if you're born into a family that only has a single parent that really constrains your life chances people die on average 15 years younger than if you're born into generational poverty you. lose a father it's a fight every day to meet your needs and the needs of your family. show small seemed wrong. but old roles just don't hold. any new world beliefs yet to shape our disdain becomes to educate and in gain strength equals betrayal. when so many find themselves worlds apart when she's to look for common ground.

hello and welcome to cross talk were all things are considered i'm peter lavelle as a culture war consumes american politics during this election cycle the economy remains in a big area state millions of people live on the margins the only constant for them is insecurity economists debate and eventually recovery they speak of a u. of the end of now but is the reality a k a recovery a permanent underclass. to discuss this and more i'm joined by my guest richard wolffe in new york he is

professor emeritus of economics at the university of massachusetts amherst as well as author of the recent books understanding socialism and understanding marxism and in westport we cross to peter schiff he is chief global strategist at europe a civic asset management right gentlemen crosswalk rules in effect that means you can jump in anytime you want and i always appreciate it ok let's go to new york richard you know looking at the news about the economy looking at a lot of macro numbers and sometimes i think it's very quite confusing and where the economy is going particularly when we look at unemployment permanent unemployment and jobs that are permanently lost here but the more i look at it and you gentlemen are preeminent experts here i don't i don't really think it's that you are an l. i'm really quite taken with this k. a recovery the rich got richer and the poor guy. or is that an oversimplification richard go ahead not at all i think we've already seen that now folks light some

time that at least 2 more 3 or 4 decades of growing inequality both of wealth and income and instead of that being understood as having contributed to this combination pandemic and crash we're living through instead of that being understood we see the crash having made it worse the growth of the wealthy at the very top having outstripped everything we could have imagined at the same time that now over 60000000 americans have had to file for one or another kind of state or federal unemployment compensation assistance this is a system that is standing out of control in terms of extremes of wells' inequality and income inequality and there's nothing on the horizon that suggests that that's going to change and so i think that is becoming a permanent quality of this economy and is a society that used to in the 20th century pretend that it was

a vast middle class that capitalism was a tide that lifted all boats i don't think this is politically already a logically sustainable peter the same question to you because if we look at the consumption patterns of the top 10 percent during the worst of the pen demick a lot down their consumption went down something like 15 percent but the class that serves them their income went down more than 30 percent that's according to some reports here so i mean and we do know they just pays those stories in the billionaire stories how they've really done well out of all of this year is that is that akin to a k. recovery because we do have this growing and maybe permanent underclass go ahead you're well you know i don't even care what letter you want to try to use to describe it my problem is with the word recovery because i don't think we've recovered. all sure there has been a recovery in the stock market in that the market recovered what it lost in the

early days of coded and yes i mean these this recession that we're currently in began with a very substantial collapse and yes there's been a bit of a bounce off of that collapse but we're still in a recession and so i don't know if recovering to being in a less severe recession then we were in at one point really qualifies as a recovery and i don't think we've seen the lows i think we're going to relapse i think we're actually going to go down and there's a good chance that the stock market might make new lows as well but regardless of what happens with that bubble in the short run the reality is that main street's pain has actually been wall street again it's precisely because the economy remains so weak and what's really at the root cause of the weakness is not capitalism it's the failure to have capitalism it's the federal reserve that is monetizing masts of

government debts that are only inflating asset bubbles but at the same time it is depriving the real economy of the resources that it actually needs to grow and build a real recovery that would in fact lift all boats instead we're settling for a fake recovery because that's the easiest one to create because in order to have a real recovery we're going to have to have some short term pain in order to make that possible because what has to recover is not consumption but production we need more savings we need more capital investment and to and to enable lat we actually need higher interest rates not lower interest rates and we need a smaller government not a larger government so everything that we have done since the pandemic began is actually weakening the economy and we're compound ing all of the states. that we made before the pandemic if you remember we were already slipping along before

anybody heard of covert 19 and 4th quarter 2018 that's when the wheels started coming off the bus that's when the fed did the about face and started cutting rates that's when they really started to move from quite a tame tightening back a quantitative easing now in march of 2020 right dose trends excel aerated we went right back to 0 and we went we skipped q.e. 4 and went right to q.e. infinity but all these policies are simply blowing more air into a big bubble and at the same time they're depriving the real economy of the air that it needs to grow if it if i go back to reagan all of these mistakes and i think centrally agree with much much what peter spent but much of those mistakes have benefited the same people the richest people that we've ever known in the history of humanity those mistakes ok yes i agree no no no i have assets we're aware of where greed we're agreeing but i'm going to focus you know richard here is that but because these mistakes have benefited these people why should they

do anything about it i mean made out i mean there's no executive let me go to richard there's no one getting there these mistakes. yes i think the use of the word mistakes here it always amazes me it's a mistake over and over again year after year peter is quite right i agree but these mistakes being systematic the repeated over and over again are not dealt with adequately by suggesting that if only the mistakes were made we would have some nice sanctioning capitalism that would look again lift all boats it seems to me that the people at the top end figured out that if and when they can they can make more money if that drowns the economy and in that downturn they can turn back to their advantage as well using monetary policy to insulate the stocks of. it's the bulk of farewells depends this is a this statement so often repeated that the word mistake starts to lose its meaning

this is the way capitalism slayer's out it might be nice to imagine that it would function some other way but that's the utopian imagery of that stateless capitalism that probably never existed but in the last 100 years sure has disappeared as this state has become a major lender so the gross and concentration of wealth with or without the merger is between the state and the biggest chap in the lists which is happening more and more as we see i think this is the real capitalism we have to live with and not the imaginary one that peter likes to suggest so now you see i read it i mean the middle i'm in the middle of a big bowl of between being and when you said you agree with peter i think you agree with both peter and here we're going to go to the other theater here what you used the word countless methinketh that i think it's very problematic because it

doesn't seem to be benefiting the whole lot of people because they know none the less here i would agree with peter our guest here in the sense that i'm tired of socialism for the very very rich and then everybody else gets the crumbs in the comp was the economy go ahead well 1st of all don't confuse what america has now with capitalism i mean what's left of capitalism have been destroyed by socialism so it's the socialism that has crept into the system that is responsible for the problems in this mass disparity in wealth but also you assume that this is going to end well for the rich i assure you it's not these asset bubbles are temporary a lot of this wealth only exists on paper people are not actually spending that money it's just on an on a brokerage account statement what is coming is a major collapse in the value of the dollar inflate. it is ultimately going to result in the cost of living writing much faster than the paper value of peoples

assets so believe me the rich are going to get theirs too everybody in america is going to be impoverished to a degree by these failed policies it's not just of course the middle class they're just going to suffer the most but in the end the rich are going to suffer too but the real solution for everybody is a return to capitalism what we need is sound own money and independent fed that no longer artificially manipulates insta interest rates to prop up asset prices and to subsidize government deficit spending we need much higher interest rates that will result in a big decline in spending from government and consumers will have more savings will have more capital or capital investment we need a lot less regulation as well as cuts to government spending so we can have a more vibrant economy instead of the sick economy we have now that is on life support that is temporarily benefiting people who own the assets that benefit from

the inflation that the fed is creating but ultimately that inflation is going to rise result in an increase in the cost of living for everybody and we are headed for a dollar crisis and clearly the rich on more dollars than anybody else play they have the most to lose when the value of the dollars they're holding completely implodes ok i'm certain i think we have one day all 3 of us have been coming to a crisis that is on her right but richard how can how can you save money how can you invest money if you don't have a job i mean it's very simple here. i mean i'm mazed a little bit by this and we're going to have an i interest rates we're going to really crunch down on the economy you mention in passing that consumers will have to save more than anything lasts to save from that's why this level of savings of the great mass of americans is virtually 0 or negative already they didn't suffer in for so long businesses. unless you crunch down on them which is already happening now it is a recipe for much more trouble more oil and

a us in this society then we're already then we're already seeing i agree with peter that this is going to end very badly and it's going to be slaves the bubble at the stock market alongside of everything else but for me this is the end of an empire for the 1st time in my adult life i don't see a way out i don't see a solution emerging i used to it my ear that way capitalism over change the great depression and all the others of selections that it has imposed on the people around it but they don't hassle israel in a host those inflexions government did not listen honestly out of it wait a minute it struck me as one remarkable thing he says so blames socialism for the ills of capitalism is an extraordinary move at a time like this when the socialist movement is coming back from

a period of his story weakness precisely at the times that the growth and equality what went well into that as unesco socialism has been a large and well then he has a service undermining and you tell your structural bill that it was not me you're talking about is law is that social mores or not i have to jump in here we're going to go to a heart breaking out with our break we'll continue our discussion with a recovery stay with our. best guys are financial survival they say money to develop. thirty's if this is a central perk support dying a government funded program right now say stop the. time . the time corporations repeat the same mantra sustainability very important to

accelerate the transition to sustainable transport sustainability stay in her manner more equitable and sustainable world. they claim their production is completely harmless. little. companies want us to feel good about buying their products while the damage is being done in far away this is something this must keep going to. be doing don't even. understand it look at who is a woman and. welcome back to crossfire for all things are considered i'm peter lavelle tree mind you were discussing whether there will be a k. recovery.

ok richard let me go back to you in new york. a few years ago i met an indian businessmen very successful indian business and at the time india's economy was doing quite well again usually using these macro be a macro economic indicators ok g.d.p. growth. income number of people employed but at the same time there's like 200000000 people that live in stark covered in india and i said to him i said is your indian model just to accept that you've got it how 200000000 people in stark poverty because you see your economy is growing and as an investment target people are pouring money into it i mean is it it has the indian economy sense except that it's going to have an underclass so i'm asking you is this what's happening to america where you were going to have been under. class permanent under cattle class and if. it will the perception is that the will be enough political stability

to maintain the status quo because it seems to me i agree with the last remarks you made in the 1st part of the pro the program is that you know i don't see a way out here go ahead richard yeah i think that's exactly what's happening i think we're learning in a variety of ways to live with an enormous underclass i disagree with you that we didn't already have one i think pretty good but i think it we are now learning to live with a much larger one and you can see that in a variety of ways except in space flight what people claim of 200000 people dead from a pandemic that didn't have anything like that impact in many many other countries the united states has 4 and a half percent of the world's people it has 25 percent of the cold it cases and 25 percent of the deaths for a rich country that's a stupefying failure of management but it's also the acceptance of guns the couple

suffering in its population as if it were normal and ditto for the level of poverty divil ditto for the level of discrimination dr antony funnell chief yesterday at the bloomberg equality senate explained how people of color in america have the lowest wealth the lowest income da used. cases of coal did and they are the frontline workers they are the ones that are suffering from hypertension diabetes obesity if you wanted a truth of everything the black lives matter movement wanted to suggest about systemic racism you could just listen to dr found chief in 15 minutes and you would get it and it is being accepted mainly by the government right now as official policy so instead doing absolutely nothing. to undercut it i think we are becoming the society we used to see overseas enclaves of wells new york san francisco

chicago and all of that and so rounded by s c e of the really desperate poverty they have accepted that in india and they have for 50 years if not more despite being independent from great britain they have accepted it in brazil another case and more weight you look at trump both sonora and moldy and you can see the kind of right wing government for which this is an acceptable range you know peter and obviously i want to follow politics very carefully and i watch snippets of the the republican and democratic conventions and i was appalled absolutely appalled that neither party had a proactive economic agenda presumed to propose to pursue in light of the. high unemployment. and the in the structural changes that are going through the

economy i didn't see that from either party here and it goes back to my question to richard is there is this an exception acceptance that we're just going to have a whole lot more poor people. well you know we're i disagree that we've even been having a growing economy i don't think we had any growth even before kovac and i think the g.d.p. numbers were manufactured based on understating the true rate of inflation and so by understating inflation you can make it appear that a stagnating or shrinking economy is is actually growing it's not you know the reason that americans don't have any savings is because the economy has been growing they've been able to keep it together through debt they've used debt to replace their income but why is that it's because we don't have a vibrant economy because we don't have real increases in productivity thanks to big government and banks the federal reserve so we're in this gigantic hall because we have banded capitalism and embraced a socialist form of government we have government central planning we have central

planning on interest rates we have price fixing and market manipulation and we have an economy where we're trying to generate growth by printing money and giving it to people to spend and that is not going to work well i said the only way to get really good amik growth is to shrink government so that we can have a stronger more vibrant economy because we need more productivity to consume more we have to produce more and the government doesn't produce anything all it does is interfere with the productive efforts of the private sector you know the problem is though but peter did the government it particularly in the last 2 years that particularly during this economic turndown they chose winners i mean the you know so jeff bezos announced goal and all that there's a real socialist in america because you're the winner in all of this ok i mean i think you know these terms calculus and socialism don't really mean anything for me is that both lose it who's big government promote that is the middle class is not

the working class isn't the big tech companies are. the banks are doing really well here are the banks that i do well look at the device or implode. look at the look at their sarah prices look the banking sector is in a lot of trouble but look none of the bailouts should have happened there should have been a p.p.p. the whole thing was a disaster nobody should be getting a check from the government these extended unemployment benefits were a mistake what we need is less government not more government government has to cut spending not increase said money printing is just going to make it worse it's going to destroy the value of our money and we're going to blame all these problems i'm capitalism and we're going to continue to build a bigger and bigger government that is going to suffocate the life out of this economy and the people who are going to suffer the most are going to be the middle class of the poor ok we're going to face are you good where if you have got i agree with you how the dollar is being destroyed here but the people that are benefiting from this they turn their dollars into real assets like right yes yes well i always

found value here but what about working people that lost their job you know they're going to get it you can't really can't turn it into an area you know if i didn't government supposed to know about it and if you only look at stuff like problem by poland and ireland it means he's going to go ahead richard i've always found it extraordinary that the way soaks like peter tried to exonerate the capitalist system from each grotesque failures is by having a deus ex not going to the government drops into this story so that all the anger and bitterness and rage against the capitalism that produces all these problems including owning and controlling the government is exempted from that criticism you cited it all off on the government create this utopian fantasy of a get out of let me an era king but out of capitalism without

a government has never had an say you know governor all easing into government the governor there actually halle's and i like things. they are ultimately has always been controlled by the people who have the big boxed they've used it from their own advantage the imagination that we could have a capitalism with the employer with a minority of employers a control everything who are not going to try to control the government is a fantasy we have never let your ignorance of encouraging this relation is only exceeded by your ignorance of history listen i don't do that to you so do but i'm telling you you're wrong you've got to understand capitalism go away no idea which is not who you are declaring enabling itas an appliance alleles lens what to do keeping on talking doesn't solve the problem i go days you go what is your solution to the problem you're not directing this conversation by magic in your heart of it yeah well actually we are listen we have gotten it there is more money printing and

that girl do listen you know that were did or you know her i'm just chilling up time doing this yeah ok peter asked a fair question what is the solution richard because well we have about 2 and a half minutes 3 minutes go here we got capitalism is a system that is organized in every enterprise by having a small minority of people the owner the shareholder the major shareholders the board of directors making all the decisions from the majority of people who are called to employees that's a very similar arrangement to the lords and the serfs of feudalism and to the ministers and the slaves of slavery we didn't break out of that dichotomy of a few controlling the many until we developed a concept of democracy the solution to the problems of capitalism is to put capitalism where we put slavery in feudalism we have to substitute a democratically organized and to price right to debase every factory every store

every office organized in the way we organize our politics one person one vote we decide together what to produce out of produce where to put. juice and what to do with the fruits of the labor we've all get you to follow me as your little sister the knowledge that you're talking about creating life you know me how to astral like environment i didn't care but if you think there's a war you know well yes in cuba you're in the soviet oh yeah you're going to liberia you have this in a fantasy world is not is not only eric's it doesn't work it only works in your imagination it doesn't 2 work reality and your heater ology meter splitter it is very polished and i want to ask you is a substantial question here peter how do you how would you react to tens of millions of people that have lost their jobs have no future and i don't think they to think in terms of capital ism but a lot of them would say what is competent has been doing for me and i think that's a legitimate question if you because

a recovery i agree with your 1st answer this program will get a recovery it depends on yourself where you are in life if that's a recovery or this solution. depends on embracing capitalism and rejecting socialism we need to restore free market capitalism to this country big government needs to get out of the way we need to have sound money and limited government again that is the only path back to prosperity there is real pain there are real problems i don't deny that government and central banking cause those problems and government and central banks are not going to solve the how could a more government we have it will work if we try to socialize me because i'm going to end it and if there's some kind of socialist paradise a guy that only exists lamely i disagree man is like we're going to take a bad situation let's make it much much worse you know who controls the government just as well as i do blaming the government just likes of people who are pulling the puppet strings all of the criticism they do less or you know that i have to

jump in here i'm putting it right it doesn't hurt because i want to make my case in westport and in. we are going to want to thank our viewers for watching us your r.t.c. next time remember. cas

calendar is dying alfonzo among his die and there's changing pay change dard served our. whose 1st words were had a lot of us here a challenging post you've got 2 years to live. i have no doubt that what happened was criminal. offense concentrated market is a $1000000000.00 industry these companies have huge financial motivations to solve these problems there are numerous stocks showing that dumped his work keen to test facts or a concentrate straight insights of its own that patients want gives them doctors the wrong stoplight long term system why they were keeping them secure those who stay. and people still die i'm always question or so i tried being hard to live

when so many have. this is a military plane crash lands on a highway in eastern ukraine at least 22 people are dead critically injured. in the 50 attack near the former paris headquarters of the satirical magazine is now being treated as an era the incidents left 2 people injured and comes after the magazine recently published controversial cartoons featuring the prophet muhammad. also in france a new covert infection 16000 cases were recorded in a single day on thursday but the latest restrictions on life designed to stop the virus are only spreading. meanwhile across the channel ethical concerns are being raised over reports that volunteers in the u.k. could soon be deliberately infected with in a.