this is charlie rose. charlie: jack lew is here, the u.s. secretary of treasury. a role since february 2013. he was previously president obama's chief of staff. and prior to that, he was a director of the office of management and budget. a role that he also played in president clinton's cabinet. on wednesday he will deliver a speech on the impact of u.s. sanctions policy. he will deliver that speech at the international peace in washington. coordinated sanctions led by the u.s. were integral to reaching the agreement with iran to suspend their nuclear program.

sanctions policies also playing a role in the fight against terrorist organizations, including the islamic state. for all those reasons and more, i'm pleased to have jack back at this table. welcome. jack: great to be with you. charlie: give us a sense of what sanctions have achieved and not achieved in our history. jack: if you look at sanctions, they've evolved dramatically from what they were before. they started out as kind of blunt instruments. an example is an embargo on cuba. cut off a country. if you do it alone and you do it without the support of the world, it doesn't work very well. it doesn't change policy. the purpose of sanctions is not just to inflict pain, it's really to get a government, a sovereign state, to change its policy. you look at what we've done in the last 10 years, iran is obviously a central example. by working systemically to bring other countries along and to work as a global community and to put pressure on iran, it

actually changed iran's calculus. iran decided to come to the table and to negotiate, to remove its work, to back away from its work on a nuclear weapon. and in return we have agreed to lift nuclear sanctions. now, it's not an easy thing to do. it's not easy to say a country that supports terrorism, we're going to relieve the pressure we've put on them. but how do did we put the pressure on them? we put the pressure on them by getting the whole world to agree that it was a threat to the region and to the globe for iran to get nuclear weapons. and we got a diverse range of countries, including china and india, that are very dependent on iranian oil, to cooperate with us. and it was only because of the pressure that came from the world standing together with the united states at the lead that iran felt the pressure in a way where they ultimately were willing to negotiate away their nuclear weapons program. what we've learned from that is how important it is to work on an international basis.

how the pressure is greatest. we've also learned how important it is that when you have an agreement, that's predicated on change your policy and get relief from the sanctions, there has to be relief from the sanctions. otherwise no one will ever respond to a sanctions regime by changing their policy. charlie: and the argument is made that it will be very, very difficult, if iran violates the policy that they've agreed to or their behavior that they've agreed to, to put the sanctions back together. because it was so difficult to put them in place in the first place. jack: i don't think that's correct. charlie: that argument is made. jack: the argument is made but one of the really important features of the iran agreement is that we have retained the ability to snap back sanctions, both u.s. sanctions and international sanctions -- charlie: but can you get the international community to agree? that's the question. jack: at the risk of getting into the details, the way the international snapback was constructed, if iran violates and if that violation is brought to the u.n., we could veto any

effort to stop the snapback. so it is very much incumbent on iran to keep its agreement. now, i am very much of the view that we have to keep pressure on iran in areas like their support for terrorism. to change their behavior. these past few days we've designated entities in iran and around the world that have supported iran's development of missiles, which we believe are unacceptable. which have supported iranian airlines that ship for the irgc. charlie: these weren't snapbacks, these were new sanctions. jack: these were new designations. the nuclear sanctions were lifted, the other sanctions stay in place. could the nuclear sanctions come back if they violate? yes, they could. charlie: what sort of community would agree to that? the community of nations that came together -- jack: there would have to be a real violation. what we can't do and what i've argued to congress is you can't, in the name of one, pressure iran on other issues, bring back the nuclear sanctions as if you

didn't have an agreement. the agreement is iran backs away from a nuclear program and the nuclear sanctions are lifted. we have made it clear the other sanctions would stay in place. iran is not the only country that's subject to sanctions right now. we have a very important set of sanctions in place with regard to north korea. with regard to russia. and with regard to north korea, here's another lesson on the importance of international cooperation. china worked with us at the u.n. china is the neighbor to north korea. they have more influence over north korea than any other country. they worked with us at the u.n. and we have since that u.n. resolution had our teams working with the chinese to execute against it and to implement it. in the case of russia, russia is one of the u.n. security council permanent members. we have sanctions against russia working with our g-7 partners and others around the world.

there are multiple ways to work in the international community. charlie: here's what's interesting about that. secretary kerry just returned from moscow where he's trying to work something out with vladimir putin, the president of russia, about syria. so he's there trying to work out something about syria. at the same time that we're imposing sanctions not only on russia, but on some of their leading friends of the president. jack: the reality is, we are working with russia, we worked with russia on the iran negotiation. they were part of the negotiating group. charlie: the president said they were very helpful. jack: they were helpful. we're working with them, trying to change the conditions in syria. but we're also making it clear to them that their aggressive actions to take crimea and to move in eastern ukraine are unacceptable. and the sanctions that we put in really reflected a highly sophisticated way of putting pressure on the government in ways that they noticed, that are having a real impact. but without causing the kind of collateral damage to europe or the global economy that would have made it harder to get the collaboration with other countries. charlie: you've heard all these

arguments, i know, when people talked about the iran agreement and were critical of it. they all said, look, whatever you think about the agreement we're getting, and there were lots of differing views in terms of the benefit to the united states, and whether it would truly inhibit iran, but they also said, you know, by eliminating these sanctions, you're giving them at least $100 billion in which they can use for an engagement in all these behavioral things that we object to. jack: well, first, the number is not as big as people think it is. -- it is not really $100 billion. because a lot of that money is locked up and can't go back to iran. there's maybe $50 billion that theoretically could go back but that's the money they need to do international trade, they have to keep foreign reserves. iran's own estimate is there's maybe $30 billion that they could bring back. they've had difficulty bringing that money back. they've had difficulty re-engaging with the global financial community. we've actually made the case that the sanctions are lifted

and been clear that that money is money that they do have access to. we've also made clear that if it goes into the wrong hands, if they support terror, if they support regional destabilization, we reserve the right to go against that separately. one of the things that i've made this case to congress and i truly believe, at the height of the sanctions program on nuclear sanctions, they were still supporting terrorism and regional destabilization. those sanctions didn't stop all of iran's bad activity. so the notion that you can take it to zero wasn't even true under the most severe sanctions program. what we know, what we know, is that iran's domestic needs are enormous. hundreds of billions of dollars of domestic investment that they need to get their oil industry able to produce at historic levels. to pay their own military that hasn't been fully paid because they don't have the money. to provide services to their citizens.

everything we hear is that the domestic needs are enormous. i am going to do everything i can to keep track and to take action, if we see money going to malign activities. but what we've got out of the iran deal is of critical importance. we got iran to back away from all the pathways to developing a nuclear weapon, they have a much smaller and peaceful nuclear program, we will see if they cheat, we will take action if they violate the agreement. i think the world is a safer place. i think the region is a safer place. with iran backed away from a nuclear program. and the sanctions were put in place to accomplish that, did their job. one of the points i will make in the speech is, if you want sanctions to work, if you want countries to change their behavior, when they do what you're telling them to have to do, there has to be a response. there's no person or institution that will respond the way you want if that doesn't happen. sanctions won't have any effect. charlie: is this sanctions policy that you will announce in

this speech, and add to our understanding of sanctions, also part of this argument that the united states has many arrows that are available to it in terms of response to practices that we don't approve of, and we object to, and it's not always necessary to make it a military response. jack: one of the things that i think is very important is we have developed these economic sanctions as a way to give the current president and future presidents tools to choose what tools to use when they need to confront situations that are just unacceptable. i believe that military force should be the last, not the first, resort. and having a variety of options, i think it's critically important, especially in when they're powerful and effective. one of the things we have to be careful about is when we talk about the use of force, we understand that it has a lot of consequences. it also has consequences when you put sanctions in place.

it has consequences in terms of the direct impact and the indirect impact. in terms of how other countries in the world fare economically. we can't shy away from using sanctions because it will slow down growth. but we can't do it frivolously either. we have to do it in a way that's very clear headed. that doesn't treat it as being some sort of light treatment. it's a serious step and it's something that has to be guarded in order to have it in the future when you need it. charlie: one of the criticisms of sanctions in the past has been you're not hurting people who make decisions in a country. you are hurting the people who live in the country. jack: i think the old broad-based sanctions had that problem. and it also hurt our own country, cutting us off from trade and commerce. i think if you look at the russia sanctions, they're very targeted. they're targeted at the centers of power, where the decisions are being made, and they're targeted at the key industries, particularly sectors that are highly dependent on technology and other collaboration with the

west, like finance. i think that what we've done has caused a real impact. i'm not going to pretend the current economic situation in russia is all due to sanctions. low energy prices are clearly a major factor. but without lower energy prices, the sanctions have had a real impact. it's not low energy prices that are making it hard for russia to obtain financing internationally. i think that what we've done in the case of russia actually proved the point i'm making. there were some who at the time we were designing the ukraine-russia sanctions were saying, do everything all at once. now, if we had done everything at all once, europe would have been very, very hard pressed to go along with us. because it was going to have a much bigger impact on europe's economy than on the u.s. economy. but doing it in an incremental way, by doing it in a targeted way, we have kept a unity between the united states and europe that i don't think russia expected. in the case of the iran sanctions, doing the oil sanctions incrementally, putting them in place so that china and

india could adjust over a period of time, kept them with us. it's easy to stand up and say, use all your ammunition right at the start. but you wouldn't do that in war and you shouldn't do it with sanctions. charlie: just tighten the pressure. jack: you tighten the pressure and show you'll ratchet it down if there's a change of behavior. charlie: do we assume sanctions were part what have led to the great change in south africa? jack: i think economic pressure did lead to the change in south africa. and it took a very long time to put an international consensus together. i think that things like the jackson amendment helped to change russia's policy on its human rights policies, particularly with regard to soviet jews. we learn from each of these that there are ways to change how countries think. you can't mandate what another country does. you can't change the way they make their decisions.

you can change the incentives. you can change the structure. and i think that by doing it internationally, by doing it in a way that shows we'll go up and down, depending on the response, we've made it clear that there's a rational set of decisions to be made. obviously in the case of russia, they've decided they can endure a lot of pain. charlie: they have. jack: i don't know how long that will last. but what we've also said is if they continue, the sanctions just by virtue of time get more severe over time because time makes them mount. they won't go away unless russia's changing its policies. charlie: so far you've not seen a change in russia's response because of the sanctions we have imposed? jack: i think we probably have seen a change. we haven't seen a complete correction. what russia needs to do is implement the accord. charlie: they say the same thing. we need to implement that accord. jack: but they are the ones who have to take actions to do it.

obviously ukraine has to take actions as well. i think ukraine has shown its willingness to take actions. and russia -- charlie: the government of ukraine. jack: yeah. the government of ukraine. i think that it's hard to say what russia would have done absent sanctions but i think it's clear that they're trying to explore a way to not have it get worse. charlie: help us understand how it looks. if in fact you're a country that imposed sanctions, and you're cut off from international markets and you're cut off from international sources of finance, and give us a sense from their point of view what it is, it does to their economy, that might change their policy? jack: it affects the economy both in the financial and the real economies. charlie: you can't sell your products. jack: if you can't acquire the technology you need, you know, for a country like russia, for them to do the kind of deep, arctic drilling for oil that they need, they need international cooperation. it's a big deal to their economy. right now with oil prices low, you might think that that's a thing of the past.

but arctic drilling is about the future. it's not about the current. it's long-term planning. if you need to issue bonds and you want to do it in dollars or euros, your ability to do so is limited. we've made it very much -- much more cumbersome for them to do it legally and because of that, there are some who won't -- there's things that banks are told they can't do, and then there's other things they choose not to do. just because they don't want to get close. charlie: how much violations have there been of the sanctions against russia? and the sanctions against iran? before they signed the nuclear deal? in other words, were people willing to risk penalties, because there was money to be made and economic advantage by carrying on trade? jack: one of the things we worried about a lot with the russia sanctions was not creating spaces where we are or another country would step out, another country would step in.

to move together, so that you wouldn't have what we call back fill, where without concerted, unified action, there's relief essentially. because you deal with country y instead of country x. by working closely with our partners around the world, we've limited that quite considerably. charlie: how much support for sanctions from china? in other words, how often does the chinese government support you in the imposition of sanctions? jack: china has a view that the multilateral sanctions are the right way to do it. and i think working with us in the united nations on the north korea sanctions, it was a very important statement. enacting sanctions in the u.n. is step one. implementing them is step two. since the u.n. security council acted, we've had our senior officials in china meeting with the chinese about implementation. i think that's very important. they worked with us on iran -- charlie: what about the sanctions with iran and russia? jack: they worked with us on

iran. and they were part of the p-5 plus one. there were japanese entities that were violating and we've taken action. but in general, they have been part of the international effort. charlie: -- at the extent that you would prefer they be part of the international effort. jack: i think that the fact that they cooperated with us on the oil sanctions against iran was very important. i think the fact that they're part of the international effort on north korea is critical. are there things that they could do to toughen up on how they look at what happens between their economies? of course, that's what we're working on now. charlie: i had a chinese official say to me once, not recently, but, look, if you'll provide all the oil we get from iran, we'll be prepared and certainly enthusiastic about supporting you in a sanctions

effort. but we need oil. to run a burgeoning economy. jack: my conversations over the last five, six years have been similar in china and in countries like india. where they share the conviction that iran has to be stopped from having a nuclear weapon. but they have to hear that we understand the impact on their economy, of not buying oil from iran. charlie: what do we to do help them find oil? jack: obviously developing their own resources. both natural resources and renewable technologies is important. making -- we have actually done our part in increasing the global supply of oil because the united states isn't buying as much oil on the global market. that makes it easier. our energy strategy, our growing independence in energy, has actually made it easier for countries like china and india to have choices. what i was saying a few moments ago about incremental steps,

understanding that you can't do it all at once, that you have to phase it in, was critically important. because they couldn't just drop like a rock. there were some in the united states who thought it was somehow less tough to do it incrementally than to just shut oil immediately. i believe that if you had done it immediately, you couldn't have kept the global consensus. what put pressure on iran was that unity. by doing it in a smart way that brought the world together, we were tougher. charlie: donald trump and other candidates in the republican debates who have all been opposed to the iran deal have said on their first day in office they're going to unravel the deal. is that possible? and can they do that? jack: i think that the iran deal reflects the most progress we've made in decades at stopping something as dangerous as iran developing -- charlie: but can a new president

unravel a deal that an earlier president had made? jack: look, it's very hard. but elections matter. and i think that it is very important that we continue to make the case for the importance of the iran deal. and sticking to it. i know i talked to members of congress all the time who are increasingly understanding that we've accomplished something very important. they still do not like iran's behavior. it's not as if i'm defending iran's behavior in other areas. but there's a growing recognition that we have stopped iran from developing a nuclear weapon and i think anyone who tries to reverse that is taking on something that would be destabilizing and dangerous. charlie: we have a congress controlled by republicans at this point. if in fact -- and they have not chosen to eliminate the embargos against cuba.

and there were some questions at one point as to whether they might impose new sanctions against iran during the negotiations of the deal, which i think the president said would do great damage to the negotiations. jack: we've continued to have that conversation. we continue to believe that we have to be quite focused on implementing the sanctions on terrorism and on regional destabilization. but trying to put in place a new sanctions regime that replace -- replaces the nuclear sanctions would basically be breaking our word. the united states has to have its credibility in order for things like sanctions to work. iran backed away from its nuclear program based on our commitment to phasedown the nuclear sanctions which is exactly what we did. we never told them the other sanctions were going away. they can be annoyed about it. but they cannot say that they were misled about it. if there were to be legislation that put the nuclear sanctions back in place or that looked like we were trying to do that, that's a different story. ♪

♪ charlie: what can you tell us today that -- the impact of sanctions against isil is having a direct impact on what they do? jack: so, let me just take a minute, it's a complicated story because isil is a complicated creature. when isil started its seizing of territory in iraq, what did it do? it would capture a town, it would -- steal money from a

bank, and it had some money. then it developed an economy on the ground. what have we done? we have cut them off from the international financial system. we've worked with the government of iraq so that iraq has closed 90 banks in isil-controlled territory. they've shut down much of the money exchange business. and we've worked with our military to identify what are the sources of income that come in to support isil, and there's military action that is attacking both their financial centers, blowing up banks with money -- charlie: we had a drone attack on one of their financial officials. jack: yes, and in the case of oil we have been having strikes that not just go at the wells, but at the trucks that move the oil. if you look at what happened just recently in raqqa, where an isil leader had to cut the pay to isil fighters in half, that shows you it's having an impact. there is a strain.

isil has a lot of weaknesses. apart from being criminal and immoral, they have -- they need a lot of money. if we can shrink their access to money, we make it harder for them. we have more work to do. i don't want to suggest we're done. but we have to use all of the levers we have. sanctions are one. but it is not just sanctions. charlie: when you look at what they are doing, are you alarmed in terms what have they may extend their strategy around the globe, looking at what's happened in brussels and paris, and looking at these cells that seem to have sufficient money to do what they need to do? jack: the terrible truth about the horrible events in brussels and paris is, it doesn't take that much money to do things like that. you've got to get at the heart of it and understand why they're reaching people in these places, and find the people who are doing it and stop them. charlie: that's a hard challenge, though.

jack: it's been very hard. we work with our counterparts in belgium, in france, around europe. to make sure we share information so that if we see where money is moving, before or after events occur, we have the most sophisticated capabilities in the world, one of the challenges, the rest of the world needs to pick up its game and develop that sophisticated set of tools. we can't watch everything in the world. we can share what we see. i think that the response to horrific acts like this has to be with determination not to let the terrorists get us off of what we have to be about, which is supporting our values, living our lives. we have to work day and night on the military front, which we're doing in many places right now, on the financial front, to cut them off, both the leaders and the resources, but we can't let them stop us from leading our lives.

charlie: back to cuba for a moment. congress passed those economic sanctions and they'll have to change that policy. do you see any receptivity? jack: it's interesting. first, i think we have worked i think very much within the law to do what we can do to normalize and open up. but we've made clear, without a change of law, without changing the embargo, without changing the act, we can't make it truly normal. i'm not going to sit here today and predict when congress might do something. but i've been surprised on both sides of the aisle at a willingness on the part of many, not everyone, but many to recognize that the policy of the last 50 years hasn't worked. charlie: what would it have been like -- jack: this is a chance to truly open up and change cuba. charlie: those people who insist on sanctions would say, let the cuban government change their policy on human rights and political prisoners and a whole range of things and we'd be proud and -- i mean, we'd be pleased to consider taking off

the sanctions. jack: you look at the world under the policies of the last 50 years, where did it leave news is it left us in a place where our closest friends in europe and canada passed laws telling their businesses, you cannot comply with these sanctions. in latin america, we are getting isolated. weare at a place now where are in a place by increasing contact with cuba, cuban people will be exposed to the american people. they will be exposed to american values in american media. that will be a force for change. we were not getting it done the old way. it just wasn't working. charlie: what are the tools you need? or do you have everything you need because of the relationships developed and the strategies developed and execution developed against iran?

jack: i think we in the united a very sophisticated set of tools. i alluded to this a moment ago. most other finance tools aren't as sophisticated as the treasury department tools. there is a need, not just for developed countries, but in emerging economies where money can move around. we do work with the imf so that sanctions do not leak. they can watch what's going on in their economy and take the actions necessary to stop. we are working in a concerted way to build these systems. it is not glamorous stuff that ends up on the front pages. if you want to take actions against individuals and entities, you need to have those tools. charlie: because of the snapback

provision, if iran violated the provisions that they, so far -- -- have fulfilled. jack: so far. charlie: that if they violated everybody that participated in the sanctions program would sign up again. jack: the way it was set up, it gives us the ability to exercise a veto if anybody wanted to block international sanctions from coming back. it was very well negotiated. charlie: they still could stop it. jack: if there was a vote at the u.n., they could veto that. it would require affirmative action. it was an affirmative part of

the agreement. that was the point of the joint comprehensive plan of action in the first place. none of this today is based on trust and faith. it is based on monitoring, verification, being able to see what they are doing. ♪

♪ charlie: there is a g-20 meeting coming up in china. jack: from an economic perspective, i think dealing with the challenge of sluggish global demand and growth is something that we talk about. charlie: demand? jack: as we emerge from the global economic crisis that started with the financial crisis here. we have seen many economies not getting the robust levels of growth you need. the united states, as much as we want to do better, the u.s. has done very well compared to the rest of the world. charlie: people dream of a growth rate of 3.5%.

jack: it means the core of the u.s. economy is doing even better. we are losing about .5% of gdp a year due to international pressures. charlie: that's because of the lack of global demand. jack: that's right. charlie: because china is overcapacity -- jack: china is part of it. you have to separate it and go around the world. china was in the rapid growth period it was in coming into its own as a major economy. the challenge was to manage one of the hardest economic transitions the country made economically going from a tightly state-controlled system to -- charlie: an export economy. jack: to a consumer driven economy. they understand intellectually what they have to do.

the five-year plan reflects that. it is hard. take something like excess capacity. it is terrible to have millions of people working producing things that nowhere to go. it is shrinking their economic potential. they have committed to shutting down excess capacity. steal, coal, aluminum. that would be a big hard thing to do.

they have no choice. if they do not do that, they will choke on overcapacity. charlie: and you believe they are making the right decisions. jack: the plan has committed to very significant steps. they now have to execute against the plan. thethat will require having political will to withstand the lumpiness that comes from doing hard things. china still has a lot of capacity. and their understanding of what they need to do. for a few months, china is out of tools. that is not the case. they have a lot of foreign reserves. they have a small deficit in terms of their government budget. charlie: more fiscal policy than monetary policy? jack: we have stressed that they have to use all the tools.

i think the five year plan reflects a much stronger commitment to fiscal policy. the more they emphasize growing consumer demand. the more it accelerates the transition they have to make. using their fiscal policy tools is critical. we've made it clear they cannot resort to exchange-rate policies to gain unfair advantage. the good news is we had the strongest commitment we have ever gotten by all the g-20. to refrain from competitive devaluation and coordinate so we don't surprise each other. charlie: are they more excepting in terms of currency issues now? jack: i think they understand what a sensitive issue it is. there are increasing concerns that these kind of policies could be made in different capitals. if you get to a war of competitive devaluation, what you do is fight over a shrinking pie. we need to grow the global high. one of the things coming out of

the same g-20 is a commitment to use all policy tools. around the world, there's a bunch of countries that have the space to use fiscal policy more aggressively. charlie: speaking of the united states and the tools that we pleased by the action of the feds to slow down the number of interest rate changes? jack: as you know, charlie, as secretary, i don't comment on monetary policy. my job is to continue to concentrate on the core of the u.s. economy. you look at the core of the u.s. economy. the real economy has been moving ahead steadily. the latest gdp numbers show it on a macro level. we see it in car sales, household formations. charlie: it used to be said that

what business needed was confidence. they had plenty of money to spend but they were not spending it. that confidence, do you see that in terms of businesses being willing to increase inventory? jack: we are sitting here at the end of the first quarter of the year that is shown. a lot of nervousness in the markets. if you look at the geopolitical situation, look at the week weak globalnd -- demand. there are a lot of things that you can worry about. when you look at the u.s. economy, we have shown a level of strength that is quite real and sustainable. the u.s. economy is 85% domestic and most of that is consumer driven. if you continue to have a strong consumer, you have a strong u.s. economy.

i think having a stronger global economy right now is where that confidence needs to come from. charlie: where do you see inflation over the year? jack: inflation, depending on which measure you look at, has been getting closer to that kind of 2% target people have been looking at. it is not showing any signs of exploding. i think it's a good thing, personally, if there were more pressure on wages right now. the problem we have is the disparity of income. the way to solve that is for there to be some increase in wages at the middle and lower levels. charlie: raising the minimum wage? jack: it is something we should do as a government. charlie: what is your number? jack: we have been supportive of the proposals that are in the 13 -- charlie: not 15 like cities have imposed?

jack: we are supportive of efforts to increase the minimum wage. if we can't do it at the federal level, we are supportive of the state and local level. what we have seen from the states that have moved is that it hasn't hurt them. have not lost competitiveness. the basic proposition that if you work full-time, you should not be in poverty is something i don't know how you argue against. we have to raise the minimum wage to get there. and we have seen slow wage growth. there is some sign of it moving. it has been long overdue. charlie: beyond wage policy, what are the second, third, fourth best way to deal with income inequality. jack: if you look at growing the

economy, growing more jobs and better jobs, it clearly starts with things that are pretty straightforward like infrastructure. we have a crumbling infrastructure. people go to work building the infrastructure. and we are talking about low interest rates that are the perfect time to make long-term investments. we also know there are a lot of jobs open in the country. the people don't have the skills they need to do the jobs. when you look at community college and education being free for those that work and perform, it is a way to get the skills for the economy of the future so you don't get stuck in the economy of the past. when we look at our tax code, there is still advantage over -- wealth over earned income. tax reform on the business side is something that is critically

important that we do. it is hard for me is that here when i see a clear pathway to getting it done in this administration. we will not stop pressing for it. we have a business tax code that has the highest statutory rates in the developed world. companies are leaving the united states to avoid these tax rates. we need to close loopholes. that will give us the ability to close our tax rates in stop in version. charlie: in terms of apple and others that have huge amounts of cash overseas, they say if there was different tax policy, we could bring money back home. we have made a proposal that is not that different in structure to do with that through

international business tax reform. jack: some of the proposals made by republicans to deal with that through international business tax reform where we have a minimum tax on income wherever it is earned. a company would get credit for taxes they pay overseas and pay a reasonable rate to repatriate the money or leave it overseas? it is up to them. we would use the money to bring money home. we bring together two things that would help our economy. i thought it would be a very promising discussion last year. i think the political climate just made it not time. -- not the time. it needs to be done. charlie: will we see the tpp? jack: we saw the trade promotion authority pass through congress. that was a very important thing. the tpp would open markets to u.s. goods and services and also would take the standards that we

hold dear in the united states. charlie: you must find it amusing that the principal democratic candidate is up use -- opposed to what your president has proposed. jack: if you look at tpp -- charlie: both democratic candidates. jack: it is profoundly in the interest of creating american jobs. i'm not going to comment on the politics. i am going to stick to what we gain. we know the growth in demand are covered in markets -- a country like vietnam is actually reforming labor laws in order to comply with tpp. if countries pick up their standards of labor, pickup up their standards on environmental issues, it makes our products more competitive and things we hold dear become more widely held around the world.

charlie: if you look at the countries the tpp covers, that is where the economic growth of the future is coming from. jack: population growth. the u.s. will remain one of the powerful drivers of the global economy. i have said over and over again, the world cannot count on the united states to be the sole driver of the global economy. we need burgeoning populations, developing economies that are growing at a faster rate because of their place in the development cycle. a new middle class. we want to be part of that. we want to be selling goods and services there. we want them to be abiding by the standards that we think makes the world a better place. charlie: when i was in china over the weekend, you constantly heard this idea of china's economic growth and the five-year plan that it is not a

zero sum game for the united states. that the united states ought to be invested in china's growth as an economic powerhouse. jack: we have said publicly and privately that it is in china's interest for the u.s. to do well and it is in the u.s.'s interest for china to do well. as one of the largest economies in the world, is responsibilities going along with that. embracing standards is actually an important thing. charlie: when will china have the largest economy in the world? jack: it depends on how you measure different answers. to me, it's not really that material. together, we have more to do with the direction of the global economy than any other country. it is an important economic and strategic relationship. we have to work on things we agree and challenge and confront them on things were we disagree.

we have to have the personal relationships do that. and with the standby are convictions. charlie: will it happen in the next two years? jack: i can't tell you, charlie. if you look at china's economy and what it means to the world, it is not at the moment integrated into the global financial markets the way the u.s. economy is. the main transmission channel for china's economic growth is through what it buys. when china slows down, they stop buying raw materials. charlie: commodity prices go down. jack: china has to stabilize at a level of growth so they need to stick to their reform agenda. i don't think china is destined for a hard landing. i think they can manage. charlie: the performance is an economic agenda, not a political agenda. jack: economics and politics are, in any system, closely connected.

charlie: two quick questions. commodity prices and demand. what has to happen? is it simply the chinese economy as a principal driver of demand around the world has to be stronger in order to see commodity prices go back up? jack: partially, we have to recognize there was a commodity super cycle that was reflecting unsustainable levels of growth. successfully increase global demand -- china, japan, europe. a major commodity and markets have been very sensitive to moves there. in that market, we see two things happening.

we have seen supply growing at a time when demand was softening. markets go through cycles. that will work its way through. charlie: if britain leaves the european union, what impact will it have? jack: you know, the impact is partially economic in terms of slowing trade and economic relationships. it is partially geopolitical and strategic. in a world where one of the things that drives the economy is the uncertainty of geopolitical risks. at the g-20 meeting the risk is , something people were talking about. charlie: they talked about it in china over the weekend. jack: is that something they can measure with an economic index? no.

is it clear that when you increase the level of unease it has an economic consequence? yes. i have seen all kinds of estimates what it means to the british or european economy. europeans have a hard time struggling getting to a sustainable rate of growth. and youth unemployment. anything that goes in the wrong direction would be bad for the global economy. charlie: this last question comes from my friend lynn manuel. will hamilton remain on the $10 bill? jack: i said we were going to put a woman back on our money and i have been so moved by the response. millions of americans sat around tables like this and talking about what women have done to contribute. i have been clear, time and again -- first and foremost, we

have to value security. we have to do this in the order that bills need to be modernized to be safe from counterfeiting. but we can't wait. we waited 100 years. the contribution women have made. the $20 bill is further down. charlie: they are not as enthusiastic about andrew jackson as alexander hamilton -- jack: i have been clear from the very beginning. alexander hamilton is one of our heroes. it's about a whole series of bills. we will be working on the 5, 10, and 20. what has been striking to me is that nobody can tell you what is on the back of the five dollar bill or the $10 bill or the $20 bill. how do we take these buildings on the back of our bills and

bring them to life? charlie: how long do you need to study this? jack: we have gotten millions of responses and we are getting close. how did the lincoln memorial play a role in our history . when you ask about the treasury department, when there was a smaller federal government, one of the major demonstrations for the women's right to vote was the treasury department. we will announce it soon. charlie: like next week? jack: soon. charlie: we have to finish the design. there are a lot of issues. i haven't announced anything. charlie: give me something. are you expecting to do this in the next six weeks? jack: i'm not going to put a date out there. we will do it when it's done and it will be exciting. charlie: thank you for coming. we look forward to the speech you make on sanctions and the role they play on foreign policy and the economic relationship

with countries. thank you for joining us. see you next time. ♪

mark: i'm mark crumpton; you are watching bloomberg west. let's check with the first word. paris prosecutors say a french citizen arrested last week has been charged with allegedly plotting and eminent terror attack. officials say the suspect is accused of participating in a terrorist group with plans for at least one attack. he also faces charges of possessing explosives and holding fake documents. the united nations secretary-general ban ki-moon is making a global appeal on behalf of syrian refugees. ban wants to resettle nearly 500,000 syrian refugees around the world over the next three years. says countries can benefit f