albert about the carl study center at the numbers the of oklahoma, which houses the papers of 58 former members of congress. >> this document is a memo labeled personal and confidential, and it lays out what albert should do if he becomes president. it says, step one, take the oath of office, step two, physically take over the office. step three, resigned from the house. this is something out would have had to do if he moved to the presidency. it would only be temporarily. this is an interesting piece of history many people do not know about. we think about nixon and impeachment, but not the other things that could have happened during that time. >> watch our cities tour on

saturday at noon eastern and sunday at 2:00 p.m. on american history tv on c-span3. >> "washington journal" continues. host: we are back. today,ht on magazines and we are focusing on the atlantic magazine piece written by our guest robert atkinson, a contributor. is big business really that bad? why did you ask that question? guest: most people now seem to have that interview. if you want to demonize something today, you put the word big in front of it. if something is big, we see it as that, not treating to -- bad, not contributing to society. big businesses actually

contribute more to the economy. we have a problem by demonizing big businesses. we have policies that favor and exempt small companies from ulcerative things, giving them lower taxes, tougher enforcement on large companies. that leads to slow economic jobs, lesser competitiveness. we need size neutrality. industrialend favorability based on size. host: big is beautiful, debunking the myths on big business. how prevalent is this viewpoint? when did it change? guest: for a long time, politicians praised small businesses because it is a good sound bite. over the last decade, what you have seen is this increasing campaign, particularly among

some progressives who appear to want a world of small companies, neighborhood owned shops. it started with demonizing companies like walmart, and now we are on to amazon. one of the problems is it overlooks all the contributions big companies make. they pay 54% higher wages, employ a higher share of women, minorities, veterans. they spend a lot more money protecting the environment. they lay their workers off less. they injure their workers less. progressivese that should care about him big companies outperform -- about, the company's outperform small companies. host: where did you get those numbers? guest: most of the numbers come from the government. the government does a pretty good job of reporting how firms

perform based on their size. host: what do you say to viewers that don't trust the government's statistics? guest: if you don't trust the government's statistics, you don't trust anything. they do an excellent job of collecting and reporting that data. that scholarse and advocates now playing a variety of ills from stagnant wages to growing income inequality on the domination of markets by large firms, channeling antique figures such as louis brandeis and williams jennings bryan, claiming that monopolization is rampant and antitrust enforcement is the only cure. where are these people getting their statistics? guest: they are getting their statistics from the same place i am getting my statistics, but as

the famous senator from new york can, weekend -- you disagree on your opinion, but we should be able to agree on the facts. what they are largely doing is cherry picking the facts. let's look at him, --income inequality. have firms and large firms no difference in income inequality. when you look at wage growth, that is pretty obvious, large companies pay 54% higher wages. the question of concentration, if we really think there has been monopolization of the economy, a few big firms dominating everything, profits should be going through the roof. right now, profit rates are lower for corporations than they were in the 1960's. small company profits have grown

faster over the last 15 years. big company profits are lower than smoke of the profits. this is no evidence to myth that monopolization. tot: let's ask our viewers call in. sis big beautiful? republicans (202) 748-8001. democrats (202) 748-8000. independents (202) 748-8002. you also write that the small is beautiful consensus is wrong, but we should not replace it with an equally some minded orthodoxy in favor of big business. a dynamic economy requires interaction of firms of all sizes. small firms play legitimate if diminished roles today. absolutely.

we are not saying small l asanies are not as usefu large compass, but we are saying it is time to move to size neutrality. to demonize them just because they are big, which is what justice brandeis did in the early part of the century and what a lot of folks are doing today, saying amazon is big, therefore they are bad, that is a core mistake. conservatives and republicans who want to have free markets, we should have an economy and policies that do not put the thumb on the scale based on size. host: what is your argument for those that believe innovation comes from the steve jobs in his garage? when you really look at the evidence now, you don't see that.

there are really important small firms better like steve jobs, they get in their garage and grow. when you look at apple technology, steve jobs was an incredible innovator. a lot of the technology they initially used was developed by the corporations like xerox. more r&d.anies do evidence shows they are little innovative than small companies. big companies are pretty darn innovative. amazon, opinion on while amazon is not a monopoly in the same sense as google and facebook, the percent of retail spending it has taken over has no end in sight and will not without careful regulation. there is no question that this enormous company is in a position to undermine the cost

structures of thousands of competing businesses. your reaction? guest: i hope so. since when did america become a world where we are saying the marketplace should be protected from competition? we could have the same conversation 10 or 15 years ago, and instead of saying amazon, we could say walmart. everybody believed walmart was going to dominate and kill most retailers. today it is walmart that is on their heels because of the competition. we should be looking at this in the long run. right now, people get wonderful likeits from the company amazon. they're getting lower prices and convenience. what is wrong with that? what we look at with the new anti-monopolists are saying, they will say we cannot go after

a company like amazon because of prices and simmer wellness. -- consumer wellness. it is clearly in the interest of consumers. let's move on. host: but? guest: they don't want to move on because they don't want an economy where there are large corporations. they want to economy were there are local shops and stores. if you want to spend your money that way, feel free. we should let consumers make those fundamental choices. first callers our in pennsylvania. republican. what do you think? caller: i am so glad he mentioned the market in all of this facebook -- he mentioned walmart. in all of this facebook brouhaha, how is that any different from walmart tracking our purchases?

it has been going on for years i don't understand how facebook knowing what we're doing is a big deal. thank you. guest: absolutely. walmarthink about that or other retailers use data, they use that sell and stop the kinds of products -- stock the kinds of products that u.s. consumers want. the same thing with facebook and google. big companies have the most incentive to do the right thing. facebook right now because of is scrutiny they are under, they're making changes. small companies never get under the pressure of public scrutiny and congressional hearings. they do whatever they want.

one of the great things about large is they not only have to fight with rules and regulations as they have to comply with the court as well. host: they will have to face the public court as you say when mark zuckerberg testifies on capitol hill. the first is on tuesday at 2:15. we will have coverage on that on c-span3 or c-span.org. on wednesday, he will go over to the house side of the house energy and commerce committee at 10:00 a.m. eastern time. coverage on c-span3, c-span.org, and the c-span radio app. let's go to jay, a democrat. hi. caller: good morning. i believe the problem with big business now is that what has

changed is the people at the top are taking all the profit. we like to say these great companies are not making money. i don't think that is a problem i think -- problem. i think the problem is all the well in the company is speaking wealth in the company is being given to a small view. host: let's take that point. guest: i think it is a good point. the growth of income inequality not just to the top, but the toth of 1% is not just going corporate ceos. 25 of the richest financial managers made more money than the largest 500 ceos

mind. -- combined. there is a lot of income equality. a lot of it is on wall street and in finance and not as much in big corporations. paying moreions are to their ceos from but they are also paying more to their workers. their front-line workers, their blue-collar workers that work on the factory floor, they are making anymore salary and benefits than similar work as smaller companies -- workers in smaller companies. host: what is the justification for the ceo salary in the parachutend a golden if the company is failing? guest: very little. salariesefend ceo

where the ceo drives the company into the ground and then gets fired and makes seeing amounts of money. lear in thec book went to u.s. companies have to do to regain trust? they had done things that have led people like the last caller to be skeptical. they are still a force for progress. host: what do they have to do to regain trust? guest: i think if you look at the recent scandal at wells fargo, the corporate minute he should have been much more outspoken in saying this is not represent us. we don't agree with this. we decry it. instead of sitting on the sidelines and letting congress attack wells fargo, the corporate community needs to police their own and say these

are not the right standards for being a corporation in america. another step to take would be stop apologizing for being big. sayt of corporations will we help small businesses. sure, but stop putting your light under the bushel basket. you are doing a lot of important things for america. you are more competitive, export more, do more r&d, treat your workers better. int: let's go to mike connecticut, independent. what do you think? caller: good morning. as soon as i heard him say if you don't believe government statistics, you don't believe anything. most of america or a lot of america don't believe anything i guess. i would like to address big corporations. they are not american

corporations. they are international corporations. they are crushing the middle class. this is all part of a new world order to bring the world under one corporation flag. how can you sit there and say big corporations are helping the people? the jobs are out of the country, they are international corporations. host: thank you. guest: an interesting point, but what we have to remember is in the 1950's is a lot of corporations were state corporations. gm was a michigan corporation. what happened after 1952 is they became national corporations. they moved jobs to the southern and western states. people said, these corporations no longer have loyalty to their home state. that was the new reality. we are living in a globalized world.

a lot of corporations are globalized. we can complain about that, but that is the reality. these corporations have to be global to survive. if they decided not to do that, chinese corporations would dominate our economy. we need to put in place policies that give them the right incentives to invest more in america. the tax reform bill did some of that. we need to do more. we need to do a better job of aligning corporate interests with american interests. corporations and say we don't like them because they are not patriotic enough, we will lose competitiveness. we will end up with a lot lower wages. we will end up with a lot worse jobs. robert, anois, democrat. you are on the air. caller: i am on the republican line, greta.

thank you, c-span. i am very biased. i understand days when it leans liberal. athink president trump is great president this time. applaud him for sending troops to the mexican border. i wish the media with the come along for 72 hours. his poll numbers would soar. the senses of 2010 was not politicize. -- census of 2010 was not politicized. the census of population is not my area of expertise. business is. if we cannot trust the statistics from the government

on business, we really have problems. you can choose which data points you want to use, the years, but the data itself is a very important part of our economy. in newet's hear from don mexico, independent. caller: good morning. alive 2008, you would be aware that the big banks took us into the greatest recession since the great depression. has to what bigness offer. you mentioned wells fargo. wells fargo is defrauding the american public. if big is wonderful, i don't want it. nott: first of all, we are defending every single large corporation. we're talking about averages.

on average, large corporations do a better job of complying with the laws and expectations we had as a society -- have as a society. my point with wells fargo was not to defend them. it was if anything to attack them. if we look at this mythology that the financial crisis was canadiansthe banks, have much larger banks as a share of their economy. they did not have the same problem. what was different? they had regulation. the government was turning their back on what they needed to do. a lot of this was caused by small banks and small loan originators peddling junk that the big banks dealt with. the point is not all big firms are good or small firms are bad,

we need legislation that applies to all firms. jim, question or comment? caller: i think the reason a lot of people don't like the big corporations is mainly because of the lobbyists. the voters think it diminishes the importance of their vote, that it does not count anymore because the politicians are paid for. host: mr. atkinson. caller: it is a good question -- guest: it is a good question. talk about that in the last chapter of the book. the window here, i can see the headquarters of the national realtors association. incredibly powerful lobbying organization. they are made of small companies. the national federation of independent businesses, the car

dealers, they are very powerful lobbies in washington that are small business associations. the problem is not that big companies are the ones with all the political power, the problem is we have too much political h companies. the real challenge is rich individuals that are able to bypass the rules and fund advocacy campaign strictly. it is the sheldon edelstein's of the world, the really rich behind the rich family steve bannon. host: robert mercer. guest: who are really corrupting our political process. host: george soros. guest: george soros on the left. why don't they get what they

want as much as you would expect? one of the things companies have been lobbying for is high skill immigration reform. it is not happening. why doesn't it happen? it is a political issue. voters don't want to do that. members respond to their voters. i think we overstate the power of big business. it is a lot more nuanced. host: michigan, glenn, independent. good morning. caller: i have a couple of remaining comments about the business.. big i wanted to bring up accountability and how much more difficult it is to hold a large corporation accountable as opposed to a smaller company. i will take the answer off the call. guest: thank you. when you look at the evidence on

regulations and whether it is osha, safety for workers, polluting the environment, whatever it may be, we have a system where congress has erected a vast array of laws that minimize the obligations small businesses have. if you have less than 15 workers, you can legally discriminate on the basis of gender and age. why would we accept that? i think it is almost the opposite. the valujetmber case, the tragedy 15 years ago where there was a plane crash over the everglades, the company that caused that was a small company that is legallyp put oxygen canisters on that plane.

when a big company does it,thing bad, we care about and that is a good thing. they oftentimes get punished and in theck market -- stock market. ,e do a good job with the media with the public, with the internet, we do a good job when big companies grow. we make it -- screw up. we make it painful for them. caller: talking about big retailers, it benefits us, we get lower prices. when you have six media giants control 90% of what we read, watch, and listen to, that can be dangerous. we fought so hard not to have a nuclear plant.

because of the money and politics, they went ahead and built it. now it is closing because it is leaking. it is just outrageous what these large companies can do because of the power and money behind them. that is my comments. i don't really have a question. host: thank you. guest: i am old enough to number one we had three networks. that was your choice. you did not have other choices. you had one newspaper in your local region. i think it is the opposite. i think we have an enormous diversity of voices. if you are liberal, you can go to msnbc. if you are conservative, you can go to fox. lots of choices. i think we have a lot more choices today and competition. we have so much competition that the news industry is actually hurting. many monopolies

actually exist? is it bad for one company to have a monopoly? is youa pure monopoly have 100% of the market or close to. we have very few. city may.n your the top four firms have less than 50% of market share. on average, the big four firms each have 12.5% of the market. beings nowhere near monopoly. some of the other industries, let's talk about airlines where we have four major airlines. one of the things we don't pay attention to is airline had one of the highest productivity growth rates over the last 20

years. they are fighting intensely for market share in to get productivity up. you still see intense competition. you not really see monopoly profits. industries that are concentrated, maybe they have a percentage or two points higher. instead of 9%, they may have 11% in some cases. i don't see that as a challenge. part of the reason i don't see it as a problem is the evidence, largeronomists, the firms on average are more productive because of economies of scale. we benefit from that. particularly the workers. host: let's go to oklahoma. jack, a republican. caller: hello. i would like to say a few things on big business. take walmart. people don't realize when walmart started out, they started out here in the