>> gun violence spreads fear and death threats over easter. the reverend jesse jackson joins us. does a new supreme court ruling mean the end of affirmative action. crushing numbers for the middle class has the u.s. trailing other nations. shakespeare turns 450 on wednesday - how many americans owe their names to birthday. i'm antonio mora.

welcome to "consider this," here is more of what is ahead. >> stop the killing. >> a series of shootings in chicago. >> you hear three to four gunshots. >> much of the violence is gang related. >> why shoot enjoyment children. >> it certainly is a wake up call that we have a lot of work to do. >> the american middle class is no longer the richest. >> the game is rigged to work for those that have money and power. >> we need an economy where it grows from the middle class out, bottom up, and everyone has a chance. >> president obama leaves for a week-long trip to asia. >> we believe prosperity in asia is tied to the growth in this region. that many are concerned the united states will not be there when the united states knocks on the door. >> china is the elephant in the room on this trip. >> we begin with an explosion of violence in chicago. nine killed and 36 others,

including children shot and wounded over the weekend. five of the injured were between the ages of 11 and 15, playing in a park next to an elementary school. the weekend before easter 37 people were shot, four fatally. the chicago tribune editorial board on tuesday arrived if chicago was helpless. the department of justice moved to create a special federal unit devoted to kerb the gun problem giving the city an unwelcome main, chiraq. mayor rahm emanuel was visibly shaken by the shootings. >> i made decisions in the mayor's office. there is nothing harder to do than to reach out and put your arms around a mother - mother and a father who have lost a child to senseless meaningless violence. >> people are immune to the

sound of gunfire. this is at home. these streets don't belong to the gang bangers. they are our streets. >> for more, we are joined by the reverend reverend jesse jackson, founder and president of the chicago based rain bow push coalition and a long-time chicago resident. good of you to join us. the shootings over the weekend horrific. they brought the number of whom sides to 90. two less than during the same period last year, to the shooting, bullets in the past of the kids are traumatised. chicago has been the murder capital of the u.s. what is it going take to stop this? >> it's a painful state of an underclass state of emergency. there's three chicago, there's inglewood, and there is austin, lan dame, rowsland -

unemployment is around 4%. unemployment in chicago around 4%. there's chicago land, with jobs on signs. three chicagos, all of this where you have cut schools and >> schools, trauma units, jobs and post offices. it's a lands of desperation. drugs are coming in, guns are coming in and guns out. there's poverty and disparity. >> the disparity is dramatic, between... >> 3500 blacks die, 3500 lack of access to health care. there are health disparities, education disparities, and there is no solution. we have 10,000 long black use with the cost of 50,000, some

have been there six months to six years in pre-trial detention. in the detention calls, 90,000 each. s there's no lock-up solution to the crisis. >> the difference is so dramatic, that you have within a matter of a few blocks, you go from a dangerous part of the united states to the safest. >> look at first class gaols and second-class schools. look at the suburbs down state. we know where the guns and drugs are manufactured. we know a store that cells 7%. we know where the gun shop is. we will not stop the gun flow. we know where the drugs are coming from. there are no gun shops in chicago.

guns in, and drugs in, and jobs out. unless we look at it comprehensively as well as targeted employment and job training, we'll miss the mark. >> these shootings happened, despite the crackdowns and strategies and the most violence prone areas. do you think the unit will change anything? >> most of this is taking place in the area where president obama was an organiser. one other place would be a reconstruction plan right there given all the numbers and lots that you have begin to rebuild and have people put to work building houses. it's an area where the businesses close. the congress starts economic investment. they go it 11% down. what would be a better place in the zones of crisis to invest to

invest in job opportunity, and some youth have been in gaol for so long reasoning should be trained and monitored, not just turning criminals. >> and do you worried without investment and jobs, that the cold winter may have kept the violence down and now the nicer weather came out, now maybe the weather is nicer, there has been violence. mayor rahm emanuel questioned that saying it's not the weather, weather you have values. and the chicago tribune agreed, asking on the editorial page is chicago repless. >> we are seeing a superficial article featuring the mayor, police chief, a romantizizing of chicago, ignoring poverty and disparity. poverty is a weapon of mass destruction, reducing life

options, undermining a will to fund education, weakens the body and mind. it matters. unemployment matters. lack of access to jobs and training matters. schools and hospitals and trauma units, and post offices all of this matters. unless there is some welfare l.b.j. reviving poverty. that - it's the cause, not just of the effect. it's horrible, horrible - with us, chicago, it's the fear for the international drug trade war. the guns are targetting chicago, and jobs leaving chicago in those zones, we know where they are coming from and the gun, and we know where they are going to, we need the will to fight the fight.

the number of killings reportedly dropped to 415. that was according to the statistics out of the police department. they have come under scrutiny. there's allegations, investigative reports in the chicago magazine. books are being cooked. do you think the problem is getting worse or better. >> those problems give us a falls sense of hope. you go to the community. abandon lots and vacant houses where the base bailed out, not linked. city bake, a meeting in st. louis, they are in six or seven billion bailout. who could not be reinstructed with a bill and say they paid it back. you take the interest of that kind of lone. you can rebuild and make the

one%. 1% justice and opportunities. but for the 99% we build more and more gaols bearing the youth young and younger. hope is about - despair is about the hope. it must not be allowed to have this. i hope the president and - the tenacity, necessity, coming to that zone, to prove that we can together do something and we can, i believe we can. we can't do it in passing, we need to invest time and money. >> given the level of violence in chicago for many years, there's little doubt that there is a state of emergency, reverend jesse jackson, a pleasure to have you on the show tonight. thank you. >> thank you sir. >> switching topics to tuesday's supreme court ruling on affirmative action. the court ruled 6-2 to uphold michigan's voter supporter band to use racial preferences to help determine admissions to

state-run universities. justice elena kagan reduced hers. kentucky, writing for the majority said the debate was about who -- kepd writing for the major di said the debate was over who could control it. jami floyd joins us. what does this mean. in 2003 the supreme court said that michigan law schools could, in fact, use affirmative action as part of their decision-making process as to who they admit. for the state of michigan they vote to amend the constitution. >> in direct response to the decision. >> you can't use affirmative action as part of the admissions process. this ruling basically says yes, a state can vote not to use affirmative action. >> this goes all the way before. this is what we are talking about, a legacy of tension. in education. >> and other areas of life.

>> tension in race and education. interpretation in racial poverty making. that's what justice abdulla sodig said. we'll get to that. >> yes, we'll get to that. >> it this affirmative action or something else. one of our sweets, something that follows us, you and i were tweeting about the fact that we'd do this, a follower wrote in this is not an affirmative action, it's a political process case recording the topic of affirmative action. that's what the major city said. justice anthony kennedy says in the majority - the case is not about how to debate racial preferences should be resolved, but who resolves it. the majority wants to say this is not about affirmative action or racial preference, it's about whether voters can decide in their state - and there are seven states that have done so - whether or not affirmative action should be rolled back or

done away with. in anna cavell you know it began with prop 209. now we are in michigan, and a number of states are going in this direction, and justice anthony kennedy with the majority says they can do it. >> seven states, including california's no affirmative action. is it a states-rights issue, that states can decide, voters can decide what the supreme court is saying, voters decide what we go in our state. justice carl soderberg says not. here she says -- sonia sotomayor says no, we are talking about bigger issues, we are talking about equal protection of the laws, the fundamental rights that a democracy provides for all citizens, and we are not at the point where we leave minorities who are oppressed alone to fend for themselves. the affirmative action debate evolved since john roberts got

to the court. pt chief justice direction which issues will come before the court and justice sonia sotomayor, and chief justice john roberts tangle about whether we should be ready for the colour blind society or recognising we are far from there. >> she wrote a 58 page dissent and read it from the bench. >> an unusual mood. >> anthony kennedy read his. >> she said specifically that it evis rated an important strand of laws, voting against affirmative action mich knan voters changed basic rules of process in a move that disadvantaged racial minorities. in effect, does the decision says that minorities can target minorities if they vote in favour of a measure that might harm minorities. >> justice kennedy and the chief that joined the opinion say we are not saying that we approve the rol back of affirmative

action, we are saying the dialogue about race can happen in the political process. >> she is saying that is not good enough, spif. and it's interesting the viewers should know we are reading a lot of language, because it's important language coming from the supreme court. >> and a detailed line. >> we don't want to the misquote. >> choouz roberts wrote in a 2007 opinion on affirmative action, the way to stop discrimination is to stop discriminating on the basis of race. eloquent and idealistic notions of what he believes we become as a society, that we don't need affirmative action. she said that that was simplistic. >> you probably have the same language, because we are two lawyers. she said do you want me to do it or you do it, we can argue it out. the way to stop discrimination, she almost mockingly writes is

to speak openly and capped didly on the subject of race and says let's use the constitution to do that. they are coming from differentize places and so are we as a country. >> he came back criticising her saying it does more harm than good to openly question the candidacy of the supreme court. >> that's right. >> judicial comedy. >> i think that he has a point that we should assume pure motives on the part of every justice on the u.s. supreme court, and i think she does much when they get back and our colleague wrote about what's behind the scenes of the supreme court, and i condemn his book "the nine", i think when they get back they are col eejal. the power of lapping whim on the u.s. supreme court is undisputed. i encourage people to read part of these opinions. >> a final question - is this

ruling consistent with higher rulings in the supreme court that seem to say no, you can't vote in a way that targets minorities even if it is a state right. >> affirmative action is well targeted. even a decision which is a roll-back is re-established that affirmative action is legal and constitutional. just saying that quotas were not. chief justice roberts focuses on stigma. it is believed that stigma may be worth it for some who can avail themselves of the programme. i don't think any of the justices, even those in the majority said that affirm tv action is unconstitutional. the question is whether they'll chip away at the well-established principal, to undermine it as sonia sotomayor feels. >> a judge joined the justice.

>> on a narrow ground. >> it's an important decision, good to see you. >> coming up, is the wealth of america's middle class falling behind other countries. what message is he sending. join the conversation on twitter on facebook and google+ pages. well it's official...

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xfinity...the future of awesome. >> america's middle class, once the envy of others, is no longer. an analysis in the 1960, found

if you were poor in the urks you were worse off than counterparts in europe and canada, a reversal from 35 years ago. that's despite the fact that economic growth in the u.s. is equal to or stronger than growth in other countries. those gains have gone almost exclusively to wealthy americans with less trickling to the middle class. how did we lose the richest middle class title to canada. >> we are joined by branko milanovic, a senior scholar with the luxembourg study center and a visiting professor. he served as the lead economist at the wank world bang and the author of: >> good to have you with us. >> thank you for having me. >> the "new york times", and the luxembourg income study center looked at the numbers. the conventional wisdom is the poor are getting poorer. when the poor in this country

are compared to the poor in industrialized countries it's the case, and also is the case for the lower middle class. the middle american, the median american income, that that american has fallen behind the canadians. >> that's the point of the study. you know, it's basically inequality has now really started hurting even the middle class. it's a big story. we knew that the american poor have been actually basically stagnant for a long time. and falling behind the poor in other rich countries. that gradually has gone up towards the lower middle class, but for the first time, to some extent we have the data going back to the 1970s. you can probably extrapolate in the past. for the first time, maybe in 50, 80, 100 years that the middle class americaners not the top. >> this happened after 2000 or so, because american incomes had

kept growing by 20% sips 1980. the year 2000 came along, incomes stagnated from the middle down, and that's why it's really happened. other country's wealth in those income categories went up. >> it's a longer process. it started in the 1980s. obviously it accelerated in 2000s and more with a crisis. it's not something that happened overnight. many people knew that for a while. it is that ipp equality was -- ipp equality was not a topic. people did not talk about that. the middle class did well and borrowed a lot. all the combination of developments made things more visible. why is it happening. >> it has happened for many reasons. i go over some of the conventional. one is that u.s. slipped in

achievement. the other one is that the effects of globalisation and openness and outsourcing have been a little stronger in the u.s., in the hollowing out of the middle. >> on the education front. there's a difference between older americans being better educated than counterparts, but not the case among younger americans. >> that's a striking finding. it's the case, over 50 or 80 years, that the americans had a high percentage of people as college graduates and enrollment at universities, and having younger americans falling behind counterparts and being on the level with italy and spain, which is not normally the level that americans aspire to, is a shock. this is not the process starting five or 10 years ago. it's something that if you look at it, it has to start from way

behind. >> could any of this be that the dollar is not as strong as in the old days, and the currency differences are part of the problem? >> no, in this study, what we do, we do the study, and you make comparisons where you take groups much people, and adjust for the cost of the basket, which they use. >> cost of living. >> you adjust for cost of living. that's why norway, which is expensive, if you compare their number, in normal dollars, they will be greater. because the cost of living is high, they get incomes that are reduced by 30%. on the other harningsd the spaniards -- hand the spaniards and italians get a boost. >> one of the things that the article in "the times" mentions, it's not a question of salaries, buts people in european countries have benefits. people in the lower middle class

and poor get more from the government in the way benefits monitor. >> the advantage of this study, these are the data. the is not only wages. the dominant part of the income. it's income from capital which is strong for the rich people, but also from social, self-employment, unemployment benefits. social security, all of the things. >> you are not counting five weeks of vacation and other social services that others provide. >> no. >> that makes the u.s. comparison worse, because the one thing we cannot include is how many hours you working or if you get state-provided health care. it's complicated. if we include that. that makes the u.s., you know, fall behind further. >> what do they need to do. >> it's a big question.

there'll be a change. political change would essentially respond to the awareness of people in the middle class. in other words we should not look calmly, which is is g.d.p. growing. we should look how is the average person, in our jarring job, the median, average guide. he may be doing significantly worse than numbers suggest. how to do better. >> if you look at what is said, it's one way, and another way is redistribution. >> higher taxes for richer people. >> it's not popular. this is one of the ways to do it. >> that could slow down g.d.p. >> it's an interesting point. people who argue that ipp equality and high fax and low taxes are necessary for growth, they have to explain how come, if it bass the case, how come we

have northern european countries overtaking the united states. >> a lot provoking things in the study. >> thank you very much. >> turning now to president obama. >> remember when he said three years ago that the u.s. is making a disoimentic pivot to asia, it may be underway. the president bordered air force one tuesday for a week-long trip where he'll meet with leaders in japan, south-east asia. he will not meet with china, on the agenda an asian-free deal, regional tensions over territorial claims. the role in the world's fastest growing region, for more on the pitt falls and problems, as he awaits i'm joined by gordon chang. he's the author of nuclear showdown - north korea takes on the world. good to have you on the show.

>> president obama is not travelling to china, he will not meet with president xi jinping. but won't china be the elephant in the room. no matter what, as the elephant travels around the room, with the territorial demands of china and military moves it makes. >> yes, he's not going to china, the trip is all about china. it will be in the back drop between the four nations, because people in the reem job are nervous about beijing's provocative behaviour and are nervous about america's response and willingness to stand up to the disease. what do you say to susan rice, who says that the leaders will are not anxious about china. >> i think that she was committing perjury on friday when she said that. nobody in the room agreed. you know, clearly you have asian leaders looking at what is going on in the ukraine.

but also syria. on syria the president said he wanted to use force but needed to go to congress. people in south korea, especially japan were thinking if china or north korea attacks us, does the president need to go to congress before the united states honours a defense treaty. that is it a concern. it shows that bad policies, in one part of the world have ramifications elsewhere. >> the u.s. insists that it is not trying to contain chinese expansionism as we try to do to the soviet union during the cold war. seems the chinese do not agree, they think it's part of what the president is doing, he's setting up an expanded naval region. >> yes. it's an issue of words. the chinese want territory controlled by other nation, not just japan and south korea, it's phil eaches, indonesia, brunei, vietnam.

we are trying to prevent them doing that. you can say it's not containment. it really is containment. because they are engaging in acts that go beyond responsible to beligerrant. >> clearly the united states does not want them to do that, the chinese do not want to be a part of the system. >> do you see an issue with the president ignoring china, he'll pretty much skirt the country. >> he should ignore china. we pay too much attention to the chip eats, that's the problem. we inflate their already big sense of ego. that's counterproductive. it's good that we start to work with the allies and friends in the region, and the trip is three allies and one friend. it will have ramifications behind that. it's an important thing for the united states to do. we should have done this before.

i'm glad we are doing it now. >> the president scheduled meetings with shinzo abe, and benigno aquino, and the philippines, the allies, and the leader of malaysia, whom i suspect is the one you talk about as our friend. ambassador chris hill said our allies, quality time is as important as quality time, and the u.s. is not giving them enough quantity, do you grape. >> absolutely. the united states has been distracted by the events in ukraine and crimea. we have been involved in syria, afghanistan, places around the world. this is a case where the united states needs to pivot everywhere at the same time, because the world is going side ways, so we need to spend the time in the region. president obama didn't go to the region when he cancelled due to

se quest ration, it september a bad message. he'll have to do it again. it's not a one-time 8-day trip. he'll have to go back to the region, it's an issue of reassurance. >> with all the things pulling attention away from asia, will the focus be kept on the easted. >> he'll have to do it. this is one of the things - the president is more concerned about domestic priorities, this is something that will tug him back to the region, things are dangerous right now, where you have aeroplane leaders especially the japanese prime minister and about the philippine president talking about how it looks like 1914 or 1938. defer def marylandjohn d. mayer in the >> regional leaders are concerned about a conflict. the united states is the only party that can paint peace and security. that's why we are going to have to go back here.

>> peace and security depends on north korea, and president obama is gaping to south korea to -- going to south korea to talk to its president. north korea is threat nick to stage a nuke -- threatening to stage a nuclear test, a new form. activity picked up in the testing site. it would be a tremendous provocation if they conduct a nuclear test while the president is in seoul. >> this would be a stinging rebuke of a president. almost unpress depth and that's why it's not going to happen. it tells us that the north koreans will royal the region like in half a century, and shows a disrespect for the american president. that's why the united states has to make sure that it will not happen. especially when he's in south korea. symbolism counts in places like north korea and china. symbolism will be unmistakable. >> gordon chang, appreciate you

joining us, hope you'll be back to talk about how the trip goes when that's over. >> thanks. a quick update to a story monday night when discussing the drone strikes in yemen reportedly killing 55 yemens. a talk with brigadier general mark kimmitt, who said it was aimed at leaders hard to embrace. one of the leaders, ibrahim al-asiri, was killed in an attack by special horses. he was the -- forces. he was the master mind behind the bomb and believed to be a dangerous asset. the most significant member of the al qaeda killed since osama bin laden. still ahead - so much to the backlash for overtesting, a critic says students need to be tested more. shakespeare celebrates a birthday. are americans driven away from

their cars. why the u.s. may be using automobiles less. foro shakespeare theatre

do we need more tests, not fewer? criticising college entrance exams and boycotting standardized tests faced by grade schoolkids has become increasingly common. some educators said using the s.a.t.s is a national scandal, the next guest argues they can't accurately predict success. they wrote an op-ed, saying they needed more tests, not less. the professor and author of "personnel intelligence", the poir of parliamentary, he joins

us. kids are over tested, spending too much time prepping for exams. why should we press them with more exams. >> we think there are two issues there. one is they are overtested, and i think one of the issues in a school basis is that we do need to decide which tests are most important to give students. testing in classrooms helps students learn. so that's one good reason to give tests. and the other good reason to give tests is because we can assess the students and ability and what they know. >> as you know a major criticism of no child left behind is those adopting common core is teachers teach for the test, losing site of what the kids need to learn. so wouldn't more tests complicate the problem? >> well, what i'm saying is we

don't necessarily need more tests of the same sort, but rather that we can brokened the kind of testing that we do at schools. teachers do respond to tests and try to teach what tests will measure. but we don't necessarily have to make the same kinds of tests all the time. we have been have tests that measure verbal ability and mathematical ability and tests measuring student's abilities to think creatively, the ability to work with special objects and understand how space objects work in space, and then my own interests are going to be intelligence, such as emotional intelligence. how students reason one and another's intelligence. >> you argue that should be done in high school to evaluate kids going to college. when it was announced a few weeks ago that the s.a.t.s will

change. power fully, there are nowhere as good a predictor of success. that's the conventional wisdom. how accurate is it. >> i'm not sure that that is the conventional wisdom. i wouldn't characterise it as the conventional wisdom. i think in - in our discipline, and, of course, there are many points of view amongst psychologists that the s.a.t.s are regarded as working as well as predictors, and that is the case when you consider grade point average takes years to accumulate. the s is three or four hours of testing. it adds to that prediction dramatically. maybe consequentially is a better way of putting it. making an incremental difference. >> the larger study found using

both, s.a.t. and grades is the way that kids needed to be evaluated. don't colleges already do that? >> i think most colleges do. it's a shame in the sense that we are backing away from tests like the s.a.t., because they function well. that's a reason - but i think if we say that a child's readiness is focussed on verbal ability and problem-solving kids and parents don't want our kids represented by three numbers. one of the alternatives is to add a few other scores and tests to represent other spects of the children's abilityies.

>> can we in is it easy to bring in tests to look at creativity, or whether someone would be a good engineer. >> the most creative is if you take a child and put them in a school or you relate someone who might have done well. admissions offices don't want to do that. don't want to do that. it's a consequential decision, as a society we have to make is a decision as to whether we say there's nothing we can do, or whether it might make sense to brokened testing that we do. also, one of our objections to

testing is that our students get nervous about taking the test, with good reason. if there are more tests, i think that students will be calmer about them, because there's more opportunity to do well on one kind of test or another. >> and then the hope would be also that the variety of tests might also compensate a bid for the issues with the s.a.t.s being culturally and income biased. >> the issues of the s.a.t.s being biased was a genuine issue several decades ago. i regard it as less of an issue, it is true that students from higher ses do better at those tests, but that is probably a consequence of the fact that they can solve the problems and depending on your perspective you can attribute it to the fact they had a better education. the test is a messenger.

it's pressure on students to take jobs in order to help earn money whilst in school. >> an important conversation as kids prepare to take the s.a.t.s. the book is personal intelligence. good of you to join us. >> coming up, are cars less popular in america than they used to be. numbers may surprise you. 450 years after shakespeare's birthday we check his impact, including a car top you probably didn't know -- cartoon you probably didn't know was based on hamlet. results up next.

>> today's data dive celebrates one of literature's biggest birthdays. it marks 450 years from what is believed to be the day. april 23rd, 1564. in the 52 years we live, shakespeare is believed to have written 37 plays. four centuries after the death, it's believed to be consistently produced and studied in the world. the influence goes beyond the theatre, especially when it comes to the english language. it coined the words and phrases,

eyeball, fashionable, sank tam ownious, lacklustre, in a pick , and foregone conclusion. he modified or created names that are popular all these centuries later. jessica, olivia and miranda. the phrase box office comes from the globe theatre. getting in cost a quoin and they were collected in locked bombs. it would bring the box back to a filled room. it was called the box office. these days you can see a play. then there's shakespeare's impact on pop culture. hamlet has been adapted for the big screen dozens of time. it's been inspiring "the lion king," sops , about a motorcycle gang and a classic "strange

brew" with rick moranis. "romeo and juliet" spauped a wide range of works including a tony and oscar winning musical "west side story," and "ten things i hate about you," the teen comedy and martial arts film "romeo must die" amongst many. an odd copies dense, shakespeare was not only born on april 23rd, he died on april 23rd, '52 years later. while there are several events to commemorate his birth. they'll be overshadowed in england by plans to mark the 400th anniversary of his death. maybe it's fitting. death was central to his great tragedies. >> coming up, are americans going to a more or less car dependent society. tef tef montreal maine & atlanticm. >> che

>> one of the enduring symbols of men freedom has been -- american freedom has been cruising the open roads with a window down and a tankful of gas. research is finding that instead of finding freedom in the cars, more and more americans are looking for freedom from their cars, joining us from freedom arizona is micheline maynard, a visiting prove score at the walter cronkite school of journalism and mass communication at arizona state university, and a forbes contributor and author of

"curbing cars", america's independence from the auto industry. by every measurement across the board households have fewer cars, consume next gas and it started happening in 2004. why was that the turning point? >> right. so a loft of people think it's related to the recession. it started before the recession. a big reason why it's happening is the millennial generation, they were born from 1980 and onwards. there are interesting statistics showing that fewer young people get their driver's licences, it's a quarter of young people and they are driving less than parents did, only about 25% fewer miles are being travelled by this generation, compared with the gen xors and the baby boomers, it's young people and other factors.

as the father of a daughter who could have gotten her driver's licence almost two years ago i can relate to the problem. why is it happening? >> a couple of reasons especially. first of all, many, many states changed their driver's restrictions for young people, if you look at the state of new jersey, you can't get a full driver's licence until you are 18. many states are concerned about drunk driving. they collectively changed these laws. there's a third of states that offer free driver's education, and it means the kids have to pay for it. it can cost three or $400. if you are 16, 3 or 400 is a lot of money. a lot of people have trouble getting jobs that they would have had after school. it's a lack of time. lots of other things to do, the

laws and the mobile generation, the idea of a smartphone is more important to me than an automobile. >> that's what the young folks these days said in surveys, that their mobile devices are more important than having a car. the trend is not just that people are going car free, but car light. explain that to us. >> yes, this is actually a more significant development than people giving up the cars altogether. let's face it, this is the united states. this is a big country. it's hard for a lot of people to get along completely without a car. i talked to numerous people who told me that they are rethinking how to use the car. instead of a family of four, we have two parents and a car for the kid. sometimes one of the parents is working from home, and they don't need a car. they are able to take

transforation to the work place. maybe one uses a car, dad can take the bus or a street to work. i see a lot of students using skate boards. there's a light rail system, lots of bicycles. everybody is rethinking the way they get around, to use a car when they need to. when they don't need to use a car they use the portfolio of transportation. >> you have telecommuting, and a guest that wrote a book. fewer people living outside of big cities. >> this is a big, big development. so a couple of years ago, i was talking to a senior toyota executive who told me they had identified 60 different cities around the country. this is a few years ago, where people moved from the suburbs into the city, and it's two groups of people, millennials who think the cities are great.

they want to have the city, the urban experience, and parents who raised their kids. they don't want to have the five bedroom house. they want to move back into the city and have a condo by the lake. one of the things about moving back into the city is there's not a lot of parking. if you have a three-car garage in the suburbs, you may move to a condo giving you a parking spot. doesn't mean you give up the car, but you don't have multiple cars, you have the one and this new urban life, lending to a lot of alternatives to automobiles. >> is there a negative side. we saw the near disaster. we grew up hearing that what is good for general motors and america, this trend cannot be good for g.m. or other car makers. >> one of the things that i say in the e-book published is that the car makers have to embrace

solutions and a thing that they are doing is they are making cars expensive. >> they are loading them up with technology. the idea is that instead of trying to sell a bunch of cheap cars, they sell fewer but more expensive cars, you don't make it up on volume, but you get the profits. one thing they have not down is not really sponsoring the bike-sharing systems. making deals with zip car to provide them with a fleet of vehicles. i think we see smart car companies tread into the territory before too long. we saw it at the new york international auto show. crazy cars and crazy expensive cars. it does seem to be an industry that is changing. micheline maynard, pleasure to have you with us. the new e-book "curbing cars." >> the show may be over, the

conversation continues on the website. aljazeera.com/considerthis or facebook or consumer plus. see you next time. . good evening, everyone, welcome to al jazeera america. i'm john seigenthaler, is affirmative action dead. the fall out from the supreme court ruling. what the decision means for minority, the law and getting into clem. dangerous cargo, trains carrying oil - the string of fiery derailments, and safety questions about the risks on the rails and beyond. home ward bound. if you think you have a tough commute, wait until you