radio and online audiences also our c-span audience today. it's my pleasure to introduce david davenport he's the author of rugged individualism dead or alive. he's also a research fellow at hoover institute at stanford university and president at pepper dime one of our great educational institution just not in the bay area. david thank you for coming to share is this with us. [applause] >> thank you, george and ladies and gentlemen, it's pleasure to be with you today. it occurred to me as we collected up yet one more spring rain and we're competing with the warriors playoff game, and i

assume that giants and dodgers game, i don't need to give a talk on rugged individuals you are the rugged individuals for showing up here tonight to thank you for coming. you're also brave to come and hear an academic talk of many good stories i think about scholars and academics one i heard recently was at a scholarly panel that i was attending. and the moderator of the panel was a federal judge. and he said you know, we have some of us referring to himself who are as tedly roosevelt himself a rugged individual once said, we're in the arena. our face is coveredded with dust, and blood and sweat. and then he said you have kind of out of the way up in their ivory towers the academics. who are carefully watching the battlefield and then when the battle is over, about they come down on to the battlefield and shoot the wounded. we have a marksman on our panel

so i will have to shoot a couple of people probably not in the audience but in history as we think about rugged individuals and then where it has been and where it's going. so my coauthor and then gordon lloyd, uh-oh i'm not able to get us going. let's see if i can do it over here. here we go. my coauthor gordon lloyd and then like to go back to come back to go back into history but not just for the purpose of staying in history, but to see what we can learn and bring that back to policy today. and so in this book rugged individualism we wanted to go back into american history and see what we could recapture that might be useful for public policy today. and we especially spend some time in the new deal and, in fact, one of the great speeches franklin roosevelt set up a new deal was delivered here at the commonwealth club 85 years ago this year.

so in a sense i'll be responding all be it a little bit late to what roosevelt said at the commonwealth club that day. so rugged individualism has had an interesting history, my mother who just passed away this year at a age 99 when i would ask her about her sports team she would say oh, they're up and down. they're up and down. but well that's kind of true a rugged individualism it had its ups and downs as henry famously said even a paranoid has real enemies and rugged individualism has had some enemies over the years. particularly during the progressive era, there was quite an economic chris teak of rugged individualism. and that continues through today. and i would say there's also been a sociological critique of rugged individualism that it has form of selfishness withdrawing from the society and we'll look at both of those so it has had had its ups and downs there are

people who would say that it is alive. there are who would say that it is dead so we offer you at the gig of our book this matrix where you can decide for yourself where you would place rugged individualism. would you say it is dead or alive? and then wherever you place it, would you say that's a good thing or a bad thing? and so president obama, on more than one occasion referred to rugged individualism as part of america's psyche but he felt that would was a large he would go on to say and dr. lloyd and i believe it is alive if only barely sometimes. and it is good that it's alive and it would be better if it were even more robust so. there have been different people and -- in history and even today who are in different places on this chart. the other thing i would say by way of overview is that we in the book sort of address this in two different ways. we try to look at the political realm and what that has done for

and against the idea of rugged individualism and then we also look at the intellectual realm of ideas. what are some of the ideas that are about in our society? and how have they affected rugged individualismsome so let me try that -- no let me try that again and take off any giants' watch to keep track of time here and go back in a moment in history. so individualism was very much planted, i would say, in america's dna at the founding. and -- that was jay who said america is the only nation that was founded on a creed are and part of the creed i would say of america's founding was individualism and i would say if there's nothing else you remember about individualism to e me this describes it right here. the founders of this country no longer wanted the important decisions about their lives to be made by churches or kings or queens or --

the social class and to which you were born. but they wanted to be able to make the key decisions about their own lives as individuals. and so that really i think, was the founding idea if you will of rugged individualism. is we a country where we are fre to make the key decisions about our lives. and so, of course, declaration of independence as we know very well talks about individual rights, how the king, how king george had abused people's individual rights. and how that really -- that was the purpose of founding this country was so that people could pursue life, liberty, pursuit of happiness these were individual rights they wanted presented in this country. and the constitution sort of its companion document if you will is very much drafted toward protecting individualism. and i speak in part, of course, of the first ten amendment, the bill of rights a list of

individual rights that the drafters of the constitution thought needed to be protected mostly from the danger of their own government. but there are also parts in the main body of the constitution that are very much about protecting individual rights. there are checks and balances, there are balances of power. there's separations of power. all to keep the government from -- or majority fractions from getting together and taking away peoples' individual rights so very much stated in the declaration guaranteed by the constitution, and now really entering its golden era if you will, the golden era of rugged individualism on the american frontier. and the american frontier when you think about it is not just a place was not just a location. a geographic place -- but it was a whole spirit. it was a whole ethos of the time so alexus french journalist who came to the country in 1800s

and wrote in america and he said the very availability of land, the vast expanse that allows people to go find more elbow room to relocate when they want to, is part of what makes democracy an america work. it is part of what allows individualism to flourish. and so he felt that -- this expanse, this wilderness that we had in america was part of democracy itself. and academic at the university of wisconsin frederick jackson turner wrote quite a bit about the american frontier and in particular, 1893 he wrote the frontier thesis, and he said you know, america is not just different from england by reason of geography. but again, it's a whole wilderness ethos that has grown up in america. and people gathering together, fishing and hunting and building their own houses and so forth. it fosters the sense of rugged individualism.

although he did not use the phrase as a i'll share in just a moment. i may, i make a note here that the frontier did include, however, collaboration sometimes people say well, you know, they wrnght really rugged individuals because they had wagon trains and they built huts together and work together and they collaborated that is absolutely the case. but i think the key is, rugged individualism means that you have the freedom to consent to join these various groups. they were not regulated to join wagon trains they were not mandated to build each other huts. but these are things that people out of their own freedom con seconded to do wanted to do, saw the value in doing so i wouldn't make the mistake of thinking rugged individuals never collaborate never cooperate. we'll talk about that more when we come to america today. so this was really sort of a hay day, the wilderness years, the

danielle boones wanting more elbow room. these are the hay days we often think of about rugged individualism. but then as i mentioned earlier rugged individualism came under attack from those progressives. and -- in 1890 if you want to put a date on it, the american census bureau u.s. census bower row would no longer count migration to the west and reach pacific ocean and that was the end of the migration west so we're no longer going keep track that have. frontier in efnght closed now in 1890, according to the census bureau. and so the argument of the progressives was, well, this was going to create a big change in our country. it is now going to be necessary for us to band together and to live in cities. and we're going to have to have more government and more regulation if we're going to live together in this way. and, in fact, we'll need to look

to europe more as an example because europe has been living with limits and boundaries much longer than we have. and then, the attacks became more focused charles beard wrote an essay called the myth of rugged american individualism. i've sometimes said that president obama must have been channeling his inner charles beard when he gave his famous you didn't build that talk. yiewrm that? you may think you built a business but you didn't really build that and internet and roads and infrastructure -- that was needed. my reaction was that i did pay the taxes that did count for something but his central point was government really builds a lot of what you needed. well that was the argument that charles beard made. he said, you know, businesspeople talk about rugged individualism but he said, in fact, they want a lot of government help, and beard makes quite a list of 15 or 20 things that businesspeople wanted

bridges and canals and railroads and so forth in order to make their business withs work. so he calls it the myth of rugged individualism. another famous progressive john dewey education philosopher than anything else called it ragged individualism and he said thank goodness you know we've now reached the end of the frontier, the end of the west. the move through the west -- because we can finally get rid of this ragged individualism which has really been sort of a curse on our society. now, in that same time frame, rugged individualism had some defenders. and ironically, the person who coined the term was herbert hoover, i think in a way if you read that essay i mentioned -- about the frontier thesis by frederick jackson turner he should have named it and he described it in great detail and didn't stick landing and get that actual colorful phrase. and so it was left at herbert hoover in 192 in a campaign

speech to call the american system as he said a system of rugged individualism. and this was important to hoover because if you remember your history, hoover had spent most of his career up to that point as a mining engineer and various countries around the world. and especially during after world war i he led major food relief efforts in europe especially in belgium herbert hoover is on national he not a hero in this country particularly but national hero in belgium because he saved them really from starvation. and so when hoover came back from europe, he said, boy i'm really glad to be back in america because over in europe -- they're taking on all of the various forms of toal i cannism and they're becoming socialists they're becoming fascist all of these collectivist total yaren ideas and glad to be back in america with a america system of

rugged individualism and then he would always add he would say now this is not a fair, dell takes a hindmost kind of individualism because what we also have in this country herbert hoover qowld say is -- the quality of opportunity. people have an opportunity to enjoy their individualism and so herbert hoover is within who coined expression rugged individualism -- and as i said for him it was accompanied by -- equality of opportunity. well, then the new deal franklin roosevelt new deal which he previewed at the commonwealth club became i would say a near death experience for rugged individualism. because roosevelt clearly felt that part of the problem and indeed part of the economic problem he thought that was causing the great depression was rugged individualism where businesspeople he called them the tightness, the economic titans on wall street and in new york who would run the

businesses out of their own selfishness, but would not be mindful of other people. it -- who needed to be taken care of in the economic system. and so herbert hoover would say when rose vement and hoover ran for president in 19 3-2 hoor said this is not a contest between two men but a contest between two philosophies of governments because roosevelt wants to move away from individualism what had hoover called american system and he wants different system a new deal is very different kind of system. and the american system -- versus the new deal as i said, the new deal was about expert administrators, more central government planning. emergency measures, government growth, all of this was part of the new deal that roosevelt would run belong and the way gordon and i characterize it, caricature if we were better artists is the forgotten man and

the rugged individual. those are two sort of cartoon characters that sort of captured this debate between roosevelt and hoover so you have -- what we think of as rugged individual on the the left. herbert hoofer american system and we have roosevelt's forgotten man here on the right. and a roosevelt basically would say -- we need to replace the rugged individual with the forgotten man as the focus of government policy. and, in fact, his secretary of interior harold said we have turned our backs for all time on rugged individualism soicky said it is dead we're turning our backs on it. we're now focusing on the forgotten man -- as a the focus for a policy. so really gordon and i argue a second first book and second called new deal in modern conservatism we argue that the new deal is really the paradigm for american, domestic and economic policy today, 80 years

later. we with live under the new deal. it was expanded by president johnson in great society and expanded again by president obama with health care. but it is basically the new deal system that franklin roosevelt put in place. interestingly although in the 1920s, you have a series of presidents who tried to roll back the government growth caused by world war i. we might have expected the same thing to happen after world war ii in the new deal but it did not. eisenhower did not roll back the new deal measures. and other presidents began to build and grow on it and o.c. the growth of the administrative state is sort of now a given. that's what we live with today. so we talk in the book in moving to modern times about two modern, political revolutions. the great society revolution, and the reagan revolution, and

interestingly i'll just tell this one anecdote about the great society. lbj great society where if possible it was said hetted to out roosevelt roosevelt. roosevelt was his mentor, and he was such an effusive character one time he stopped at a campaign -- stop and actually he wasn't supposed to stop and speak but he was in a motorcade and konts contain himself and reached down and picked up a bull horn and he said in this campaign we're for a lot of things and we're against mighty few that's kind of a summary of lbj in the great society he wanted to attack poverty. wewehe wanted to attack, improve education and a improve the cities he wanted to improve rural areas he wanted government very actively improving our great society in every possible way. but -- when he made the changes that he did to health care for seniors, medicare, medicaid, he nevertheless left the left room at the table if you will --

for rugged individualism. and so under lbj's health care, he added a safety net if you will medicare and medicaid for seniors who would immediate it. but for others, he said you know if you want to keep your own health insurance, if your employer provides health insurance, if you want to take care of your own -- you can still do that. but we will create a health care safety net for those who are not rugged and able to do that for themselves. and actually we hold that up in our book as a bit of a model -- we wouldn't there be room at the table for both the forgotten man and the rugged individual wouldn't we want to leave room at the policy table in america for both of these important icons of our history? and as i say even lbj in his -- fusive did that. and then reagan revolution, really did a lot for rugged individualism rhetorically. but it didn't really turn out to

turn back government as a much i think as reagan might have liked. but he did rhetorically resign the role of government in our lives. you know he famously said -- that government is not the solution to our problems. government is our problem. and he did carry out some very significant tax reforms. he did move policy and money from the federal government to state governments in many ways. but as i said it was really in some ways more of a rhetorical victory than a policy victory and then we also have philosophical debates particularly in the realm of economics. and i'm going to skip forward to -- this debate today. the economists are still debating rugged individualism versus the forgotten man today and today's version of it you will -- i skipped over milton friedman and michael harrington and others in the 60s and 70s. but the debate today is really

led by thomas, and his capital in the 21st century income inequality which president obama called the challenge of our time. and -- and one with of the things that we think happened in our society today is as thomas sowell another hoover fellow said if his book intellectual in society what happens today is that intellectuals come up on a problem that they write about or talk about and then policy people sort of grab ahold of that and try to find and implement policy solutionings. al gore and climate change would be classic example where al gore developed the scientists had already developed agenda and wents on the roads talking about it, became both domestic, international policy and that's happening today in the economic side thomas and capital income inequality is becoming kind of the latest version of should we

do away with rugged individualism and move toward much more of a collective set of ideasesome in so he argues it's a pretty wold book if you've not read it. maybe a little thicker than you would want to tackle but he says safety nets aren't the solution. more education is not the solution for the forgotten man. we have to have income redistribution are he argues. and he said really the only fair distributor of money is the federal government. e he arguments federal government should be spepgding 50% of our gross domestic product rather than 25 to 30% now spends. so it is a pretty radical set of social ideas saying in fairness session not enough. safety nets are not enough. we need to redistribute money and the federal government needs more control of that. the second critique of rugged

individualism i previewed for you it come trs realm of sociology and these two books capture it, habits of the heart, by robert bella and severalful his colleagues and bowling alone by robert putnam. and they basically argue that -- what we had already feared that what toqueville said when he wrote in the 1800s is that individualism could become selfishness in america. people could just withdraw from civic life and just be content and happy in their own careers and in their own lives. and they both argue that that's really what's happening. that people are bowling alone if you will that bowling leagues and other form of civic participation are sort of going away. and that needs to be readdressed. my own view would be that -- we point this out in our book that really there's plepght plenty of evidence to the con there's plenty of evidence that america is still the most --

philanthropic and generous country in the world. it is still the country that generates more churches, nonprofits, social organizations than any country. so i'm not sure it is right to say perhaps some of the old form of civic engagement have gone away. i don't belong to a bowling league -- admittedly. but i belong to some other things and i participate in other things so maybe that the tomorrow of sirveg engagement has changed rather than gone away. francis who is now a -- stanford as well, says i think makes it an interesting observation says american might be anti-status, by they aren't really selfish. and so it may be that americans don't really like the government telling them what to do with their time and their money -- but they're not really selfish they're pretty generous with their time and their money. so this is a bit of a -- a bit of philosophical debate

from the sociology side and policy debates today. one of -- that is still goes on about obamacare. and you know, the tough thing about obamacare is, the elimination of individual choice. and it was really based entirely on the forgotten man. there was no room left for the rugged individual. i remember when both of my sons neither of whom is terribly political each called me up and they said dad, our health insurance was declared illegal. i said well that's interesting boys why is it illegal? it doesn't have pregnant care but we're not planning to get pregnant. well had is -- this is kind of lack of choice that you have. and here's a case of individualism is losing out if you will in the policy realm. so we closed our book with some hope for the the future i guess it's probably good to have some hope.

i remember a bunch i lived in l.a. for 25 years and i remember a bumper sticker on 405 freeway in large letters there is no hope and then below that in smaller letters but i could be wrong. so maybe that's the message had i have for you here it's seeming hopeless but maybe i'm wrong and maybe there's hope here so we close our book with reasons to be pessimistic about individualism and some reasons to be opts mystic. and so in terms of pessimism, certainly the political climate doesn't seem to be very hopeful to individualism. it seems to us that individual liberty has become a bit of an abstraction especially to young people they don't really see how it is meaningful to them unless their health insurance is declared illegal because males need pregnancy coverage incase mayor decides that you can't have a 16 ounce cup for your soda but buy two eight ounce cups there's examples like that

where individual liberty appears to be -- more pragmatic but practical and people, young people today individual liberty is a little bit of an abstraction. i think a further problem and i say this as a former college president -- i think a further reason to be pessimistic about individualism is sort of a coddling if you will of young people today. the so-called helicopter parent who are very real -- i have talked to a lot of them. and also on our college campus we see today that you know, the need for safe spaces, the need for -- to avoid microaggressions or o trigger words when one friend of mine and faculty said only thing i know about microaggression is create a microaggression that's how i deal with it. but that's not very successful. [laughter] so we're developing young people

who are pretty sensitive and pretty well taken care of, and the idea of individualism is not really much encouraged for them. reasons to be optimism to be optimistic excuse me. we think gore deny and i think that we are entering today some new frontiers that could be positive and helpful for rugged individualism and i'll talk about in further in just a moment. immigrants are pretty interested we find in rugged individualism. immigrants, i think, more than native born people have come to this country to start businesses and build a better life for their children. and so in the many of the immigrant communities we see people who are really -- engaged in and interested in the individualism that is offered here. of course, question will that arrive in the period but what

does donald trump mean for rug the individualism and i can say we're not sure -- [laughter] do you remember the very first tweet we have to not only study presidential addresses now question of to study presidential tweets. the president's first tweet was about -- was about the forgotten men and women he said. who have been heard and they won't be forgotten again. and his inaugural address was full of references again to the forgotten men and women. so i'm on the telephone quickly with coauthor is this franklin roosevelt forgotten man comeback to life, and we debated it and discussed it and we said, you know, we think it is something different this time. roosevelt's forgotten man were people that he thought had been forgotten by the economy and by the economic titans. that, that big business was running over people and people -- the common man if you will needed the power of the federal government to sort of check the power of big business.

and allow the forgotten man to have that sort of protection. we think actually trump's forgotten men and women are a little different. they're people that have been i think i believe forgotten by their own government or being run over or not being well protected an cared for by their own government. and so that's the forgotten man we think that donald trump is concerned about the forgotten man and a women who are not really being well cared for or well attended to by their -- by their own government what we don't know i would say is what trump solution to that would be. that is he intrelsed in more individualism or is he interested in more -- sort of big government collectivism but aimed more to protect those kind of people? and there's some evidence both ways we can talk about that in q and a and finally as i said we see a little hope to the the future because young people are living on very different frontiers if you will --

of individualism. which is sometimes can called network individualism. i have three children in 20s and 30s and they all spend more time on their own -- by themselves in their own rooms than i did. in my teenage years or at their present ages. interestingly, of course, even though they're by themselves in their own room they're connected to other people through the internght and apps and various tools that are at their disposal. so this life of network individualism at least it -- they seem to be more interested in individualism. the second kind of hopeful aspect of the new frontier we see is on the business side young people seem more interested in doing their own thing than in joining big new york company and working there for 50 years and retiring. so if you go down the street from my office to stan ported business school you meet young people today who are really

inspired to start their own business, to join a startup company, to do something on the social concern side with hair lives. with their lives very different from old business school aspirations you will to move to new york and join a big company or big -- investment firm. and so question see in both their social media lives and in their business lives some greater interest if you will in individualism. but we don't know how well that's going to translate to their political lives. as at the same time they say they want more individualism. we have these crazy polls saying that young people are interested more and more in socialism. and so there's a little disconnect it seems to me between their individualism lives and a the kind of political systems that protect that. and interest in socialism. again a topic we can take up in a moment. so at the end we say we actually turn to the bible -- revelation chapter 3 in verse 2 where the writer is addressing

some churches that are dying. and the author says that his advice to them is to awaken and strengthen what remains. so that's the conclusion of our book is we need to awaken to value of rugged individualism and piemed ways to strengthen it to identify these liberty moments when our liberty is being challenged, to guard the constitutional protections that checks and balances and so forth not to do away with them. we especially think we need more civic education today, i mean, when young people don't know who their senator is, and they think judge judy is on the supreme court you know on and on we can go, clearly if we're going to have -- a system of individualism that protects the republican we need more civic education. but at the end of the day will government really change? i mean business has changed. social groups, civic groups have deinvolved into more nimble networks kinds of businesses and

social groups will government really change? it is hard to see that. it is hard to see the government deinvolving into something smaller and more nimble at the end of the day we have a modest plea. and that is -- doesn't rugged individualism at least deserve a seat at the policy table? i'm in favor of a safety net. herbert hoover was in favor of equality of opportunity. we all have greaments on how that's carried out. so i'm not arguing here that we shouldn't have safety nets. i'm just arguing that we should also have opportunities for rugged individuals that they would, policy would also take them into account? and not be simply federalizing everything sort of in favor if you will of the forgotten man. needless i could say nothing worse than an author talking about his own book. i remember the essay that the third grader asked to write on the subject of souk are socratee

thought he could. sentence number one he was a philosopher. he talked a lot. they poisoned him, and so i think it is always good to remember that. if you're -- [laughter] if you're the public speaker it is possible to go on too long but we saved ample opportunity for questions or comments and george i think has suggested how we might carry that out. >> i like to remind our audience online and on radio they're listening to david, of research herbert institute talked about ideas in the book. one cultural thing america renews this myth over and over again about rugged individualism and ideas, and in the early 60s john kennedy called it the new frontier and he mentioned we have to, you know, reenforce this rugged -- equality of opportunity element. didn't have as much time to do work on that and then lyndon johnson took over.

but the hollywood must have taken up on that imagery because movie how the west was won came out with big stars that was really -- a way of mythologizing the whole takeover an i have an interesting experience with that because i was a ten-year-old boy and went down to houston, texas, for a conference and showed this on a cinema a huge, everything in houston was huge. and there's this scene -- maybe 20, 30 minutes in with jimmy stewart that there's the robbers and jiminy stewart takes -- a barrel of gunpowder and lows it into the fire and all explodes. so at that scene, the barrel is thrown into the fire -- there's a huge explosion and the entire screen goes blank. turned out that lightning struck the building right at the moment that that scene was. so the whole audience was of about 1,000 people. that's a dramatic took them an hour to put it back together again. [laughter] but --

i thought it was very interesting that missiles in that film and the westerns and everything and then this switch, of course, by the end of the 60s and early 70s of all of the movies with that, like little big man and so on and so forth and hollywood switch and change and said we can't have the rugged individuals because it was a little too much. >> no, i think it's very true that -- rugged individualism is most encouraged and most hospitable with fron tears but the west is not only frontier so i think you're right john kennedy pointed to space as one example of a new frontier and i just saw recently that movie hidden figures about, you know, some rugged individual ares who worked hard to make all of that sort of work -- in the new idea thought they have a new ibm and they have to call for rugged individual to

get in there and do this by hand to make sure it pointed out. as i mentioned we think that social media presents some new frontiers for young people, and the new world of work if you will is kind of a new frontier so i think the notion that individualism is encouraged and nurtured by new frontier is absolute right but they don't have to be the myth of the west but other frontiers. >> i like your idea seat at the table so i have another question for youing individualism. clearly individualism is always a minority position. because you're taking it -- so what do you think a different parts of american history what percentage of the american population prefer rugged individualism to being taken care of? because as a society, with and a democracy in majority democracy one would, you know, whether the majority want and of course we have to protect against majority but in general, what would you think even at the height of rugged individual what diewngt percentage of people that engaged in it were?

>> that's -- yoim that's a good and hard question. i would say that -- when you survey people historically say on economic side, that poorer people nevertheless have been in favor of capitalism because they see the opportunity even if it is not their present reality they don't want to close off the opportunity that they might benefit from that kind of system. so there's plenty of evidence that people really like the freedom of opportunity if you will. that you have in this system like -- the system of rugged individualism. on the other hand, what we're experiencing right now i think in our society is once you have given people more than a safety net if you will will, you've given people a kind of guarantee of something like health care, then their opinion begins to change. obamacare was unpopular, very unpopular until recently when it

appeared that it might go away so it's a hard debate and it's i think it is still a very current debate today. but as i said i think there's often a middle ground where you can create a safety net and you can also leave the opportunity. we argue in our book that the individual mandate for example, and obamacare wasn't they is to make it work and has been argued -- and, in fact, there were it has been eaten up by exception such that it hasn't worked as intended. so it probably wasn't really necessary and in effect to have the individual man dit and to have in a sense federalized health care. so again, i think that's our plea is can we find ways to make policy that addresses both the forgotten man and the rugged individual. >> take that point of view it is very interesting that you say that history of the 20th century for how this all developed -- it seems to me a little bit -- that the communism in states but

especially the communism had in russia, soviet union, was a competitor for the united states. and freedom right capitollism especially during the depression and the fear of it actually was what melded this sort of welfare for state cap lism that seems to be a more stable thing which is combination of the two ideas. right, because it takes care of different parts of the society and different ways basically. >> no i think again i think to me that is an accurate read of history and it is constantly finding the right balance to me. in my view we live in sort of a pendular society and things swing back a bit to the right are. elections are corrective mechanisms constitution protections, supreme court decisions, even roosevelt faced some were stopped as going too far and back to the drawing board so we have these correctives as you say that sort

of keep a blended system working in a sense. >> so who would like to ask the first question? [inaudible conversations] like to ask a question you can line up behind this foal low here. >> thank you for the talk so i have two quick questions. so the first is -- so you talk a lot about -- how equality of opportunity and part of the system where rugged individualism exist and for it to thrive. can you talk a bit about why there's such an inequality of actual outcomes in our society so -- is it a problem that rugged individualism has gone too far that creates sort of had this -- inequality in outcome where particularly minorities or, you know, people who are -- you know socioeconomically

challenged poor essentially aren't able to, you know, rise in social status and in incomes? and then the second question is about -- what type of welfare system you would design to essentially have principles of individualism, you know, deeply, deeply integrate into that welfare system. you talk a little bit about how stanford students are really excited to, you know, join this new startup economy, but as you know you know a lot of people have been left out in this economy. we have labor force participation rates that are dismal right now. you know, particularly uneducated people are piengdzing they're losing their jobs and spending more time playing video games stuff like that. eventually you know if we want these people to have a decent quality of life there's going to have to be some welfare system in place. i agree that the current sort of -- disability welfare through disability is not working for these people, so i guess what

had, what is the type of welfare system that we could design that would adhere to principles but also you know allow an increasing number of unemployed and potentially unemployable people to thrive or to have a good life. >> wow -- if i could answer that -- then i should be president -- >> you're addressing your first question i will say that i think maybe -- in the inequality debate which we're having these days that were missing a couple three key points, that the debate is become a little distorted if i may say. i remember taking religion class at stanford and the professor said very memorably to me hair city is not truth but overemphasis on one part of the truth so i think there's hair

city that needs to be clarified. one is difficult to clarify that is to me really important -- data qowld not be so much the inequality of income if you will -- but the income mobility scale and historically many this country, the income mobility possibilities have been very high. i mean, people could go from the bottom to top and draw from the top to the third. there's been a lot of fluidity. one of the problems with bringing that to the debate is those long-term studies income mobility studies basically ten year studies. and the last one has been a while. it showed that income mobility was still pretty good. but it was a little bit dated. so i think to really evaluate what we're talking about it would be good to understand more. because ikdz get more behind income mobility behind outcome might same kind of income or carling.

the second part of the debate it that i think that is disorder or lost is -- as pikety and others have said in their books it is a real book to read is problem is not even really at the 1% level but the upper 1% of the 1% that has really distorted if you will -- income inequality. it's the entrepreneurs, the bill gates steve jobs, hollywood stars it is the rock stars, it's the baseball and basketball stars. these are the incomes that have really distorted the income inequality charts. and, of course, i mean, addressing that is problematic. i doubt that we want steve jobs to be taxed so highly that he felt like he had to start apple in some other country or o something. so again that's a part of the debate that i think we don't have enough information about. so even -- i first loved to see the income inequality debate a little is

sharper and clearer and focus on things that we can really do. now, you're saying questions, of course, even harder if i were the -- of welfare what would i do and i'm not an expert on welfare. this is more of a book of political philosophy if you will than -- welfare policy possibly. i would say that -- in general and i think this addresses both the people who have been in poverty for a long time and it addresses the newer members of this frustrated economic class that came out and voted, you know, surprised everybody and voted for trump in the rust belt in upper midwest and so forth and that is -- education is really, i think, a key issue and by that i don't just mean the quality of k-12 public education although that is part of it. and even though i tend to be more conservative i'm not in favor of the test iting and the

accountable in all of those kind of changes we made to our education system few be we also don't have the right incentive for retraining people pop people in rust belt places they would be happy to work in startup but they need retraining and we actually at the moment have a tax system that desense and investment in education to me that's a more promising approach than to others that we have. but it's a tough question. i don't claim to have all of the answers to that, certainly. yes, sir. >> thank you so much for talk. i'm from south korea and that i always have a question that is -- rugged individualism you said like american ideology does it work in other krpghts? countries buzz like i used to train with u.s. marines and, you know, they're very republican -- and they keep saying you know, you know it is working

because -- but i feel like when i look at asia, for example, japan still has king and queen. south carry is becoming more socialism country because of the election that we had two weeks ago, and i believe that it's not quite working in other krpght and what do you think about that? >> no, i would say that -- i would say someone said about something else it is not so much that it has been tried and failed but it hasn't been tried a lot in other krpghts country as you say declaration of independence and constitution, for people to have individual liberties that are rugged individualism is to have enough a free market system where if you felt like you started a business or you worked hard so that your son or o daughter could have a different kind of economic life and career, that there could be some payoff from that, and then

others argued also to have the land available at least in the -- in the incubation period. one of the things that i think is an interesting question to study is, for a while we were trying to promote democracy in other countries. and it sort of bill a question of well how could you like build a green house that would let democracy sprout and grow faster well it is hard to do if you go into a country landlocked with a powerful and economic system, there's not a lot there to water. and to nurture and to grow. so i'm not aware of other countries that have had this success with this that we have. and, of course, the warning we're trying to give is kind of the herbert hoover warning you know do how much of that system do we want to undo in the name of solving some other problem? and can we keep enough of that system at the table so that this could be nurtured and live as well as take care of other social needs that we have.

>> australia experienced closer to ours or -- a lot of land -- >> yeah, i mean, certainly you have all i know are myths about australia certainly you have myths of people living more of that kind of life. but i -- from a government point of view i don't know enough to really give a good answer to that question i'm afraid. [inaudible conversations] yeah, i just i don't know enough about australia to give an a intelligent answer. >> can i ask you quickly follow-up so i guess what i was trying to ask with my first question about inequality of outcomes was more along lines of what you were talking about which was able to essentially mobility right. >> right. >> so what i'm wondering is, is the reason why and this might be a perception that i have, but i don't believe it is just perception that that mobility is extremely low among particularly like african-american, poor communities is this because of

an excess of rugged individualism where essentially the certain group has coopted government power to set up a system where they're able to thrive, or is this story more of -- some sort of of like ine efficient, you know, government explanation like, what i'm wondering is like is there too much rugged individualism sometimes and can it, you know, create a system where you know, once powerful have a lot of money they can afford, you know, the lobbyist, x, y, and z and power becomes concentrated you know, is there a need for every once in a while for rugged individualist to be cuts down to size that everyone in, you know, so that everyone can -- have that opportunity again? >> yeah, i think i would say that answer is yes. that in any kind of mixed system if you will, or hybrid system you can have hairys so problem

with poverty an inequality as i said if it is correct that the problem is at the very top sort of superwealthy, that's not really stopping us from doing things in other places. it's not draining you know apples not draining money from the inner city as a general rule that kind of people who can afford to go to the warrior game tonight are probably not and pay steph curry carling are not draining money out of the inner city. i think it is probably more that we haven't come up with solutions to poverty and i would acknowledge i think herbert hoover said as american we have equality of opportunity. i would say equality of opportunity is tougher to get now. than it was in herbert hoover's day, and so if, you know, if i

wanted to boost rugged individualism i think i would also have to work with on equality of opportunity for that. hybrid to work -- i think i'm sphoj for that. yes. >> david, either from personal experience or for the book can you address whether you've seen any correlation or even anti-correlation between maybe the strength of organized religion in the u.s. and rugged individualism from the one hand it would seem like religion encourages more interdependence and community maybe hypothetical to rugged individualism but first we look at history might seem that when organized religion is christianity was strongest in the u.s. that's when rugged individualism thrive so any correlation at all or thoughts there. >> certainly we argue in the book that one of the roots, if you will, or part of the dna of rugged individualism that was planted in this country was -- religion, specifically christianity and then that time

specifically a certain is form of protestant christianity. this was part of the dna what was planted in this country. so a key part as we point out in the book of that is, man's individual accountability to god. that sure you can elect or o consent to join a church. we're not going to have state churches here that everybody has to join or everybody has to follow. but in america, you had freedom of religion. you could join a church by your own consent or not. if you join by your own con sent you accept some community activity presumably but again that's your own choice, your own o decision. but ultimately, a religion in america has been more about -- man or woman's's individual accountability to god so that's a strengthening of individualism and has generally been a good thing and -- maybe one of our challenges today.

>> hi, i have actually 18 questions to ask you. >> is our time about up, george? >> used to be spoiled of a student of dr. davenport so i could ask questions for an hour so i guess what would be a fun question ask is how do you see the psychological elements of rugged individualism assisting in the turmoil that we're experiencing in washington right now? where we have kind of that individualistic president who is not really being accountable to the other checks and balances that we've created. our population -- who is not necessarily in taser favor of a lot of policy it is may be a good time to tap into that ideal. if it's able to blend with a lot of the progressive ideals around obamacare as the example you give was very good in that --

did we need to have it as a mandated policy and probably i would imagine ors may have left that out. but at the same time, it should probably be illegal for -- insurance companyies to deny pregnancy care to women and you know there's -- there's another half to the whole so individualism could still exist and be helpful today. >> i -- we are already at work on our third book, and as a working title of that book is -- how did public policy become war and not deliberation? and that's how we describe what's going on many washington it has become about winning and it has become about war. and our current president i think is -- encouraging a that further. i would a also say congress has not been helpful it takes a powder whenever there's big things to be done. and i was working in d.c. a couple of years ago when it looked leak we were finally

going to have a debate in congress about what we should do in syria. i thought okay finally we're going to, you know, as a country we're going to come and deliberate about this. and what did congress do declare an a early holiday -- to go home in campaign so that they wouldn't have to take any hard votes before the election. and one of the congressman said -- in effect to the president he said, just bomb the place and tell us about it later. you know, this is our system of checks and balances now. so -- i agree with you checks and balances system has been broken for a long time. and i think to restore any part of our government question need to be strengthening that, and i would love to see congress everyone a republican congress stand up to say no to the president. he has bad ideas, and then sit down to work out some better ideas. ...

thank you very much. [applause] >> you got the idea of equality

and opportunity verses equality of outcome and in the whole debate. mark twain said this would be discussed in the 19th century and if you equalize all the money across all the people with three years should be back in the same hands as it was before and i think we have seen not with many systems of communism. it still ends up in the hands of the people who control everything. and i have personal experience. i came up in a very large family. at i have 11 brothers and sisters and my parents were very , trying to make it equal all the time. even to the point where we guide green grapes they would pick out 10 in each and we be at 10 but the outcome of course is completely different across-the-board as adults. it's all based on personality and other things. you can figure out how to do the incentives just for economic reasons but you also add in all the personalities and say

everybody has $100. everyone does different things with it. it's a very difficult subject. very nicely addressed with the basic ideas are struggling between here and there so thank you very much for your book and for your talk. it's the 115th year of enlightened discussion. thank you very much. [applause] [inaudible conversations]