the impact on the future workforce with james. then, ty and brock benefiel on their podcast, the climate pod. c-span's washington journal starts now. ♪ host: good morning and welcome to washington journal. the cost of housing in the united states is skyrocketing. with houses and rental prices going up all around the country. the covid-19 pandemic, along with supply chains disruptions is making it worse. with the cost of land, labor and lumber, -- and the trend of moving out of metro areas and consolidating households because of covid-19 is ending, leading to a shortage

of affordable apartments and houses. our question to you this morning , is housing affordable in your community? we will open up special lines this morning. renters, we want to know what you are seeing out there. you can call (202) 748-8000. new homeowners, if you recently bought a house or condo, we want to know what your experience is like. your number is (202) 748-8001. if you are looking to buy a house or condo, we want to know what you are seeing in your community. your number is (202) 748-8002. if you don't fit in any of those categories but you want to talk about our topic, your number is (202) 748-8003. keep in mind, you can always text us at (202) 748-8003. we are always reading on social media, facebook and facebook.com , c-span -- facebook.com/c-span,

on twitter at c-span wj. we want to know what the housing market is like in your community. what are prices on houses right now? is rent getting out of control? we want to know what you see. before we start this conversation, let's see what the data says about the housing market of the united states. we will start with a story from bloomberg that sets the stage for our conversation. the bloomberg story says the u.s. housing market shifted into overdrive during the pandemic, with more than 6 million homes selling in 2020 one, despite skyrocketing prices in many cities. from miami, and 18.8% increase. in denver, 18.6 percent. phoenix, 32 -- 30.2%, it is a

national phenomenon. the median selling price for a home in november, $416,900 was nearly 25% more than it was in february of 2020. in the early weeks of 2022, there is no sign that cutthroat bidding and rising prices won't continue. the total inventory homes on the market dipped below 300,000 nationwide in early january. less than half of the inventory available before the pandemic. that is from bloomberg. that is what the housing market looks like right now. let's talk about what the rental market looks like. i know many of you out there rent instead of owning homes. what is the rental market like right now? there is a story on cnbc.com that talks about the rental market. here is what cnbc says. if you are a renter in a big city -- were a renter in a big city during 2020, chances were

you could land a sweet apartment deal, assuming you kept your job through the offset of the covid-19 pandemic. many people were leaving cities like new york and landlords were discounting apartments dramatically. now, that is reversed. many of the people who left are coming back. and those who moved in with their parents or other family members are looking for their own place to call home. by the end of 2021, the number of renter households increased by about 870,000, compared with 2020. the overall rental vacancy rate has dropped to the lowest levels since the mid-1980's. the rental market out there is also getting tight. a tight rental market means prices will be going up. there is conversation already going on in washington about what housing looks like right

now in the united states. here is joel griffith at a senate baking -- banking hearing, summarizing the rising cost of housing for homeowners and renters. >> families are feeling the impact of the steep rise in home prices, stranding -- spanning the pandemic. over the past year alone, prices are up close to 20%. residential property prices in the united states, adjusted for inflation, are now 2% below the all-time record levels of 2006. home prices are increasing far faster than families income growth. the home price to median income ratio is now -- despite low-interest rates, the mortgage payment hit 32 per -- 32.7% this fall, the highest

level since 2008. in a return of mortgaging even close to the historical average would increase borrowing by 50%. of course, renters -- apartment rental costs have jumped more than 15% nationwide, in numerous cities, not just on the coast. host: let's see what america says about housing, affordability in their own communities. let's start with joseph, who is calling from new york. joseph, good morning. caller: good morning. i just -- i just want to say that it is rough right now. host: you still there, joseph? caller: yes, i'm here. host: what would -- when you say it is kind of rough right now,

what do you mean? caller: i'm a single father, taking care of my daughter for 13 years. i lost my baby moms. i'm in the rescue house. i'm on the hud. it is getting rough. the pandemic -- i lost my job because of the pandemic. now, the landlords are starting -- they want their rent. i really don't know what to do. the hospital i was working at, there is a new virus out there now. host: were you able to get any government assistance during the pandemic to help you with your rent? caller: not really. they slowed down the rent a little bit because they knew we could not pay for it. they told us just to hold on. i've been trying to get to the government so i can get the landlord some money.

right now, i'm in a hotel right now because they are renovating the bathroom. i just lost my mom last year. i didn't have nowhere else to go. my sister had to put me in a hotel, me and my daughter. now, we have to go back. when us guys don't have no place to go, with the housing thing, it is getting rough out there. i know a lot of young folks that don't have nowhere to go and don't have nowhere to stay. older people too, they don't have nowhere to stay. host: what part of new york are you in? are you in brooklyn, manhattan, long island? where are you in new york? caller: newburgh, new york. host: how much would an apartment go for in newburgh? caller: you talking about a one bedroom apartment, you are

talking $1200 a month. that is just a one bedroom apartment. i'm not talking about the electricity or anything. a studio apartment over here, you will pay at least $700 a month and it is like a little closet. you don't have anywhere to put a tv or a microwave. landlords charge so much for a little space. host: let's go to mitchell who is calling from washington, d.c. mitchell, good morning. >> i'm looking at the background. i live close to the background of where you are, the southeast quadrant of the capitol building. i can see the building from here and two bedroom apartments here are almost $5,000. you have young educated people

sharing one bedroom apartments and couples sharing studios, anywhere from $2000 to $5,000 for that range. it is like the intense competition for the well educated, well-placed. as a landlord, everybody is going after the same group of people. that community was blighted 30 years ago. i think it is amazing. i also understand that there are not opportunities for many who came up in the same community, just having watched the developing. host: mitchell, are you a landlord or are you a renter? you said two bedrooms are around $5,000. what do you think one bedroom

would go for in washington, d.c., today? it depends -- caller: it depends. one bedroom apartments in the same place could go anywhere from $3500, $3000 and up in this particular location. host: let's go to duke, who is calling from stonington, maine. duke, good morning. caller: good morning. the housing problem here and all over the country is ridiculous. the prices are going through the ceiling. i don't know how families, especially young ones, can afford to have a place. i remember my grandmother telling me in the early 1970's when the waltons first came on, she said i'm not going to live to see it but i think you will and i know your kids will and i know your grandchildren will,

but it will take two to three families under one roof to keep one place going. i think that is where we are heading. i'm afraid with these prices and stuff, we will have another housing bust at some point down the line, where everybody will be so upside down. they will lose their places and they can't afford to live. host: do you own or rent in maine? caller: i own. host: what do you think the average price of a single-family home is where you live for the average price of a one bedroom apartment where you live? caller: i will say probably an apartment is somewhere between $1200 and $1500 a month. i will say the average house would probably sell for around 250,000 to 350 thousand dollars. somewhere in that area. host: do you think that is affordable for people in your community or are housing prices out of reach for most people? caller: i think they are out of

reach for quite a few. we are a fishing village here. there are so many rules and regulations and stuff. i think a lot of people will get out of it. i don't know what is going to happen. i am concerned for the whole coast of maine, because of the regulations and stuff and regulations -- and the cost is so high, everywhere. host: is that something you think government should be involved in? housing is a private industry. should government be involved in making housing affordable? caller: i don't know. i don't like the idea of government having their nose in the middle of everybody's business in the first place. that is a hard one to say. i don't know. host: i don't know is also a good answer. let's go to lanita, who is calling from fort payne,

alabama. good morning. caller: yes, good morning. how are you this morning? host: i'm fine. go ahead. caller: i have a short to lead up to my riddle -- rental party where i rent an apartment. first off, my husband passed away and i had no family left. i could not take care of the place. i moved into a senior living apartment complex. i started out and my rent was $278 an hour. -- $278. it went up to $331. i got taken off of disability and put on social security. i got a good raise. me and my rent jumped from 330 one dollars to $434. this is a senior living property. there is no -- there is no upkeep or change in things. on top of that, last week, i was

asked for a six month balance in my checking account. she wanted six months of balances from my checking account. to me, that is none of her business. rent should be where it stops. host: when you said she, who is the she? your landlord? caller: she is the manager of the apartment complex. host: ok. keep going. caller: a lady across the street does not have a checking account. she has a card and they put her money on the card. the same manager asked her for that card and her pin number, to that card. now, that is getting a little bit too into our business. she has no right to anybody's pen number to anything.

i pay with a check every month. she pays with her -- she goes to walmart and gets a money order with her check card. this landlord asked for her pen number. i don't know what that is all about. i don't understand it, yet. we are seniors. we are here to live out the rest of our lives, we hope. i think it is just -- the price of groceries, you have to stop and realize most of us senior citizens can't eat certain things like younger people can. therefore, we are having to pay more for what we need to eat. i was going to buy some cream of chicken soup yesterday. it went from $.98 to $1.18. that is a good jump for a can of soup. host: let's go to melinda, who

is calling from grafton, new hampshire. good morning. caller: good morning. i am with mountainside properties. i can give you a good perspective of what is going on in new hampshire. host: go ahead. caller: since the pandemic has started, it has been difficult for providers to find homes in the state. we are struggling with the inventory. sellers are making out good, unless they don't have a place to go to. guys -- gas prices are higher. the only thing i can see that could alleviate this problem is to have people build more homes. we need contractors out there, building more homes. that is basically it. that is how i see it. host: from your perspective, there are not enough homes available for the people who want to buy them and can afford

to buy them, or is it that there are not enough people out there who can afford to buy the homes? caller: what i see is that people who have money who can afford the higher priced homes that are anywhere from three inch of $50,000 and up, those homes are available. for the majority of people who can't afford that, they can't find a home for 150 to maybe $300,000. it is just not there. we definitely need more affordable housing and i'm sure throughout the whole nation. host: whose response ability is it to make affordable housing available? is it something the government should be doing? is that something the private industry should be doing? whose response ability is it to make sure that there are homes available that people can afford to buy? caller: maybe they can work together in conjunction.

the funding can come from the state or from federal funds. but somehow, this is something that can alleviate the problem with the lack of housing, if they can work together. i know that the contract -- contractors are extremely busy. even when we need repairs, people are having a hard time having an electrician come out to their homes because they are so busy. we need more contractors out there and know that building materials are expensive. in the long run, it should help a lot of people find affordable housing. host: from your perspective, who is to blame the situation we are in right now? whose fault is it? caller: i don't think it is anyone's fault. i think the pandemic through us. i don't think we were prepared for it. so, i just think it culminated. host: at the senate banking

hearing earlier, about homeownership, senator bob menendez asked about the racial homeowners gap in the united states. here is a piece of that conversation. >> there is a massive racial homeownership gap in this country, which is a serious problem. owning a home is a key to building intergenerational well and reducing racial wealth and inequality overall. according to the census bureau of data, the white homeownership rate is about 74.4%, compared to 43 .1% for african americans and 48 .4% for hispanics. so, miss martin, what are some of the barriers to minority homeownership and how do large commercial landlords mitigate or exacerbate those obstacles? >> i can respond to that. what we have discovered in northeast ohio is that lending

disparities are real. we are finding that the majority and minority of neighborhoods do not have equal access to credit. essentially, we still see redlining going on in those neighborhoods. we also see very disturbing trends where black borrowers, even high income black borrowers are having less of an opportunity of getting mortgage capital than moderate income white borrowers. so the research is startling. it is very clear, as stated in some of our areas, there is almost no opportunity for homeownership. it has become a completely investor dominated market. there are few to no mortgages

for parts of our community. >> these practices are often concentrated in low income and black and brown communities. the effect is that they are extracting wealth from these communities and to buy a home, you need wealth. you need to build up money to make your downpayments and stable income. these practices, because they put so much pressure on the families that live in these homes and are renting these homes, they feel like they are in a constant state of fiscal emergency. that is very difficult, under those situations to have the kind of stability that lends itself to the purchase of a home. host: let's see what some of our social media followers are saying about the issue of is housing affordable in your community? here is one post from facebook that says no. what is difficult is the lack of available housing. there are few apartments and homes available so the prices are going up and the competition is fierce.

here is a tweet that said shouldn't the federal government do something via aid or regulations to ensure affordable housing for americans in america before engaging in foreign wars? another tweet says material prices are outrageous. why wouldn't -- wooden sheet rock, especially. a landlord says reasonable rent in minnesota. in larger areas, it is so high that people on minimum wages cannot afford rent. one last text says rent skyrocketed because buyers cannot afford first time starter homes. inflation can be blamed on the biden administration. we want to know, is housing affordable in your community? let's go to joe, who is calling from maine. joe is in the market to buy. joe, good morning. caller: yes, good morning ken

thanks for taking my call. i am in the market to buy. like a previous color mentioned, i am an investor. the houses here in maine, five years ago i bought my home, the value has doubled. it has gone from $200,000 to $400,000. i could have my house sold in a day. that is just the market. i bought my first home in massachusetts in 1990. the interest rate was 10%. the markets changed with the interest rates. they never made lower income housing available. there were no programs. they did some in their 30 years

in between. my point today is there is no lower income market. the income you pay has not kept up with the housing affordability. host: let me jump in for a second. you said you were looking to buy a house for an investment. do you see yourself taking your house -- a house away from someone who needs to buy a house to live in? caller: i would buy land and build a house. i am looking for the investment. i can't afford to buy a $400,000 house. that is not my intention. i am looking at the land but the land is tripled, also. those acres now are $100,000. this is in the last two to three years. this isn't ten-year to go.

now, you can't find anything under $300,000. another woman from new hampshire said $150,000. if you see a house for $150,000, it is gutted inside. and it has to be torn down, usually. there are houses that need work, contractor housing or what ever they call it -- whatever they call it. if you buy land and you will be a developer, they have some control and demand that you make affordable housing. because, what is happening here is on the coast. these investors from massachusetts, new york buy up a place, tear it all down and

build the marina with $100,000 homes or whatever, they are not building any affordable housing. host: let me jump in one more time. you said you were looking to buy land as an investment, do you think housing is a good place to invest money in right now? we live through the housing -- lived through the housing bubble crash, about 10 years ago, when we saw all of these housing prices crash and many people lost not only their money but the place they lived in. do you think housing is a good place to put your money? caller: what i will say is that fact -- that the fact you need a house is never going to go away. that it is a good investment, i will say yes. i would also buy an acre and put full houses out. i would love to do that. i am 63 years old.

i am not in a starter home position. absolutely not. i'm not looking to make $1 million. there is a company out there now, i won't say their names, but you could find it out. they are building houses complete, ready to go, electric planning, hooking up to a line for $50,000. they come on a truck. you unload them and you don't -- you can actually do it yourself. you get a contractor, the house is up and scanned. host: let's go to elizabeth, who is calling from hartsdale, new york. elizabeth recently bought. caller: we bought a house in florida. it was difficult to find a house rate as soon as you saw a house, especially in new york, it would be gone in an hour. so, we decided to do -- we were

on the computer, on realtor.com. as soon as we saw house, we called the listing broker who was listing the house. and we lucked out. we were the first people to look at the house. and we put an offer in and we were very lucky, with only $1000 over asking. this market is so crazy. our offer was accepted and that was in december. and we put our house here in hartsdale. that was in a week. we are moving in two weeks, to florida from new york, because it is less expensive. we are retired. and the taxes and the energy prices are so crazy here. it seems like everybody is moving to florida. host: how hard was it to find a place in florida? is it a house, is it a condo?

where are you living in florida? what type of house are you moving from? what type of house are you moving to? caller: it was so difficult. we started in july. you are right, you are on the computer and you are doing those zooms where they walk through and the broker has a phone and you see it on your phone or your computer. it is really very difficult. i ended up flying down for three days to see the house, the first house. it did not work out. it was just -- it was very noisy. so then, we had been looking, looking, looking. i stayed up all night on the computer, seeing something would come up and the next day it was gone. we found the house and put an offer in. you have to put an offer in. i flew down.

i flew down for two to three days. we liked the house. it was a done deal. hopefully we will still like the house. we bought in a community where they have activities, they have a pool and golf and that kind of thing. we are kind of excited and very nervous because we are moving from new york to a completely different state and it is hard. you have to get the mover and get rid of your stuff here. i am very stressed. it is very stressful. we think we are lucky with our house here. three to four years ago, this house that we are in would have sold for a lot less but we were the only house on the market.

we had four offers. host: are you seeing more in florida than new york, -- saying more in florida than new york? is the monthly mortgage more or less? caller: the house here is probably almost double the house in florida, that we are selling for. because florida is a lot less expensive. new york is crazy. they keep going up and up, doubling the electricity and gas, it is crazy. host: let's go to rick. rick, good morning. to the callers that called in --

caller: to the callers that called in, main, you're correct -- maine, you're correct. a house today is $185,000. senior citizens who have lived here all their life have social security income of $1200 to $1400 a month. the inflation requires an increase in municipalities. they can barely live on social security. a refugee in the united states of america gets $3032 a month. their rent is automatic direct deposit. there is a food and clothing allowance. they have a better foodstamp and welfare support system. yesterday on channel seven, they announced the chief was given a brand-new home in the state of

idaho, at the expense of the american taxpayer. they have to live out on the street during the daytime and can go into shelter at night. they fund a refugee program and the daughters of dreamers. to the father who called in earlier who is living in a hotel with your daughter, my heart goes out to you. get on the phone and tell them it is time to wake up and listen to the voice of america. jesse, thank you for your hospitality and god bless this great, republican country. host: let's go to diane, who is calling from key west, florida. diane recently bought a house. good morning. caller: good morning. i bought a house 23 years ago, thank god. i paid $161,000 for my house.

i believe that this was designed. this whole steam about the mortgage being so expensive. it started in 2007, 2008 with the mortgage bus. at that time, people were buying second homes and were refinancing because the interest rates were zero. and then, people started to play the game. they started to use houses after investments. in key west, they are building -- they say it is affordable housing but it is unaffordable. we live in florida. we have florida salaries and you can pay $3000 to $5,000 to rent an apartment. also, they have countries to protect for schemes like this. in norway, if you are going to buy a house, you have to live there year-round. in key west, 60% of the homes in key west are second homes.

meaning that people are not living there year-round. it has a devastating effect on our communities. they are not contributing to local businesses. we don't have enough workers. businesses are dying to get workers. it has such a devastating effect because of this mortgage crisis that happened in 2007, 2008. i think that the government definitely has to come in. because, the developers, the realtors, insurances are way out of line. everything is increasing. the only way that we can be saved is if the government intervenes and we have rent control. if people are forced, you can only buy a house if you live there year-round, so that they don't become investments. another thing is the environment is taking -- making an impact. when these developers make a proposal to build affordable housing projects, they build the

maximum number of units and disregard for the environment. now, we have so much traffic. we have so much pollution and the water, the impact is devastating. there is no regard for the environment. the only excuse to pay us anything that the developers want in the florida keys is that they say there is a housing crisis. but, you cannot build your way out of this. you have to have rules and regulations and everything has to be turned around. host: let's go to lacey, who is calling from bristol, tennessee. good morning. caller: good morning. yes. let's say my wife and i, we purchased a home about three years ago. not really too much of a home. but between, we only get a little over $2100 a month. our house payment alone is like

500 something dollars, counting utilities -- not counting utilities or anything like that. it is a struggle for us to even eat and pay our bills, our utilities and things like that. you know, that stimulus that we got, it was a shot in the arm for us. i don't understand. with what the fella said earlier about immigrants, it is hard for me to understand something like that. things can get higher and more expensive. i don't know what people like us are going to do, except in the in a nursing home or something like that. i don't understand it at all. how in the world are people -- can people accuse joe biden?

there is no superman that could have stopped what is going on right now. that is my opinion. host: during a hearing earlier this week, renters from across the country spoke about housing issues, including affordability and availability. here is part of what a renter from montana had to say about her situation. >> business practices have been openly questioned in state legislatures and congress. they are questioning the misuse of fannie mae loans to fund these predatory private equity groups like haven park. they drain local communities unaffordable housing and harm families, using funding created during the new deal to stimulate and sustain affordable housing. in 2019, a press community partnership received national awards for their outstanding affordable housing work. two months later, their subsidiary dealt with enterprise

provided funding to haven park to provide the parks, forcing us out of our once affordable homes. we have meant -- met with the enterprise ceo and president to tell them of the hardship the haven park enterprises have caused. enterprise, unfortunately, today, some of their work is at odds with their vision. they are fueling the fire. two years later and we have no way to fight back. what is hardest to live with is i thought my home would preserve my memories and help my future. haven park is taking that away. with few consumer protections, we live in fear and uncertainty. i am including a solution to

this huge injustice they described in their protections, making this recommendation a requirement is all it would take. host: keep in mind, if you want to see the full hearing from the senate banking housing and urban affairs committee, you can see it on monday. c-span will re-air the full senate banking housing and urban affairs hearing monday at 8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span two. of course, you can watch it online, any time c-span.org. we want to know, is housing affordable in your community? what are the prices out there, whether you are trying to buy or you are trying to rent? we want to know what it is like in your neighborhood. let's talk to alan, who is calling from asheville, north carolina. good morning. caller: good morning, jesse. thank you for having us. ok, well, i live in asheville

and the rent has gone up 25% here. we have short-term rentals, which takes up a lot of housing. i am concerned that we will try to get the government to solve all of these problems. if we go into rent control, it is like someone mentioned, prices will go up because no one will invest. after 2008, the governor came in and gave a lot of money to blackrock. they would go to the courthouse and buy up 100 houses at a time. and not even look at them. and you were competing against that. the average working class guy, who could have taken advantage of that unfortunate situation, was blocked out. blackrock is lining up a conference right now. you look at college, it was $1500 at one point. to go to college.

now, you have to mortgage your life. childcare, there needs to be -- there used to be childcare on every corner. the government gets involved, we don't have enough childcare. host: i can hear from your comments that you say government should not be involved from -- in affordable housing. how do we solve the problem because there are so any callers who say there is no affordable housing. how do we solve the problem? caller: the reason it is not affordable is because it is so difficult. the only way anybody can develop affordable housing is if they are a blackrock. they put so much regulation on everybody. i have four millennials, two of them own homes. they got in five years ago. two of them were not interested in it.

now, one is trying to get in and he is blocked out. i was trying to invest in rental housing. i didn't make much of a return. mom and pop rentals are out. there is no way a mom-and-pop -- i'm a realtor also and a broker. it is crazy. if you are a landlord, a small mom-and-pop landlord, we used to be full of those too. they would work with people, don't worry about the rent this month, get back on your feet. they would work things out. if you are going to rent a place where somebody is being paid to manage and you can't pay the rent, you have to go, whatever the case is. you have to reduce regulation. the government will control all of the housing. they are going to control all of the childcare. the health care, the working class person can't afford health

care. host: from the realtor side, what is the solution to get more affordable housing out there. i think i heard you say it is fewer regulations from government, that would help in some ways, how do we get more homes for first-time buyers like millennials? how do we get -- caller: we have gone to double afar. the point where the reduce the interest rates to 0% and 3%, increase the price of houses. my son makes $1500 a month for whatever. he has $1500. with the interest rates down, he can afford more principle. the prices go up to meet the $1500 threshold. he picks up more debt. and people are saying the banks are making that extra money. the bottom line is he is more in debt now. if the interest rate was higher,

the cost of the house would have been less. so, the government controlled interest rates, ok? they brought back mortgage securities. now, we have a situation where the housing prices are on-site. everybody has called in and said that to you. everybody says i can't afford it. you know why? in 2014, the economy started turning around under president obama, they should have started raising interest rates and they didn't do it. they are still not doing it. we have 7% interest rates. host: let's go to renee, who is calling from las vegas, nevada. good morning. caller: good morning. how are you? host: go ahead. caller: so, what is going on is the rentals here are ridiculous. in the last two years, rent that

was 600, $700 an hour is -- $600, seven to dollars is now $900. the housing situation got crazy. you have a lot of people in vegas who are living in what we call weeklies. it is hard when you have social security and your monthly payment -- your rent is $1025. housing has gone to the point where it is not sustainable. you're making a decision on whether you pay rent or eat. with the stadium being built, they have to make up for the cost. and the fact that they lost money building a stadium in the midst of a pandemic where no one could go to games. we have seen the rise in the properties around our area.

for a 50-year-old woman, who is on social security and disability and wants to be a homeowner, it seems like it is completely out of reach. host: some people would say if you can't afford to rent where you live, move somewhere else, or you can afford the rent, what would you say to the people who would say to you, since you can't afford to move -- live in las vegas, move somewhere else? caller: i would say i'm from los angeles, california. my benefits come out of los angeles, california. i can't afford to live anywhere in las vegas. it is cheaper to live in las vegas. this was very affordable. this is extremely affordable, 2, 3, 5 years ago. this was the place to be. host: let's go to stephen, who is calling from louisville, kentucky. good morning. caller: thanks for having me.

i just worry about the gentrification of my neighborhood. i live in a place, in a neighborhood called camp taylor. and people are buying -- in some cases, they are actually tearing houses down and putting new houses on the thing. we used to be an affordable place for -- i don't know -- i only make $30,000 to $40,000 a year. i had somebody call me, just the other day, that wanted to give me 250 housing dollars for my house. -- 250 thousand dollars for my house. where am i going to move to? where are the poor working people supposed to move to and

live? it is the gentrification, etc., etc. it's just not right. it's just not right. i wish the hell i knew what the answer was. host: let's go to michelle, who is calling from illinois. michelle, good morning. caller: good morning, good morning. how are you this morning? me and renee sound like twins. i'm in the metropolitan part of chicago, on the south end. about -- i am disabled. i am 50. i have a daughter. i had a friend who was a manager of a mobile home of community. i was able to afford a two bedroom unit apartment for $600.

in 2016 -- i didn't have to go but i needed to move out of that area because it was not safe. however, i was able to move right behind the high school. it was $850. fast-forward to june, my unit is up and the landlord is selling the building. i'm looking at two bedrooms and they are $1300. i can't afford that. i don't know what i'm going to do. i'm almost pushing to go farther south, where it is not that much shopping. it is more rule. i don't know what i am going to do. host: let's talk to ruth, who is calling from forsyth, missouri. good morning. caller: how are you, thank you for taking my call. i just recently moved from new york city, the heart of the

city. i was paying $2000 for a studio. and -- for a studio, 500 square feet for a studio. i got smart and moved away. i moved to missouri, to the suburbs and i bought a home, brand-new, for 230 thousand dollars. a4 bedroom with one acre, in the suburbs of st. louis. the price has gone up since i bought. and people are calling me, constantly, for me to sell my home, sell, sell, sell. and then i say where will i go? if i leave out of this house, i will have to upgrade and pay more money for another house. missouri is very affordable. i tell people all the time, they need to move to missouri. it is like a flyover state but it is a great place to live.

host: the top republican senator on the banking, housing and urban affairs committee, pat toomey, says government intervention is not the answer to make housing more affordable in the united states. here is a portion of what he had to say. >> to improve housing affordability for all americans, whether renters or owners, we should pursue reforms that leverage the power of free enterprise to increase housing supply and make markets more competitive. we need to scale back the role of government and increase the role of private capital. we need to phase out subsidies that increase housing prices and rents. -- rent. we need to end the gse conservatorship. the state of the housing market affirms the urgency of the reform.

the housing market is cyclical. it is a question of when, not if there will be a housing downturn. the housing finance system is not prepared. the system is still dominated by the same gse's that did so much to cause the 2008 financial crisis. the $7 trillion behemoth has an even bigger market share today than they had before the crisis. they certainly remain too big to fail. these flaws in the system continue to risk future taxpayer bailout. they undermine market forces and threaten financial stability. and they do very little to make housing more affordable. it took 50 years -- 50 years -- and many hundreds of billions of dollars in federal housing assistance have been spent and they have had no meaningful impact on homeownership rates. it was 64% in 1970. it was 65% in 2021. host: let's go to our phone

lines and talk to lynn, who is calling from florida. good morning. caller: i live in a popular area of florida. the houses have gone up, they have doubled or tripled. a house that normally went for 200,000 dollars is selling for close to $500,000. i could sell my little place and move north. but then, what i can afford, because i am retired is not very nice. it is like trying to buy a place for $440,000, it needs to be done -- read on. i might stay put. i feel bad for young families. thank you for your time and letting me speak. host: let's talk to david, who is calling from denison, texas. good morning.

caller: good morning. everybody is talking about micro issues for the most part instead of the macro. in 2006, when we had the housing -- in 2008, its effect on the economy. in 2006, we had the housing price index. they talk about the cpi. the differential between the cpi and the aci was choi in tub dollars in 2006. -- $2 trillion in 2006. housing prices came down. it is now 25% bigger than it was then. we had a massive housing -- how do you get that?

the government is always responsible. i read a lot of history of economics and study different economic schools. one thing they agree on is the government monetary policy and policy coming out of congress, mostly the monetary policy is that it is always responsible for these things. it was responsible for the depression. we have a situation now for example. investment companies buying homes went from 6% of the market , it was 5.8% of the market in 2000, to 18% of the market in 2021. 9000 homes were bought by speculative investors, speculators in the last quarter of 2021 alone. somebody mentioned there are second homes and people are not

living them -- living in them. you have the fed, even though they are struggling and talking about rates at a quarter interest point. they are continuing to pump $40 billion a month into increasing the money supply, by buying bonds. half of those are mortgage bonds . so many financial people talk about how unbelievable an air responsible this has been and they keep doing it. host: let's go to betty, who is calling in from riverside, connecticut. good morning. caller: good morning. this is betty and i live in riverside, connecticut. i have affordable housing because i live in whole housing. i pay under $300 a month and my social security is my total

income. it is right under $1000 a month. not only that, because i don't own a car, this is senior housing. senior housing or disability, disabled people could live here too. mostly seniors live here. here in greenwich, because i don't have a car, they transport me to all of my medical appointments. and they even give you a coupon for the local taxi so that if they can't transfer you, you can take the taxi. they help the seniors here with their housekeeping. one girl comes in and helps with the laundry.

i used to live down south in hud housing. i am originally from connecticut , and i moved back. i have to get down every day and thank the lord for how blessed i am. host: we would like to thank all of our callers who called in for our opening segment. coming up next, american enterprise institute's james pethokoukis join just to talk about automation and the future -- joins us to talk about automation and the future of work. later on, tie and brock benefiel in their podcast the climate pod. stick with us. we will be right back. >> book tv every sunday on c-span2 features authors discussing their latest nonfiction books.

at 4:25 p.m. eastern, a discussion about the u.s. election system with john fund and the heritage foundation. they are the authors of our broken election, how the left changed the way you vote. at 10:00 p.m. eastern, democratic state senator will haskell on his book 100,000 first bosses when he talks about legislation he has worked on since being in office. he is joined by millennial action president and ceo. every sunday on c-span2. find the full program schedule on your program guide. or online apple tv.org. -- online at booktvtv.org. the senate will consider the nomination of dr. robert kayla's to be head of the fda and a

short-term funding bill to keep the government financed and a postal service bill. both pieces of legislation passed the house last week. some committees will hold virtual hearings. thursday at 3:00 p.m. eastern, the inspector general of the capitol police testifies before the house administration committee on his review of the law enforcement agency in the wake of january 6. next week to live on the c-span networks or on c-span now. head over to www.c-span.org to stream video live or on-demand anytime. c-span, your unfiltered view of government. "washington journal" continues. host: we are back with james pethokoukis, who is a senior fellow at the american enterprise institute. he is with us this morning to discuss the impact automation could have on the future of

work. good morning. guest: good morning. host: let's get some basic definitions. when we talk about automation and work, what are we talking about? are we talking about people using cars, automating factories? what is automation when it comes to work? guest: i think historically you are talking about machines that do what people were doing and then either helping people do that thing better or completely doing what a person used to. a modern example would be something like an automated teller machine, which does a lot of what bank cashiers used to do. that is an example of automation. or a kiosk at a fast food place where you can order what you want rather than going to the counter and talking to a human. those are two examples of automation.

host: you recently wrote a piece called thinking about the automation risk to jobs. can you summarize for us what exactly is the current state of automation in the u.s.? is this good or bad? guest: what is interesting is before the pandemic there were a lot of stories, academic studies about the risk of automation. anyone who stays up on the news knows there is a lot of stories about artificial intelligence and robots. maybe you have seen some of those videos of robots going across balance beams, running and jumping. there was a lot of attention to the issue will these advances and up replacing a lot of human jobs? will we have a lot more unemployment? it was something people were talking about a lot before the pandemic.

the strange thing is people seemed to be worried about that. at the same time in those years right before the pandemic, we had fast falling unemployment, rising wages. there was this weird disconnect between people's concerns and what we actually saw happening in the economy. then we have the pandemic. here we are again. what led me to that story were two things. news that john deere had come out with an autonomous tractor, which goes back to the very beginning of automation concerns with agriculture 150 years ago and news that maybe we are going to replace umpires with automated robots that will call balls and strikes. thinking we are going to have another automation panic in the coming years. i am skeptical as to whether

that is a concern. the history is that while machines replace jobs, we create new jobs. while the concerns of automation have been around forever, since the industrial revolution come in the end we have always created more jobs and found new things for people to do. host: like you said, we are seeing more and more automation showing up, like the kiosk at fast food restaurants. the question becomes we also learned during the pandemic that there were some jobs that could not be automated. there were some jobs that you need human beings to do. what lessons did we learn about automation from the pandemic that we can use going forward? guest: one lesson is that -- the reason i mentioned the kiosk is it forces businesses to think

more about technology and becoming more efficient because of a difficult business environment. it may have pushed some businesses, is this a good thing for my company, to take the risk . you have a lot more open minds in business about new technology. you are right. we also overestimate how advanced this technology is, and we saw there are a lot of jobs that people need to do. those jobs probably are not going away anytime soon. i think that is a good example. we tend to be overly concerned about robots taking all the jobs. you will see those are the kinds of jobs people need to do. i guess they call them high touch jobs, jobs you want a human to do. host: let me remind our viewers

they can take part in this conversation. we are going to open up regional lines for our conversation about automation and the future of work. if you are in the eastern or central time zones, you can call in at (202) 748-8000. if you are in the mountain or pacific time zones, your number is going to be (202) 748-8001. keep in mind, you can always text us at (202) 748-8003. and we are always reading on social media, on twitter @cspanwj, and on facebook at facebook.com/c-span. i watch video sometimes on youtube, and i hear the automated voice reading news articles and doing some of the same things we do here on television, which makes me wonder will one day this be occupied by a robot reading the news and asking questions? what type of jobs are

potentially on the line to be lost to automation in the future? guest: that is interesting. i know some companies, some news organizations, they will have computer software, ai do basic stories, like a company's earnings report, which is similar quarter after quarter. what we are seeing now is an example of things humans can do. they can find somebody, find a program to accurately duplicate a human voice to read the news. what it cannot do is what we are doing now, this back-and-forth. you reacting to what i say and asking more and more interesting questions. those kinds of jobs display what humans do very well, thank, process -- think, process

information. social cues. unless you are talking sci-fi versions of technology, and maybe that will happen eventually, that is what people can do. also things which are very physical. we overestimate how well robots act in the real world. take autonomous vehicles. a lot of technology companies have spent a lot of money on self driving cars. it has proven to be a lot harder than they thought. elon musk predicted in 2017 or 2018 we would have a million self driving cars on the road within a year. several years later, we do not have a million self driving cars on the road. it turns out to be a difficult thing. when you think of a job that also requires empathy. you could probably automate something say nurse does, but

there are lots of aspects that would be hard for a robot to duplicate. those human skills will be in demand in the future as well as higher level abstract thinking. host: what are companies looking for and looking at when they decide maybe we should look at automation for this task rather than hiring a human being? guest: i think the classic -- we could talk about a customer service job where a lot of the basic questions might be able to be asked in an automated way. if you look at a job and think i can break that job down into discrete steps, like part of the job is doing this or doing that, answering a phone and directing someone to this department. if it is very understandable,

and you can write down what that job is. that is a job you could theoretically automate. if you cannot really write that job down and make it very clear these are the steps to do that job, like what you are doing now, that is a job that is difficult to automate. a lot of these jobs in the middle, back office jobs, or jobs that are subject to a lot of automation, jobs that require reacting to different circumstances. one day is not like the next day. jobs that are physical, those are jobs which are difficult to automate. host: does automation always automatically equal job loss? guest: there can be long periods where automation can cause job loss. it can hurt wages. i don't want to present a

utopian story that there is never any disruption. let me go back to the automated teller example. people thought went automated tellers started coming out, that is it for bank tellers. they are all going to lose their job. that did not happen. any individual bank or bank branch might have had fewer tellers. the atm's allowed banks to open more branches. we have not seen a fall off in the number of bank tellers. thank tellers are doing other things other than helping you withdraw money. a lot of them have become more like customer service representatives or marketing representatives. it requires more skill. they are doing something differently. over time, we may see far fewer bank tellers. sometimes these changes take a long time to play out. if they take a long time to play out, it gives people more time

to adjust and look for new careers. i don't want to paint a picture that there is no disruption. over the longer run, what we have seen is people train. they find new skills. people find different things to do. we don't see mass unemployment. host: let's let some of our viewers take part in this conversation. we will start with sammy calling from north carolina. good morning. caller: good morning. we had -- hot dog place closed in virginia. we offered them $3 million to build a plant. the company is a 100 year old country ham business the chinese had bought out. they put in $17 million of

investment in the building, but it is all automated. not a hand is touching the hot dog creation. it did not create jobs. if a robot is taking jobs, start taxing them or get something if they are replacing jobs. guest: that is actually a super interesting example. first, it shows that efforts to focus -- saying we need a lot more manufacturing in this country, we need to bring manufacturing back from overseas. whether you think that is a good idea, you should not confuse the idea of more manufacturing necessarily with a lot more jobs. a lot of those jobs would be automated. if you like the idea of

manufacturing, things made here, great. don't think there are going to be lots of workers necessarily in those plans. as far as the idea of the robot tax goes, there have been people who have suggested that. bill gates, the cofounder of microsoft, has suggested in the past the idea of a robot tax. to be clear, people that have suggested that are not suggesting it to stop all automation, to make sure that we have -- that we take robots and machines out of plants so people can do more thing. i think their concern is about very rapid automation that would make it difficult for people to adjust. either that may be slowing down a little bit or use that money to help retrain people. if you look at the economy, one of the big problems of the u.s.

economy for the last 50 years has been slow productivity growth, worker productivity growth. over the long run, there is a close linkage between how productive workers are and the amount of wages. it is difficult to say we want people to make more, but we don't want them to be more productive. you can also relate on the robot tax, you can look at it in trades. some people who have been concerned about the impact of trade on the economy in the early 2000's have said that, well, we like trade. we like open trade, but maybe it happened too fast, and people cannot adjust. it is somewhat similar. we are going to have change. companies are going to turn to machines if they are more efficient when they can. the concern is about it happening so fast that people

cannot adjust, maybe there will not be new jobs happening. that is a real concern. over the long-term, you want a more productive economy if you want higher living standards for yourself and your children. host: we talked about bank tellers and atm's. we talked about kiosks and fast food workers. we have talked about umpires and ball and strike calling robots. i remember there was a day where there were gas station attendants where you would come out and they would pump your gas. what other jobs we can look at right now we can say this job is at risk because of automation? guest: it is hard to say because sometimes machines will will place -- will replace a job, and

sometimes the technology will just help people do a job more efficiently. something like a simple spreadsheet. there is no doubt that has made accountants, bookkeepers more efficient and can do their job better, and therefore they can make more money. it clearly cost some bookkeepers and accountants their jobs. it is very easy to say this as an either or situation, and these are jobs that get replaced that people do not do any more like the old telephone operators plugging into the switchboards. those jobs disappeared. some jobs are just made more productive, and the technology complements those jobs rather than replacing. sometimes it can be hard to predict. a really hard thing to predict

is what will be the new jobs. we can look at a job and think maybe a machine will get better and do that. maybe a machine can do your job or my job. it is difficult to protect what the new jobs will be. it requires a leap of the imagination that a fast-growing productive economy will create new things for people to do. sometimes that is not much comfort if you are right about your current situation. host: one of our social media followers wants to know about the security of automation. this person writes in, what happens when the power goes out or the place gets packed and you have automation -- gets hacked when you have automation? guest: you can also worried what happens when a worker gets injured doing a physical job, maybe a job, whether it is a

truck driver, which is a difficult job, or someone working on a garbage truck, very difficult job that maybe it could be easier if you have more machines involved. the key is to focus on those problems. i think focusing on cybersecurity and making sure we have a reliable energy grid, you want a lot more emphasis on that. focus on that rather than saying those risks are too big and people should do more work in society. host: let's go back to our phone lines. let's talk to stephen from lexington, kentucky. good morning. caller: good morning. thank you for having me. happy saturday. i am in the automation world. i work with integrators, oems, many factories in kentucky.

many of these facilities are not up to standard or even able to be automated. they are lacking a lot of -- they are stagnant. they want to look forward into the future. i believe they can. i think there is an infrastructure problem kind of keeping us behind. i think a lot of moving parts happen with automation. big word right now is iot, the internet of things, things talking to things. making sure we are being proactive, not just reactive. at the macro level, is our infrastructure capable of handling automation? guest: i think the issue of infrastructure, which there is all kinds of studies that talk about infrastructure, whether it

is roads and bridges, whether it is our energy grid, super important, whether the u.s. has been doing enough to update infrastructure, and what you are referring to is what companies are doing. we want more business investment in this country. that is something we need to focus on when we make changes, whether it is regulation or taxes. if the government does not do its job, which is infrastructure, and if the private sector does not do its job, which is investing, investing in new machines, making workers more productive, then you will probably have a stagnant economy. i think that is what the caller might be getting at. host: let's talk to t calling from atlanta. caller: good morning. i am an engineering teacher. i teach my students engineering.

i tell them, whether you like it or not, automation is not going to stop. you have john talking about automation. grammarly definitely reduces the ability to hire people to look over the work because it is so much easier. you have zoom technology. you don't have to travel to a different state. you can consult with people. i don't want to go to the mechanic and have them spend two hours trying to figure out what is going on with my engine. you can look online and see what the job of the future is going to be. my concern, when you have people like bernie sanders talking about we need to tax some of these companies and generate money to fund the next generation of jobs, the american people don't get it. you cannot stop automation.

it is always going to go. one last thing. thank you, c-span, today for having a call in about the housing. i want to do mark collins about -- to do more call ins about matters that impact lives. host: go ahead, james. guest: housing may be one area where we could do with a bit more automation as far as the actual construction process. there is one economic status or observation that i could emphasize today and that i write a lot about, if we make the u.s. economy and workers able to be more productive, able to do more, you will see their wages and paygo up.

some people don't think that is true. they think it used to be true. there remains a tight linkage between making people reductive and pay. if wages are something you are concerned about, then you want a society with more technology in it. that means we have to make sure we are not just investing in machines, that we are also investing in people. that includes k-12 education, worker training. we have done a bad job in this society helping workers train and transition to doing new things. you need to invest on both sides of the ledger, not just say we need to have tax breaks so companies by more robots. we need to make sure we are investing human capital as well. host: i can add that i bet t can

agree with this as a professor having automated spellcheckers does not always mean people write better papers. you still need those editors and teachers out there to teach people and teach people how to write and make the writing better. guest: that is a good example. that gives teachers more time if they can quickly find errors, they can do what they do best, which is teaching, instructing, showing people how to write a paper, how to make their writing flow more, how a student can make a point more simply. they can do the more interesting bits of a job if they can quickly find the errors in a paper or assignment. host: hopefully it works like that. a question i have for you,

james, there was a recent survey of warehouse workers that shows their concerns and optimism about automation. i want to go through that quickly with you from the harvard business review. some of the concerns workers had about automation was fear of job loss, inadequate training on the automation, and unreliable technology. some of their optimism about automation was that it would make their jobs safer, they would be able to produce things weaker and more efficient, and be able to do high-quality work. are these the common concerns you see about automation when you talk to workers and businesses? guest: i think that sums up peoples concerns and hopes and another basic economic principle, there are trade-offs. you have benefits and costs.

most people realize we are probably not going to start either removing machines, nor do they think it is likely that we are going to stop adding machines. obviously, there is going to be concerns about jobs. it is tough to tell someone don't worry, there will be some other job for you. it is always sort of a leap of faith. that leap of faith has been justified for 150 years. we have been able to find new things for people to do. there is a competitive aspect. if your company does not want to modernize and add machines, some other will. if companies in your country don't want to do that, companies and some other country will. let's not add any new machines.

that is a false sense of security. it is a temporary feeling because competitive pressures will push companies eventually to update technology where they can. i think the key is that people feel secure that if they lose their jobs that they are going to get the training, that they are going to have the safety net for a while. people have to have confidence in that if they are going to accept the disruption that is natural in any dynamic economy. people that are worried, that is something for government policymakers to address. host: a story recently that they say the states of nevada and south dakota have the highest share of workers at high risk of automation. why is this risk of automation different in some states than others? should this be across-the-board

across the u.s. as companies modernize? guest: i think that has to do with the kinds of companies. different states have different weightings of different business sectors. that is why i would think it is different in one place. i have not seen that study. i am not surprised. there might be a greater risk in different areas. host: let's go back to our phone lines and talk to keith from florida. good morning. caller: good morning. can you hear me? host: we can. go ahead. caller: interesting conversation. one of my things is the interaction of human beings is what we are not keeping up on. at some point the teaching has to end, and life experiences have to start. you have to have skills to get through life. these people change jobs so often that they do not stay there long enough to get the

skills and experience of the job. i have a situation that i could not do now that i did 30 years later. i took $300 in my truck and my dog and i moved from melbourne, florida, in 1990. within one day, i had a place to stay, a job, because i went and rented a hotel room and called places and talk to them personally and got hired on the phone. today, you have to fill out an application online. you don't talk to these people. we educate, but there is no life experiences. now, we are buying things from automation. we could live off our funds sitting in -- our phones sitting in one room. we are not having life experiences with people. we are reading it from paper. all them studies look good on paper, but they never seem to

work out in real life experiences. that is the problem. host: go ahead and respond, james. caller: i -- guest: i think that is important. this is what concerns me. like that dog by the way. you need to have real expenses dealing with humans. my concern with this is the pandemic and the work at home and doing everything over zoom, which can help productivity, especially for younger workers, maybe now their initial jobs will all be remote or via zoom. they missed that experience of being at a workplace and the soft skills of coworkers, understanding expectations of bosses. all those soft skills i am worried younger workers are not

gaining. it is one thing if you are in an office you have worked out for years and then you go hybrid. you know those people. you have been in the workforce for a while. my concern is a lot of younger workers will not get those skills, and that will weigh on them going forward. as someone who has hired a lot of people for various positions, i know i would never hire someone without personal contact. i suppose if you are hiring thousands of people a month like amazon, but i want to know who that human being is. i don't just want a collection of resume lines or have an ai figure out this is a good worker. i want to understand what they can bring to a job. host: let's go to ed calling from indianapolis. good morning. caller: interesting topic today. in the past, i worked on research in automating construction, which as james

said non-repetitive physical things are hard to do. trying to make construction more efficient was our quest. one of the things we stumbled upon was an automated bricklaying machine. at the time it seemed strange to us. it is more prevalent than you would think. when you talk about job loss, it could scare the mason, but as many people in the construction industry no, masons are a dying breed. finding a way to make that technology work might create more opportunities for masons and masonary companies because people would choose a brick facade because they know they can get it done. while it would perhaps be threatening to the mason, in the

bigger stream, it leads to efficiency and more opportunities for that piece of construction. great topic and one that was interesting for me in the construction industry trying to find those automation opportunities. guest: i think that is another interesting example. it shows that another way that automation can create jobs. if you can do something more efficiently and make the existing products more efficient, you can have a greater supply of homes. it can create actual demand for the product and create more jobs than we would have otherwise. that kind of topic, like construction automation, is also a topic i write a lot about in my newsletter on sub stack.

i urge viewers to check it out. host: one of our social media followers has a contingent i want you to tackle. this person writes, the people that lose out to automation are the older workers, the ones over 50. does automation affect one sector of the job market more than other when it comes to age? guest: that sort of situation, what to do -- maybe somebody in their mid-50's, whether they lose the job because of changing technology, or they lost the job because of trade or the company moved to a different country or part of the u.s., that is an extremely difficult situation, which is why -- it is difficult to retrain people.

it is tough to learn new things. it is a difficult -- automation affects the entire workforce, but the ability to adapt and change for some people gets a little difficult when they are older, which is why we need to make sure we have a strong retraining system, a strong safety net to help people as they find that next job. that is why it is not just about the private sector, adding machines, adding robots, but also the government's role in helping soft and or smooth -- soften or smooth those disruptions. host: we have both been in journalism a long time. we know you have to be ready to do something new because your old job can go away at any moment. guest: it is certainly an

industry that has been disrupted by technology. host: let's go to our phone lines. mark from new jersey. good morning. caller: good morning, jesse. good to see you. i take issue with something the gentleman said about how worker productivity has not increased at the rate wages have. i don't know if he is not factoring in for inflation, but if you go to the bureau of labor statistics, it is clear that since 1979 real wages of nonsupervisory workers have only increased by 17% since 1979. productivity has increased by 61.8%. that means productivity has increased three and a half times

faster than real wages. the other thing i want to say quickly is we hear this thing about training and education every time there is some sort of massive downsizing of workers. it is just window dressing. it is just pr. it is meaningless unless there will be jobs available once the people have been retrained. thank you. guest: interestingly enough, the very issue the caller raised, the disconnect between productivity and pay, is the exact thing i wrote about my latest substack. it is an incredible myth that people think there is this long-term disconnect between how productive workers are and their pay. there was a disconnect in the 1970's and 1980's.

we don't see that anymore. wages have gone up by 30%. when you adjust properly for who the workers are, productivity, wages, you will see that even going back decades that productivity and pay have tracked pretty close. they continue to track pretty close. i urge people to check out the sources i just mentioned. i know the caller has seen this chart showing productivity going up and wages going nowhere in this huge gap. i think that is a myth. i think i make a pretty strong case. as far as education training, we do not do a good job. a lot of what we do at the american enterprise institute's think harder about how to do a better job at that. there is concern always that there will not be jobs around and people worried about automation for 150 years that

jobs will not be around, but we have managed to create more jobs. i remember when people were super worried and a lot of new stories about automation taking jobs during the pandemic, we have the lowest unemployment in 50 years. host: let's talk to alan calling from scottsdale, arizona. caller: thank you for c-span. i have been an owner for 35 years in the mailing technology. it is a simple formula. when i go into analyze anybody to help them in terms of saving money, it is basically this. 15 dollars an hour equals $86,000 of equipment. one employee. i have a customer that is ready to do 100,000 letters a day in

his plans. you take a look at that and provide them with an inserter that folds the stuff and shoots it out. he needs two pieces of equipment. if one goes down, he will never get that 100,000 out a day. the other side of the thing with older people, i am 73. i don't plan on retiring. if i am running around in a wheelchair, might think about it. if you look at the pool of people, we have less people out there in the marketplace to hire, quality people. it is across-the-board, whether it is an 18-year-old not wanting to go to college versus a 65-year-old. i would hire a 65-year-old if he is healthy, or she. it is all about what they bring

to the party as an individual to the company. when you have a piece of equipment that is $180,000 doing 10,000 an hour, you have a scenario where how many people does it take to run the equipment? host: i'm going to let you respond to what he said. guest: he made up one good point. -- he made one good point. if you have a tight labor market, companies will care less about a little gray hair if someone can do the job. it is a classically -- classic cliche that the best social program is a job. during the pandemic we had a tight labor market, and wages were rising across the board for lower skilled, lower income workers. you have to start with the basics.

basics is having a dynamic economy that is creating jobs, where there is a tight labor market. host: let's talk to david calling from georgia. good morning. caller: good morning p how are you? host: just fine. go ahead. caller: [indiscernible] it made no difference who was paying. i am 72. i watched the whole thing change. we gradually went to automation. we eliminated the low skill person. we have access to reach out from the first grade to the 12th grade. you can do anything and

everything in that length of time. we need to be challenging their minds from the very beginning to what they are interested in. technology. they know what to do. when i started out, the first job was a -- every man, woman, and child had a job. at that time, i think everything was based on housing. went away from the thing. gradually ease away from the basics, things we had to have. we had to have clothes. we had to have a place to stay. you have to have somebody lay the bricks. nobody knows how to do a thing. host: go ahead and respond

before we run out of time. guest: i will respond with a quote from one of my favorite economists who says the only music of life's uproar. the only music of life is change. we have to accept it. we need to get ourselves and our children ready for it. in the end, i think you get a better world because of it. host: we would like to thank james pethokoukis, senior fellow at the american enterprise institute, for coming on this one. thanks so much. guest: thanks for having me. host: still ahead, our weekly spotlight on podcast segment will feature brothers diane brock benefiel and their podcast -- brothers ty and brock

benefiel and their podcast the climate pod. you can call and talk about your most important political issue. you see the numbers on screen. start calling now. we will be back with your calls in just a moment. ♪ >> exploring the people and events that tell the american story on american history tv. on the presidency, abraham lincoln scholars talk about the 16th president's speeches and what they revealed about his views on the constitution. we will feature the annual lincoln form with discussions on abraham lincoln and the civil war with lucas wore, and carolyn janie, author of paths of war. watch american history tv every

weekend and find a full schedule on your program guide. >> i can report to the nation america is on the move again. >> live tuesday, march 1, the state of the union. preston bided addresses the nation reflecting on his first year in office and laying out his agenda for the year ahead. live coverage begins at 8:00 p.m. eastern. we will take your phone calls and social media reactions. the state of the union address, live tuesday, march 1, at 8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span. >> "washington journal" continues. host: we are back. this is our open phone segment where you can call in and talk about the most important political issue on your mind. we are going to open up regular lines for this segment.

republicans, you can call in at (202) 748-8001. democrats, your lines (202) 748-8000. independents, you can call (202) 748-8002. you can always text (202) 748-8003. we are always reading on social media, on twitter @cspanwj and on facebook at facebook.com/c-span. let's get updated on the current situation in the ukraine with the u.s., russia, and what is going on there. there is a story on cnn this morning but i want to bring to you with president biden soon to talk to russian president vladimir putin. i will bring this story to you in just one second. here we go. president joe biden plans to speak with russian president vladimir putin saturday, a person familiar with the matter said, as the u.s. warns russia

could attack ukraine at any moment. the high stakes talks, at a critical juncture in the ongoing crisis. a significant increase in russian ground forces have surrounded ukraine, and putin could decide at any moment to activate them into a deadly invasion. he has not decided whether to act, the white house said, but that has not stopped american officials from increasing their warnings and attack is a distinct possibility and could occur swiftly. bidens phone conversation with putin scheduled for 11:00 a.m. eastern time saturday will be his first since the end of december. since then the number of russian troops near ukraine has increased as the prospects of an invasion have increased according to american intelligence assessments. national security advisor jake sullivan came out on friday with

the latest assessment of a potential for a russian invasion in ukraine. here is what jake sullivan had to say. [video clip] >> we continue to see signs of russian escalation, including new forces arriving at the ukrainian border. as we said before, we are in the window when an invasion could begin at any time should vladimir putin decide to order it. i will not comment on the details of our intelligence operation. it could begin during the olympics despite a lot of speculation that it would only happen after the olympics. we are ready either way. we are ready to continue results oriented diplomacy that addresses the security concerns of the u.s., russia, and europe consistent with our values and the principle of reciprocity. we continue to make that clear with russia. we are ready to respond

decisively alongside those allies and partners should russia choose military action. our response would include severe economic sanctions with similar packages imposed by the european union, the united kingdom, canada, and other countries. it would include changes to nato and american force posture along the eastern flank. the president held a secure video conference today with key allies and partners to coordinate our approach to this crisis. the participants were the u.k., france, germany, italy, canada, poland, romania, the secretary-general of nato, and the president of the european union. we have achieved a remarkable level of unity and common purpose, from the broad strategy down to the technical details. if russia proceeds, its long-term power and influence will be diminished, not enhanced, by an invasion.

host: we want to know what is your most important political topic to talk about this morning? let's start with linda calling from norwalk, california, on the democrat line. good morning. caller: hello. i just am curious to know why do -- if we own property, why do we have to pay property taxes even when the house is paid off whether property is paid off? host: that is a good question. let's go to gary calling from sterling, virginia, on the republican line. caller: good morning. jesse, the last time i called you we were talking about hurricanes. i had a suggestion to use supersonic fighters to detonate synchronized -- have a squadron

fly into the eye of a hurricane and do a sonic boom because it might knock the hurricane apart before it gets a. i hope you remember that so you can run that up the flagpole any time you got somebody that might have some juice to get that done. i think that might be great. that was one of the most terrifying events when i was four years old, i was in the eye of a hurricane. my dad said that his 37,000 feet or something up. you could just see a wall of clouds. it was amazing. all these people accusing president trump guilty of all these crimes. the man is not guilty. it is because of reasons of insanity.

i am really familiar with mental illness as my father had a severe case of ptsd and gave me a concussion when i was 22 months old, but that is what i see in mr. trump. i'm sorry, i have to say that. host: let's go to walter, who is calling from connecticut on the democrat line. good morning. caller: good morning. how you doing? host: i am fine. go ahead. caller: i want to talk about the concerns of automation and declines as far as jobs. i started working for an aerospace company with the aircraft in hartford, connecticut. i'm sure you have been on planes , any american airlines, any

plane. my point is that -- i retired at 45 years. i started right out of high school, went to an apprenticeship. when we were talking about it in the late 1980's, they were talking about automation. we had a study joint with the company. automation, what does that mean? you are going to have less people in more automation. what are you going to do with these people? you are going to have less workers, but you have automation. some of these people are in their 40's. they are not ready for retirement. they say we are going to retrain everybody. we are going to have better jobs. you say that. if you have a machine that replaces five workers, you got 20 or 30 of these machines with

four plans. you have one machine that can do five, 6, 7 employees' worth of work. strong negotiation. we told them no. these people have high school education. some don't. they are not like a toolmaker or electrician. we want to hammer out some of those details. problem now is that the automation is so rampant now that even uaw, now they got trucks that are going to be driving with no truck drivers in the trucks. work for us is not perfect, but it did work. host: let's go to kathleen calling from st. paul,

minnesota, on the independent line. good morning. caller: good morning. here is a fun fact. 2007, we had 2.75 government employees. 2009, we had host: let's go to marietta from maryland on the democrat line. good morning. caller: good morning. i just called to say all of the republicans who are threatening to open up all of these investigations once they get back into office should realize now that they've already set a precedent that if you subpoena somebody you do not have to show up for that subpoena. they are the ones that set that precedent so they could open all of the investigations they want what you do not have to show up. my second thing is what is going

on with the teachers and children and parents in the classroom. i can almost guarantee you that a majority of the people that's doing this never attended a pta meeting and they never paid pta dues. thank you. host: is go to douglas who is calling from florida on the republican line -- let's go to douglas who is calling from florida on the republican line. caller: president biden has given the russians essentially a green light by saying they want to be any americans in ukraine, so there will be no problems with the russians facing the state. no americans will be faced in no americans will be killed. he is also talking about limited interest into ukraine so he is already saying likely it

happened here there's no american armor and nothing to stop the russian army from entering. putin is a thug and has always been a thug. the only thing russians ever understood was force. all of the nato forces not in that country and they can't oppose the russian villa terry. -- russian military. host: let's go to mary. caller: i am calling because i am outraged that trump had the insurrection asking followers to fight hard because otherwise they would not have a country, and then the insurrection happened and he was watching

everything that happened. why is he above the law? he is causing more mischief by supporting the strike in canada. he outwardly said i support the fighting for our country and democracy. he is nothing but a troublemaker. host: go to ronald who is calling from nevada on the republican line. good morning. caller: good morning. i just wanted to start off with

what your first caller asked why do we pay property taxes when our house is paid off is what the lady said. the question, i would like to go at it from the backside, why do we pay income tax and why do we pay interest on debt that the federal government has set up? really what should happen is the local infrastructure which is based on property ownership are cells that it was originally based on. originally the states got together and the region the states were organized was to promote these united states. the resources that are generated from prosperity of the society

would be actually more local than collectively federal. that is why if you really look into it, why is your property, your homes, why are they in the county? why are they under the -- why aren't they under the county jurisdiction if you think about it, the early teens of the 19th century, everything got switch to everything is federal. we have federal taxes and social security and all this federal stuff and all of this federal debt. i don't think we are ever going to make it back to what the original founders set up, which was life, liberty, and the

pursuit of property. host: let's go to ray who is calling from lezz in view, tennessee on the republican line. good morning. caller: good morning. you know the saying that elections have consequences, for all of the people who voted against donald trump and voted for biden, elections have consequences. look at what is happening today. you have problems and every front because you don't have a leader. you picked this man who has done nothing for 50 years for the american people and you pick him to be your president. good luck to you. thank you. host: let's go to jim from pioneer, ohio on the independent

line. caller: talking about automation , i am a cnc programmer operator and i don't worry about losing my job to automation. more automation means i can run more machines at the same time. i am in a real good spot. i am making half of what i did the years ago. there are new fabulous machines that cost a lot of money and that makes the calculation a little different than just how much product committee versus how much the pay is there was a caller who called in and talk to how much it cost. host: let's go to stephen who is

calling from quincy, illinois. good morning. caller: i watched a portion of c-span yesterday that had the guest of james bovard who offered no proof of fact to back up his stupid claims that the coronavirus is not serious and that vaccinations and face masks are not helpful. i thought it was one of the most disgraceful programs you've ever had. he in my opinion is a nutcase. he indicated he hated president biden, police officers, and dr. fauci and on and on. after having him on your program, why don't you schedule the congressman when from georgia to discuss how she denies the holocaust ever occurred and it is a fake part of history and schedule somebody who sounds like rush limbaugh to discuss how the sandy hook killings in 2012 of the six and

seven-year-old schoolchildren was staged and never occurred. i just thought it was a disgraceful program and i am horribly disappointed in c-span to somebody as ridiculous as him up here -- appear. host: let's go to james who is calling from romulus, michigan. caller: i just wondered if you could possibly do a segment on the court filings by john durham and who has been named in these court filings. you have georgia tech university, who created false evidence and gave it to hillary clinton's lawyer who then gave it to the fbi who said he did it as a concerned citizen. you have victor darr janco -- darchencyo.

yet the national security adviser involved here you have multiple people from the hillary clinton campaign who have faces in front of the special counsel could you just did a filing last week or a week and a half ago about how this lawyer who is representing these people has a conflict of interest. i think you should get somebody who knows about this who is a legal expert to go in and have a program on this, because when you have a university, the democratic national committee has been named in the indictment. why this isn't on tv or the news or you people don't do a segment on it is ridiculous. host: let's go to scott calling from roseville, california on the democrat line. good morning. caller: i called to complain a little bit if that is ok. host: you wouldn't be the first this morning. caller: a lifelong republican

until i did a complete u-turn when i learned, and there is worse than this, i learned the way to greet a woman from a rerecording early on from the previous administrations term. today i was watching a different network and jumping back and forth and your show is way better. i have educators in my family, first grade teacher, for great teacher, and every lady knows that every single one of those kids in the class is her kid. they are not with mom and dad and they are into the classroom and they respond to the teacher. they took kindergartners to six-year-olds and said you get to take your masks off today here at great is that. all of the kids responded to

their teacher who they see as their mother while they are at school and i thought that was the worst. wait worse than anything -- way worse than anything that is have been to the previous administration. but nowadays, anything is ok, even using the little kids. that will be on the news all day today and tomorrow and probably through the news. i hope we can work things out with ukraine during -- ukraine. host: let's go to robert. caller: some of the democratic callers, i am just wondering, are they made up callers or are they for real good you never rebuttal the left. you let them you on and on and you don't bottle the democrats but you bottle the republicans.

anyway, c-span is great for you have to watch out because the tide is turning. host: go to morgan who is calling from reading, pennsylvania on the democratic line. caller: i hope to say that i hope all americans remember that the republicans have given love and support to the terrorists of january 6 who injured over 100 police officers and five people died because of their actions and to remember that tom invited a teenage double murderer to mar-a-lago -- that trump invited a teenage double murderer to mar-a-lago. i just hope americans remember all of that when they go to their voting booths at the

elections coming up. host: let's go to edward who is con from jackson, mississippi on the independent line. good morning. caller: good morning. i wanted to touch on the history lesson about federal taxes that was brought up earlier the concept of the united states. i believe the caller mentioned 1914. i think when the federal government assumes the debt that hamilton wanted the federal government to assume the debt from the war shortly after the revolutionary war, the southern states did not want to do that because they had already paid back most of their debts, but there was a compromise struck at jefferson's house to make the new capitol between the north

and the south and in exchange for putting the capital closer to the south, the southern states were lifted for them all to go in and have the federal debt from the war be pooled together and paid together which is the beginning of the strengthening of the federal government. i just wanted to touch on that. the last thing i wanted to say is i appreciate the fact that you are so calm when people come in and the job that you do. as a former media producer, i think that everybody should -- if you ever hear anything on the news that makes your blood boil and hits all of these buttons and you feel chemicals, go watch another news channel and remember the people you are mad at other democrats are republicans are your neighbors and your family. if we are going to get to this moment in time, we have to

remember that balance is important with political ideologies just like it is with every other part of our life and remember that we are a team of rivals, not a nation of enemies that is all i wanted to say. host: we would like to thank all of our callers for calling in. up next, our weekly spotlight on podcast segment featuring brothers ty and brock benefiel and their podcast “the climate pod.” but first, governors on both sides of the aisle talked about energy and climate issues in their recent state of the state address here is a portion from those addresses. [video clip] >> iowa is a national and international leader. what we do reverberates beyond our borders and that is certainly true when it comes to agriculture and energy, and

especially with renewable energy. iowa is a leader and we lead the nation in the production of both even all and biodiesel and crops that make them. everyone knows that noble fuel is important to iowa. d.c. is losing sight of its important to the country. time and again in administrations of both parties, the federal government has walked away from its commitment to renewable fuels and we have to bring them back. well, we need to do it again. the biden administration focused all of its efforts on electric vehicles, actively working to eliminate gas powered cars. that is a mistake, especially as china works to lock the precious metals that make ev batteries. instead, we need to continue to embrace an all of the above

approach where we support energy sources that come from right here in iowa. to do that, i'm introducing new legislation that will improve access to e 15 and b 20 and upgrade iowa's fuel infrastructure to offer more blends and proposing way invest carbon capture solutions to sustain and build on our leadership in renewable energy. let's send it d.c. a message that can't be ignored. let's remind them that america's energy is growing right here in iowa's fields. [applause] >> while we put the pieces together to address current needs that concern our communities, we also have to take action this day to address the long-term existential

threats the state. in december, i spoke with esther not kayla baron -- astronaut kayla baron. she was aboard the international space station and i was at my home. she is traveling 17,500 miles per hour above us and orbiting the earth once every 90 minutes. i was honored that she took my call. i asked her what perspective this experience gave her about our collective home, this planet . she said something that really has stuck with me. she told me she was amazed by how thin our atmosphere is. how at night there is a burnt orange glow at it edge, revealing just how paperthin the layer is between the livable world and the nothingness of space.

she said the most important thing we need to survive is the ability to breathe clean air. our planets fragile state is not just merely graph with a narrow point to that calamity. you saw floods go through the windows. people who lost 600,000 acres of commercial timber to wildfires. when i looked into the eyes of people who have lost their home and i see the pain they have, that is the pain of climate change and we have to do everything we can to fight it, every corner of our state faces disasters today.