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tv   Stossel  FOX Business  October 21, 2012 12:00am-1:00am EDT

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tonight. john: such a nasty word people say it caused by our financial problem. a lot of people in business are greedy but aren't you? at abc a documentary on greed showing how it can be self-destructive. >> to test people's greed they put dollar bills in ballpark you can get as many for yourself but every 10 seconds if there is money left he will double it john: the game ends if they empty the bowl. what happens? >> they could have made more
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money if they left half of the bills but they did not work that out. >> sally kohn is a liberal blocker writing about that attitude >> i don't think greed is bad but what values do we hold alongside as a country? as a society? to balance out those impulses for the better good of everyone? john: an economist from george mason university thinksthe government should but out except in foreseeing rule of law. >>roperty rights constrain self-interest. i don't like to 17. we are more self interested ourselves, our family, not
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about strangers. every economy will be based on self-interest. with greed d people grabbing more than they deserve. john: who decis what we deserve? >> the market decides. it is the one institution that allows people to grab more than they deserve. government feels greed. >> i i agree wit part of that. government has allowed big businesses t getta bigger share of the market. crony capitalism. but there is a positive side as well. self-interest is th human impulse. we temper that with others. you are allowed to do whatever you want to do when your neighbor's land or the public square. we have values of
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community, the common good. john: let's turn to business. with a bowl of money the purchase attends figure out to it is in their self-interest to not empty the bulls did make if we each take a dollar then we will never empty the bull. >> now they are cooperating. >> without government setting the rule. >> there are four people coming together we will opete beyond a rsult interest. that is why the founding fathers created the country. john: but they lose customers. >> but that is what a government does. the other formula is what about inequality? let's imagine we were part of a large family.
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we have a cake we have to share. the unimagined for sick of argument i am the stronger hard-working member so i get it decent piece of cake. that is mine. will little kid he has not worked as hard he gets a small piece that is unconstrained greed. john: if the rich take a big piece we have less? >> we can try to grow the cake but right now we have resources if you cut taxes for the wealthy days literally right now that means we have lss to spend on public programs. >> that is just not true.
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the analogy makeit seem the economy's wealth is a fixed side. ined the more you have there is less for me. that is a bad analogy. john: if bill gates takes $50 billion he takes auge piece but we have less? i think he made no whole new take. so did steve jobs pursuing their own terest they make us all richer. >> that is why bill gates did have a generous piece of ca. but the quality with the infinite number of case in the quality tends to compound itself we want you to have the government program and the quality rhodes to help your cake get baked in the first place.
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>> that is historicly inaccurate. look at less government in our history, people think the rich tt are richer but it was rockefeller, carnegie, they came with nothing. that made the rest of us will be your. john: that is the key. >> i would quibble. john: rockefeller did not make the rest of us wealthier? >> blaming 8146 us? noboby is saying there should not be incentives broke we want the g.i. bill bill, good public schools, roads that help the next generation of companies john: inequality makes me
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uncomfortable but by letting them until their creed. >> there has been an economicecovery 1% has gone to waste . john: bet lead is better than zero. >> at ast to do with the fact the government is way too big and promising more taxes if te current administration is elected. they want to set -- want to make money. johnthat takes it from the. >> the beauty is they can onlyake more money by making you better off. that is the duty items
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serious. if i thought it was true i would say u can have the whole cake. if that will quote trickle-down to be. it will not be the way that i like it. people make their cake. steve jobs became rich. he baked a lot of cakes but on the dotted by baking cakes for a lot of people. i personally don't care if he got x% more than anybody else. they would not have had anything if he did not have the inceives of the market john: who did more? mother teresa o or michael milkin? she was selfless and helped
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people but michael milkin broke financial rules, went to jail, invented jump bonds. >> michael milkin by making financing much more efficient the capital markets, entrepreurs access. john: he allowed at evlon revlon, mattel to grow. >> it made capital more available. john: does greed help more people? >> i will go with mother teresa. >> my heart goes out to her. she is a good person bt a lot of people create jobs by sending jobs overseas to china. that is a good pilosophy
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but to the american economy is a loser. >> because they become wealthier. the data shows that it has happened in agreed to make you happy? yay says yes.@7
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john: greed, for lack of a better word is good. greed is right. greed works. john: greed works? yes it does. i was surprised to read an article t cbs news.com that says embrace it. live it. tap into your inner gordon gekko. it was written by a robber.
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>> agreed is good. >> know it is not. >> i would argue greed is a good tng. it saves lives. when they look to make a profit they are designed to create better services. the benefits everybody. john: it was the foundation for this country? >> add-os see that in the declaration of independence. >> the pursuit of happiness is. john: happiness comes from family those who believe then god it has little to do but the others do not. >> family and religion can make you happy.
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a by relentlessly pursuing a goal that could make me happy. the burning desire to move mountains to get it. john: gordon gekko was implying that. would get the rest of his speech. he goes beyond greed is good. >> greed clarifies and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit. greed an all forms money, life, love, knowledg the a board search of maind mark my words. it will save he other bell fracturing -- malfunctioning corporation called usa. john: was to look selfish >> we seek if i am pursuing something to make me happy
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somehow that will hurt you but just ecause igwas up for what i want is that what this country is about to. john: greed is ambion? am i and self-interest? >> wanting something better. we are authors. when you're up at 1:00n the morning not becae you wanted to influence three or four people but millions. the ambition, desire for more that people saw us to pursue more. john: makes us work harder. >> absolutely. john: the other eight hours maximize your free time. sleep for eight, you work for eight. >> you sleep and work a certain amount but to et a little bit more greedy and
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your free time, i get to greedy with it. do something marvelous. john: you take your own food to parties? >> i am quite greedy wn it comes to my health. many things i do not eat. much tthe embarrassment of my wi i will bring my own food. why is he doing this? john: there feelings are hurt? >> that is okay. i care so much about myself i am willing to sacrifice a dirty look. john: new ways to think about the word greed. thank you robert.
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john: the new "atlas shrugged" movie just came out playing in 1,000 theaters. it is faithful to the book. the book brilliantly predict did today of the suffocating bureaucracy that gradually kills freedom and opportunity. last year there was another movie but that was just part part i was a rush job. rt to was better in the movie maker is a businessman you made this happen. it bewilders me nobody else did because this book sells
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1 million copies, 55 years later number 100 on the amazon list. my book is way below that. rated one of the most influential books after the bible. >> bought the rights 1992. i thought it would be a quick outsource and the studio. but it did not have been. the rights expired so early april i tried to develop a team and two 1/2 onths later restarted photography. john: news center own money. >> production budget was 5.5 and the rest of it was the other five. john: you spent twice as much of your own money.
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>> ii i did but up but we did have investors and the budget was at 20 million. john: in the movie is set in the near future. few jobs, gasoline is $40 a gallon because the government crushed the business and a few pple are struggling to keep there business alive. >> that is faithful to the book. >> we discovered there are so many entrepreneurs who took to the movie. yes. i am under appreciated. i and denigrated. this move -- movie proved very popular because frankly the business class does not belong with the government. john: in this scene james
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taggart president of the railroad gives a noble speech. >> ideals are higher than profit. instead of aristocracy of money, now it is about influence. >> you need to learn some manners. >> monday is the root of all evil? >> you think money is te root of all evil? what is the root of money? >> monday is a tool that allo us to ade. >> it is the sixth page seen inhe book, ayn rand really says the root -- monday is the root of all good. disinformation. and a barometer of a virtue. it allows people to create a
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life they are producing to the maximum of their ability. then would never "maxim" of this they casee best within themselves than that enables them to maximize their life and the money they make. john: i was impressed have 55 years ago could know the terms politicians used today. she wrote about was like equalization of opportunity act. in this scene haig is on trial for violating the fair share act. >> you can seize my property just because you need it? than does any burglar. >> you are misrpresenting the letter and the intent of the fair share law. based on the highest principle of the public good
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john: that sells today. fair share. >> it does unfortunately sell part of the underlying theme of the scene is don't continue to denigrate me. appreciate the producers. jobs not accretive by politicians bupeople that seen in decades if you continue t not appreciate what the on to procure does with the gnp of our society we will go on strike. john: people don't. they go golfing or create their own world wher the betterrpeople have a more prosperous life but in real life you take it. >> recently yu are right. friends of my will say i can
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go another year or two but i will stop. i will sell my company. i will go to a beach. you will see more and indu of entrepreneurs will finally say. the enough. watch us. it will have been. john: another quick exchange >> that is what laws are four. >> no use whatsoever. >> i began a 150,000 pages of regulation reiforced today. they say it lamar hurt me but it gives the a government the power to selectively enforced. >> i have been involved 30 years with a dozen different
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companies. think you to the opportunity but we hahad constantly dozens of lawsuits every year. i have been involved with several hundred and have settled dozens and dozens. john: you hurt people spend my there are some of lawsuits and entrepreneurs are constantly e involved and easy target. >> use the a mesothelioma mesothelioma, of lung disease or sometng else after another. it is enough. john: there is the third movie to complete the trilogy? >> the target date is july july 4th, a 20 to seven we look forward to that. the new "atlas shrugged" movie. thank you john aglialoro.
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♪ >> social justice -- >> push for social justice, and that's our job. >> president obama believes in social justice. >> social justice. >> social justice here at home. >> social justice, i'm sick of it. the left is for social justice. who can oppose that? if you do, you are for social injustice? i better be for social justice. that means a big well fair state taken from rich people given to the poor. that seems fair to people. john faces that attitude all the time, a professor at brown university, one of thee most liberal schools in america. you say free markets are the way to help the poor, but that can't
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go over well at brown. >> it has. they wer surprised by it at first. they see the powerf the idea. >> those who contradict the ideas, isn't it hostile ground? >> it's interesting at brown, occasionallyostile, but browne's a wonderful place. >> i say "hostile" baa i had an experience there. i went there to cover a story years ago cause a brown student was hounded out of school after he slept with the young woman who later said she was drunk and therefore couldn't give concept and therefore that was rain. -- rape sex and alcohol when was in college were often combed, and what was the new definition of rape? an activist there said this was not a discussion that should even be allowed. >> get off campus. >> we don't want you here. >> come on, everybody! louder! >> the school to learn, there's one opinion, and the other
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opinion turns out to be wrong. >> and then somebody pulled out my microphone cord saying "rain is not tv he." the totalitarian left, unfair? >> it's not brown's finest moment. the students, in fact, i was a new professor when that happened, and they were in my office before they met you, and i urged them not to go, because in that instance, brown was dead wrong on that case, and i said, if you go, he'll eat you for lunch, which you did, but brown changed a lot since then. >> i'm glad to hear that. go to the other controversy. you have written a book "free market fairness," and i think americans and brown students say what's fair about the free rket because it creates a wealthisparity? some are wealthier than others. >> yes. free market fairness is made sense of if you know what fairness.
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what is justice? what is fairness? brown students think something like equality. if you want to have a fair society or just society, you should have a society with lots of redistribution from taxation to the rich to the poor. that's a just society. especially a society with great inequality, a society where some of the rich peopleot rich because parentsere rich, had advantages -- >> it's unfair. >>hich is more fair? most brown freshman, fresh off the boat a month ago coming into the class think, well, this is fair, obviously. now let's play for a minute. play it over 15-25 years. the society encourages equality and focuses on those questions does not grow. a society that celebrates a certain kind of greed, urges people to make great things of themselves, that grows. look at it again. which of the two societies is more fair? which is more just? well, watch my thumbs. they indicate the poorest people. if this is the just society, you
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care out equality, but not the poor. i think fairness requires to be focused on the poor, and we evaluate the system, in part by asking, how does the system work for the working poor over time? >> even though it's more unequal. >> absolutely, absolutely. that inequality is going to do some driving to pull that lowest group up, and what's really important, it's such a basic point for students especially, what do we care about for a just society? this or the poor? i think we should focus on the poor. when we focus on the poor, capitalist arguments look better. >> this goes back to the conversation we had earlier about the cake. >> yes. >> to theleft, there's a cake, and bill gates takes a big piece. >> that's right. >> you say? >> i say we shold ask ourselves what kind of society we want to work in, live in. what kind of society should it be? a better, morally attractive community is one that encourages ople to up leash their creativity in the world, stand up on their own two feet, makes
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them able and wanting to be authors of their own lives. that's the community we want to live in, a community where people -- everyonements to be the cake baker and make more cakes, new cakes, new confections not thought of yet. that's the better society. better society for people. >> and by the end of the temple at brown, your students come around a little bit? >> a lot do. a lot do. it's a new versionf libertarianism, bleeding heart. some at brown joke about it that i bring the gospel of the change of libertarian thinking, and they call it the gospel according to john, that's overdone, but they say that at brown. >> all right. what about my earlier question, then, who did more for the world? mother teresa or the jailed michael milkin. >> what a painful question. my grandmother, a fan of mother
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teres, she'll roll over in her grave, but michael did more. the work he did to make capital markets efficient created wealth, enabled people to stand upon their own two feet as causes of their own lives, t be economically independent. that's a really important giftt3 that he didn't know he was dog, didn't intend to do that. >> he may not have cared. >> may not have, but what a magical thing to help other people become responsible causes of their own lives, what more respectful way can we live together? >> thank you, john. when we come back, a different take on what really helps poor people. >> we want more prosperity, and not just for us, but people all over the wor who are poor. we have to stand up fo the free enterprise system.
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>> greed is a nasty word. people talk about today's greed, t, come on, people have always been greedy. greed's a constant. beauty of a free market is it harnesses green. the way to get rich in a free market is serve customers well. i think that makes the market moral. maybe i shouldn't use the word "greed," but call it
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"enlightened self-interest". people who have done more than anyone to explain how capitalism are moral are steve forbes, author of "freedom manifesto: why free markets are mal and big government suspect," and author brooks of the american enterprise institute. author, you made a video to expln the morality of free enterprise, viewed 100,000 times on youtube. before we talk about greed, let's play a part of the video. >> since 1970, the worst poverty in the world, the pcentage of the population that lives on a dollar or day or less is declined by 80%, 80%. there's been no achievement like that in humanistory. billions of people have been lifted out of poverty. it's the most amazing thing that humanity's ever accomplished. what hapned? was it the incredible success of the united nations? central planning or the international monetary fund or global foreign aid? of course not.
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it was globalization. it was free trade. it was entrepreneship. it was property rights. it was rule of law. in short, free enterprise saved those people. if we want more prosperity, and not just for us, but people all over the world who are poor, we have to stand up for the free enterpri system. it's truly the system for good samaritans. >> most people don't believe that. i would say most people think it is the u.n. or foreign aid or central planning. china, china's boom. >> right. it's wrong. what saved china s since 1980 #, they opened to reign trade. there's a lot of stuff wrong, but they empower entrepreneurs and open up trade to the united states since 180 up a thousand percent. >> honored private property around this time. >> exactly. >> we have a graph that shows how cna's boomed not just since they started central plan, but when they recognized private
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property. >> that's right. this is literally what we've seen since 1980 lifted 400 million chinese out of poverty. >> steve, i say most americans think trade hurts the average american or certainly the guy workg in the factoryecause if it's with china, he's losing a job to somebody in china. >> well, this gets to your introduction on the wd "greed." greed in people's minds means taking to something that doesn't belong to you. in the free market, you have transactions. i want something, you wa something, we exchange. money makes it easier. they want areasury bill, i want socks, we swap. we each get something. we have a free market where people do things, innovate, try things, and see what people want. free marketses, and this is what the u.n. won't tell you is free markets is about meeting the needs anwants of other people. government's about meeting its own needs. author's right, 40 million
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people in china is what's driving the economy, not the state owned companies. >> the perception is free markets are cold, amoral. >> opposite. biggest breaker down of bear yours of people. you may not love your neighbor, but you want to sell to your neighbor. we take it for granted that if you start a business, you want the best people possible because you want to succeed. that's new in human history. before, you rarely trusted anyone beyond your family or community or ethnic group. commerce breaks down the barriers so people know whether or not they are cooperating with each other. >> think about it this way. all three of us came from immigrants. most americans came from immigrants. bet your great grandparents, john, said i want to get to america for a better system of forced income redistribution. i bet they -- >> my father, actually -- no. >> i bet your ancestors -- >> to clean toilets and to repair them. >> to be rewarded for hard work and merit for the first time in his life.
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that's whht markets all us to do. it's a great equalizer. i work harder, i innovate, i'm rewarded. that doesn't happen in other countries. that's why markets are not about greed. they are about a better life through earned success. >> the poor, i'm told, are left behind. paul krugman talking about paul ryan's budget saying he's explicitly trying toake life harder for the poor. >> yeah, that's completely false. i'll tell you why. >> your argument about dependency, but you want to cut off pgrams and make the pr suffer? >> actually, i don't. what i want to do is for the truly poor of the country, we need woo things. relief and opportunity. if you want touarantee relief to the most indigital janet members of the society, we will be inconvenienced by a debt crisis in the country if we don't change course, the poor se everything. that's catastrophic and immoral. >> that'shy they need more
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programs. >> heassumes like we're in medieval europe. once a pes cant, always a peasant. >> address the kris schism. -- criticism. we who wanto cut punish the poor as chris matthews put it and believthe way to get rich is work harder, give the rich more money but the way to get pooreople to work harder is to screw them, take away the programs. >> no, it takes away their dependency giving them empowerment. >> they'll starve. >> food stamps, heard of them? u know, 30 years ago, matthews would have said we should have a program to everyone gets a cell phone. that cost them $3,000. today, if chris matthews had his way. $10,000, crying selfish cell phone make and the like, and we'd have it like health care. scarcity to abun dance, creating
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resources. it's not the medieval economy. >> no one wants to throw granny out in the snow and take services from the poor, but ensure people are not dependent and still live in opportunity societies, and the rest of us, actually, are on our own to make our own way and earn success to live a dignified life to say i earned that. >> thank you author brks and steve forbes. coming up, my take on greed.
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>> the recession was brought on by a greedy wall street corporations. people know they are suffering because of wall street excess. that is true. john: no. even my colleagues did not get it. theconomy has a boom and bust government made our last one worse by interfing giving out guarantees and subsidies. wall street wagreedy that is not new. everyone wants more. did you turn down a raise? i don' the beauty of the free-market is the market regulates greed. the next guy offers it for less and you lose. it is tempered by
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competent -- competition. the left says it is through government but the free-market or greed works better. i'm about to eat this juicy steak. how did i get it? in n york city? try have this because the reinsure wants to be good to me? no. because thousands of peopl care about themselves. i learned this years ago. >> at the farm saddling up for another 14 hour orkday. >> they're so much work fences, ditches, beating the cows, harvesting the hey, they're only the first of a series who by caring about themselves make su i get my stake. >> he delive the propane to heed to the water. >> she keeps the
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packinghouse clean. >> to make sure it is cleaned and sanitized before production. >>the peope who slaughter the cattle, . >> john: then the people run the freezer facility. thousands ofpeople have to work together to get the foodo market for me? >> i don't think of it that way. >> i think about money i am no one. >> i had never heard of him. >> they may not care about me but they do work hard and cooperate to bring the state.
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government cannot do it. they have ied but most fail miserably. remember theong lines sometimes people start and there was no food. free-market provides food every day. reaches celebrate that. that is our show. excuse me. i have to eat.... >> dave: dave briggs, 000. >> and clayton morris, the most portanone. >> dave: see ya. >> 17 days out from the big election and big news from 7 swing states, the unemployment ra, falling, and the guys pounding the campaign trail and those swing states, take a page out of the play book, these guys, find out how to get jobs swinging back in the right direction, hi, i'm brenda buttner and this is bulls and bears. here they are, the bulls and bears, we ve got tobin smith

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