Joe Rogan Experience #1145 - Peter Schiff

Joe Rogan 0:03 The countdown.

Peter Schiff 0:04 Just make it short. So you just-

Joe Rogan 0:06 Three, two, one. (snaps fingers) Hello, Peter Schiff.

Peter Schiff 0:09 Hello, Joe Rogan.

Joe Rogan 0:10 So you just what? Were you gonna, were you gonna ask?

Peter Schiff 0:12 (laughs) No, you just did a whole other show before this one.

Joe Rogan 0:14 Yeah, I did.

Peter Schiff 0:15 Three hours?

Joe Rogan 0:16 No, two hours.

Peter Schiff 0:17 Oh, all right, so-

Joe Rogan 0:18 It wasn't that hard.

Peter Schiff 0:18 Oh, okay, well-

Joe Rogan 0:19 It was with a comedian. Those are the easy ones.

Peter Schiff 0:21 Oh, all right.

Joe Rogan 0:21 They're just, it's just basically talking to a friend.

Peter Schiff 0:24 Okay. Well, I'm a friend.

Joe Rogan 0:25 You are a friend.

Peter Schiff 0:25 That's right.

Joe Rogan 0:26 Yeah. Uh, I remember when I first saw you, when you were doing that Occu- well, well, is Occupy Wall Street a thing anymore?

Peter Schiff 0:31 You-

Joe Rogan 0:31 Did they give up? They stop occupying?

Peter Schiff 0:33 Yeah, they did. But you know, we just f- maybe you sh- saw that on my YouTube channel. I know we just reposted the Occupy Wall Street video. I never actually had it on my channel.

Joe Rogan 0:42 Oh, really?

Peter Schiff 0:43 But, 'cause it was originally done by Reason.

Joe Rogan 0:45 Oh.

Peter Schiff 0:45 And this was about five years ago or so.

Joe Rogan 0:46 Yeah.

Peter Schiff 0:46 Five, six years ago. And so Reason TV did it, and so I let them promote it on their site. I didn't copy it. And they got millions and millions of views, and there were some other, uh, sites that, that, that went with it.

Joe Rogan 0:58 It was Ask a One-Percenter, right? Wasn't that what you called it?

Peter Schiff 1:01 Well, I w- I went down-

Joe Rogan 1:02 What did you-

Peter Schiff 1:02 ... there with a sign-

Joe Rogan 1:03 What'd it say?

Peter Schiff 1:04 ... that said, "I am the 1%."

Joe Rogan 1:05 Yeah. (laughs)

Peter Schiff 1:05 "Let's talk." And I went into Zuccotti Park and-

Joe Rogan 1:09 (laughs)

Peter Schiff 1:09 ... you know, I, the only reason I stopped, and if you, the long, the long one, the long version's just under two hours, which is on my YouTube channel now. But the only reason we stopped is because we ran out of ca- you know, uh, ba- batteries.

Joe Rogan 1:21 Canidades. Oh. (laughs)

Peter Schiff 1:21 Batteries in the camera. The camera died. But I, I, I coulda kept talking, and we were losing the light. You can see by the end, you know, it's getting dar- it's getting darker.

Joe Rogan 1:29 Just watching them get frustrated with you, but not having the words nor the knowledge to compete-

Peter Schiff 1:33 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:33 ... with what you were saying was very entertaining. Like, w-

Peter Schiff 1:36 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:36 ... agree with you or disagree with you, it was just hilarious watching someone so completely outmatched, or a group of people so completely outmatched, trying to debate economics with you and trying to understand the way business works.

Peter Schiff 1:47 Except they didn't even realize they w- they were outmatched.

Joe Rogan 1:49 No. (laughs)

Peter Schiff 1:49 They thought they were smarter than me. But, you know, the, the main reason I went there was not so much to try to convince the people there that they were wrong and that, you know, capitalism was, you know, the solution, not the source of their problems, and that they, you know, should be protesting Washington, the Federal Reserve, or Congress. It was for the people that I knew that would watch it o- on the internet. And I still get emails, even now, at least, I don't think a week goes by where somebody from somewhere in the world doesn't send me an email about that. And I know another, uh, w- website, I forget the name of it, reposted it about a year ago, and they got a couple of million views on it, just posting it again. So, a lot of people have watched it, and I get, you know, comments from people saying, "This is what changed me. I was a socialist, very left wing, I watched this, and that was the epiphany."

Joe Rogan 2:39 Hm.

Peter Schiff 2:39 "That was the moment, and then I did more research and I learned more. And now thanks to you, I'm a total libertarian or free market capitalist." And so, it's, it served its purpose.

Joe Rogan 2:48 (smacks lips) Yeah, well, it was enlightening. It's, it was, it was good, it's good the peop- to see people that are so involved in something that they'll go and they'll protest, they'll hang out in the park, but they really can't articulate their feelings or their thoughts in a, a well-reasoned debate. They really don't have the facts, but yet they're dedicating their entire life to protesting something. It's really interesting that people will spend so much energy and effort on something that they're really not even educated in.

Peter Schiff 3:13 Yeah, and it's a lot easier just to talk about something just emotionally-

Joe Rogan 3:19 Yes.

Peter Schiff 3:19 ... instead of actually taking the time to learn about economics and to understand, you know, the, the source of the problems. 'Cause anybody can just blame it on some rich person who's hoarding money and discriminating against them.

Joe Rogan 3:33 People love that. They love doing that.

Peter Schiff 3:34 Yeah. And then just say, "Oh, the solution ..." See, if you blame the problems on some rich person, well the solution is easy. Just take his money, right? Have the government come in-

Joe Rogan 3:43 Right.

Peter Schiff 3:43 ... and, and redistribute the wealth, wh- wh- which is another word for steal. Take money from somebody who earned it and give it to somebody who didn't. But if you actually take a little bit of time and use your head instead of your, your, your, your, y- your heart, your feelings, uh, you'll learn that, you know, that the, the, the source of the problems is government interference in, in, in the, in the economy, and that the protests should be directed at government, at their regulations and their subsidies and their taxes and all the things that government does to stifle economic growth and deny opportunities to people.

Joe Rogan 4:16 D- w- I, I think there would be a really funny documentary, if you could do, like, a documentary on the last occupier. Like, the last person to occupy Wall Street, 'cause it, they had to be, like, stragglers, right?

Peter Schiff 4:29 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 4:29 It, it eventually must have gotten to the point-

Peter Schiff 4:31 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 4:31 ... where there was, like, 30 people left-

Peter Schiff 4:33 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 4:33 ... 20 people left, then one guy, "No, fuck these people, man."

Peter Schiff 4:36 Well, y- you know, they started occupying different areas, right? 'Cause it caught on and it was all over the world. They were occupying here and occupying there.

Joe Rogan 4:44 And they were setting up camps, right? They were essentially living there.

Peter Schiff 4:46 Yeah, yeah. And, um, who knows what else they were doing there. But, um, but now the Occupy mor- uh, movement kind of morphed into the Bernie Sanders movement, right? 'Cause that's where all those guys are now. They were volunteering for the Sanders campaign. And, and socialism is really kind of going mainstream now, because they put the word Democrat in front of it-

Joe Rogan 5:04 Yes.

Peter Schiff 5:05 ... as if somehow that changes the meaning, right? "Well, I'm not a socialist. I'm a democratic socialist," meaning, "I want to vote for socialism, as opposed to just have, you know, an armed revolution." But the end is still the same, right? It's still socialism, and it's, it doesn't work.

Joe Rogan 5:19 Yeah, I was watching an interview with Tucker Carlson-

Peter Schiff 5:21 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 5:21 ... and some guy who's a professor at Harvard, and, uh, he said, "I'll give you the last word." The guy said, "Socialism's gonna win."

Peter Schiff 5:27 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 5:27 He, he made the piece. I'm like, "What is that?"

Peter Schiff 5:29 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 5:29 What does that even mean?

Peter Schiff 5:31 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 5:31 Like, "Socialism is going to win."

Peter Schiff 5:33 Well-

Joe Rogan 5:33 What does, what does that mean?

Peter Schiff 5:34 It-

Joe Rogan 5:34 And what is socialism?

Peter Schiff 5:35 Well, it could win at the polls. That's the problem. It's very-

Joe Rogan 5:38 Mm-hmm.

Peter Schiff 5:38 ... intoxicating to people-

Joe Rogan 5:40 Right.

Peter Schiff 5:40 ... who don't know any better.

Joe Rogan 5:41 Right.

Peter Schiff 5:41 And the interesting thing about-

Joe Rogan 5:42 It's rich people. They have too much money.

Peter Schiff 5:44 Yeah. The interesting thing about socialism is that no matter how many times it fails, people expect it to succeed, right? That's the definition of, of insanity, right? Doing something over and over again and expecting a different result. Well, the socialists always expect a different result from doing something that has-... that has never succeeded in the past.

Joe Rogan 6:01 So, socialism, by definition, is one thing, but by the emotional reaction that people have is kind of another thing. The emotional reaction is, "There's rich people that are a real problem. They're hoarding, they're greedy."

Peter Schiff 6:13 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 6:13 "I'm not concerned with money, I want... I'm, I'm concerned with people, and community, and feelings, and health, and welfare, and education. And all that money, we should take it from those rich people, and we should funnel it into education and community." And they say all these words that make people feel good, like, "Yeah, we're not about money either." And...

Peter Schiff 6:33 Yeah. It's all, it's all about feeling good. That's what-

Joe Rogan 6:36 Yeah.

Peter Schiff 6:36 ... the, the, the liberals are about. It's about, you know, feeling that they're better than everybody else, because they're, you know, they're, they're higher up on this moral pedestal, because they don't care about money. They just care about, you know, people, and...

Joe Rogan 6:48 Mm-hmm.

Peter Schiff 6:48 You know? But when you talk about rich people, they don't hoard money. I mean, the way you get rich is not by hoarding. The way you get rich is by trying to figure out what problems people have that you can solve, right? Whether it's inventing something that makes their lives better, or providing a service that makes their lives better, because the customers are in charge, individuals, right? That, that's what's gonna allocate wealth. It's, if, if somebody is better than somebody else at satisfying the desires that people have, right? If, if I can come up with something that you like, that you want to buy, that's cheaper and better than what somebody else has come up with, then you're gonna buy from me. And so, the person who ends up with the most money is the person who satisfied the most desires, the most needs, in the most efficient way possible. And, and that's what's benefiting society. I mean, it's great to have charity, and I'm all for private charity, but if you look at the wealthiest, uh, men in history, even though they've been incredible philanthropists and they've given away a lot of money, they helped a lot more people amassing their fortunes than gifting away what they made. It was the businesses that they're, they created, the, the, the, uh, products that they invented, the services that they provided, and the employment, right? That was all a function of their creating their wealth. That's what did a lot more to help society than simply giving away, uh, some of the money that they earned.

Joe Rogan 8:09 Have you ever had a debate with a Democratic Socialist?

Peter Schiff 8:13 Well, I mean, m- most Democrats are socialists, they just don't know it, or they don't want to admit it. Uh, and a lot of people don't even understand what socialism is. Because, you know, you'll have... The left, they'll always consider somebody, like even Donald Trump, they'll say, "Oh, he's a fascist," right? They don't even realize that fascism is part of socialism. Socialism is a broad concept that includes things like communism and fascism. So, if you're a communist, you are a socialist. But by... But it doesn't mean that if you're a socialist, you're a communist, because you could be a fascist. You could be for a lot of things. But fascism is a form of socialism where the government doesn't just steal all the property, like the communists want to nationalize everything and take legal ownership of the means of production, right? The government just owns all the capital. Under, under fascism, the government is a little bit smarter. They, they realize that people will work harder if they think they're working for themselves. So, the fascist doesn't want to nationalize businesses, they just want to control it through regulation and taxes. And that's pretty much what the Democrats want to do. They want to control everything by taxing it heavily and regulating it, and those, that's an important aspect of fascists. I mean, a lot of people associate fascism with racism, just because the Nazis were, were racist, but you don't have to be racist. I mean, fascism started in Italy, and that... There, there wasn't any racism there. And if you go back to, uh, the Nazi Party, it's the National Socialist Party of Germany. That's what the Nazis are. It's socialist. So fascism is a form of socialism. That's why the communists and the fascists, you know, argue so much, because they're really, they're fighting over the same turf. It's which brand of socialism is better, fascism or communism? But they're not at opposite ends of the political spectrum, they're on the same end.

Joe Rogan 10:00 So, do you think that people are frustrated with the current system, and so they see someone like Bernie Sanders come along that offers this radical change of pace? He's saying, "You know, uh, we need to end income inequality and redistribute wealth," and all these different things, and it just sparks a, a, an emotional reaction in people that they know that the current system, the way it's in place, especially the way it was under Obama, they didn't like how things were, they didn't like how things were under Bush. They think, "We need someone who's not a career politician, or someone who has got a radical new approach. Oh, look at this Bernie Sanders guy, he wants to do some stuff with money. Let's, let's vote for him."

Peter Schiff 10:34 Yeah. Look, people, you know, are grasping for straws when they're looking for a solution. That... Look, that's why Trump is president. I mean, a lot of people think that Trump's election maybe shows that the ec- the US electorate has moved right, right? That we're more Republican or more free market, but that's not what that election was about. It was about the fact that we had a lousy economy and Trump was honest about that to the voters. Trump told people that, "The numbers are phony. Don't believe these unemployment numbers, 4-5%. It's a lie. It's fraud. It's fiction." And he was right, because the way they calculate it today, they don't calculate that millions and millions of people who have given up looking for work, right? They don't count the people who just have a part-time job and they're still looking for a full-time job. So, the real unemployment number is much, much higher and, and Trump talked about that and, and he called out, you know, all the politicians from both sides, right? Not just the Democrats, the Republicans. And he said, "Look, I'm gonna clean house. I'm not a politician. Vote for me," right? "I'm gonna make America great again. I'm gonna drain the swamp." You know, and he appealed to people's, uh, you know, their, their, their fears about immigrants. "I'm gonna build this wall," as if the reason that things are bad is because we have too many immigrants taking away the jobs. And so people decided, "You know what? What the hell? Let me, let me give this guy a chance, because things are bad. The media's lying to me. Wall Street's lying to me." And so, you know, Trump, Trump won. But unfortunately, now Trump is part of the establishment, uh, and now all of a sudden the fake-... economic numbers are legit. Now, every time there's an unemployment number out, he tweets about how it's the lowest it's ever been. So, I, I think that when we get this next recession, which is going to happen while Trump is president, during, during this first term, which I think will be the only term. But when all the-

Joe Rogan 12:22 Really? Why do you think those two things?

Peter Schiff 12:24 Well, because I think the economy is going to fall into a severe recession.

Joe Rogan 12:28 What makes you say that?

Peter Schiff 12:29 Well, A, you know, it's, we're overdue, right? I mean, you don't normally have an expansion that lasts as long as this one. I think we're, we're the second-longest in history, and if, if we go for another year, it'll be the longest expansion in history.

Joe Rogan 12:41 So 2008 is when it started to turn around, or '9?

Peter Schiff 12:44 2009.

Joe Rogan 12:45 2009.

Peter Schiff 12:45 Yeah, kind of the end of 2009.

Joe Rogan 12:46 So we're nine years in now?

Peter Schiff 12:48 Yeah, exactly.

Joe Rogan 12:48 And what is a usual expansion and compression?

Peter Schiff 12:51 I don't know, five, six years?

Joe Rogan 12:53 So, hmm. Interesting.

Peter Schiff 12:53 So this one is long, but also, this one required more government stimulus than any other, you know, uh, uh, recovery. And I don't think we actually recovered. I think the government simply, you know, injected a, a bunch of cheap money into the economy and exacerbated the real problems, but, you know, reflated the bubbles in the stock market and, and the housing market. But, you know, everybody talks about how the economy is doing so great, but it's really not much better than it was under Obama, if it's any better at all. And we've... GDP growth for Trump's, uh, first year in office, last year, was 2.3%. That mean nothing great. First quarter was 2%. Um, this quarter might be better than three, maybe, maybe not, but, I mean, I think it's gonna be... The second quarter will probably be, uh, the best quarter of the year. Maybe we're probably gonna go downhill. But, you know, last year was, I think, the, the weakest year of job growth since 2011. So people wanna talk about how great everything is, but it's more a function of people are hoping things are gonna turn around. There's a lot of optimism now that things are gonna get better. But I think that the people who are so optimistic, a lot of them are gonna be disappointed, because what we're gonna end up with is a weaker economy. The only thing that's really strengthening is inflation. Uh, inflation is gonna pick up, so the cost of living is really gonna be rising as the economy is falling into recession, so we get stagflation, uh, which is probably the worst possible, uh, economic scenario. And, you know, I think that the, uh, the left, and even the Fed, is gonna be able to blame it on Trump, because Trump has come in and, you know, claimed credit for this great economy that he believes we have, and he's claimed credit for the record in the stock market. But he's basically put his name on a bubble, and when it pops, you know, it's gonna be hard for him to try to blame the next recession on Obama when he's already said, "Hey this is my economy. I created it." And so people are gonna be disappointed, and they're gonna vote, I think, for, uh, s- another person whose promises change. And unfortunately, that's gonna come from the left.

Joe Rogan 14:51 So you think this is gonna happen within the next three years?

Peter Schiff 14:54 Well, yeah. I mean, you know-

Joe Rogan 14:55 Well, when is, what is the bubble? Like, what, what do you think is gonna cause it to crash? Commercial real estate? Is it credit? What is it?

Peter Schiff 15:01 Well, I mean, commercial real estate is expensive, meaning it's in a bubble, but that, you know, that's not gonna cause it. I mean, air's gonna come out of the bubble. I think we would already be in a pretty severe recession now had it not been for Trump winning. Had Hillary won, I think we would already be there. But I think the-

Joe Rogan 15:17 What makes you say that?

Peter Schiff 15:18 Well, we got a lot of false optimism as a result of, of Trump, and we did get the tax cuts. And the tax cuts, you know, just like, you know, any kinda artificial drug, you know, you can inject yourself and, and, and get a little bit of a phony high. Uh, because remember, the tax cuts were paid for, uh, with debt. We didn't shrink government, right? If you, if you make government smaller, that's great. Then you can cut taxes, 'cause now government doesn't need as much money, and you can, you know, you can relieve the taxpayer of the burden of paying for it, and that's great. But if you just cut taxes but you don't cut government spending, and of course what the Trump administration did was the, was even worse. They increased government spending. We increased welfare spending. We inf- increased warfare spending. Uh, and so spending is more, but they reduced their tax revenue, so the deficits are just exploding outta control. And those deficits are gonna do l- more damage to the economy than the tax cuts or benefit, except you get the benefit first, maybe for the first year, and then you start to deal with the pain after that. And so I think that's gonna set in, uh, you know, long before the end of Trump's term.

Joe Rogan 16:24 So you think that th- this is what is causing the economy to be in a really, uh, at least, uh, to, to look like it's in a really healthy state right now?

Peter Schiff 16:32 Well, some of the numbers, right? Some of the numbers look better. Um, but beneath the surface, again, it's not improving, just like, just like it wasn't improving under Obama. That's what laid the foundation for Trump's victory, was because Obama and everybody kept talking about how great the recovery was. But the average voter knew that that was all a bunch of nonsense because he wasn't living in, in, in that reality.

Joe Rogan 16:55 So if you were the financial advisor to the president, what would you tell him?

Peter Schiff 17:01 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 17:01 Well, how would you... (laughs) You're laughing now. What would you do to try to keep the economy moving in the same direction? Is it possible to ward off-

Peter Schiff 17:08 Well-

Joe Rogan 17:08 ... any kind of a crash right now?

Peter Schiff 17:09 We don't wanna keep it moving in the same direction. I mean, it's in the same direction it was going in before Trump came in, and that's towards the edge of a cliff. I mean, so what we do, we need is, is, is an about-face. And Trump is not doing that. I mean, the-

Joe Rogan 17:22 An about-face, what's, so like for the people that are listening to this that don't understand, like they, they're saying, "Okay, the economy's supposed to be doing well. Uh, black unemployment's the lowest it's ever been. Un- unemployment is down. Uh, all these jobs have been created."

Peter Schiff 17:37 Yeah, well remember, again, the unemployment rate is mainly down because so many people that are unemployed are no longer counted as part of the statistics. So, you know, that, that's... If you look at the labor force participation rate, near a record low. I mean, certainly for men, uh, it's the lowest it's been in the history of the republic. Um, but, and look at the, you know, workers to population, so fewer and fewer people are actually working, and more and more of the people who aren't working are not included in the unemployment statistic. So if you backed all those people in, right, able-bodied people who don't have jobs but should be working, then the unemployment rate is much, much higher.

Joe Rogan 18:14 Hm.

Peter Schiff 18:14 So that, that doesn't really paint a good picture. And then, you know, you look at the fact that so many Americans are s- unqualified, right? There's a lot of jobs out there that go unfilled because American workers aren't qualified to fill those positions because, you know, we, we take a lot of our kids and we keep them in high school until they're 18, 19 years old. Many of these kids should, uh-... drop out of high school and learn a trade. I mean, a lot of people, you know, they don't have the aptitude for, you know, academics. There's no point in just being in high school. A lot of times, they're glorified, uh, daycare centers. But they should be out learning trades, and of course, we make it harder for employers to train people on the job with occupational licensing laws and minimum wage laws, so we destroy a lot of the opportunities for younger kids to get skills. And then, the ones that we send to college, they waste their time, you know, majoring in liberal arts, so they spend four, five, six years in college, learning nothing of any real value in the market. They accumulate a massive amount of debt in the process, and so, you know, we have a labor force that's highly educated in that they've got a bunch of degrees, maybe they didn't learn anything, but they got a piece of paper, but then what they have is a lot of debt. And so we don't have a lot of people qualified to do a lot of the things that need to be done.

Joe Rogan 19:28 So, what would you tell the president? If you were, if you, he said, "Look, Peter Schiff, uh, I don't know shit about the economy."

Peter Schiff 19:34 Right.

Joe Rogan 19:34 "You obviously do." Help me out. How, how do we stop this bubble?

Peter Schiff 19:38 Well, I, you know, first of all, you can't stop it, you gotta let it deflate. But the question is, how does it deflate, and then what do you propose is the solution? See, the problem that Trump already made, was when he first got elected, he should not have changed, uh, his perspective. He shouldn't have said, "Hey, everything is great." Right now, he's planning on running ... his next campaign is Keep America Great, right? When Trump ran for office, he said America was in economic wasteland, that it was a disaster. He's been president for a little over a year, all of a sudden it's the greatest economy in the history of the country, which is not even close to being true. But if he's gonna try to run for re-election on, I've already made America great, and now we just wanna keep it great, that's not gonna resonate. So what he should have done from day one is leveled with the American public, again, this is how bad the problem is, and this is what it's gonna take to solve it. Because there's a lot of, you know, um, uh, pain, short-term pain that we're gonna need to go through in order to come to the other side, in order to get rid of all these problems. Like, right now, look at the trade, right? Trump is making a big deal about the trade deficits and he's launching tariffs and he's gonna have this trade war that he's convinced that we could win, and this is very misguided. The trade deficits are not the problem. They are the consequence of the problem. The problem is that we have bad monetary policy, bad fiscal policy, too much regulation. That's why we have a trade deficit, because the American industry is not productive enough. We don't save enough, we don't make the right capital investment. That's because interest rates have been kept too low. You know, our tax code, uh, favors debt, you know, and we have a lot of regulations that make American businesses less competitive. And so the result is that we import a lot of products rather than making them ourselves. And it's not because the other countries aren't fair, or because they have tariffs. Tariffs are very low around the world. I mean, there's, tariffs are not the problem. And so if Trump is simply gonna erect tariffs, all that's gonna do is tax the American public, 'cause the American public has to pay the tariffs whenever they buy imported products. So this is not going to, um, gonna turn the economy around. But, you know, and Trump is right, he points out that, well, you know, at one point in time America ran on tariffs. Which is true. (clears throat) During the 19th century, the government, you know, raised money pre- predominantly by tariffs. But we didn't have an income tax, you know? And so, it, this is the irony of it. The reason we have an income tax today is because the populist politicians of the day told the American voter, "If we can tax the rich with an income tax, then we can get rid of tariffs that the average person is paying." So the average person understood that tariffs cost them money, and the politicians said let's get rid of these tariffs and let's just tax the rich. And the income tax that was originally proposed really was a tax on the very rich. I mean, even doctors and lawyers didn't pay it. I mean, you had to be super rich before you paid the tax, and then it was like, you know, 1% to 4%, so it was a small tax, and it, and it wasn't taken from your paycheck, right? I mean, first of all if you, if you, if you got a paycheck you didn't pay the tax, but we didn't have withholding until 1943. That was part of the, the victory tax to pay for the Second World War. But Americans were told, "Let's tax the rich, and you won't have to, uh, pay tariffs anymore." Well, uh, s- the minute the, you know, the government got the nose under the tent, right, all of a sudden now the income tax affects everybody, right? People pay a lot more in income taxes today than they used to pay in tariffs. But now, now the president wants to bring the tariffs back on top of the income tax. I mean, if Trump wants to repeal the income tax and get rid of it entirely, and then have some tariffs, I'd be okay with that. But you can't do that unless you dramatically shrink the size of government, which is the most important thing that Trump needs to do, but what he's not doing. He has to make the military smaller, not bigger. I mean, he's talking about a Space Force. I mean, we, we can't even afford the Air Force, Navy, Marines that we got now. We don't have any money for a Space Force. But we have to cut everything. We gotta cut entitlements, right? He-

Joe Rogan 23:53 But don't you think we should be the first people to have a Space Force?

Peter Schiff 23:55 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 23:55 What if the Russians come up with a space force?

Peter Schiff 23:57 Yeah. No one's gonna come up with a ...

Joe Rogan 23:58 They're outta, outta luck.

Peter Schiff 23:59 What are, what are they, what are they gonna do with a Space Force? Who we, who we gonna fight in space?

Joe Rogan 24:02 Maybe we fight the Russians in space.

Peter Schiff 24:04 We won't ... well, why would we fight 'em in space? They're down on Earth.

Joe Rogan 24:07 Well, maybe they wanna fight in space. It's more novel.

Peter Schiff 24:09 (laughs) Yeah, I don't think, I don't think anybody wants to fight.

Joe Rogan 24:12 (laughs)

Peter Schiff 24:12 Right? But it's, it's ...

Joe Rogan 24:13 No, but they wanna be protected, right?

Peter Schiff 24:15 Yeah, I, I, I, I think we got that covered. I think we've got a pretty good-sized military. I don't think anyone's gonna mess with us. The problem is our economy. The problem-

Joe Rogan 24:23 So when, when you say let the bubble crash, like, what ... what would that entail?

Peter Schiff 24:27 Well basically, look. The problem, the basic problems with the US economy, and this is because of monetary policy and fiscal policy, is we don't save anything, right? And because we don't save enough, we don't invest enough, we don't produce enough, we don't make enough real things, right? I mean, when Trump wants to say that foreigners are taking advantage of us by running these huge trade surpluses...... he's got it backwards. We're taking advantage of them. The, like, the Chinese are sending us all these products that they worked hard to produce, (can clicks) and they had to use real resources, land, labor, capital, to make these products. And they send them here, and what do we give them? We give them IOUs. We give them a piece of paper, and they buy our Treasury bonds. So in the short run, Americans are just putting everything on a credit card, right? We're living a higher standard of living because we can consume what we didn't make. But when you do that, you become poorer. See, America used to be the richest creditor nation in the world, right? The world owed us a lot of money. Today, we're the world's biggest debtor nation. How did we go from being the biggest creditor to the biggest debtor? It was trade deficits. Every year, we keep borrowing money to consume. And what this has done is this has turned a rich nation into a poor nation, but we just don't live like a poor nation yet because we're still borrowing. Yeah, and you can be a rich individual yet maintain a rich lifestyle on debt, but eventually, you know, the debt's gonna catch up with you, and then your lifestyle's gonna come crashing down. And this is what's gonna happen, but what we should do instead of having a crisis imposed on us globally with a crisis in the dollar and a crisis in our bond market, we should do it ourselves. We should set these forces in motion ourselves. So what we have to do is shrink government, right? We have to, you know, cut a lot of government spending, get rid of a lot of government agencies and departments to get government out of the way so we can lower taxes legitimately, and then we have to allow the Federal Reserve to let the market set interest rates. Interest rates have to be much higher than they are now, right? That, 'cause that's gonna encourage people to save. If interest rates are high, you'll put your money in the bank to earn that high rate of interest. When money goes into a bank, it can get loaned out to businesses. Right now, all that money is going to government or it's in the corporate, you know, bond market where it's not growing the economy, or, you know, the money is being used to finance stock buybacks. We need money on Main Street financing capital formation, uh, entrepreneurship, you know, new businesses, new jobs. So we get higher interest rates, we'll get that, and we need people to stop buying things they can't afford. You know, you buy something if you have the money to pay for it. You don't just put it on a credit card. But if, and if credit card interest rates went up, and if credit was contracted so that credit card companies were not giving out as much credit, they're, they're giving out a lot of credit now because the government is misdirecting it, but if we slow down our consumption, we increase our savings and investment, then the economy can actually grow. But if interest rates go up, asset prices have to come down. The stock market has to come down a lot. Real estate prices have to come down a lot. Now that means people are gonna lose money. They're not gonna be happy about that.

Joe Rogan 27:26 Yeah, this sounds counterintuitive to everything that I've always heard about how to boost up the economy. The idea would be that spending and people buying things is great for the economy.

Peter Schiff 27:34 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 27:34 We need more of that.

Peter Schiff 27:35 No.

Joe Rogan 27:35 No?

Peter Schiff 27:35 That's, that's putting the cart before the horse. You can't buy something that doesn't exist. Something has to be produced before it can be consumed, so it's the production that drives the economic train, not consumption. See, right now, we're just consuming what the Chinese produce.

Joe Rogan 27:50 Right.

Peter Schiff 27:50 But, but the consumption doesn't mean anything unless you produce something first. So you drive an economy by creating supply. It's supply that creates demand. If you just try to create demand without the supply, it's just inflation.

Joe Rogan 28:03 It's weird too that w- we're, we keep hearing things about Chinese telecommunications companies, like Huawei in particular. They're always telling you to not buy their stuff. Wasn't there, there was something about, there was something in the paper today about Huawei. It was about, uh, I think another country saying no to these, uh, I guess Huawei in particular is the third-largest cell phone manufacturer in the world, and they, they have a close tie with the Communist government, and they believe that there's, there might be some shenanigans going on with their, their electronics.

Peter Schiff 28:36 I don't know. I, I mean, I'm not familiar with that. I mean, I know that the, the, there's, there's constant talk about trying to, oh, you know, just don't buy, uh, certain products or-

Joe Rogan 28:46 Well, Huawei, they were actually, the, the State Department told people to stop buying them. They-

Peter Schiff 28:51 Was it a national security threat or something or-

Joe Rogan 28:53 Something along the lines of, um, s- uh, third-party spying. They're, they're, they're concerned... What does it say here? Australia to ban Huawei from 5G Rollout Amid Security Concerns. This is-

Peter Schiff 29:04 Yeah, I think it's-

Joe Rogan 29:05 ... but US had an issue, and I think the US issue was slightly different. US was, um, it was the State Department that was saying for security concerns to, to not-

Peter Schiff 29:15 Yeah, I don't know, but you, I, you know, whenever they talk, look, they're talking about these, the, the auto tariffs as this, from, and they say it's national security, as if somehow my buying a foreign car is, you know, somehow jeopardizing-

Joe Rogan 29:26 What is that?

Peter Schiff 29:26 ... national sc- I don't know. I mean, they, you, they, you know, the, the, the Canadians have called Trump out on it, said, "What do you mean? We, we, you know, we've fought as allies in every single war. How are you saying that you have to put tariffs on, uh, on Canadian products?"

Joe Rogan 29:38 So why is Can- why is Trump doing this? Like, wh-

Peter Schiff 29:40 Look, again, he's going after the symptom. Trade deficits are the consequence of a problem. Most politicians ignore the trade deficits, right? At least Donald Trump is putting them on the spotlight and saying, "Look, this is a problem." It is a problem, but not for the reason that Trump believes. In the short run, in the here and now, the trade deficits benefit America because the world is subsidizing our standard of living. We're getting to buy things that we otherwise wouldn't be able to have. I mean, without these trade deficits, we wouldn't have all these consumer goods on all these shelves. I mean, people would not be able to buy stuff. Prices would be much higher if we had to make stuff ourselves. By having the Chinese make it, you know, it's a lot cheaper, and plus, you know, it's great for our environment because, you know, we don't have to pollute our own air because the factories are over there. Uh, but in, he, so he's right that it's a problem, but in that...... it's a reflection of the fact that the economy is inefficient, and that's what needs to be addressed. It's like, you know, we have cancer, but you just can't put Band-Aids on the blemishes or something to cover it up. You gotta actually get to the, to the source of those blemishes, which is the, the Federal Reserve and their bad monetary policy, and our government policy, our, our fiscal policy, our regulatory policy. We need to have that type of change, and then the trade deficits will go away. But if we simply try to, uh, put tariffs on, it's just gonna make our own problems worse. All that's gonna do is make prices higher. It's just gonna mean that Americans are gonna have to spend more money buying stuff, and it also actually undermines a lot of American businesses that export into countries that are retaliating. And also, a lot of US businesses, uh, import components and then they assemble the components here, but now those imported parts are gonna be more expensive, and so their net exports are more expensive, and so they become less efficient.

Joe Rogan 31:28 The people that are supporting Trump, the people that are happy with the way things are going have be- have said that him lowering taxes for corporations encourages growth.

Peter Schiff 31:37 Well-

Joe Rogan 31:37 And it encourages ... it, it gets more jobs, and there's, there's more economic activity. Does that make sense?

Peter Schiff 31:43 Well, look, if we eliminate taxes, yeah, that'd be great. I mean, the lower taxes are, the better it's gonna be. But not if you borrow the money to pay for the tax cuts. So, the idea is if the government now has to go into the bu- market and borrow money that it no longer collects in taxes, that's gonna have an impact on the economy. That's going to further deplete our savings pool. That's gonna put real upward pressure on interest rates, and obviously the Fed is trying to counteract that. But, you know, the, what they did with the tax code though, they dramatically complicated it. I mean, there's a lot of ... there's a lot more complexity in the code now than there was before. Not like it wasn't complex before. So initially, they talked about simplifying the code. They didn't do that. They, they, they made the, the, the code a lot more complex, and they certainly, you know, they lowered ... they raised ... lowered taxes for some people, but they raised taxes for other people. I mean, depending on what state you in, there are a lot of people now that are gonna pay higher taxes.

Joe Rogan 32:41 What ki- What people are doing?

Peter Schiff 32:42 Well, people in California, where you got a, you know, you got a 13% income tax in California that's no longer deductible on your state income ta- on your federal income tax. So that's a-

Joe Rogan 32:51 Oh, so that, that's a new thing?

Peter Schiff 32:52 Well, yeah. I mean, uh, up, up until this year, you, you could deduct your state income tax from your federal income tax, so, you know, you ... the, the, the effective tax rate was, you know, maybe 40% less, because it was just money you would've sent to Washington, so instead you sent it to Sacramento. But basically, the state tax rates are almost double now what they were last year, uh, in i- the, the way it impacts the payer. So there's a big increase in state taxes for individuals.

Joe Rogan 33:18 (laughs)

Peter Schiff 33:18 You di- you didn't know that?

Joe Rogan 33:20 No.

Peter Schiff 33:20 Yeah, you know, you oughta ... You know, you oughta move to Puerto Rico with me.

Joe Rogan 33:23 I know, but I hear you guys don't have any power.

Peter Schiff 33:25 Well, uh, we got power now.

Joe Rogan 33:27 Now.

Peter Schiff 33:27 But, you know-

Joe Rogan 33:27 How many months did it take?

Peter Schiff 33:28 Well, it don't ... I have a generator. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 33:30 Yeah, but you're the only one. You're like Mad Max out there.

Peter Schiff 33:33 No, no, no. No, I'm not.

Joe Rogan 33:33 Do you have armed guards?

Peter Schiff 33:34 No, no.

Joe Rogan 33:34 Standing outside making sure nobody steals your water?

Peter Schiff 33:37 No, it's not. It's, you know ... In fact, (laughs) e- eh, we were laughing about it, but you know, w- s- w- ... I was on your show a year ago, right? We talked, we talked a lot about Puerto Rico.

Joe Rogan 33:45 It was post-Trump, right? Trump had already won.

Peter Schiff 33:47 Yeah, Trump was ... Trump had won.

Joe Rogan 33:49 Right.

Peter Schiff 33:49 But it was before Maria.

Joe Rogan 33:51 Right.

Peter Schiff 33:52 But ... And so I was on the show, and we were talking about Puerto Rico.

Joe Rogan 33:55 Yeah.

Peter Schiff 33:56 And we also talked about cryptocurrencies and Bitcoin and stuff like that. But since then, hundreds and hundreds of crypto guys have moved to Puerto Rico. I mean, like, some of my neighbors now are these crypto millionaires. They're living on ... I've seen now on the beach. They all ... They, they weren't there a year ago. They're, they're there now. They're, they, they kind of ... They call it a Portopia. They all want to come there because there's no capital gains tax, but I gotta, you know, kinda credit you, 'cause I think a lot of these guys didn't know about it until they heard about it on this podcast. And they said, "Wait a minute, there's no taxes down there in Puerto Rico," and, uh, now they're all there.

Joe Rogan 34:33 And they moved, uh, just in time for the hurricane?

Peter Schiff 34:35 No, they moved after the hurricane.

Joe Rogan 34:37 (laughs)

Peter Schiff 34:37 I, I moved before the hurricane.

Joe Rogan 34:39 Is moving after the hurricane a better move financially? It's probably cheaper land.

Peter Schiff 34:43 I ... You know, I d- you know, I, I ...

Joe Rogan 34:44 Can you buy easier?

Peter Schiff 34:45 No, it's ... You know, I can't even tell. Some of the real estate has actually gone up. Um-

Joe Rogan 34:50 Really?

Peter Schiff 34:51 Yeah, and like, the real estate that was untouched, you know, I mean, my community, uh, weathered the storm, uh, pretty well, so maybe it made it more desirable.

Joe Rogan 34:58 Really?

Peter Schiff 34:58 Um-

Joe Rogan 34:59 Why did your community do so well?

Peter Schiff 35:01 Just, I mean, it's got ... It's, it's ... You know, even though I'm on the beach, the elevation is p- is very high, so we didn't get any flooding. And I guess the construction is much better there, you know, the houses are built better, so they didn't-

Joe Rogan 35:12 Fall apart?

Peter Schiff 35:12 ... withstand ... Yeah, they didn't withstand the damage, and the community got up in ... you know, up and running a lot quicker, so ...

Joe Rogan 35:17 How long were you without power?

Peter Schiff 35:19 Oh, there was ... Well, officially there was probably no power for a couple of months. But I have a ... You know, my condo has power just as a big generator, and so we had, we had condo power there right away. But the house, so I, I ended up buying a house there too right before the hurricane, and I didn't have the generator put in yet. So the house didn't have power for months and months, which just exasperated ... I had some damage to the house, and then the fact that there was no power made it worse because it got very humid in there. But I've since purchased a generator, and I've got it all installed, and so I'm ready for the next, uh, for the next hurricane.

Joe Rogan 35:50 (imitates whooshing sound)

Peter Schiff 35:50 But, you know, I, I got ... There was ... Funny, funny thing. Before the hurricane, there was a l- a, a lot of controversy from this podcast, from my, um, my, my, uh, my talk about Puerto Rico, because I mentioned on, on the show that I had moved some employees to Puerto Rico. I have three single guys that used to live out in Southern California, and they all moved out to, to Puerto Rico, uh, because I moved my business there. This was in 2013 I moved my asset management company, Euro Pacific Asset Management, moved it to, uh, to Puerto Rico. And, uh, so these guys moved out there, single guys, and I mentioned that they were having a g- you know, a good time there. There's a lot of very beautiful women in Puerto Rico.... you know, um, I mentioned I think five Miss Universes have been from Puerto Rico, which is, which is a lot for a small place. And I said that, you know, they have a good time there, because the labor force participation rate in Puerto Rico is terrible. I mean, hardly anybody has a job. Maybe, maybe a third of the people who should be working are working. And that's, you know, and that's again because of the socialism down there, the welfare state that's there, and it, you know... And the minimum wage in Puerto Rico is effectively like, you know, it's the medium wage. It's like having a $15, $17 an hour minimum wage here, so it destroys a lot of employment opportunity on the island. So I mentioned that, you know, if sh- you know, they- they have a good time down there, because there's a lot of women, and if you're a guy and you got a job, I mean, you know, you could write your own ticket. That's a big plus, uh, to have a job, because women want to date guys with jobs. And- and this-

Joe Rogan 37:16 That was controversial?

Peter Schiff 37:17 You know, you wouldn't think it would be-

Joe Rogan 37:18 (laughs)

Peter Schiff 37:18 ... but all of a sudden, all these big, uh, guys down there in Puerto Rico, they'll probably say something again, because obviously they watch your podcast, but, or look- but, um, a couple of the really big guys were calling me out saying that I'm insulting Puerto Rican women, like, you know, I'm calling them whores or something, because I said that they want to date guys with jobs. Which-

Joe Rogan 37:38 Well, doesn't every woman want to date a guy with a job?

Peter Schiff 37:41 Yes. It's not just Puerto Ricans-

Joe Rogan 37:42 But what women are running around going, "I don't want a guy with a job."

Peter Schiff 37:45 No, exactly. Of course a girl wants a guy that has a job. I mean...

Joe Rogan 37:50 Every girl.

Peter Schiff 37:50 Yeah. I mean, probably one of the main reasons we get jobs is to get girls.

Joe Rogan 37:54 Oh, yeah.

Peter Schiff 37:55 I mean, you know, and you know, generally, the more attractive the woman, you know, the more- the better your job's gonna have to be to attract her.

Joe Rogan 38:02 Yeah, there's a- there's a term for that, right? Hy- hypergamy?

Peter Schiff 38:06 Uh...

Joe Rogan 38:06 Like women tend to gravitate towards men with higher social sta- status and- and higher incomes.

Peter Schiff 38:10 Well, I mean... Well, first of all, if you want a guy to take you out on a date, if he doesn't have a job, where's he gonna take you?

Joe Rogan 38:15 There you go.

Peter Schiff 38:15 I mean, you know, so I mean, it- it's not... I didn't think it was a controversial statement.

Joe Rogan 38:19 I don't think it is.

Peter Schiff 38:20 That-

Joe Rogan 38:20 I think people are just making much ado out of nothing these days, and they can write a blog, and then you talk about what they wrote 'cause you were upset that them being upset at you.

Peter Schiff 38:27 Yeah, I mean-

Joe Rogan 38:27 So you come out on the podcast and talk about it again. So you're feeding it.

Peter Schiff 38:30 No, but I'm correcting it.

Joe Rogan 38:31 (laughs)

Peter Schiff 38:31 I mean, I just want to say-

Joe Rogan 38:32 Yeah.

Peter Schiff 38:32 ... that it's not just, you know... There's nothing wrong with a woman wanting a guy that- that has a good job. I mean...

Joe Rogan 38:39 Not only that, it's favorable.

Peter Schiff 38:40 Well, yeah. Well, but it's not only just because he can take her on a date. I mean, when a woman is on a date with a guy, I mean, everybody is a potential husband and you gotta bring something to the table.

Joe Rogan 38:49 Yes.

Peter Schiff 38:49 You know, you gotta, you know, you gotta- you gotta have ambition.

Joe Rogan 38:51 Gotta have something.

Peter Schiff 38:51 You gotta be a go-getter. You gotta, you know, you just can't be-

Joe Rogan 38:54 Yeah.

Peter Schiff 38:54 ... living in your- in your parents' basement.

Joe Rogan 38:56 Yeah.

Peter Schiff 38:57 You know, I mean, what is it? I mean, you gotta get a job, right? To get the money. So then when you get the money-

Joe Rogan 39:01 So what was the protest though?

Peter Schiff 39:01 ... you get the power-

Joe Rogan 39:01 What were they saying?

Peter Schiff 39:02 ... to get the women. Huh?

Joe Rogan 39:03 What were they saying? What was the protest?

Peter Schiff 39:04 That I was insulting Puerto Rican women.

Joe Rogan 39:06 By saying they want a man with a job?

Peter Schiff 39:08 Yeah, like they're just all gold diggers or something.

Joe Rogan 39:10 (laughs)

Peter Schiff 39:10 You know, I didn't say the guy, you know, it was just they on- they only wanted money, but look, I mean, having a job is a key thing. I mean, guy- we don't care, the guys don't care as much what the woman does. But women, I mean, that's a big thing.

Joe Rogan 39:23 Almost nothing. They don't care at all. If she's hot-

Peter Schiff 39:26 If- if-

Joe Rogan 39:26 ... the guy makes a lot of money and the girl's hot-

Peter Schiff 39:28 Yeah, I mean, look-

Joe Rogan 39:29 ... we care.

Peter Schiff 39:29 If-

Joe Rogan 39:30 She's hot and nice-

Peter Schiff 39:30 If-

Joe Rogan 39:30 ... she knows how to read.

Peter Schiff 39:31 If a guy was gonna set up a guy, right? With a friend. The first thing the guy's gonna say, ask is, "What does she look like?"

Joe Rogan 39:37 Yeah.

Peter Schiff 39:38 Right? That's the first question.

Joe Rogan 39:39 Is she hot?

Peter Schiff 39:39 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 39:39 Is she nice?

Peter Schiff 39:40 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 39:40 Is she hot?

Peter Schiff 39:40 Right. If a woman is gonna tell a girlfriend about a guy, what's the first question?

Joe Rogan 39:46 Probably what he looks like first.

Peter Schiff 39:47 No. What does he do?

Joe Rogan 39:49 First.

Peter Schiff 39:49 I guarantee it's what does he do.

Joe Rogan 39:50 Really?

Peter Schiff 39:50 What does he do for a living?

Joe Rogan 39:51 I think first it's what he looks like, second is what does he do.

Peter Schiff 39:54 Nah, nah. I think what he looks like is lower down on... I think it's what does he do for a living, is he- does he have a nice personality, does he have a good sense of humor. I think, I think how does he look is a little bit lower down on a- on a woman's totem pole of-

Joe Rogan 40:07 Depends on how hot she is.

Peter Schiff 40:09 Well, maybe.

Joe Rogan 40:11 Yeah, it depends on how good she's doing in the marketplace.

Peter Schiff 40:13 Yeah. But I mean...

Joe Rogan 40:15 (laughs)

Peter Schiff 40:16 But all this, I mean, it's almost- it was almost part of the whole political correctness thing of it, like, or the Me Too, like you can't, you- you- you can't say something... Anything that you say is gonna be spun like this is- this is-

Joe Rogan 40:27 Yeah.

Peter Schiff 40:28 ... against women-

Joe Rogan 40:29 Right.

Peter Schiff 40:29 ... because I'm stating something that's very obvious.

Joe Rogan 40:32 Right.

Peter Schiff 40:32 That- that- that, you know-

Joe Rogan 40:33 You can't state obvious anymore.

Peter Schiff 40:35 No. No.

Joe Rogan 40:36 No. No.

Peter Schiff 40:37 I mean, and- and it's all, like, look- look at-

Joe Rogan 40:38 But you- but you can, because I think these outrage peddlers that make these articles and write these blogs, who the fuck is agreeing with them? I just- I just don't buy it. I think what they're doing is they're striking a chord and uh, uh, uh, a few malcontents go along with it. But you read those things and you think like, "Wow, there's some validity to this because it's in, you know, X publication."

Peter Schiff 40:59 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 40:59 "And so I- I gotta comment on this. They're- they're misrepresenting what I said."

Peter Schiff 41:03 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 41:03 But they're outrage merchants.

Peter Schiff 41:05 Yeah, and everybody wants to act like you can't say something that's offensive to anybody. Like if somebody gets-

Joe Rogan 41:11 Yeah.

Peter Schiff 41:11 ... offended, um, then, you know, like, you know, this, um, what was this? You know, this, one of these contestants, I- I read the story, but one of the contestants on the- The Bachelorette, um, apparently on his Instagram page, he liked some jokes that, um, that, you know, kind of a little- maybe off color, a little bit offensive jokes that right wing, somebody on the right, uh, had posted on their Instagram page and it was like a big deal. He had to take down his whole Instagram page.

Joe Rogan 41:38 (sighs)

Peter Schiff 41:38 Like, hu- I mean, it's obviously jokes.

Joe Rogan 41:41 Right.

Peter Schiff 41:41 They're jokes. Jokes are offensive. That's part of what makes them funny. I mean, who-

Joe Rogan 41:46 Yeah.

Peter Schiff 41:46 I mean, how... And almost all the jokes offend somebody.

Joe Rogan 41:48 Yes.

Peter Schiff 41:48 But now you can't even have a sense of humor. Everything has to be, you know, you can't- you- you can't offend anybody, which you don't have a right not to be offended. That's the whole part of freedom of speech. People are gonna say things and do things that you might be offended by and you just gotta- you just gotta deal with it. You can't be looking like, you know, I- I gotta have a law against that, or...

Joe Rogan 42:10 But these, uh, these offense merchants, these people that get offended, they- they- that's their currency. They- they- they trade in being offended.

Peter Schiff 42:19 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 42:19 And then once they find something that's in any way offensive, they just start writing blogs about it and making videos about it. And that's their- that's their in.

Peter Schiff 42:28 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 42:29 Their in is finding something Peter Schiff said about Puerto Rican women.

Peter Schiff 42:32 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 42:32 Just saying Puerto Rican women's offensive-

Peter Schiff 42:35 Why? (laughs)

Joe Rogan 42:35 Just saying it. Because, it's just, this is the world we live in. A white guy like you-

Peter Schiff 42:40 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 42:40 ... wealthy guy, you're gonna talk about Puerto Rican women. You fucking piece of shit. And they just-

Peter Schiff 42:44 Yeah. Well, they're, I mean, they're white. Most of ... I mean, they're a little darker skinned than, than, than most Caucasians, but-

Joe Rogan 42:49 Yeah, but you can't say that. In this day and age, the, they're people of color.

Peter Schiff 42:52 (laughs) They're Latin, they're Latino.

Joe Rogan 42:52 They're people of color.

Peter Schiff 42:53 Well, what color am I?

Joe Rogan 42:54 Ah.

Peter Schiff 42:55 I got a ... I'm a, I'm not, you know, I got a little color to me.

Joe Rogan 42:57 That's a, that's an interesting conversation I just had with a friend of mine who s- claims she's Black.

Peter Schiff 43:00 Uh-huh.

Joe Rogan 43:01 I'm like, "I'm darker than you. How are you Black?"

Peter Schiff 43:03 Yeah. Well, it's all-

Joe Rogan 43:04 Okay.

Peter Schiff 43:04 Look, it's, it's this whole mentality that people have now about not being offended. It's about feeling that they have a right to something, or not being entitled, or people confusing a privilege with, with a right.

Joe Rogan 43:17 Right.

Peter Schiff 43:17 Right? So like, you'll have all these groups that demand, you know, women's rights or gay rights. Women or gays, they don't have rights because they're women, right? We all have individual rights. And so, men and women have rights because they're individuals. They don't get a separate right because they fit into a group.

Joe Rogan 43:36 Right.

Peter Schiff 43:36 All that is about privilege. And y- you don't have special privileges granted to you by the Constitution. We all have rights. And when people try to, um, pretend that a privilege or c- a, a group privilege and try to give that the status of a right, I know, uh, you talked about it- (sniffs) on your, on your podcast. We had the Supreme Court ruling recently regarding the gay couple that wanted a wedding cake. And they, you know, they sued because the baker wouldn't make them a, a wedding cake with, you know, a couple of guys on the top and, and decorate it in a way that it was obviously for a gay wedding, right?

Joe Rogan 44:14 I had, I, uh, there's a bottom misunderstanding about that, and I read something recently that not only did they not do that, but they weren't making custom cakes.

Peter Schiff 44:23 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 44:23 So they didn't make custom cakes for weddings. So when these, the, the gay couple came in and said they wanted a custom cake and they said, "No, we don't make that."

Peter Schiff 44:30 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 44:31 Like, that was also part of the problem-

Peter Schiff 44:32 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 44:32 ... was they don't ... That's not something they even do.

Peter Schiff 44:34 Well, but-

Joe Rogan 44:34 They could've, would've sold them a cake they already had.

Peter Schiff 44:37 Yeah, well, the bigger-

Joe Rogan 44:37 But they didn't have one with two dudes holding hands.

Peter Schiff 44:39 Well, the bigger problem is, first of all, they ... It's not like you have this gay couple that just went into a bakery and then they were denied, you know, the, the ability to buy a cake.

Joe Rogan 44:50 Right.

Peter Schiff 44:50 Right? They probably went to 100 bakeries to find the one that wouldn't bake them a cake. So-

Joe Rogan 44:54 They did specifically do that.

Peter Schiff 44:56 So that was-

Joe Rogan 44:56 That was part of the story, was that they wanted someone to deny them.

Peter Schiff 44:59 Yes. And-

Joe Rogan 45:00 So they had a story.

Peter Schiff 45:01 Right. And of course, you know, if you're a baker, right? I, I, I don't know what the margins are on wedding cakes, but wedding cakes are probably like the holy grail of cakes, right? I mean, yours- if you're sitting there in the small bakery shop, you're waiting for somebody to call for a wedding cake.

Joe Rogan 45:14 Mm-hmm.

Peter Schiff 45:15 'Cause those are the biggest cakes you could make, very expensive cakes, so everybody wants to do a wedding cake. Nobody cares whether there's two guys or a guy and a girl on the top of it. You just want to make the money that you're gonna get from baking wedding cake. Now, you come across a guy who just has a strong religious conviction. He just, you know, w- doesn't want to bake a cake for a gay wedding. Okay. I mean, he's the one that's losing. He's losing out on the, the, the, the commission to bake h- the cake. I mean, the gay couple isn't hurt by that. They ... There's so many bakeries that would bake them that cake.

Joe Rogan 45:49 But wa- was this couple d- were they denied because of religious reasons? Is that why the people said they weren't, wouldn't make the cake? Like, wh-

Peter Schiff 45:56 They, th- yes. They said it was religious reasons, and that's what the Supreme Court, I think, went on religious freedom. But as far as I'm concerned, it doesn't matter what their religion is. Nobody is required to perform a service for somebody else if they don't want to. That's slavery, right?

Joe Rogan 46:11 Okay. What if it was, what if it was a Black couple?

Peter Schiff 46:12 Yes. I-

Joe Rogan 46:13 And what if these people were racist, and what if they said, "We don't wanna bake a cake for a Black couple."

Peter Schiff 46:17 Well, then yo- the Black couple can go find a bakery that will bake them a cake. I mean, what's the odds of there being a racist baker out there? But I, you know, I mentioned, if I was-

Joe Rogan 46:27 In today's day and age-

Peter Schiff 46:28 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 46:28 ... it's less than ever before.

Peter Schiff 46:30 Right. But let, l- l- look, look. I mean, st-

Joe Rogan 46:31 But it's still possible, right?

Peter Schiff 46:32 I, I'm Jewish, right? Let's say there's an anti-Semite baker, right? And if he, if I go in there and the guy says, you know, "Oh, I don't wanna bake cake for Jews." Fine. You know, because ... Let's assume that he knows I'm Jewish, he hates Jews, and he spits in the cake. I mean, I'd like to know, like right up front, that this guy who's about to c- bake my cake hates Jews, so then I'll go and buy my cake from somebody who doesn't hate Jews-

Joe Rogan 46:58 Mm-hmm.

Peter Schiff 46:58 ... 'cause I don't wanna worry about what I'm gonna be putting in my mouth. I mean, why would you wanna even force somebody to bake a cake for you that you've gotta eat if you're forcing them to do it? Or, you know, th- this is all nonsense. But, you know, the, the idea that you can't discriminate, that you can't make choices, right? I, I, I have a right as an individual to, um, you know, to do things that I wanna do, but I can't force somebody else. Rights are about ... The government could ... You can't rob from me and you can't steal from me. So you can't take away from me something that I have. But I can't force you to give me something I don't have. And just because I feel a certain way, like if you go back to the, the, uh, the gay couple, just say, "Okay, you can't discriminate."

Joe Rogan 47:40 How did the Supreme Court rule on that, by the way?

Peter Schiff 47:42 Well, they, they, they uphold- held the right of this individual, but it wasn't like a, a real-

Joe Rogan 47:47 The right of the individual to not sell the cake?

Peter Schiff 47:48 To not bake the cake.

Joe Rogan 47:49 Yeah.

Peter Schiff 47:49 But I think it had to do with some esoteric state law. It wasn't a definitive ruling that says that you have a right to discriminate, which I believe that, I believe you do. I don't think the government should be discriminating, but private individuals. But the point I was about to make is, you know, for, for, for gay. So let's say that you, Joe Rogan, were, um, w- working as a gigolo. That was your job. You just had sex with women and you charged them money.

Joe Rogan 48:16 Nice.

Peter Schiff 48:16 Right? Yeah, that's your job. Now, what if a dude comes up to you and wants to partake in your services. Do you have to serve him?

Joe Rogan 48:24 That's not the job, sir. The job is women.

Peter Schiff 48:27 But ... No, no. You can't discriminate.

Joe Rogan 48:28 What?

Peter Schiff 48:29 Right? That's my point.

Joe Rogan 48:30 I can't discriminate in terms of having sex with men?

Peter Schiff 48:33 Well, not if you're doing it for business.

Joe Rogan 48:35 Well, what the-

Peter Schiff 48:35 Not if it's your business.

Joe Rogan 48:36 ... the hell? My job is gigolo.

Peter Schiff 48:37 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 48:38 Gigolo is a guy who has sex with women.

Peter Schiff 48:39 No, no.

Joe Rogan 48:40 That's the job. It's like you're asking a firefighter to dig a hole for a pool.

Peter Schiff 48:43 No, no, no. Gigolo is a guy that has sex for money.

Joe Rogan 48:45 No, no, no, no, no, no, no.

Peter Schiff 48:45 Doesn't matter whether it's a guy or a girl. No, that's the point though.

Joe Rogan 48:48 I have sex with women, bro.

Peter Schiff 48:49 Well, but then you're dis-

Joe Rogan 48:50 Look, I got a business card.

Peter Schiff 48:51 But then you're discriminating against men.

Joe Rogan 48:53 Oh.

Peter Schiff 48:53 How could you deny-

Joe Rogan 48:54 No.

Peter Schiff 48:54 ... how could you deny a man the opportunity to have sex with you?

Joe Rogan 48:57 Hmm. Interesting.

Peter Schiff 48:58 See, it's the same thing. You can't look, and you could say, "What if it's, what if it's not sex?" Okay, that's-

Joe Rogan 49:02 Okay.

Peter Schiff 49:02 ... what if it's just a masu, what if it's just massages?

Joe Rogan 49:04 Right.

Peter Schiff 49:04 What if you're a masseuse, but for some reason you just don't wanna massage guys, you just only wanna massage girls?

Joe Rogan 49:09 Right.

Peter Schiff 49:09 Shouldn't you be able to do that?

Joe Rogan 49:13 Yes.

Peter Schiff 49:13 Yeah. I mean, so, what, and so, so some-

Joe Rogan 49:15 Because it's, it's, it's touching people.

Peter Schiff 49:18 But-

Joe Rogan 49:18 If you, if your business, you want your business to be limited, "All I do is massage chicks, bro, I don't touch dudes."

Peter Schiff 49:23 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 49:24 It's gross.

Peter Schiff 49:24 Why, but why, but yeah, but you should have a right to do that. But then once you extrapolate it, you just make a decision. Now, you could make more money if you massage girls and guys, 'cause you have a bigger market, but if you wanna limit your business opportunity to just women, well that hurts you, right? That-

Joe Rogan 49:39 Hmm. Interesting.

Peter Schiff 49:40 It's your right to do that.

Joe Rogan 49:41 Yeah, like a massage therapist that doesn't wanna massage guys, you never hear about those and you don't get offended.

Peter Schiff 49:48 Any-

Joe Rogan 49:48 Men don't get offended by that.

Peter Schiff 49:49 No. And look, guys-

Joe Rogan 49:50 What? You won't massage me?

Peter Schiff 49:51 Well-

Joe Rogan 49:51 What, do you hate men?

Peter Schiff 49:52 Well, but, you know, you could do it as a, as a customer. I mean, uh, you know, let's just say I'm a, I want a massage and I can say, "Look, I'd prefer to get a massage by a woman."

Joe Rogan 50:01 Yes.

Peter Schiff 50:01 I mean, most guys would probably prefer to get a massage-

Joe Rogan 50:03 Yeah.

Peter Schiff 50:03 ... by a woman.

Joe Rogan 50:04 Yeah.

Peter Schiff 50:04 Well, is that, that that's totally legal.

Joe Rogan 50:06 Right.

Peter Schiff 50:06 They always let the customer. The customer can discriminate. The employee can discriminate.

Joe Rogan 50:11 Right.

Peter Schiff 50:12 Right, nobody would say, you know, hey, if I, I, let's say I'm, I, I happen to be black and I wanna work for a black boss, nobody would say that was wrong. I could go to a white boss and I could say, "I'm sorry, I don't wanna take the job because I wanna work for someone black." They, you can't sue me for not taking the job.

Joe Rogan 50:28 Right, but you're actively seeking out a black boss, which is the difference between that and being approached by a bunch of white people and saying, "No, I hate white people."

Peter Schiff 50:36 No, no, no.

Joe Rogan 50:36 "I don't wanna work for you."

Peter Schiff 50:37 No, the point is, if a, if a white person, or even a black person, was seeking out a job applicant of a particular-

Joe Rogan 50:44 Oh, okay.

Peter Schiff 50:44 ... they would say, "That's illegal. You can't discriminate."

Joe Rogan 50:47 Right.

Peter Schiff 50:47 But the employer can do it all, the employee can do it all he wants.

Joe Rogan 50:50 Right, right.

Peter Schiff 50:50 Right? Customers... Right, if I was, if I was a, uh, uh, uh, if a gay couple wanted to have a cake baked and I went, and they went into a bakery and they said, "Yes, we'd like to have a cake baked. Are you straight or gay? 'Cause we want our cake to be baked by a gay baker."

Joe Rogan 51:06 Right.

Peter Schiff 51:07 And the straight guy said, "No, I'm straight, sorry." They, fine, they can keep searching until they found-

Joe Rogan 51:11 Right.

Peter Schiff 51:11 ... the gay-

Joe Rogan 51:12 A gay baker.

Peter Schiff 51:12 ... baker. And-

Joe Rogan 51:12 Right.

Peter Schiff 51:12 ... no one would say, and, you know-

Joe Rogan 51:13 No one would care.

Peter Schiff 51:14 And I'm not saying that we should make that illegal, I'm just saying the law should be consistent, that we sh-

Joe Rogan 51:18 Yeah, that is interesting that the employer, or r- rather the customer can basically go wherever they like. And no one, no one says, "You didn't go into this restaurant because you don't like gay people, because gay people run this restaurant." Nobody ever says that.

Peter Schiff 51:31 Right, and I, they can't force you to eat there if you don't want to.

Joe Rogan 51:34 Right. But the other way they can. They can-

Peter Schiff 51:36 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 51:37 ... force you to use, or to have someone use your services even if you don't believe in what they stand for.

Peter Schiff 51:43 Yeah, and they, and they, you know, they, the left always tries to make it out like if you have this perspective, right? "Oh," like, "Oh, you must be a racist if you believe that people have a right to discriminate." Look, I, I, I'm, I believe that people have a right to say a lot of things that I disagree with. I'm not gonna stop them from saying things. You know, I believe in free speech, even if what you're saying is idiotic or offensive.

Joe Rogan 52:02 Yeah.

Peter Schiff 52:03 And I believe people have a right to discriminate because the, the bigger problem is when the government becomes the thought police, because the minute you make it illegal to discriminate, now you have to get into people's minds, right? If somebody, um, doesn't promote somebody or fires somebody and they happen to be black or a woman or too old or handicapped, uh-

Joe Rogan 52:23 You assume their motive.

Peter Schiff 52:24 But, no, but now you're gonna say, "Oh, you fired that person, uh, b- because he's black."

Joe Rogan 52:29 Right.

Peter Schiff 52:29 Well, what if that had nothing to do with it?

Joe Rogan 52:30 Right, you're assuming their motive for firing people.

Peter Schiff 52:32 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 52:32 Right.

Peter Schiff 52:32 And now I gotta prove that I didn't do something for what I was thinking when I did something. I mean, i- none of that sh- you know, all of that too makes it so much harder for employers. I mean, look at what just happened. This isn't race, but it's part of it. Did you see that story, um, uh, the other day about Trump's driver is suing him for overtime?

Joe Rogan 52:51 Yes, I did see that.

Peter Schiff 52:52 Yeah, so this guy worked for the Trump Organization for, like, 25 years, driving, he was a personal driver for Donald Trump. And he's now suing him because he claims that he worked more than 40 hours a week and so he wants more money.

Joe Rogan 53:07 Right.

Peter Schiff 53:07 Now, of course, he worked for 25 years, why didn't he ask for a raise, like, during those 25 years, right? But apparently his job, he had to be on-call for maybe, I don't know, 10 hours a day. Right? And, and on-call doesn't mean he was actually driving. He just had to be available to Trump if Trump needed him. But that, you know, he could, you know, be on the internet, he could be watching a movie, he could be reading a book, sending emails, you know, trading stocks, whatever he wants to do. So it's not like it was that, like he was really working, but he had to be available so he couldn't, you know, go out of town, right? Um, but he's going back and he says that, "Well, I had to be available for more than 40 hours a week." Well, maybe it was 50 hours a week or 55 hours a week, and now he wants back pay, time and a half, right? Because overtime laws say you gotta get time and a half. But first of all, he wasn't even an hourly worker. The guy collected a salary, something like, I don't know, $65,000, $70,000 a year was his salary. And, you know, he knew what the salary was when he took the job. He knew what the hours were. If he didn't like it, he could have said something to Trump, he could have demanded higher pay, or he could have quit, right? But instead, he works without complaint, and then 25 years later files a big lawsuit. Now, the point-

Joe Rogan 54:19 So he's out of work? This is what happened?

Peter Schiff 54:20 No, he's still working there. He's still working there.

Joe Rogan 54:22 He is?

Peter Schiff 54:23 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 54:23 And he's suing while he's working there?

Peter Schiff 54:25 Yeah, which, you know, and, and then of course if you fire them when they sue you, it's like, oh, it's retaliation, then it makes it worse.

Joe Rogan 54:31 Right.

Peter Schiff 54:31 But the problem is, you know, Trump, he's got a lot of money. I mean, he can deal with this. But your average small businessman, you know, this kind of stuff kills you when people start suing you.

Joe Rogan 54:42 Yeah.

Peter Schiff 54:42 It costs a lot of money and a lot of that happens too with, um, you know, the, the, the discrimination laws, I mean, because, uh, small business owners are so concerned about getting sued-... that they, they try to hire people that they think are less likely to sue them, and then it ends up backfiring 'cause it works against all the people who are protected classes, who are now able to sue you. You know?

Joe Rogan 55:04 Mm-hmm.

Peter Schiff 55:05 But I also wanted to, wanted to point out on, on, you know, the overtime laws, 'cause so many people think, "Oh, this is terrible, right? I mean, he should pay overtime." You know, overtime is ... those laws are probably some of the worst laws out there, because they don't protect workers, right? Because what happens is, let's say you got a job and you're working 40 hours a week and you're an hourly worker, and you wanna, you want more hours. You want more money, right, maybe you're, you know, maybe you want to, you know, you, you, you're trying to attract a higher caliber of girl, so you're trying to get more money. You wanna work more hours. So you-

Joe Rogan 55:36 Sexist.

Peter Schiff 55:36 Yeah. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 55:36 That's sexist, what you just said.

Peter Schiff 55:38 (laughs) So, so you-

Joe Rogan 55:38 I'm writing a blog.

Peter Schiff 55:39 So you tell, you tell your boss, "Hey, can I, you know, can I work an extra 10 hours a week?" Right? "I wanna get some, I wanna get some-"

Joe Rogan 55:46 Pay up.

Peter Schiff 55:46 "... I wanna make some more money." Right? Well, your boss says, "Well, I'm sorry. I'd like to let you work an extra 10 hours, but I have to pay you time and a half." Right? And the guy says, "Well, I don't need time and a half. I'll just work 10 hours for the same pay." Well, that's illegal. "Sorry, I, I, I would like to do it, but I can't." And if the, if that boss needs extra workers, he has to go bring on a part-time worker. So now, let's say if I wanna get an extra 10 hours work, I gotta find another job someplace else where I can work part-time, where the, the, the time and a half law doesn't apply. But now, I gotta get from my, my full-time job to my part-time job. How long does that take me? Maybe-

Joe Rogan 56:24 How common is this, though, that people are n- denying people extra work-

Peter Schiff 56:28 Oh, it's very common.

Joe Rogan 56:29 ... even though they need it, because they don't wanna pay the time and a half?

Peter Schiff 56:31 Oh. Oh, it happens all the time. I mean, that's, that, that's where moonlighting came from. That's the whole ... I mean, obviously, people, you're gonna have, you're gonna have people that work for two employers, and then other people working, and they're, they're going back and forth between the same companies, because-

Joe Rogan 56:43 So what you're saying is it's weird if someone has to work extra hours, why are you paying them double the money?

Peter Schiff 56:49 Well, (clears throat) or time and a half, but-

Joe Rogan 56:51 Time and a half.

Peter Schiff 56:51 But the-

Joe Rogan 56:51 Why are you paying them the extra money, because they're doing just, just 'cause they're w- working more than eight hours a day?

Peter Schiff 56:57 Well, but the thing is, the employer doesn't wanna pay the extra, and he doesn't have to if he can hire somebody part-time. But the point is, that all of these, um, the, the, the details of employment should be negotiated by the employer and the employee. The government should stay out of it. You know? And that way-

Joe Rogan 57:16 And the time and a half is a government law?

Peter Schiff 57:17 Yes, it's al-

Joe Rogan 57:18 Is it nationwide?

Peter Schiff 57:19 Y- Uh, well, different states could have different rules, and, and federally, they have different rules over what constitutes, uh, how m- how much pay do you have to earn before the overtime rules apply, so you ha-

Joe Rogan 57:29 But also, isn't it pretty arbitrary, like this decision that's 40 hours a week is the right amount of hours?

Peter Schiff 57:32 Yeah. Well, look, everything the government does is arbitrary. That's what laws are. They have to come up with a number. But all of this should be free for discussion. You know, it's interesting, because you have the, the liberals um, believe that, hey, you know, two people should be able to, uh, you know, have a relationship without the government interfering. Right? You know, they can have a sexual relationship. It's, it's none of the government's business, uh, you know, who you're, you know, you're sleeping with. Well, why don't they have the same, believe in the same freedom when it comes to economic relationships? If an employee and employer are having a relationship, why doesn't the government just butt out and let the employer and the employee negotiate the relationship and the terms of the relationship that they think is best for them? Because there are a lot of workers that, "Oh, I don't need the overtime, but maybe there's another benefit that I would prefer to have, uh, that I could get, but I can't, because of government laws are requiring things that I don't want."

Joe Rogan 58:28 So you're against minimum wage, you're against essentially all these government regulations in terms of what people get paid.

Peter Schiff 58:34 Yeah. I mean, the minimum wage is probably the dumbest law. I think we talked about that on, uh, on the last podcast, but it's probably the dumbest law, uh, that you can come up with, because all it does is hurt the very people that you are intending to help. You, you're hurting the, the least-skilled people, uh, you're preventing people from getting jobs in the first place, and you're, you're creating extra incentives for employers to eliminate jobs, to try to use capital instead of labor, to try to outsource. I mean, nobody is gonna hire somebody if they're losing money. Right? People have a certain amount of productivity that they can bring to the table, and when an employer makes a decision on who to hire, uh, they have to hire somebody that brings them at least enough productivity to cover the wages. And, and so what happens is, when you have a minimum wage, let's say the minimum wage is, you know, $8 an hour, and I'm a unskilled worker and I have to convince an employer to pay me $8 an hour. I have to also convince him that I can deliver more than $8 an hour of productivity to his organization. And if I can't do that, I can't get a job. Now, what if I can only bring $5 of productivity? Well, that means you can't get hired. Well, I mean, if I could, if I only have $5 an hour worth of skills and I can't get a job to improve my skills, I'm, I'm stuck in unemployment forever. I mean, the worst thing you can do to a guy with minimal skills is prevent them from getting a job, because it's the job that's gonna enable them to increase their skills, so they can earn more money in the future.

Joe Rogan 1:00:09 I know what you're saying, but the idea is that if you have a minimum amount that you allow people to pay, then at least the people that are working for that company will have a real income where they can pay their bills and feed themselves.

Peter Schiff 1:00:20 No.

Joe Rogan 1:00:20 And that this company, because they have all the power, they have all the money, and a poor worker who's stepping into the market for the first time or, you know, just hasn't, uh, been, uh, been able to acquire job skills that would allow them to make much more money per hour, that they, they would be taken advantage of by this large corporation.

Peter Schiff 1:00:38 Well, you know, the corporations don't have all the power, because they're not the only employer. I mean, all employers compete with one another for labor, and, um, and they, and they bid up wages. I mean, you can't, you know, pay people less than the market value of their labor, because somebody else will hire them.... you know? So, eh, the, the, eh, eh, you could talk about, "Oh, wouldn't it be great if everybody could earn more money?" But-

Joe Rogan 1:01:01 Has there ever been a proven example of this, where they've had no minimum wage and it's been-

Peter Schiff 1:01:06 Oh.

Joe Rogan 1:01:06 ... a financial boom?

Peter Schiff 1:01:08 Oh, absolutely. Well, first of all, we didn't always have a minimum wage in the United States. I mean, it, it, it happened really in the 1930s. But you can look at situations of countries that have no minimum wage, and they have very low levels of unemployment, and you can look at areas where the government-

Joe Rogan 1:01:22 Like what country is this?

Peter Schiff 1:01:23 Well, I mean, you know, they don't have a minimum wage in, in, in Singapore. Um, and, you know, and there are, there are countries that s-

Joe Rogan 1:01:28 Isn't Singapore an interesting-

Peter Schiff 1:01:29 A lot of them-

Joe Rogan 1:01:29 ... example, though? It's an extremely wealthy country, right?

Peter Schiff 1:01:32 Well, that's one of the reasons. And they have low-

Joe Rogan 1:01:34 Is that why?

Peter Schiff 1:01:34 (laughs) Yeah, they don't, they, they, it's, it's very easy to do business. But you can look at examples where the United States has imposed a minimum wage on other countries. I mean, the minimum wage did a lot of damage in Puerto Rico, but, you know, look at another American territory, American Samoa. Right? American Samoa, we basically destroyed American Samoa with our minimum wage. I mean, the, the, the Samoans are, you know, you know, are, are furious about it. This happened years ago, actually. And I, the reason I even found out about it, I was watching 60 Minutes, and they were doing a report about, I think, football players in Samoa. And, um, and during their report, they mentioned that there was like a depression going on in Samoa. And it was like, there was 30% unemployment and really high inflation. And I was like, "What the hell's going on in Samoa?" So, I wanted to research that on my own, and I found out that we imposed the minimum wage on Samoa, and we destroyed all their jobs. Their, their two biggest employers were Tun- uh, Chicken of the Sea and StarKist. They were canning tuna, and then they were shipping the tuna back to the mainland. But the minute they raised the minimum wage, they made the production, uh, uncompetitive, 'cause now you had to pay the higher wages plus the shipping cost to get the tuna back to the mainland. So, they, they, all the canneries shut down, and then it created massive unemployment. And then prices went way up on the island because they no longer had boats coming back and forth to pick up the tuna. So now, all of a sudden, the shipping cost of imports went way up, so they had massive inflation, sky-high unemployment, all because of the minimum wage. So, you, you could look at, you know, m- examples of how minimum wage destroys jobs, uh, you know, right there. Yet, you know, they continue to advocate for these higher wages because it sounds good. "Oh, everybody should earn a decent living." Well, you know, not if you don't have any skills, you can't. And a lot, of course, you know, a lot of kids, you're, you know, they're 16, 17, 18, 19, 20. I mean, people live with their parents still. Uh, the most important thing is getting a job so you can acquire the skills to get a better job, to, you know, to move up the ladder in an organization, to e- enhance your, you know, your value to employers in general. Right?

Joe Rogan 1:03:34 And what's the argument against this?

Peter Schiff 1:03:36 Against what?

Joe Rogan 1:03:36 I mean, I'm sure, um, uh, against what you're saying about minimum wage, against, uh, uh, all of these ideas that you're, you're just proposing. Do you, do you get a lot of pushback? I mean, I'm sure what you're saying, this free market capitalism approach is, it's-

Peter Schiff 1:03:50 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:03:50 You know, there's a lot of people that oppose it.

Peter Schiff 1:03:51 Of course. I mean, you know, there's a lot of people that don't think it out, they think with their mind or their, or their, their hearts-

Joe Rogan 1:03:57 Emotions, yeah.

Peter Schiff 1:03:57 ... rather. And they don't even get the, the re- the origin of the minimum wage was racism. I mean, the first minimum wages here, it was designed to keep, uh, employers from hiring, uh, the Chinese or from hiring Blacks 'cause they, you know, the, that, that's where the minimum wage came from, you know, to try to prevent employers from hiring certain people. So, they said, "Well, let's have a minimum wage, and then, and that will reduce, uh, hiring of people who have less skills." And, and, and so, and the, the labor unions, the biggest supporters of the minimum wage are the labor unions. And none of the labor unions' workers earn the minimum wage. So, you might think, "Why are they, do they so care about the minimum wage if they don't e- if they get paid a lot higher than minimum wage?" And it's because you always have a competition between skilled labor and unskilled labor, right? So, let's say a business, a businessman has the option of hiring a skilled person to do something, and let's say the skilled person is gonna charge $20 an hour, or an unskilled person. And let's say I can hire three unskilled people for $5 an hour, and that equals $15. Well, hey, I'd rather hire the unskilled worker. I can pay three $5 an hour to do the same job of one skilled worker. But now if the skilled worker can, could lobby for a $7 minimum wage, now if I have to hire three unskilled people, it costs $21. Aha! Now all of a sudden, I hire the guy with skills. So, the labor unions benefit by keeping unskilled people unemployed, because they have more skills, and therefore they can, you know, they can get more work.

Joe Rogan 1:05:27 That sounds like a complicated mess to me.

Peter Schiff 1:05:29 (laughs) Well, it's, uh, it is a mess for the-

Joe Rogan 1:05:31 Oh, it is, it's-

Peter Schiff 1:05:31 ... for the unh- for the people that get, get priced out of a job, yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:05:35 Now, democratic socialism is the thing right now. This is the, you're hearing it all the time. You're hearing it constantly in the news. What, to what do you attribute that? Do you, do you think it's a frustration with, uh-

Peter Schiff 1:05:44 Yup.

Joe Rogan 1:05:44 ... just the lifelong politicians? Like, what, what do you think it is that's causing this uprise and upswing? Like the woman, what is her name that won in, uh, New York?

Peter Schiff 1:05:53 Yeah, you know, she's actually half Puerto Rican.

Joe Rogan 1:05:56 Yeah.

Peter Schiff 1:05:56 One of my, uh, my countrymen. But yeah, I forget her name (laughs) and-

Joe Rogan 1:05:59 One of her countrymen. Isn't Puerto Rico in the United States?

Peter Schiff 1:06:02 No, actually, you know, I, I found this out as I'm traveling now, you know, I still have an American passport. But when I, when I mention what country I'm from, and I look, "W- where you live," I always have to select Puerto Rico as a country. Even though it's part of America, it's, it's still considered its own country, even though you still are American citizens when you live there and you travel on a, on a US passport. It, it, it's listed as a separate country from-

Joe Rogan 1:06:26 Yeah.

Peter Schiff 1:06:26 ... uh, from the United States.

Joe Rogan 1:06:27 I was just gonna read her name, uh, from the tweet.

Peter Schiff 1:06:29 Yeah, that's her.

Joe Rogan 1:06:29 Alexandria Ocasio-

Peter Schiff 1:06:30 Yeah, and you know-

Joe Rogan 1:06:31 ... Cortez.

Peter Schiff 1:06:32 And-

Joe Rogan 1:06:32 28 years old, damn.

Peter Schiff 1:06:33 Yeah, well, she beat, she beat a, a ten-term-

Joe Rogan 1:06:36 Incumbent, yeah.

Peter Schiff 1:06:37 ... incumbent, and of course, he was a white guy. That's a, that's a negative for him.

Joe Rogan 1:06:40 Mm. She's-

Peter Schiff 1:06:41 But, uh-

Joe Rogan 1:06:41 A woman of color.

Peter Schiff 1:06:43 Yeah, you know-

Joe Rogan 1:06:43 Latina.

Peter Schiff 1:06:44 Nice-looking woman, too, actually.

Joe Rogan 1:06:45 Beautiful.

Peter Schiff 1:06:45 Yeah, so, but, but, but, but the thing is people, I think, in that community are just voting out of frustration. In fact, I, I looked at her commercial, you know, and it's a very powerful commercial. You know, kind of like, you know, about, you know, "Um, women like me are not supposed to run for office. We're not supposed to..." Of course, I mean, you're not, that's all a bunch of nonsense, but it, it's a story that, that, you know, I think resonated with a lot of people, like, "Hey, let's stick it to the man."

Joe Rogan 1:07:09 Yeah.

Peter Schiff 1:07:09 Right? You know, and, uh, and that's what they did. But-I think that this, this, uh, wave is gonna be bigger than people think. I think people are underestimating. They're saying, "Oh, this is unique," because, you