too small-minded to see any solution beyond the flawed idea of using the force of government to get what they want (which in the end will self-destruct anyway).

This group falls into Adam Carolla's "stupid or liar" category. They know nothing of economics or are just lying to fit a narrative they prefer. I tend to presume most people are reasonably intelligent, so my money is on the latter. The video is litterd with errors/dishonesty, but I've chosen to respond to 31 of them.

1. Claiming the economy is "under the influence of neoliberalism" is a stretch. Beyond that, neoliberalism is not capitalism.

2. Asking whether productivity and wages are decoupled is stupid. Wages are a small part of compensation. Benefits (also compensation) have increased significantly, even if wages haven't risen very much. Even so, there are still issues with the calculations which use the GDP deflator (pure nonsense) for "productivity" inflation and the Consumer Price Index (itself a massive mess) to adjust wage inflation. That's nonsense.

3. Besides all that, your smartphone could absolutely be thought of as a productivity gain that is benefiting far more of society than just the most wealthy.

4. We do spend too much on wars, but most of that is borrowed from the future, and our children and grandchildren will suffer because of it. That said, war is a massive, wasteful redirection of resources.

5. We should privatize social security. It's a mess, an enormous Ponzi scheme, and most under the age of 35 are not likely to see a dime of it.

6. People should work longer. When social security first passed, life expectancy was 61.7 years. A lot of people never lived to see social security. Now the overwhelming majority of society does. That destroys the already shaky (and morally evil) economics of the system.

7. What are her 3 jobs? We aren't talking about 3 40-hour per week jobs, so what are we talking about?

8. We diversify our investments, why not our income? Working three jobs may be much more stable than working one, where everything disappears when we get fired. Thank God for side hustles.

9. I'm not sure it's uniquely American, but it is fantastic. It's admirable. Leisure is not something to celebrate. It's far healthier to view it as a useful tool to recharge us and propel us to new accomplishments.

10. If being President wasn't a job for Bush because of "naps" then it wasn't for Obama because of golf. (I think that President shouldn't be a job, but I don't deny that is one)

11. Why does she presume that the only job older people can do are waiting on people. That seems very ageist.

12. How do we know she's working her "fingers to the bone?" We don't know what jobs she's working.

13. Why hasn't anyone on this panel considered the possibility that she enjoys working? Maybe she likes getting out of her home? Maybe she likes the variety that working a few different jobs offers? Maybe she doesn't need the income from all three jobs but likes having some extra? There are a million explanations that don't have a negative slant, but these presumptuous, elitist intellectual-lightweights seem incapable of even giving them the slightest consideration over the one that fits their narrative. (I'm not saying any of these are necessarily true in this woman's situation, but they know exactly as much about it as I do, which means they have no right to talk about her "having to work her fingers to the bone")

14. Many people are aware of the difference between the rich and not rich despite not knowing any personally. They happen to think it's okay because much of that wealth was earned by providing value to others. Just because they come to a different conclusion than this fellow doesn't mean they are ignorant. Once again the disgusting elitism rears its head.

15. Someone working on the board of a company is working more than four days a year. It's their job to be aware of what is going on in the company and being informed that way takes a lot more than one day a year. If they don't do that, they won't be on the board. Also people aren't just compensated for the work they do. They are also compensated for the level of responsibility they have. People on the boards of large companies make decisions that have an influence on billions of dollars, and tens of thousands of jobs. They have far more responsibility than someone at the bottom of the company whose decisions won't have nearly the influence. They can debate whether that dynamic makes sense (although they'll lose because it does), but putting it in terms of quantity of work once again puts this individual in the "stupid or liar" category.

16. The wealth is not being "extracted." It was exchanged. We won't know whether wealth is being created until we know whether other people are willing to exchange things of value for it. That means, to know whether work is creating wealth, we need to invest time and resources on the front end, with the possibility that we may receive nothing on the back end. (That result happens all the time - it's what drives companies out of business) Most people aren't willing to invest that much time with the risk of getting little or nothing in return. So instead, they trade some of their potential earnings down the line if the business went well, for a guaranteed income today. They then don't have the risk of getting nothing if their work ends up not producing wealth. They also don't live with the concern and risk weighing down on them that those with more responsibility do. And that psychic revenue must be accounted for when considering compensation. So no wealth is being "extracted." It was voluntarily exchanged. This guy is simply spewing Marxist nonsense. The marginalist revolution allows us to know that this theory of value is just not true. (And yes that theory of value was first popularized by Adam Smith, who was also wrong about it)

17. Corporations don't amass money just to "crush people." They are trying to stay ahead of the competition. (But if this really is someone's concern, they should realize that companies actually wouldn't amass as much wealth or easily remain ahead of the competition in the absence of government, and larger government only helps them deepen their foothold.)

18. Yes, some people do want their companies to be bought. That's because they don't want the responsibility associated with running a large company (see #16). (If you are wondering why that may be, consider the stories of the heads of companies like Uber and American Apparel.) There is nothing wrong with people creating something that people value, growing and providing more value, and allowing someone else to help it continue to provide value.

19. Clearly they know nothing about how you value a company. I'm less concerned with what a company is able to make today than what it will make over 10, 20, 50 years. However, the fact that the panel can't see that should demonstrate the fundamental flaw with their short-term way of thinking.

20. Amazon "operating at a loss" (which is not strictly accurate) is a fantastic thing. It means they are investing everything they make, plus more from outside investment and loans, into the company. That means jobs for people in the fields they are expanding their business into. We should see that as a wonderful thing, but as we've seen (points #6, 8, 9, 13), the panel actually doesn't want people to work. So jobs aren't really a good thing in their minds.

21. I'm not a huge fan of Bezos' government ties, but the people who work for him are in the American version of "poverty" (an artificial line in the sand) which makes them better off than 95% of the entire world.

22. I love that this teen isn't letting a tough situation stop him from living his life as he always does. It's simply beautiful. He tells me that I have no excuses for not getting something done every day. That kid will get somewhere in life.

23. Also, one tweet tells us absolutely nothing else about the man walking 15 miles to work. With just that information we could fill volumes of books on what might be going on there.

24. Life is hardship. The smarter question to ask is what enables us to, occasionally, avoid that hardship?

25. The college cost issue is almost too much to write about. Mostly lets acknowledge the presumption (based on context) that college is the only, or at least a vital, path out of hardship. It's not.

26. Why is it someone else's responsibility to see for these peoples' transport? Where exactly does that funding for transport come from?

27. Why should employers be forced to pay for time off for catastrophic accidents which they had no part in causing and didn't occur on or with company property?

28. In all of the questions posed by something called FAIR, there is an underlying assumption that it is the responsibility of others to be forced to provide something to these people. Using force to make some people work for others is a pretty ugly and immoral thing, despite whatever FAIR may think.

29. Let's note that FAIR and our moronic panel while criticizing the reporting of the stories of people working hard to achieve something, fail to give any examples of the people "falling through the cracks" as they claim. That's not to suggest some people don't struggle in America, they certainly do (although often when examined individually there are many points at which they could have taken a different path). I mention it to point out that they are at least as much of a failure as they claim other media to be, as they make broad generalities with nothing to support their case that can stand up to the slightest bit of reasoning.

30. Yes, actually. You can absolutely always try to make something of yourself. The panel and FAIR fail to understand what people find so compelling in these stories. It's not the results. It's not the conditions. It's the beauty of the human spirit. It's the beauty of individuals who stood up and took responsibility for themselves rather than trying to force others to take responsibility for them. They show some of the best that human character has to offer.

31. Again, why is it everyone else's job to provide public transportation to every end of society at all times? What if where this man is coming from, no one else travels in the direction that he does? What if providing him public transportation required a driver to continually drive a route that only he rides on? Government should spend money to maintain a bus, a driver, etc. for just one man's trip to work? And let's remember that the money to fund all this comes from the wealth that is taken by force from others who have created it. And isn't that what they themselves have defined as exploitation?