professor robert arise shes on the lining of former secretary of labor in
the clinton ministration economist author of the new book
in eugene look
beyond outrage what has gone wrong with our economy and our democracy and how to
fix it professor reich
welcome back to the program
don't count how are you
i'm great i hope you are too
uh... i should add by shabbily robert rice shari i c h dot org is the website
where people can find more information and i'm presuming they can find his
newly booked there
has yet to be the in fact the about the possibility of
a paperback out in september
okay great cell
uh... the title begs the question why does god around with our economy and our
democracy and i could fix it
held up basically at instrum much of it is about eighty quality comic you've
talked about this i've talked about this
but if you look closely you see that
has more and more income and wealth have
uh... centralized his have concentrated at the top
uh... the vast middle class and the port simply don't have enough
purchasing power to keep the economy going
at that's one big reason why this recovery is so anemic
and uh... here which is to blast our on this uh... in america where bloomberg
wants to ben
big gulp drinks relieve the bailey's trying to do something about obesity he
tried to get a tax on them of the lobbyists got to the legislators they
couldn't do anything
but you know you look at the research from wilkerson picket uh... over the
u_k_ at equality trust in and a lot of other research in there seems to be
almost a wonder one association between obesity
and poverty
and and and as poverty is exploding in the u_s_ is or a b_ c_ in inequality in
societies when this is this is not just some smaller academic setting
hia and to live but look at center cat
uh... showed that one of the reasons for the inequality leads to so much
uh... so many social problems uh... in the bottom half of the distribution is
because uh... people feel that day that that that that that
game is stacked against the uh... the dice are loaded at they they can't
possibly
get ahead more and more americans feel that way
and the net result is is not just uh... a kind of giving up kind of sense of
hopelessness
uh... along with uh... many of the social problems that come from that
sense of hopelessness
but it's also a bad for a democracy because uh... as we can see right now
you've got billions of dollars accumulating
in the coffers of super pacts that barb
basically bear
into french the interest
surya and the money of the very rich
whole well
how did we get here
well and that we got here
for a bit because uh...
for decades in the you know i was a a cabinet member in the clinton
ministration
i did what i could uh... but innale
frankly we didn't do enough and i think that that was true uh... of the first
term of the whole bomb administration i hope
there's a second term
uh... certainly reagan uh... and the two bushes george w_ bush and his father
uh... did a lot to push us in the direction of widening inequality
uh... but
uh... it's not a hopeless i i you know people who say to me well
inevitably globalization and uh... technological change it's just great
just inevitably going to happen
as they were wrong i mean this country both in the first decade of the
twentieth century it also in the nineteen thirties
and again in the nineteen th
sixties
we reversed widening inequality we've done in or we can do it again
right and so what are the policies that we should pursue to do that in your
opinion
uh... well number one we've got to have a truly progressive tax system
uh... we have a tax system now where
uh... the wealthiest americans are paying have the rate of taxes they were
paying
before nineteen eighty one
uh... and that many of them are paying fifteen percent uh... you know i make a
look at ross bromley so i'm twenty one million dollars he's paying less than
fourteen percent y
because so much of that is treated as capital gains subject to fifteen percent
tax cut or that's
that's absurd molina and particularly for private equity manages to others
who don't even risk their own capital dot that's all the police is created for
the priroda critique people well that and the have defended it very very well
because uh... hope all of their money going to politics
is a testament to the power of money and politics
i mean you need a progressive tax system you need uh... to invest in education
infrastructure you need to makes
sure it that the fed to
and also
the uh... the fiscal policy that comes out of the white house and congress i'd
generate high employment rather than high unemployment there's no way we can
get you about wages back and uh... the middle class can do better if we have so
many people unemployed
uh... we've got expand something called the earned income tax credit at top i
mean uh... either there's no single magic bullet but we've done it before we
can do this again
we did the words driver right she's got it and you you book out called beyond
which will soon be a paperback
and i'm sure you can pre-order written and it's not what right can you can
people for your this is the correct you'll hear circuit
greater detail is beyond our request gone wrong with our economy and our
democracy how to fix it
and is webserver right sherry i c h dot work
aren't
it it seems to me is that
the the if you were dead
takes the the seventy thousand foot view the you know the very biggest picture
possible view of this
that the original sin is money in politics and giving them
montana
no that is the original you know i a m agreed to become
chairman of a group called common cause
uh... it's been around for four decades uh... its primary intent in fact this
entire purpose is to reduce the power of money in politics the citizens united
decision
uh... which by the way school leah and thomas
uh... were instrumental in not only in terms of writing it but they
very right wing groups uh... the uh... enough
that plotted
that into higher
uh... strategy uh... that decision has opened the floodgates obviously and
where we're now seeing
uh... the results were reaping the whirlwind of all of that
uh... money ad
does not
have to rule politics
we have some
very important reforms after watergate they lasted for a number of years uh...
we can reform the system again
although you know the founders did not say that the supreme court has more in
the constitution
at the supreme court has the power to strike down laws or for that matter to
create doctrines like the idea corporations are people in the money is
not property it's instead speech
on the court took that power onto itself in eighteen oh three decades called
marburg versus madison on isn't it that and in fact article to see article three
section to the constitution explicitly says that the supreme court shall
operate under regulations defined by congress so congress could say you know
tomorrow you you have to at least fattened by by the judicial code of
ethics uh... but
parikh absent any kind of congressional oversight and absent the supreme court
going back to you know the constitutional uh...
basis of power that they that they have now we've got this probably got these
nine guys uh... men and women just don't you know of three blocks more upsetting
uh... are like the kings of america uh...
don't we
or do you think that we need a day a constitutional amendment to get around
to them to say that money is property not speech and the corporations are
legal fictions not human began operations yes i do i think that that is
absolutely necessary
uh... and that amendment could completely exactly that
uh... nowhere in the constitution nowhere in the first amendment uh... can
it be found nor should be interpreted that money his speech and corporations
are people
uh... congress has the power
and the president uh... has the power with congress a term limits
uh... money
in politics and limit corporate uh... spending
with regard to political spending and and uh... this kind of spending on
advertising
uh... whose intent is obviously political out right now uh... things are
completely and totally out of control abut it we don't have to only way to a
constitutional amendment tom
uh... if we had a system of public financing
uh... that really did match
four dollar with public dollars on a check-off system every dollar that eight
candidates for officer who is in a general election
uh... raised from small donors uh... under let's say two hundred dollars each
that clicky without the playing field that would make it very briefly before
uh... of these republicans it's mostly republican terribly to depends upon such
extraordinary well yeah financed their campaign server wilson professor robert
rice his corroboration toward his new book beyond outreach check it out thank
you sir i'd make it up