levi strauss today's levi strauss is the guy who sells plexiglas and the companies that sell those big states 6 feet apart dots that are stuck to the floor everywhere now fair enough they fill a sudden need as we are all feeling needy but who else stands to profit from the pandemic and who are the damnable profiteers who state attorneys general should be busting right and left let's ask the university of massachusetts professor emeritus richard wolfe richard as we are wait instructions to return to america's broadcast headquarters in washington where cleaners look like they're mopping up plutonium we've been issued a 17 page manual handsome instruction book for re entering the workplace now is a long time consultant i'm green with envy i can only imagine how many billable hours went into producing that document but for what other products and services

is this pandemic a legitimate gold rush and richard who are the opportunistic profiteers. well there are so many it kind of londell to the mind on the one hand you have the hustlers and i'm trying to are like the people who are using a social media on the internet to sell fake medicines to sell fake cures to sell fake vaccines and to sell all manner of things that are going to protect you from the virus and from getting sick. much of that is illegal and many of the claims involved are straight out of the regal but it's going on it's very hard to stop it exists both in the united states and in the larger world so that's one con but even when you get upset about it it's a small amount of money compared to what you might call the legitimate examples

like you were mentioning of levy stroud's with the genes. let's take one example amazon where you can't go to a store safely when you don't want to get joe masks and gloves on and all the rigamarole what do you do you use a delivery service amazon is a delivery service jeffry be so host is a delivery boy it tells you a lot about the united states that the richest reward we did is do someone who can deliver packages quickly but he's cashing in the current estimate is that his personal wealth every tied up in amazon stock went up something on the order of $24000000000.00 in the last and weeks so there's something extraordinary in an economy that makes what was already the richest man in the

world that much richer while 42000000 people went on employment benefits facebook anything that the internet offers is something that is now going to be purchased as we're all stuck at home trying to figure out how to pass the time i'm worried over the job we may or may not have when all this is over and cetera et cetera huge amounts of money being lost by the neighborhood store or lost by the local restaurant lost by all manner of people that money has however moving somewhere and it's moving to the people who are in a position through no effort of their own they're just lucky that the way this virus works brought then an avalanche of new business in europe less point they're trying to tax all of it so they're claiming that they have

a national emergency and those who are already rich and became richer should get at least a significant portion of their windfall to help a country and problem we're not doing that in this country and it's making that the tension between europe and the united states more difficult than them they already were. and history has not been kind to the widening gap between the haves and the have nots you are raising 2 interesting points when you say a mouthful when you say amazon because amazon is more than stuff i've been watching movies and t.v. shows and i have access to 14000 songs if i bark at alexa because i'm an amazon prime so he's got a big software play there jeff bezos does but in terms of the delivery dynamic i don't think that in whatever the new normal turns out to be that that's something

that's going to sustain have we gotten spoiled by this bring it to me moment we've been in. i don't think so and i only thin the argument and you're quite right took to ask the question president news and reason that i think it won't go that way my wife is a psychotherapist and so i am earning a whether i want it or not to all of their discussions among them and one of the most profound. swirling around the internet among psychologists like tired just and all of that is the dreadful you need loneliness that americans had as a people going into this but that has become much worse because you're locked down in your home you can't visit your children don't go out and meet the kids their own age they're with you all over time you can't really give them the to i mean that tensions and the difficult these also are building up to what at least i'm hearing

are explosive levels of loneliness and that we are told you know what when this breaks when finally there's a vaccine or whatever allows us to go back to whatever the normal is there is going to be a desire to go to the mall to go to the shuttle or to go to the restaurant not simply and not even primarily to buy the object going to have a meal it's going to be with the people again even if you're only your casual station because it's becoming a very urgent need that the stores and malls will be able to fulfill and amazon tant do that. we are social animals and the browsing is something we have missed we're speaking with richard wolffe the economist and it's hard to imagine that our economy is not going to suffer in cleanup mode after uncle sam has been running the

printing presses day and night creating the monopoly money for all these relief payments is hurtful inflation inevitable and are we at risk of what guys our age remember as stagflation. you know i'm afraid. yes we are subject to it and yes we are going to pay for the policies that have been in use today it is important and i say this as a professional economist it is important to understand that this is the worst economic cope wrapped in 99 years it's its worst the only thing worse than this is a great depression itself of the one thing. and not only do we had such a collapse but we have my own crisis on top of it it is all rot to deal with and

the people in charge of our economy secretary of the treasury the new chairman or the head the federal reserve mr powell and so on they are what ever they show the public they are an excuse they know a hole that we don't have any roadmap out of this the mayor throwing money just as you say printing it out of going out and you know throwing the money they're saying the kind of things you say when you're running that if i can get out of this mess now throwing everything i got there's no point in worrying about the future so if they're not we're going to have to regain that future but it's a kind of marx scary prospect it's all one train all that money where has it gone it has not gone to masses of people to produce more goods and services we know that because they're all on the employed and companies can't even sell what's already in their inventory so of course the money isn't going to go into producing

more where is the money going it's going into the stock market which has added insulation now that's wonderful moods but a 10 percent of americans who own 80 percent of the shares went for everybody else not at all and finally there's the wrist if and when that money. that runs into the stock market were to become sear full about a crash in the stock market again where's that money going to go they're going to start buying what are called real goods land buildings inventories and then you're going to see the inflation where it hits our pocketbooks rather than in the stock market where it makes the rich even richer and all the while the difference between rich and poor worsens. well i just got a minute left but i must ask to that point look we've just seen in the space of

about 3 weeks we went from 3 percent unemployment to over 40000000 unemployed and beyond those round numbers gaze into the crystal ball which occupations in the new normal will be dead ends and what will be the opportune new career paths i got just a minute richard. well i'm afraid we don't know i wish i could give you an answer and tell you but to variables are so many and the unknown nature of all of this my guess is however that one of the areas that will come back strong is everything having to do with health and much known has to do with education we were unprepared for a virus we could and should have been prepared for we don't have in place a medical system that is as good as many other countries who have less resources

than we do i think you're going to see a reaction in which people demand and we as a society will give ourselves then asked new jobs in the health care clinics care etc and the other big crisis is education we stopped at your schools i'm a professor we don't teach at a distance to do proper teaching you need an interactive arrangement that is private and that is intense and we're going to want that back in the same way that we want to get back into the browsing and the interactions with other human beings . i think you're absolutely right economist richard wolfe thank you again for your time always appreciate your perspective on these issues coming up while we've been hunkered down mother nature is on the mend are we seeing the green future this is the big picture on our team america.

other central bankers warren buffett are effectively playing financial russian roulette right so they have a gun and in there is one bullet of risk they spin the chamber they point at america's head and they pull the trigger hoping that they won't blow off the america's head and that they get to keep all the free money this day and they do that every single day and then eventually like in 2008 they blow off america's head and it will happen again soon and they'll say well you know we were acting in the greater good.

you can be go with yeah you. want something terrible has been happening something wonderful has been. happening fewer cars and trucks on the road fewer planes in the sky and if you look up at that sky over los angeles even over new delhi it's actually blue on land and sea critters are returning to places that they had shunned and while the 50th anniversary of earth day went to unnoticed dramatic changes in our environment seem

to be happening overnight as a result of lockdown orders taking place around the globe while these orders and tend to mitigate the spread of the corona virus the unintended consequences have been some quick and stunning anecdotal changes to our climate challenges have we seen the greener future in the new normal or have we given planet earth a gift we're going to have to take back let's ask brian keene who's president of smart power dot org a nonprofit washington based firm and brian was the very 1st guest on the very 1st show i did on our team america almost 3 years ago brian we haven't schedule off welcome back is. going to be back in your good you remember that. the the midnight how ling of coyote's hua ventured back in the music to the

ears of city folk but long time no see dolphins in the canals in venice what are some of the other good things that have happened while we've been torturing the environment less lately. it's been unbelievable it's in you know it's i think everybody wanted says is producing part of this it's we're seeing in a ml's going to that we've never seen we're seeing cleaner air mean you mentioned new delhi you can see aging them from space where we've never been able to see that before dolphins in venice we're talking about there's literally deer now walking down the streets in major major cities major cities and towns across the united states. and you've never seen that before the trick here that we have to keep reminding ourselves is. they've actually probably already always been there it's just that now we're not so what's happened say in venice for instance the dolphins have actually always been there it's just that there have been so many people so many boats so much mud and muck being picked up every day that we just never saw it

and so it's happening is actually that we're the ones going away and the animals are taking over and so it's really kind of passing to see it happen what's really very cool to see him to realize what we've done is that we have changed human behavior because of the coronavirus literally overnight we changed could we changed human behavior and a lesson there and kind of the exciting point if you will is that we can change human behavior now hopefully we don't have to do it again as dramatically as drastically but if we're going to actually solve the climate crisis is going to take a piece of changing our human behavior and so what we're seeing is a you know what we can drive less we can actually go to the store less we can actually change our lifestyle to improve human kind of human nature for the better and that's what's really been pretty exciting throughout this process it is if you will the silver lining that really between from a coronavirus. well and nowhere will that the behavioral change be more apparent

than in the workplace with all this telecommuting we've been doing you've got the boss rethinking the return on investment of x. $100.00 per square foot of pricey new york real estate and many employees now prefer to work at home wall street journal article recently said they're questioning why do we even live here because where their home was was predicated on commuting to an office many employees remain aware of rejoining the work space or traveling to it on public transportation and in a survey of $425.00 companies by human resources consulting firm operations and 57 percent of the employers surveyed said we will allow these employees to continue to work from home only 6 percent say we will stand by our safety measures and insist that these employees come to the office with their

coworkers and 37 percent are unsure at this time here's operations and c.e.o. david lewis that's one of the big stories i think we're going to see out of all of this is that we've learned how to do business on a face to face basis without being in the same room when we do that and so businesses who have figured out how to master the art of skype or teams or zoom or whatever the product is that they're using have really come to realize that this is going to be a game changer. brian could this shift in the way we work lock in some of the relief the environment has enjoyed lately. well i 1st preface this by saying i always knew i should have gone into commercial real estate some let it into. good. exactly i don't do many things right that was one of them. but you know i think we're going to see him keep in mind you know

we are social beings we really don't like just being locked in our homes for months potentially years on end so hopefully this will end and we're going to want to be with other people and when i would quit and i'm going to work with other people i think we're going to see then what we're realizing and you know the work force was moving towards this eventually anyway very slowly that we can be as productive at home for it. for certain months of time that you know we can do work via broadband we can do work by assuming all that and then go and meet with their own. colleagues in person for a certain amount it's months of time we just don't have to all be in highway traffic and traffic jams from 7 am to 9 am and then from 5 pm to 7 pm so we really can save all of their gasoline we can actually say not produce all of that smog we don't have to waste all of that time quite frankly we are having people be

much more productive because today they are the 1st in the office because they don't leave home and then the last to leave and so it's really been fascinating to see people be more productive without creating the pollution that goes along with it it's also very interesting that there were things i mean so it challenges as well because you know support at garbage pick up is now spiking its way on it because we're all creating this much trash we're just creating it now at home not in downtown cities you know at the workplace and so you have kind of just challenges moving back and forth there along the long story interestingly though is there. it is isn't it lasting a kind if you kind of don't think these things i said in but is going to write like is that so much more trash it all now and we're eating so much more at home so kareen i think you see just that lunch downtown but now it's here so it's really very interesting but what we're gradually going to somewhere is. it does it just

doesn't go away and we still just perhaps that end you then they would say wow we really can going to change the way the timing works and so it is like oh you know i really don't care if you come into the office at noon or 2 because i actually realize that you're going to do that work from home and it's just really kind of a matter of you know let's meet can we have a meeting at 2 o'clock because we can do it by soon but actually at some point why don't we just meet in person and have that meeting would be great you make a great point about drama utility because you and i know people right there in the washington area doing the beltway pop every day their drive an hour and 45 minutes each day in each direction and we have recovered that time we're speaking with brian team from smart power dot org brian while nature has been enjoying the lock down the economic consequences have been dire how has slamming the brakes on business impacted green technology progress. so it's been

fascinating you know that it's that those numbers have been dire to just having a meeting but that the other day and i actually think it's a short term hit that what we're going to see in what i think what we're seeing is that especially as we talk about solar power that people are now saying well wait a minute i actually really need to prepare for. worst case scenarios now and residential solar is actually a big salute piece of that solution and so we're starting to see as people say well wait a minute you know i've never actually taken renewable energy seriously before but it actually could be a piece of a worst case scenario and so you can get solar to a by the way in it can be done very socially distant you know when we still sold it to folks people just if you go on and google maps or google earth and you look at someone's house you can tell them right away whether their house is good for solar when they come in look at your house bill they climb under your roof they don't

even have to see it on to me they can actually do it without even talking to without actually meeting you in person they can all be done socially distant and so it's actually not a problem in fact you know we recently are seeing this increasingly have people saying well actually i hadn't thought about it before but now i think i want to have my own energy supply too can i get a better with that and so it's really actually going to start having a really big uptick not to change and fix the sustainability land but simply to start protecting themselves and that's fine with me as long as people are understanding that hey we could actually you know take care of things here and i don't know how things are going to play on the long term so i want to make sure i have my my own energies of lines and that's really pretty tough going to change. and we're all in the survival mindset now i'm running short on time but when you mentioned small solar i must ask you a couple of years ago post hurricane maria we were talking about the fragile

grid on puerto rico and here we are again and another hurricane season and you were talking about neighborhood size power grids i got about a minute left is puerto rico still a sitting duck and if it's not being done there is this kind of technology being implemented elsewhere and places that are fraught. yes and puerto rico has serious has its own jets significant challenges still but the concept and putting in place micro-grid is really exciting and is in solar community solar plants really exciting and since we talked about it before adding to them solar storage solar batteries which are really coming on the market now so basically what you have is not only just solar that can work you know during the day when the sun is out but it actually collects the energy and then that community can tap into that

energy actually even in the in the middle of the night when this big storm hits and there's no power that community that has power when it needs it most so the concept now is solar storage is a real thing and really happening so you have communities solar plants that are really actually able to sustain local communities and that's really saying we're actually seeing utilities use that you know in arizona the largest retailer in arizona is actually seeing that that is part of their long term plan for sustainability to 2050 and that's really exciting they're actually talking about local community solar arrays we have storage as part of their long term solution. small is beautiful writing a keen smart power dot org thanks again for joining us i look forward to seeing you back when they let us into the mothership in washington meantime stay safe and thank you things i change to see the big picture from rhode island the great ocean state i'll be back here next week and in the meantime if you want to look at any of

the shows we've done they're all available on demand at youtube dot com slash the big picture r t you can watch us live in a bunch of places including youtube dot com slash r t america direct t.v. channel 321 pluto t.v. 279 dish 280. so we were this newsrooms he's. going to be named christmas. you may. know.

him and those he just came up with if you care that oh. i'm talking about is a very international community. meeting yesterday and the trick is you need to. do this to the kids who get this this study says if. there's a position that they would use for the business for their nuclear cooperation the entire thing is everything because he was the leader with the group of t.v. with the. the above the. 5 behave badly affected all day but i decided not to take this life. with my get can tell you that. is your media a reflection of reality. in

a world transformed. what will make you feel safe from. the isolation community. are you going the right way or are you being led so. what is true what is faith. in the world corrupted you need to descend. to join us in the depths. maybe in the shallows. time after time corporations repeat the same mantra sustainability it's very important to excel or it transitions to sustainable transport sustainability stay number man or a more equitable and sustainable well. they claim their production is completely

hama's. because. companies want us to feel good about buying their products while the damage is being done far away and this is something else this must be done to anyone and i mean look. this is the move and news to me doing to me man i'm stunned. understood superman and. welcome to max kaiser financial survival guide. that's the. yanks this is what happens to pensions in britain delegates and watched as a report. because i'm going to.

greetings and sal you take all right well well well welcome back hawk watchers from the hiatus i hope everybody is safe and sound happy and healthy out there in news t.v. land there is there is however one group out there who we know are definitely not healthy and they're certainly not happy and that my friends is all of our historically racist statues and memorials here in the united states of america yes activists and protesters across the nation over the last few weeks have been tearing down these idiotic idols and relics.