WEBVTT - Biden's Fed Pick Miss and Lowering the Voting Age 0:00:01.280 --> 0:00:05.119 You're listening to the Bloomberg Opinion podcast count US Saturdays 0:00:05.120 --> 0:00:08.280 at one and seven pm Eastern on Bloomberg dot Com, 0:00:08.320 --> 0:00:11.479 the iHeartRadio app and the Bloomberg Business App, or listen 0:00:11.520 --> 0:00:13.760 on demand wherever you get your podcasts. 0:00:15.920 --> 0:00:19.639 Welcome to Bloomberg Opinion I Amy Morris. This week we 0:00:19.680 --> 0:00:23.640 look at raising or lowering the voting age? What's the 0:00:23.680 --> 0:00:28.800 better fit for a democracy? Also, employee loyalty, dedication and 0:00:28.880 --> 0:00:33.040 initiative once seen as a benefit, but employees are lately 0:00:33.159 --> 0:00:36.879 pushing back against that. What can companies do to win 0:00:37.000 --> 0:00:40.879 their most loyal workers back? And we answer the classic 0:00:41.000 --> 0:00:45.560 question paper or plastic? Which one is more environmentally sustainable? 0:00:45.960 --> 0:00:50.000 Turns out there's no easy answer, but first the choice 0:00:50.000 --> 0:00:52.239 is made by the Federal Open Market Committee. In the 0:00:52.280 --> 0:00:55.960 next few years will determine if we get inflation under control, 0:00:56.320 --> 0:01:00.480 how fast the economy grows, and what happens in financial markets. 0:01:00.720 --> 0:01:03.200 The most recent nominee to the Fed's Board of Governors, 0:01:03.200 --> 0:01:06.880 Adriann Kugler. White House Press Secretary Karine Jean Pierre made 0:01:06.920 --> 0:01:07.680 that announcement. 0:01:07.760 --> 0:01:11.920 Doctor Kugler is a highly qualified and respected economists with 0:01:12.000 --> 0:01:16.680 deep expertise in labor markets, worker mobility and youth unemployment. 0:01:16.800 --> 0:01:20.399 These nominees understand that this job is not a partisan one, 0:01:20.440 --> 0:01:24.240 but one that plays a critical role in pursuing maximum employment, 0:01:24.319 --> 0:01:29.759 maintaining price stability, and supervising many of our nation's financial institutions. 0:01:29.920 --> 0:01:32.520 But there are concerns that Wile Kugler is a great 0:01:32.640 --> 0:01:36.520 labor economist. What the country needs is someone with financial 0:01:36.640 --> 0:01:39.880 macro expertise. For more on this, we bring in Bloomberg 0:01:39.880 --> 0:01:44.240 opinion columnist to Alison Schrager. Alison, always a pleasure, thank 0:01:44.240 --> 0:01:47.840 you for taking the time with us. Just based on 0:01:48.000 --> 0:01:50.840 the column that you have on the Bloomberg terminal, is 0:01:51.000 --> 0:01:53.560 monetary policy at a critical point now? 0:01:54.520 --> 0:01:56.880 I think so. I mean we're coming off of what 0:01:56.920 --> 0:01:59.960 we called to some the Great Moderation, where we had 0:02:00.200 --> 0:02:05.640 very low inflation and low interest rates and everyone thought 0:02:05.640 --> 0:02:08.400 this would last forever. And everyone thought, well, you know, 0:02:08.440 --> 0:02:12.080 we'd figured out monetary policy that if you set an intention, 0:02:12.280 --> 0:02:15.679 which called an inflation target, it would be realized. And 0:02:16.080 --> 0:02:18.960 you know, the biggest challenge was interst rates were too low. 0:02:19.440 --> 0:02:22.519 But now it turns out that maybe inflation targeting doesn't 0:02:22.520 --> 0:02:24.920 work as well as we thought. Not only that board guidance, 0:02:24.919 --> 0:02:27.160 which has become the most powerful tool. If you tell 0:02:27.160 --> 0:02:28.760 markets what you're going to do and then you do, 0:02:28.840 --> 0:02:31.760 it might actually not work that well either. So I 0:02:31.800 --> 0:02:34.160 think in a lot of ways monetary policy is at 0:02:34.160 --> 0:02:36.360 a very critical point and maybe after we think the 0:02:36.400 --> 0:02:39.920 tools we're using, and you know, it also brings up 0:02:39.919 --> 0:02:42.240 a lot of financial stability risks moving from a load 0:02:42.280 --> 0:02:44.680 to or a high rate environment that takes really sort 0:02:44.720 --> 0:02:47.679 of thinking very carefully about how you're navigating monetary policy. 0:02:47.720 --> 0:02:50.440 And also, to add it all up on, we've also 0:02:50.480 --> 0:02:53.840 really changed the tools of monetary policy. The main policy 0:02:53.919 --> 0:02:55.600 rate used to be the FED funds rate, which was 0:02:55.639 --> 0:02:57.240 the rate banks used to lend to each other at 0:02:57.600 --> 0:03:01.920 now that starting the Great Financial Crisis with the interest 0:03:01.960 --> 0:03:05.160 rate on reserves instead, which also just changes to somebody 0:03:05.320 --> 0:03:08.200 the mechanism of how monetary policy works. And there's also 0:03:08.320 --> 0:03:12.160 of course q E, which is an enormous sort of 0:03:12.160 --> 0:03:14.560 balance sheet the fedal system manage. So, as I said, 0:03:14.600 --> 0:03:16.760 I really think we're at this critical point where we 0:03:16.880 --> 0:03:19.360 might be in a new regime of monetary policy and 0:03:19.440 --> 0:03:21.919 an intellectual regime about how we think about it. 0:03:22.639 --> 0:03:24.200 Okay, so what does the FED need? 0:03:25.320 --> 0:03:28.440 I think it needs someone who really understands these challenges 0:03:28.480 --> 0:03:30.840 and you know, they're you know, I think we tend 0:03:30.919 --> 0:03:32.960 to think about economists being all the same, but they 0:03:32.960 --> 0:03:36.960 have very distinct specialties. And if you're thinking about what 0:03:36.960 --> 0:03:39.400 the FED is trying to do, it's trying to sort 0:03:39.400 --> 0:03:44.600 of steer and guide the macroeconomy by working through financial markets. 0:03:44.880 --> 0:03:46.840 You know, financial markets are the one that sort of 0:03:47.080 --> 0:03:49.360 carry out all these things. They raise interest rates, that 0:03:49.720 --> 0:03:52.840 changes credit conditions, and that feeds through the macro economy. 0:03:52.960 --> 0:03:56.080 So you have this huge financial markets, you know, apparatus 0:03:56.120 --> 0:03:59.120 which actually is to carry out and implement all these policies. 0:03:59.440 --> 0:04:02.520 So I think what we really need then, and this 0:04:02.600 --> 0:04:05.600 is a very sort of distinct specialty, is economists too, 0:04:05.600 --> 0:04:08.800 specialize in macro finance, which is the macro economy and 0:04:08.840 --> 0:04:10.640 how that interacts with financial markets. 0:04:11.520 --> 0:04:14.160 Now, as you explained in your column and as you 0:04:14.200 --> 0:04:18.760 said just now, there is a range of specialties on 0:04:18.800 --> 0:04:20.680 the FED board, and it seems like that would be 0:04:20.760 --> 0:04:23.279 a good thing that you'd have that diversity and you'd 0:04:23.279 --> 0:04:27.239 have all those different brains working together for that common goal. 0:04:27.480 --> 0:04:29.880 Not necessarily, no, I think we. 0:04:29.800 --> 0:04:31.640 Should have that diversity. The problem is we don't have 0:04:31.680 --> 0:04:35.400 anyone who does the macro finance stuck I mean, or 0:04:35.520 --> 0:04:39.239 I mean to some degree we have one. We have one, 0:04:39.279 --> 0:04:42.000 but you know he did almost that work within the FED. 0:04:42.000 --> 0:04:44.520 And what we really needs you an outsider who's really 0:04:44.600 --> 0:04:46.920 actually a great scholar in this area to sort of 0:04:47.000 --> 0:04:49.760 lead them intellectually and traditionally, at least since the eighties, 0:04:49.760 --> 0:04:52.440 we've always had that or does some degree have that 0:04:52.520 --> 0:04:55.360 presence from the New York FED President who always gets 0:04:55.360 --> 0:04:56.800 a see on the FOMC. 0:04:58.120 --> 0:04:58.920 And right now, I. 0:04:58.839 --> 0:05:01.840 Mean, we have someone more macroeconomists who doesn't really work 0:05:01.839 --> 0:05:06.200 in financial markets. So we really are lacking financial expertise 0:05:06.320 --> 0:05:11.560 on the board right now. And the latest FED pick 0:05:11.960 --> 0:05:14.520 really is more labor. We already kind of have that 0:05:14.600 --> 0:05:17.719 with Lisa Cook, so I think we don't. You know, 0:05:17.839 --> 0:05:19.640 labor is useful too, that is part of the FED 0:05:19.680 --> 0:05:22.560 dual mandate. But to some degree, if I had to choose, 0:05:22.600 --> 0:05:25.640 I would choose the financial expertise more because that's actually 0:05:25.640 --> 0:05:28.599 how it all works. The labor market is a downstream 0:05:28.720 --> 0:05:30.160 of what happens in financial markets. 0:05:30.240 --> 0:05:32.200 Let's dig down a little bit deeper and talk about 0:05:32.240 --> 0:05:34.560 what that does bring to the table, what it is 0:05:34.600 --> 0:05:37.240 that it would add to their decision process. 0:05:37.760 --> 0:05:39.600 Yeah, so when you're deciding whether or not we're going 0:05:39.640 --> 0:05:43.040 to raise or lower rates or you know, quantitative tightening 0:05:43.120 --> 0:05:46.599 or move back to quantitative easoning, which you know as 0:05:46.680 --> 0:05:49.880 you know, whatever, it's very clear we're moving into sort 0:05:49.880 --> 0:05:53.000 of some serious financial stability concerns. If you really understand 0:05:53.000 --> 0:05:56.800 how FED policy interacts with financial markets, you can know, Okay, 0:05:56.839 --> 0:05:59.840 these these are the unintended consequences that could happen. This 0:06:00.440 --> 0:06:02.800 is if we raise rates, this could up into financial markets. 0:06:02.800 --> 0:06:05.919 This is what could happen to the housing market. You know, 0:06:06.000 --> 0:06:08.000 all these things that could hapen to smaller regional things. 0:06:08.040 --> 0:06:11.320 You have that appreciation. And then later, as I said, 0:06:11.480 --> 0:06:14.680 these conditions are what affect labor markets. So it's one 0:06:14.680 --> 0:06:16.520 thing just to be like, oh wow, we're really concerned 0:06:16.560 --> 0:06:19.960 about labor markets, and you know how this affects sort 0:06:19.960 --> 0:06:22.200 of do you know this part of the labor market 0:06:22.279 --> 0:06:24.360 versus that part of the labor market. But honestly, that's 0:06:24.360 --> 0:06:26.720 sort of the second order concern of how it impacted 0:06:26.800 --> 0:06:27.560 financial markets. 0:06:27.560 --> 0:06:31.880 First, better macro view then than the granular view you're 0:06:31.920 --> 0:06:36.560 getting from all the different opinions. Exactly we are talking 0:06:36.600 --> 0:06:41.039 with Alice and Traeger, a Bloomberg opinion columnist covering economics. Alison, 0:06:41.040 --> 0:06:42.240 what do you want to see from the FED? 0:06:44.400 --> 0:06:46.880 I would like to see, as I said, some acknowledgment. Honestly, 0:06:46.880 --> 0:06:49.080 they also made a lot of policy errors in the 0:06:49.160 --> 0:06:51.919 last couple of years. And I mean I don't blame 0:06:51.960 --> 0:06:55.040 them entirely because they were following largely what had become 0:06:55.160 --> 0:06:57.479 the sort of intellectual tradition, which was a thing about 0:06:57.520 --> 0:07:01.200 poored guidance just thinking about lower for the biggest problem. 0:07:01.560 --> 0:07:04.279 So I think it would be really good to have 0:07:04.320 --> 0:07:07.640 a real intellectual leader who understands macro financial challenges on 0:07:07.680 --> 0:07:09.559 the FED to really sort of be able to also 0:07:09.600 --> 0:07:11.720 take a hard look at mistakes that we're made and think, 0:07:11.760 --> 0:07:15.000 do we need to really rethink our communication strategy and 0:07:15.120 --> 0:07:18.120 how we, you know, are thinking going forward and communicate. 0:07:19.560 --> 0:07:23.040 The FED is facing some tremendous challenges. Let's go through 0:07:23.080 --> 0:07:25.440 some of them if we could, because in your column 0:07:25.480 --> 0:07:27.640 you sort of itemize them and you talked about how 0:07:27.640 --> 0:07:31.640 they're unprecedented. This is an unusual time. It's been an 0:07:31.720 --> 0:07:34.080 unusual couple of years for all of us. Let's face it, 0:07:34.120 --> 0:07:36.280 but this is a really unusual time for the FED. 0:07:37.120 --> 0:07:37.400 It is. 0:07:37.440 --> 0:07:40.320 I mean, there's been other unusual times, but I mean 0:07:40.400 --> 0:07:42.280 these are the times you look back on if you're 0:07:42.320 --> 0:07:45.080 a monetary historian and you're like, Wow, this is really 0:07:45.160 --> 0:07:47.840 sparks a new regime and how we do monetary policy. 0:07:48.160 --> 0:07:51.080 I would say, you know, Vulkar was another time where 0:07:51.080 --> 0:07:52.880 it was really like a big change and you think 0:07:52.920 --> 0:07:55.000 about how you think about credibility, how do you think 0:07:55.000 --> 0:07:56.480 of the role of the FED and the markets. And 0:07:56.560 --> 0:07:59.120 I think now that that sort of era is broken, 0:07:59.240 --> 0:08:02.120 with higher and and with rising race, we sort of 0:08:02.120 --> 0:08:04.640 need a new regime not only in a policy that's done, 0:08:04.720 --> 0:08:06.320 but also in intellectual philosophy. 0:08:06.920 --> 0:08:10.680 Do you mean regime not only in how they think 0:08:10.760 --> 0:08:13.840 in their policy and their philosophy, but also in their leadership. 0:08:15.320 --> 0:08:18.040 Well, I mean, I'm not saying we need to get 0:08:18.120 --> 0:08:18.880 rid of Jpell. 0:08:19.640 --> 0:08:21.240 I just wanted to clarify that. 0:08:22.040 --> 0:08:24.800 But I do think say, having one at least one 0:08:24.840 --> 0:08:27.920 person who has a lot of expertise in macro finance 0:08:28.040 --> 0:08:31.960 and sort of a long history of if intellectual leadership 0:08:31.960 --> 0:08:34.040 and scholarship in this area, I just say, let's have 0:08:34.080 --> 0:08:36.400 one of those people around on the board. We don't 0:08:36.440 --> 0:08:38.400 have to change everyone. Let's just add. 0:08:38.160 --> 0:08:41.600 One, what does the FED need to do now? And 0:08:41.640 --> 0:08:43.960 then what should they be doing in the next few years. 0:08:44.040 --> 0:08:46.600 Let's take the short look at it, and then let's 0:08:46.600 --> 0:08:47.400 go for the long ball. 0:08:48.280 --> 0:08:50.320 Well, I mean, I said they face a lot of 0:08:50.320 --> 0:08:53.000 trade offs right now. Mean my inclination would be they 0:08:53.000 --> 0:08:55.559 really need to get inflation under control, because if they 0:08:55.559 --> 0:08:57.840 do not, we could end up in an era like 0:08:57.880 --> 0:09:00.120 the seventies where we just have inflation coming in and 0:09:00.160 --> 0:09:02.400 then coming back, coming in, coming back, and that uncertainty 0:09:02.400 --> 0:09:04.720 can be very damaging and it can be very hard 0:09:04.720 --> 0:09:07.640 for the FED to eventually get rid of it altogether. 0:09:07.800 --> 0:09:10.040 We might it would be something very costly, like the 0:09:10.120 --> 0:09:11.880 Vulkar had to do. I'd like to hope that we 0:09:11.920 --> 0:09:14.800 avoid that and stay strong and get inflation back to 0:09:15.240 --> 0:09:16.680 I don't know if they're going back to target, but 0:09:16.720 --> 0:09:19.199 at least three percent, and that could be a lot 0:09:19.200 --> 0:09:21.360 of work, and that could also start to really start 0:09:21.400 --> 0:09:25.200 to harm the economy, might increase in unemployment, which will 0:09:25.200 --> 0:09:27.760 create all sorts of new political pressures. They're already under 0:09:27.760 --> 0:09:30.559 political pressure, and unemployment is only three and a half 0:09:30.640 --> 0:09:34.520 percent or three point four percent, so I think in 0:09:34.520 --> 0:09:35.880 the short term they have to do that, but over 0:09:35.920 --> 0:09:37.800 the next couple of years, as I said, they're going 0:09:37.840 --> 0:09:40.959 to have to balance problems in the labor market, especially 0:09:41.000 --> 0:09:44.720 potentially problems in financial markets. Is it said, because monetary 0:09:44.720 --> 0:09:48.559 policy goes through financial markets, financial stability concerns are often, 0:09:49.240 --> 0:09:52.920 you know, always lurking on the background. So they're going 0:09:53.000 --> 0:09:55.040 to have a very tough balancing act for the next 0:09:55.120 --> 0:09:57.080 couple of years going forward, if they're really serious by 0:09:57.200 --> 0:09:58.120 bringing inflation down. 0:09:58.600 --> 0:10:01.360 Is there anything in particular that you are watching for 0:10:02.240 --> 0:10:06.679 geopolitical type incidents that may impact what the FED decides 0:10:06.720 --> 0:10:09.720 to do, or are you just mainly watching for the 0:10:09.760 --> 0:10:11.280 milestone markers from the Fed? 0:10:12.000 --> 0:10:14.920 I think the big thing to watch is commercial real estate. 0:10:15.080 --> 0:10:16.600 You know, as a lot of those loans come do 0:10:16.640 --> 0:10:18.480 and they after he financed at a higher rate, there 0:10:18.520 --> 0:10:21.199 could be a lot of problems there that trickle through 0:10:21.200 --> 0:10:23.400 the financial markets and make their job a lot harder. 0:10:23.440 --> 0:10:26.960 In raising rates further will maybe cause even more damage, 0:10:27.000 --> 0:10:28.840 and yet they'll still have high inflation to deal with, 0:10:28.880 --> 0:10:30.400 and then they'll be in a really tough spot. 0:10:31.120 --> 0:10:36.040 Alison Schrager is a Bloomberg Opinion colonist covering economics coming up, 0:10:36.080 --> 0:10:39.360 we'll look at the talk about raising the voting age. 0:10:39.400 --> 0:10:42.400 Bloomberg's Jonathan Bernstein says, that's a terrible idea. 0:10:42.520 --> 0:10:44.559 The question is why do we have voting in the 0:10:44.600 --> 0:10:48.439 first place, and all the reasons that you know, and 0:10:48.840 --> 0:10:50.960 which sort of raises the question why we have democracy 0:10:50.960 --> 0:10:52.800 in the first place, And if you think through it, 0:10:52.920 --> 0:10:56.040 all of the reasons that we have voting and that 0:10:56.080 --> 0:10:59.880 we have democracy really point to having not the higher 0:11:00.040 --> 0:11:01.880 voting aids, but a lower voting age. 0:11:01.960 --> 0:11:03.760 You're listening to Bloomberg Opinion. 0:11:13.800 --> 0:11:17.640 You're listening to the Bloomberg Opinion podcast. Catch us Saturdays 0:11:17.640 --> 0:11:20.800 at one and seven pm Eastern on Bloomberg dot Com, 0:11:20.880 --> 0:11:24.000 the iHeartRadio app, and the Bloomberg Business app, or listen 0:11:24.080 --> 0:11:27.520 on demand wherever you get your podcasts. 0:11:28.559 --> 0:11:32.240 You're listening to Bloomberg Opinion. I'm Amy Morris. The election 0:11:32.400 --> 0:11:35.640 cycle seems to get shorter every year, more hats being 0:11:35.679 --> 0:11:38.559 thrown into the ring, especially on the Republican side. Now 0:11:38.559 --> 0:11:41.480 where there are already a stable of candidates ready to 0:11:41.559 --> 0:11:44.640 viuy for the nomination for president, the election is more 0:11:44.679 --> 0:11:47.160 than a year and a half away. In a video 0:11:47.280 --> 0:11:51.120 on his Twitter page, long Shot Republican presidential candidate, the 0:11:51.200 --> 0:11:55.719 vek Ramaswami is proposing to raise the voting age from 0:11:55.800 --> 0:11:58.320 eighteen to twenty five, with some exceptions. One of the 0:11:58.320 --> 0:12:00.120 things that we don't go good enough job of in 0:12:00.160 --> 0:12:00.640 this country. 0:12:00.679 --> 0:12:04.640 He's teaching the next generation what the constitution actually says. 0:12:05.000 --> 0:12:07.679 You're right, okay, So one of the things I favor. 0:12:07.800 --> 0:12:11.120 This is controversial to some people. If you want to 0:12:11.120 --> 0:12:12.320 be eighteen years old. 0:12:12.120 --> 0:12:14.720 Graduate from high school, and cast a ballot in this 0:12:14.800 --> 0:12:17.560 country at a young age, you better. 0:12:17.320 --> 0:12:21.800 At least pass the CIVIX portion of the test. 0:12:21.840 --> 0:12:25.400 Bloomberg Opinion columnist Jonathan Bernstein says that is not a 0:12:25.440 --> 0:12:29.199 good idea by any measure, and Jonathan joins us, Now, 0:12:29.480 --> 0:12:31.480 thanks for taking the time with us. Jonathan, Why is 0:12:31.480 --> 0:12:32.000 he wrong? 0:12:33.080 --> 0:12:35.840 Well, you know, the question is why do we have 0:12:35.960 --> 0:12:39.120 voting in the first place, and all the reasons that 0:12:39.480 --> 0:12:42.200 you know, and which sort of raises the question why 0:12:42.240 --> 0:12:43.680 we have democracy in the first place. And if you 0:12:43.720 --> 0:12:47.160 think through it, all of the reasons that we have 0:12:47.400 --> 0:12:50.600 voting and that we have democracy really point to having 0:12:50.800 --> 0:12:53.679 not a higher voting age, but a lower voting age. 0:12:53.760 --> 0:12:56.800 So he's thinking in exactly the wrong direction. 0:12:57.559 --> 0:13:00.360 So would it make it harder for people to vote, 0:13:00.400 --> 0:13:03.479 then you would be making a smaller pool of voters. 0:13:03.800 --> 0:13:06.320 Well yeah, I mean, you know, one of the questions 0:13:06.400 --> 0:13:09.120 is what's the goal here? And if the goal of 0:13:09.200 --> 0:13:14.080 democracy is self government, well that includes all of us. Right, 0:13:14.200 --> 0:13:18.480 So if part of the goal is to you know, 0:13:18.679 --> 0:13:23.280 represent everyone's interests in the democracy, well, you know he's 0:13:23.720 --> 0:13:26.040 trying to find well, who are the people who are 0:13:26.160 --> 0:13:28.680 qualified to vote? Who are going to be the good voters? 0:13:29.320 --> 0:13:32.920 And that's the wrong way of thinking about democracy. The 0:13:32.960 --> 0:13:35.400 way of thinking about it if you're thinking about sort 0:13:35.400 --> 0:13:39.680 of politicans about who gets what and dividing up stuff, right, 0:13:40.240 --> 0:13:43.760 is that everybody has interest In fact, the truth is 0:13:44.280 --> 0:13:48.280 that if you really are sort of a strict lock 0:13:48.480 --> 0:13:53.480 in you know, if you go back to political philosophy democrat, 0:13:53.720 --> 0:13:56.520 the idea that you want a liberal democracy with everybody's 0:13:56.520 --> 0:13:59.280 interest getting represented. The truth is what we really should 0:13:59.320 --> 0:14:03.560 have if you think in that sense, is vote from birth, 0:14:03.640 --> 0:14:06.120 with parents taking care of the vote until kids are 0:14:06.400 --> 0:14:09.520 old enought to vote for themselves, because everybody has interests, 0:14:09.600 --> 0:14:11.840 including the very youngest. 0:14:12.920 --> 0:14:15.240 Okay, so just so I understand what you're saying, there's 0:14:15.240 --> 0:14:17.520 that theory that to get the best out of democracy, 0:14:17.960 --> 0:14:20.360 voting should be restricted to just the best of us. 0:14:20.600 --> 0:14:22.800 And in that way they would have to raise the 0:14:22.880 --> 0:14:26.280 voting age to the older, more mature, they've been seasoned, 0:14:26.400 --> 0:14:29.840 they've seen some things, kind of voter. But that, you say, 0:14:29.840 --> 0:14:32.080 would be a false premise because then not everybody would 0:14:32.120 --> 0:14:32.960 be represented. 0:14:33.600 --> 0:14:37.240 Right, Well, if your goal in democracy, if your goal 0:14:37.480 --> 0:14:42.840 is somehow to have the best people voting, problem with 0:14:42.880 --> 0:14:45.240 that is it's really a slippery slope because well, the 0:14:45.400 --> 0:14:47.560 restricting is twenty five is one thing, but it turns 0:14:47.560 --> 0:14:49.560 out that lots of people who are over twenty five 0:14:50.040 --> 0:14:53.480 don't know anything about public affairs, don't pay attention, so 0:14:53.520 --> 0:14:56.480 maybe they shouldn't vote either. And then if you have, 0:14:56.800 --> 0:14:58.480 you know, if you call that, then you're gonna have 0:14:58.520 --> 0:15:01.120 another call after that for the people who really pay 0:15:01.160 --> 0:15:05.520 attention and really are the best voters in somebody's conception. 0:15:05.680 --> 0:15:09.560 But that sort of raises a bunch of questions, including 0:15:09.600 --> 0:15:11.600 who's going to be the one who makes that decision 0:15:11.720 --> 0:15:14.960 of who's you know, and it raises the question of 0:15:15.000 --> 0:15:18.280 why do you have democracy in the first place, Because 0:15:19.160 --> 0:15:23.080 if your goal is to get the best people deciding, well, 0:15:23.440 --> 0:15:25.920 democracy may not be the right way to go then, 0:15:26.040 --> 0:15:30.600 because there's no particular reason that you need the democracy 0:15:30.680 --> 0:15:33.800 to you know that democracy will yield the best decision. 0:15:33.840 --> 0:15:36.400 What it's very good for doing is yielding the decisions 0:15:36.800 --> 0:15:38.360 that everybody participates in. 0:15:38.800 --> 0:15:42.400 Do you find this as a partisan tendency, Well, if 0:15:42.400 --> 0:15:44.320 you want to sort of look at it in practical 0:15:44.400 --> 0:15:49.040 political terms right now, yeah, I mean, there's one of 0:15:49.040 --> 0:15:51.000 the things that's been going on in our politics in 0:15:51.000 --> 0:15:55.280 the last several years is Republicans dealing with electoral losses. 0:15:55.280 --> 0:15:59.400 And don't forget, Republicans have lost the popular vote for 0:15:59.480 --> 0:16:04.720 president every time except for one, beginning in nineteen ninety two. 0:16:06.080 --> 0:16:07.880 And the way that they've dealt with that is not 0:16:09.840 --> 0:16:12.760 by trying to find ideas that appeal to more people 0:16:12.840 --> 0:16:15.480 or trying to find new people who will support them, 0:16:15.480 --> 0:16:19.680 but to try to restrict the franchise by making it 0:16:19.760 --> 0:16:22.080 more difficult to vote. So, yeah, this would make it 0:16:22.120 --> 0:16:25.000 impossible to vote for many people because they would no 0:16:25.120 --> 0:16:30.760 longer be qualified. Right now, young people vote for Democrats 0:16:30.760 --> 0:16:33.440 more than they vote for Republicans. That hasn't always been true, 0:16:33.440 --> 0:16:35.760 by the way, It's not like an automatic thing, but 0:16:35.880 --> 0:16:38.200 this is the kind of sort of short term, Hey, 0:16:38.240 --> 0:16:41.480 these people oppose us, let's keep them from voting. Thing 0:16:41.560 --> 0:16:47.400 that's very popular, unfortunately among a lot of Republicans. 0:16:47.800 --> 0:16:51.000 And we are talking with Bloomberg opinion columnist Jonathan Bernstein 0:16:51.080 --> 0:16:55.320 about the question of lowering the voting age. Jonathan, what 0:16:55.360 --> 0:16:58.640 would the benefit of lowering the voting age be besides 0:16:58.760 --> 0:17:00.000 increasing that voting pool. 0:17:01.120 --> 0:17:03.280 Well, you know, like I said, one of the things 0:17:03.320 --> 0:17:07.280 is that sort of just in a theoretical sense, young people, 0:17:07.480 --> 0:17:11.480 teenagers even younger than that, have interests and should be 0:17:11.560 --> 0:17:13.640 represented in the democracy, if you think of it that way. 0:17:14.800 --> 0:17:18.400 But there's also a question about the particular voting age 0:17:18.400 --> 0:17:22.879 that we have at eighteen. It turns out that it 0:17:23.040 --> 0:17:28.879 probably is in practical terms, allows the idea because people 0:17:28.880 --> 0:17:32.960 who are eighteen years old are often in a life transition. 0:17:33.000 --> 0:17:35.840 They get out of high school, many of them moved 0:17:36.000 --> 0:17:38.880 to a new jurisdiction, even within a city. If they 0:17:38.880 --> 0:17:41.280 move out of their parents' house across town and then 0:17:41.320 --> 0:17:43.400 you know, get a job and all that, they may 0:17:43.480 --> 0:17:47.520 have a different member of the city council. If across 0:17:47.560 --> 0:17:49.439 town means across the city border, they may have a 0:17:49.480 --> 0:17:53.000 new mayor. They may even vote on different things. Some 0:17:53.520 --> 0:17:56.359 of them might go away to college and that's, you know, 0:17:56.520 --> 0:17:59.080 sets up another thing where they're living someplaces not permanent, 0:17:59.359 --> 0:18:03.320 and the moment when they need to get the habit 0:18:03.320 --> 0:18:06.800 of voting is a more disruptive life thing for the 0:18:07.000 --> 0:18:10.320 time for them. So bringing it to a lower age 0:18:10.640 --> 0:18:14.080 of sixteen, say, or even a little lower than that, 0:18:14.680 --> 0:18:17.600 would allow them to get that habit of voting started, 0:18:17.600 --> 0:18:20.040 because it turns out voting is an habitual thing. If 0:18:20.040 --> 0:18:23.159 you start voting, you're more likely to keep voting. So 0:18:23.200 --> 0:18:26.560 it would mean that people would start voting at a 0:18:26.600 --> 0:18:29.640 time where they had a little more stability in their 0:18:29.680 --> 0:18:32.800 lives and perhaps would get into the habit earlier. 0:18:33.280 --> 0:18:35.480 Is there a way to determine what the best age 0:18:35.680 --> 0:18:38.560 would be to vote that younger would be better than 0:18:38.560 --> 0:18:40.800 older to develop those habits. 0:18:41.080 --> 0:18:44.600 Yeah, I don't think that there's a particular, you know, 0:18:45.000 --> 0:18:48.560 hard and fast rule. If you think of democracy in 0:18:48.600 --> 0:18:50.200 a different way, if you think of it in terms 0:18:50.280 --> 0:18:53.200 of not so much of politics as who gets what, 0:18:53.240 --> 0:18:58.520 but politics is a way for people to meaningfully control 0:18:59.440 --> 0:19:06.119 their own fate collectively with other people. That's lost on 0:19:06.200 --> 0:19:08.719 somebody who's three years old or five years old, but 0:19:08.840 --> 0:19:12.920 you can start getting it as young as young teenagers. 0:19:13.119 --> 0:19:14.840 And you know, if it were up to me, if 0:19:14.840 --> 0:19:17.399 I could wave a magic wand a's gonna happen. But 0:19:17.920 --> 0:19:20.320 I would probably set it around thirteen or fourteen, because 0:19:20.359 --> 0:19:23.639 that's when people can start getting the understanding of it. 0:19:23.720 --> 0:19:26.840 And the truth is, you know, if you look around 0:19:26.960 --> 0:19:30.680 at interest groups at campaigns, there's plenty of teenagers who 0:19:30.680 --> 0:19:34.320 get involved at those ages. And nobody says you shouldn't 0:19:34.320 --> 0:19:37.119 be allowed to participate in politics when you're twelve or 0:19:37.200 --> 0:19:40.479 thirteen or fourteen. You shouldn't be allowed to, you know, 0:19:40.800 --> 0:19:43.919 go door to door or stuff envelopes or write a 0:19:44.000 --> 0:19:47.480 letter here, member of Congress or something like that. It's 0:19:47.560 --> 0:19:50.600 voting that is the sticking point. And the truth is, 0:19:50.680 --> 0:19:53.359 voting is sort of the training wheels part of democracy, 0:19:53.359 --> 0:19:56.240 if you think of it that way. It's the gateway 0:19:56.320 --> 0:20:00.280 to more meaningful involvement. And so I would let you, well, 0:20:00.640 --> 0:20:04.520 I would I would start with, you know, young teenagers 0:20:04.960 --> 0:20:07.360 and let them get used to the idea of being 0:20:07.800 --> 0:20:11.119 personally involved in politics themselves, and them as they got older, 0:20:11.160 --> 0:20:16.000 they might be able to add more, you know, more 0:20:16.080 --> 0:20:18.520 involvement in their community, more involvement in self government. 0:20:18.800 --> 0:20:22.880 Jonathan Bernstein is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering politics and policy. 0:20:23.160 --> 0:20:26.600 Coming up, what has stemied employee initiative and how can 0:20:26.600 --> 0:20:30.399 that initiative be reignited. Don't forget We're available as a 0:20:30.400 --> 0:20:34.600 podcast on Apple, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform. This 0:20:34.840 --> 0:20:35.840 is Bloomberg Opinion. 0:20:44.600 --> 0:20:48.399 You're listening to the Bloomberg Opinion podcast. Catch us Saturdays 0:20:48.440 --> 0:20:51.560 at one in seven pm Eastern on Bloomberg dot Com, 0:20:51.640 --> 0:20:54.760 the iHeartRadio app and the Bloomberg Business App, or listen 0:20:54.840 --> 0:20:57.040 on demand wherever you get your podcasts. 0:20:59.160 --> 0:21:02.560 This is Bloomberg Opinion. I Mamy Morris. Four years many 0:21:02.640 --> 0:21:05.920 of us have operated with the understanding that deep employee 0:21:05.960 --> 0:21:09.679 commitment is a benefit. An employee who takes initiative is 0:21:09.680 --> 0:21:13.160