WEBVTT - Bloomberg Businessweek Weekend - May 7th, 2021 (Podcast) 0:00:01.080 --> 0:00:05.440 This is Bloomberg Business Week inside from the reporters and 0:00:05.600 --> 0:00:09.200 editors who bring you America's most trusted business magazine, plus 0:00:09.240 --> 0:00:13.160 global business, finance and tech news as it happened. Bloomberg 0:00:13.240 --> 0:00:16.759 Business Week with Carol Messer and Bloomberg Quick Takes. Tim 0:00:16.800 --> 0:00:21.079 Stinevin on Bloomberg Radio, Hi, and welcome to the weekend 0:00:21.200 --> 0:00:24.080 edition of Bloomberg Business Week. It is week sixty. Working 0:00:24.120 --> 0:00:26.800 from home. For some Tim felt like a lot more 0:00:26.800 --> 0:00:29.760 people were back in offices throughout New York City, certainly 0:00:29.800 --> 0:00:32.440 in our office at Bloomberg Headquarters. We both were in 0:00:32.479 --> 0:00:35.519 the office again this week. Traffic definitely up in the 0:00:35.560 --> 0:00:37.800 city streets. Yeah, I'm looking forward to when I am 0:00:37.840 --> 0:00:40.400 fully vaccinated taking the subway again so I can get 0:00:40.400 --> 0:00:42.919 off those streets. Whiles the world continued to open up, 0:00:42.920 --> 0:00:44.960 we saw the gaps between the halves and the have 0:00:45.159 --> 0:00:48.000 nots in our economy continue to widen. Coming up this hour, 0:00:48.120 --> 0:00:52.000 two big thinkers tackling the major issues of our time, crises, 0:00:52.040 --> 0:00:56.040 technological powerhouses, and more. We're gonna hear from Bloomberg opinion 0:00:56.040 --> 0:00:58.840 columnist and Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford, 0:00:59.080 --> 0:01:03.120 Neil Ferguson about his book Doom, The Politics of Catastrophe, 0:01:03.240 --> 0:01:07.120 plus n y U professor author entrepreneurs Scott Galloway you 0:01:07.200 --> 0:01:10.160 know him, on breaking up big tech and unlocking value, 0:01:10.200 --> 0:01:12.280 one of my favorite guests this week. All of that 0:01:12.360 --> 0:01:14.560 to come. We begin, though, with one of the Bloomberg 0:01:14.560 --> 0:01:17.840 Big takes this week. It's the Bloomberg exclusives that you 0:01:17.920 --> 0:01:20.560 need to be focusing on that only we have. It 0:01:20.600 --> 0:01:22.119 also turned out to be one of our most read 0:01:22.120 --> 0:01:24.520 stories on the Bloomberg this week. It's about how the 0:01:24.560 --> 0:01:29.400 booming US recovery is leaving some communities completely behind. Bloomberg 0:01:29.400 --> 0:01:32.399 News Federal Reserve and economics reporter Katerina survived of philled 0:01:32.480 --> 0:01:35.319 us in Carol on some really interesting data. She gets to, 0:01:35.920 --> 0:01:37.560 you know something Timmy and I have talked about with 0:01:37.560 --> 0:01:41.200 Peter Atwater and others about, you know, the recovery or 0:01:41.200 --> 0:01:42.840 even I was having a conversation with one of my 0:01:42.880 --> 0:01:47.200 brothers saying for some people the pandemic obviously it impacted 0:01:47.200 --> 0:01:49.320 We thought about her help, but they were able to work. 0:01:49.480 --> 0:01:50.960 Some of them made a lot of money if you 0:01:50.960 --> 0:01:52.760 were invested in the stock market or elsewhere, like it 0:01:52.880 --> 0:01:55.400 just didn't impact us all equally. There are other people though, 0:01:55.440 --> 0:01:57.920 that lost their job completely or just scraping to get by. 0:01:58.080 --> 0:02:00.240 And I think what's so important about katerina story is 0:02:00.280 --> 0:02:03.200 it's it's it touches on of course sector and industry, 0:02:03.240 --> 0:02:05.919 but at the same time geography and thinking about different 0:02:05.920 --> 0:02:09.400 responses that different cities have had. Atlanta's decision to have 0:02:09.440 --> 0:02:13.000 a partial reopening earlier than many places, and then Las Vegas, 0:02:13.080 --> 0:02:17.040 for example, the city heavily reliant on tourism, and what 0:02:17.080 --> 0:02:20.320 happens when tourism rise up there. It's a totally different 0:02:20.680 --> 0:02:23.160 thing than what's playing out in Phoenix, for example, where 0:02:23.320 --> 0:02:25.920 a booming home building has been really good for many 0:02:25.919 --> 0:02:28.120 minorities who live there. This is where the granular level 0:02:28.240 --> 0:02:30.240 really makes a difference. Right. You can see we do 0:02:30.320 --> 0:02:32.720 it here, We have stories, we have a big headline. 0:02:33.080 --> 0:02:35.840 But once you start to dig deeper into the data 0:02:35.880 --> 0:02:37.440 and you have to look at those demographics, you have 0:02:37.480 --> 0:02:39.880 to look at your geography. You do sometimes have to 0:02:39.880 --> 0:02:42.200 look at sector breakdowns. That tells you a much more 0:02:42.200 --> 0:02:45.440 complete story. Because at the top level it can feel 0:02:45.440 --> 0:02:48.040 like okay, look we're doing okay, but not necessarily when 0:02:48.040 --> 0:02:50.720 you dig down, hey, Katerina, talk a little about the 0:02:50.720 --> 0:02:54.120 geography here, because what's happening in Atlanta is certainly different 0:02:54.120 --> 0:02:56.200 than than what's happening in Las Vegas. Take us through 0:02:56.240 --> 0:02:58.200 those two examples that you and the team touch on 0:02:58.320 --> 0:03:02.239 in this big take. Yeah. So Las Vegas is really 0:03:02.280 --> 0:03:06.239 interesting because it is an economy that depends so heavily 0:03:06.400 --> 0:03:10.080 on that leisure and hospitality sector. Right. It's a big 0:03:10.120 --> 0:03:13.760 tourism destination. It has a lot of casinos and a 0:03:13.800 --> 0:03:17.040 lot of kind of you know, fun hotels, restaurants that 0:03:17.160 --> 0:03:19.840 people know about. Um. So this is a this is 0:03:19.840 --> 0:03:23.240 a huge component of its economy. And since this sector 0:03:23.400 --> 0:03:28.680 was so um intensely impacted by the pandemic, UM, the 0:03:28.760 --> 0:03:32.920 Las Vegas economy and unemployment there has really suffered. So 0:03:33.160 --> 0:03:36.880 it's it's kind of continued to to feel those effects, 0:03:36.960 --> 0:03:39.800 you know. It's it's not recovering as quickly some other 0:03:39.840 --> 0:03:43.440 parts of the country, like Atlanta, which is seeing a 0:03:43.520 --> 0:03:47.840 stronger recovery. It's it's not as dependent on tourism. Um 0:03:47.880 --> 0:03:50.560 it also um you know it, Georgia is a state 0:03:50.640 --> 0:03:54.840 that reopened very early on, and we're seeing that states 0:03:54.880 --> 0:03:59.000 that did that, you know, I mean, for which which 0:03:59.000 --> 0:04:02.720 could have had a negative implication in terms of COVID cases. Um, 0:04:02.960 --> 0:04:07.480 it did actually help the economic recovery. Talked us about Houston, 0:04:07.560 --> 0:04:09.400 your home state. Have a lot of family in Texas 0:04:09.920 --> 0:04:13.640 throughout the state too. Houston has been one of the 0:04:13.640 --> 0:04:20.159 better performers Houston. Actually, um, it hasn't been doing super 0:04:20.240 --> 0:04:23.880 well right now. Um. Actually, when you break it down, 0:04:23.960 --> 0:04:27.440 there was the energy crisis too. I wasn't thinking exactly, yeah, exactly, 0:04:27.480 --> 0:04:29.840 and that's really what's kind of a drag on the 0:04:29.880 --> 0:04:32.800 Houston economy right now. We look at the different race 0:04:32.839 --> 0:04:36.760 groups and everyone really is still seeing unemployment in the 0:04:36.800 --> 0:04:40.360 double digits. And exactly it's that energy impact. It's it's 0:04:40.360 --> 0:04:43.120 a big sector for the city. Um, a lot of 0:04:43.240 --> 0:04:46.080 jobs to revolve around that, and you know that is 0:04:46.120 --> 0:04:50.000 still suffering a lot. But Phoenix has been somewhat of 0:04:50.000 --> 0:04:52.039 a bright spot, especially when you dig into the data 0:04:52.120 --> 0:04:55.200 and you look at how communities that have been hardest 0:04:55.240 --> 0:04:58.040 hit by this pandemic have actually fared relatively well. And 0:04:58.120 --> 0:05:00.200 key word, they're relatively well. And it's be as a 0:05:00.279 --> 0:05:04.080 housing right right, Yeah, it's it's really seeing a housing boom. 0:05:04.120 --> 0:05:06.200 I mean, of course, a lot of cities in this 0:05:06.279 --> 0:05:10.040 country are um, but that has really boosted the construction 0:05:10.120 --> 0:05:13.320 sector and Phoenix and that in turn is helping Latino 0:05:13.440 --> 0:05:16.760 people there, um with their unemployment rate. You know, it's 0:05:16.800 --> 0:05:19.719 it's yeah, fairly low, right, like no one that no 0:05:19.760 --> 0:05:23.120 one has an excellent unemployment rate right now, but um, 0:05:23.720 --> 0:05:26.000 but it is, yeah, I mean and Phoenix. You know, 0:05:26.040 --> 0:05:29.720 Arizona also kind of like Texas, has a lot of 0:05:29.760 --> 0:05:33.480 people moving into it from places like California, right places 0:05:33.520 --> 0:05:36.600 where housing is more scared. But it's really important what 0:05:36.680 --> 0:05:40.480 you say about looking at local unemployment rates. I know 0:05:40.600 --> 0:05:43.279 you guys include this in your story about especially for 0:05:43.320 --> 0:05:45.680 more than half of minority groups, local unemployment rates have 0:05:45.720 --> 0:05:49.159 not fully recovered to march. We really need to look 0:05:49.200 --> 0:05:52.320 deeper into this to really understand what's going on overall 0:05:52.360 --> 0:05:56.480 in the economy and maybe why certain administration programs kind 0:05:56.520 --> 0:05:59.160 of might make sense going forward. Yeah. Absolutely, And I 0:05:59.240 --> 0:06:02.080 think this is something we're hearing from policymakers that they 0:06:02.120 --> 0:06:05.720 want to start, um, you know, looking more at the breakdowns. 0:06:05.720 --> 0:06:07.840 And this is this is somewhat new at the at 0:06:07.839 --> 0:06:10.560 the high policy level, so I think it will be 0:06:10.839 --> 0:06:13.720 interesting to see how how they do that. Well, that 0:06:13.800 --> 0:06:16.839 was Katerina survived a Federal Reserve and Economics reporter on 0:06:16.880 --> 0:06:19.919 an uneven comeback from COVID taking place across the country, 0:06:19.960 --> 0:06:22.520 doesn't him. We've talked about this so much, we just 0:06:22.560 --> 0:06:25.800 did with Katerina, But it's just about this k shaped recovery. 0:06:25.960 --> 0:06:28.320 Peter atwardever, William and Mary I bring him up a lot, 0:06:28.320 --> 0:06:30.839 but because he was at their front and center very 0:06:30.839 --> 0:06:33.719 early on, talking about how the recovery off of the 0:06:33.720 --> 0:06:37.720 pandemic was different for people, and really starkly different. Some 0:06:37.760 --> 0:06:40.640 people barely felt it, some people felt all of it. 0:06:40.720 --> 0:06:43.479 And what was so interesting about Katerina's story was the 0:06:43.560 --> 0:06:46.840 regional differences when it comes to the recovery. Yeah, really important, 0:06:46.920 --> 0:06:48.560 right to look around the country and just see those 0:06:48.600 --> 0:06:51.920 differences coming up. More on the economic recovery and uneven 0:06:51.960 --> 0:06:54.440 one as you just heard this time from the CEO 0:06:54.440 --> 0:06:57.000 of Siemens Us, who has a global snapshot of our 0:06:57.040 --> 0:07:00.520 world and what's needed specifically to get America back contract. 0:07:00.560 --> 0:07:11.560 You're listening to Bloomberg Business Week. This is Bloomberg. This 0:07:11.920 --> 0:07:15.920 is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Messer and Bloomberg Quick Takes. 0:07:16.040 --> 0:07:20.760 Tim Stinovik from Bloomberg radio. Our listeners and viewers on 0:07:20.800 --> 0:07:23.040 YouTube might recall that we recently caught up with the 0:07:23.040 --> 0:07:26.920 presidency of siemens Us. She is Barbara Humpton and Tim 0:07:26.960 --> 0:07:28.840 She talked with us about how work is shifting. It's 0:07:28.880 --> 0:07:31.360 something you and I talk a lot about because we 0:07:31.440 --> 0:07:33.920 know whether it's hybrid, do people come back to the office, 0:07:33.920 --> 0:07:36.960 to people stay at home. I mean things are changing 0:07:36.960 --> 0:07:40.120 a lot. She is someone who is talking with leaders 0:07:40.160 --> 0:07:43.560 about making their workplaces safe, making school safe, and planning 0:07:43.560 --> 0:07:46.120 for the next crisis. Barbara joined us again this week 0:07:46.160 --> 0:07:48.840 to talk all about President Biden's recent call to arms 0:07:48.880 --> 0:07:52.920 to address today's problems, including cementing the USS position on 0:07:53.000 --> 0:07:55.360 many levels in the future. It includes being self sufficient 0:07:55.360 --> 0:07:59.040 when it comes to semiconductors and other major infrastructure projects. 0:07:59.280 --> 0:08:03.000 It seemens we're really deeply engaged with all of the 0:08:03.080 --> 0:08:08.080 critical elements of infrastructure you're hearing discussed today. Earlier this year, 0:08:08.120 --> 0:08:11.400 I actually wrote an open letter to government leaders outlining 0:08:11.600 --> 0:08:15.320 some suggestions that we have a broader vision for America's 0:08:15.360 --> 0:08:19.880 infrastructure because this is a moment to to make those investments, 0:08:20.200 --> 0:08:24.239 and I shared our support in UM investing in manufacturing, 0:08:24.600 --> 0:08:28.520 enabling a new era of electric vehicles, UM, getting cleaner 0:08:28.520 --> 0:08:33.040 and more resilient energy systems, and transforming America's buildings. And 0:08:33.160 --> 0:08:36.440 I was pleased to see so much of this aligns 0:08:36.640 --> 0:08:40.360 with where the federal at the Executive Office is going 0:08:40.400 --> 0:08:43.760 and where the federal government is likely to head UM 0:08:43.800 --> 0:08:47.040 with the support of our legislators. So you know, here 0:08:47.080 --> 0:08:50.880 we are at this moment of deciding what shall we 0:08:50.920 --> 0:08:53.120 invest in? And this week I decided is the right 0:08:53.160 --> 0:08:56.280 time for me to raise my voice more clearly on 0:08:56.320 --> 0:09:01.480 the subject of manufacturing. This idea that manufacturing in and 0:09:01.559 --> 0:09:05.120 of itself is a key element of our infrastructure and 0:09:05.480 --> 0:09:09.200 key to developing the workforce of the future. And I'll 0:09:09.240 --> 0:09:12.439 tell you at SEMENS, we've got this perspective, not only 0:09:12.559 --> 0:09:17.120 as a manufacturer ourselves with twenty four manufacturing sites across 0:09:17.160 --> 0:09:21.079 the US and forty people all across the nation, a 0:09:21.200 --> 0:09:25.520 supply chain with twenty four thousand US suppliers supporting this 0:09:25.840 --> 0:09:31.120 backbone of the US economy. But we're also helping of 0:09:31.160 --> 0:09:35.559 the Fortune five industrial companies with our hardware and software 0:09:35.960 --> 0:09:40.559 that's helping America really adapt to the new digital revolution 0:09:40.600 --> 0:09:43.199 that's underway. This is our moment, where do we get 0:09:43.200 --> 0:09:45.640 it wrong in the United States when it comes to manufacturing. 0:09:45.679 --> 0:09:49.840 As you said, twenty four manufacturing sites nationwide for semens. 0:09:49.880 --> 0:09:52.480 So what do we do wrong here in the United 0:09:52.480 --> 0:09:54.880 States when it comes to manufacturing or making it more 0:09:54.920 --> 0:09:59.439 hospitable to more places? You know, I think our incentives 0:09:59.440 --> 0:10:01.800 have changed. If you had looked back over the last 0:10:01.840 --> 0:10:05.319 two decades, you would have seen American businesses making decisions 0:10:05.600 --> 0:10:08.720 on a global scale, where can we find the lowest 0:10:08.800 --> 0:10:13.800 cost location for the bulk production and the supply side 0:10:13.840 --> 0:10:16.480 economies of scale that are going to drive costs down 0:10:16.920 --> 0:10:20.560 by the way, all of those are very useful goals 0:10:20.600 --> 0:10:23.040 to have. But what we've seen now, especially due to 0:10:23.080 --> 0:10:27.079 the coronavirus crisis, is the fact that we need not 0:10:27.320 --> 0:10:31.920 globalization so much as glocalization, the idea that we need 0:10:31.960 --> 0:10:35.480 to produce things closer to where they're needed so that 0:10:35.520 --> 0:10:38.720 we're not dependent on single points of failure in a 0:10:38.720 --> 0:10:42.920 global supply chain. We have an opportunity to turn that around. 0:10:42.960 --> 0:10:44.680 And people have been asking me, are we going to 0:10:44.679 --> 0:10:47.680 be on shoring or re shoring? And what I keep 0:10:47.679 --> 0:10:50.120 reminding people is I think what needs to happen for 0:10:50.240 --> 0:10:53.640 many manufacturers is more of an and than an ore. 0:10:54.120 --> 0:10:57.160 We do need to serve people around the world close 0:10:57.200 --> 0:11:00.360 to where they are, but we also need to ring 0:11:00.559 --> 0:11:03.760 the ability to manufacture right here close to where we 0:11:03.800 --> 0:11:06.600 need the goods and services. Ultimately, so I'm gonna play 0:11:06.600 --> 0:11:09.080 Devil's advocate a little bit, but I can see companies 0:11:09.120 --> 0:11:11.720 gearing up already to say, but wait a minute. Now, 0:11:11.760 --> 0:11:13.200 you want us to tax more, but you want us 0:11:13.200 --> 0:11:15.920 to build plants in the United States and provide jobs. 0:11:16.000 --> 0:11:18.640 And the present makes the case that a lot of 0:11:18.679 --> 0:11:21.520 corporations get off easy when it comes to paying corporate taxes. 0:11:21.520 --> 0:11:23.679 And if you look at the data we've certainly reported 0:11:23.679 --> 0:11:26.160 on it here at Bloomberg, that is often the case 0:11:26.280 --> 0:11:30.000 where companies, through you know, various maneuvers and loopholes, are 0:11:30.040 --> 0:11:32.680 able to pay a pretty low rate. What do you 0:11:32.720 --> 0:11:34.719 say to that? What I say to that is, this 0:11:34.800 --> 0:11:37.560 is a moment when business needs to show that we 0:11:37.640 --> 0:11:40.080 are responsible. We have to step up and have a 0:11:40.120 --> 0:11:43.400 mature dialogue about this. Semans. For our own part, we 0:11:43.440 --> 0:11:48.160 are responsible taxpayers, and we are really advocating that our 0:11:48.320 --> 0:11:52.840 tax code represent a regiment that will put us on 0:11:52.840 --> 0:11:55.079 a level playing field with the rest of the world. 0:11:55.160 --> 0:11:57.600 So we of course are not going to be advocating 0:11:57.720 --> 0:12:00.760 for off the charts tax rates for corporate rations when 0:12:01.240 --> 0:12:05.040 it would actually cause investment to flee the company. But 0:12:05.160 --> 0:12:09.040 let's say we can work with other nations find tax 0:12:09.120 --> 0:12:13.040 code levels that are going to be equitable, provide that 0:12:13.160 --> 0:12:17.160 kind of level playing field, and then also really incentivize 0:12:17.240 --> 0:12:20.959 investment in the US. At Siemens, we've invested forty billion 0:12:21.040 --> 0:12:25.719 dollars over the last two decades in America, and what 0:12:25.760 --> 0:12:30.480 we're finding is that if we make these investments, then 0:12:30.640 --> 0:12:35.280 the growth comes, the health, the prosperity comes after. These 0:12:35.320 --> 0:12:38.199 are good investments for us to be making, particularly in 0:12:38.240 --> 0:12:40.720 a time of transformation like this one. So, Barbara, we 0:12:40.720 --> 0:12:45.800 were talking about the President's American Jobs Plan manufacturing here 0:12:45.800 --> 0:12:47.680 in the United States, and I'm thinking after a week 0:12:47.760 --> 0:12:50.600 like we've had so many different earnings and hearing from 0:12:50.600 --> 0:12:54.760 so many different companies, whether it's Apple, BMW, Ford when 0:12:54.840 --> 0:12:58.120 it comes to the global chip ter out, and you know, 0:12:58.160 --> 0:13:01.360 we know specifically that company ease like Apple and Samsung 0:13:01.480 --> 0:13:04.720 talking about production cuts and lost revenue because of the 0:13:04.760 --> 0:13:08.600 global chip shortage. Tell us about the situation in the US. 0:13:08.679 --> 0:13:11.360 You guys have a great vantage point. How bad is 0:13:11.400 --> 0:13:14.160 it and how quickly or what will it take for 0:13:14.320 --> 0:13:17.960 us to ramp up production so that we can address 0:13:18.320 --> 0:13:21.880 some of these shortages significantly. This is a real issue because, 0:13:21.960 --> 0:13:26.520 as you know, semiconductors are used in everything, cars, planes, computers, batteries, 0:13:26.520 --> 0:13:30.600 I mean the toothbrush that use exactly, So there may 0:13:30.600 --> 0:13:32.679 be a few in me I'm not quite sure. At 0:13:32.679 --> 0:13:35.960 any given time. We are highly dependent on this technology. 0:13:36.040 --> 0:13:38.559 And back in the nineties, the US had about a 0:13:39.800 --> 0:13:43.640 market share of the worldwide market, but now we're down 0:13:43.720 --> 0:13:46.720 to a mere twelve percent. So this is one of 0:13:46.760 --> 0:13:49.520 those areas where this would be a wise investment. It's 0:13:49.520 --> 0:13:51.839 a matter of national security, and by the way, the 0:13:51.960 --> 0:13:56.439 US security is key to global security, so an investment 0:13:56.520 --> 0:13:59.720 here is critical for all of US. And and so 0:13:59.800 --> 0:14:03.640 one of the things we're promoting at Siemens is support 0:14:03.720 --> 0:14:06.680 to the chip set, the idea that there would be 0:14:06.920 --> 0:14:10.600 incentives for local manufacturing. The Department of Commerce is putting 0:14:10.640 --> 0:14:15.120 their full weight behind us to to locate key semiconductor 0:14:15.160 --> 0:14:19.080 manufacturers here. I know there's work already going on in Phoenix. Truly, 0:14:19.200 --> 0:14:22.400 this digital economy rides on this technology. That was the 0:14:22.440 --> 0:14:25.600 president and CEO of Siemens US Barbara Humptons. I love 0:14:25.640 --> 0:14:28.040 what she said, digital economy rides on this technology. I 0:14:28.040 --> 0:14:30.760 feel like it's not just the digital economy, it's completely 0:14:30.840 --> 0:14:34.200 our economy. Some great reporting throughout the week on the 0:14:34.200 --> 0:14:37.280 Bloomberg and at Bloomberg dot com just about why you're 0:14:37.280 --> 0:14:40.120 seeing the semiconductor shortage, what it's going to take to 0:14:40.360 --> 0:14:42.720 ramp up. I mean, it's a global problem. It is, 0:14:42.720 --> 0:14:45.359 and it's one that might not end anytime soon. Exactly. 0:14:45.680 --> 0:14:48.400 Still ahead on Bloomberg Business Week, there was though some 0:14:48.480 --> 0:14:51.520 optimism from Barbara there. We just heard it. Our next guest, 0:14:51.640 --> 0:14:54.640 full of doom and glue. He certainly is more specifically 0:14:54.640 --> 0:14:57.400 doom the politics of catastrophe. It's the title of Neil 0:14:57.440 --> 0:15:00.240 Ferguson's new book. All Right, everybody, brace yourself, do it, 0:15:00.480 --> 0:15:02.720 do it? All right? That's coming up. This is Bloomberg 0:15:08.640 --> 0:15:12.520 broadcasting from the financial capital of the World, Bloomberg Eleve 0:15:12.600 --> 0:15:15.760 in Frio in New York to Washington, d C. Bloomberg 0:15:16.720 --> 0:15:19.960 to Boston, Bloomberg one oh six one to San Francisco, 0:15:20.000 --> 0:15:23.480 Bloomberg nine sixty to the country Sirius XM Chado one 0:15:23.560 --> 0:15:26.480 nine team and around the globe. The Bloomberg Business app 0:15:26.600 --> 0:15:32.320 and Bloomberg Radio dot Com. This is Bloomberg Business Week Tim. 0:15:32.320 --> 0:15:35.400 Next up, someone who gets to the bigger, broader issues 0:15:35.400 --> 0:15:37.920 that are facing our society. We're talking about Neil Ferguson. 0:15:37.960 --> 0:15:40.960 He's Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. 0:15:41.000 --> 0:15:43.560 He's also Bloomberg Opinion columnist and well known to our 0:15:43.600 --> 0:15:48.000 Bloomberg audience. Author of many books including Colossus, The Great Degenerations, 0:15:48.000 --> 0:15:50.240 and The Square and the Tower. He looks at the 0:15:50.240 --> 0:15:53.080 cracks in the American system how we got there, including 0:15:53.400 --> 0:15:56.840 his newest book, it's called Doom, The Politics of Catastrophe, 0:15:56.960 --> 0:15:59.200 and he says, the tragedies of the past year are 0:15:59.320 --> 0:16:01.680 ones we should have seen coming. But it was a 0:16:01.760 --> 0:16:04.400 year like many others, actually, and that's part of the 0:16:04.440 --> 0:16:06.240 point of the book. It's not like this was the 0:16:06.280 --> 0:16:10.680 first pandemic to strike humanity, and indeed, if you compare 0:16:10.720 --> 0:16:15.080 it with other disasters like World Wars, this is not 0:16:15.320 --> 0:16:19.880 the top twenty catastrophe. So I actually found that this 0:16:20.040 --> 0:16:22.440 gave me an opportunity to take a step back and 0:16:22.480 --> 0:16:27.360 try to contextualize what was happening. There is a strong 0:16:27.640 --> 0:16:31.640 predisposition in our media today to say that everything is unprecedented, 0:16:31.680 --> 0:16:33.880 which just means we don't really know the history. The 0:16:33.920 --> 0:16:36.880 point of writing Doom was to remind people that, for example, 0:16:37.000 --> 0:16:42.840 the influenza pandemic was far, far worse, killed a far 0:16:43.000 --> 0:16:46.560 larger share of the world's population. Actually today this one 0:16:46.680 --> 0:16:51.640 is closer to the influenza pandemic, which not many people remember. 0:16:52.040 --> 0:16:55.400 And as for world wars, which you know, my grandparents 0:16:55.440 --> 0:16:58.400 lived through. This is actually, although it might not seem 0:16:58.480 --> 0:17:01.120 that way on on TV, this is really getting off 0:17:01.240 --> 0:17:04.240 lightly by historical standards. What certainly doesn't feel like it 0:17:04.359 --> 0:17:06.600 right now living through this because I think for a 0:17:06.640 --> 0:17:09.040 lot of people, and this is our first pandemic, even 0:17:09.080 --> 0:17:11.200 those who were alive during the one in the nineteen 0:17:11.240 --> 0:17:13.160 fifties and the very few people who are still around 0:17:13.200 --> 0:17:15.440 from the one in the you know, a hundred years 0:17:15.440 --> 0:17:18.960 ago at this point. But I wonder about the response, 0:17:19.200 --> 0:17:23.080 especially from governments like the UK in the US, because 0:17:23.119 --> 0:17:25.080 early on in the book you say it's kind of 0:17:25.119 --> 0:17:29.760 too simple to to say that populous leaders were early 0:17:29.840 --> 0:17:34.240 on were the reason why those responses from those countries 0:17:34.520 --> 0:17:36.680 weren't the right Why isn't the right way to look 0:17:36.720 --> 0:17:39.080 at it? Because you compare the case with Belgium, and 0:17:39.280 --> 0:17:43.520 Belgium didn't have a great response either. Right, the excess 0:17:43.560 --> 0:17:46.479 mortality in Belgium last year was higher than in the 0:17:46.600 --> 0:17:49.840 US or the UK. I think the narrative that the 0:17:49.880 --> 0:17:52.800 excess mortality in the US was Donald Trump's foults, or 0:17:52.840 --> 0:17:56.240 in Brazil JayR ball Cinaros the UK. Now in India's 0:17:56.680 --> 0:18:00.920 it's all norandramdes Well. This is a very tempting narrative 0:18:00.960 --> 0:18:02.679 because we want to kind of pin the blame on 0:18:03.119 --> 0:18:05.560 the person at the top. But when you look at 0:18:05.760 --> 0:18:08.520 the global picture, it's not quite so clear cut because 0:18:08.520 --> 0:18:11.639 there were plenty of countries with non populous leaders that 0:18:11.800 --> 0:18:16.080 did disastrously. Peru has had about as bad uh and 0:18:16.200 --> 0:18:20.600 experience as any country, and the guy who's was in 0:18:21.000 --> 0:18:24.640 president there was not a populace. He only became president 0:18:25.359 --> 0:18:27.920 almost by by accident. So I think there's a kind 0:18:27.920 --> 0:18:31.119 of temptation to simplify this story, and the way I 0:18:31.119 --> 0:18:33.440 would put it is this, In the U s. Donald 0:18:33.480 --> 0:18:37.199 Trump made a whole succession of mistakes. It's tedious almost 0:18:37.240 --> 0:18:39.800 to list them all. He clearly misjudged the problem in 0:18:40.119 --> 0:18:43.119 multiple ways. There's nothing in my book that says he 0:18:43.160 --> 0:18:45.560 did a great job. But if we think it was 0:18:45.640 --> 0:18:49.720 old Donald Trump's fault that CDC completely screwed up testing 0:18:50.119 --> 0:18:52.760 in the first months of the pandemic, that we had 0:18:52.800 --> 0:18:55.400 no contact racing system of the sort that they were 0:18:55.400 --> 0:18:57.920 able to do in Taiwan and in South Korea, and 0:18:57.920 --> 0:19:00.960 then we utterly failed to quarantine the people that were 0:19:01.000 --> 0:19:03.800 likely to be infected. That can't all be attributed to 0:19:03.840 --> 0:19:06.679 the President United States, who presides over a huge and 0:19:06.760 --> 0:19:10.400 conflict of bureaucracy, part of which has more or less 0:19:10.480 --> 0:19:13.040 one job, which is to deal with the crisis like this. 0:19:13.200 --> 0:19:14.920 And I think one has to say that the public 0:19:14.920 --> 0:19:18.320 health bureaucracies on both sides of the Atlantic did very 0:19:18.320 --> 0:19:22.440 badly compared with say Taiwan or South Korea. The fact 0:19:22.440 --> 0:19:25.960 that they managed to contain the pandemic so successfully tells 0:19:26.040 --> 0:19:28.399 us that there was a much better playbook than the 0:19:28.400 --> 0:19:30.679 one that we used, and yet we told ourselves that 0:19:30.720 --> 0:19:33.720 we had very high levels of pandemic preparedness. Well, the 0:19:33.760 --> 0:19:35.440 other side of this coin is the country that did 0:19:35.440 --> 0:19:38.640 respond well, Taiwan and South Korea, among others. What ties 0:19:38.720 --> 0:19:41.840 down together? Why did they respond well well? One answer 0:19:41.920 --> 0:19:45.280 is approximate answer they learned the lessons of Stars and Mars, 0:19:45.400 --> 0:19:48.879 previous outbreaks of a new coronavirus that we kind of 0:19:48.920 --> 0:19:51.119 didn't pay enough attention to. But I think that's a 0:19:51.160 --> 0:19:53.359 better answer, which is that these are countries that have 0:19:53.480 --> 0:19:57.600 good reasons to be generally paranoid. If you're Taiwan, you're right, Nix, 0:19:57.800 --> 0:20:01.000 the People's Republic of China claims it. You. If your 0:20:01.040 --> 0:20:03.240 South of Korea, you've got the crazies and the North 0:20:03.359 --> 0:20:06.000 to worry about. So I think the lesson that I 0:20:06.119 --> 0:20:08.600 learned from Doom is that it's better to be generally 0:20:08.680 --> 0:20:13.000 paranoid and worried about every potential contingency and so have 0:20:13.040 --> 0:20:17.639 one very detailed plan for a specific crisis that doesn't 0:20:17.640 --> 0:20:20.720 actually work when the crisis strikes. Thanks to Neil Ferguson 0:20:20.760 --> 0:20:22.880 for joining us giving us insight into the long term 0:20:22.880 --> 0:20:25.359 impact of the pandemic on both the population and also 0:20:25.640 --> 0:20:28.280 the global power structure. But this whole idea of a 0:20:28.320 --> 0:20:30.640 lot of this, if you look back in history, kind 0:20:30.640 --> 0:20:32.520 of gives you clues of maybe some of the things 0:20:32.520 --> 0:20:34.200 we need to be worried about in the future. Yeah, 0:20:34.200 --> 0:20:36.480 the explanations for who has fared well and who hasn't 0:20:36.520 --> 0:20:38.960 fared so well during the pandemic. They're not as simple 0:20:39.040 --> 0:20:42.640 as everybody thought. No, exactly loved that conversation. You're listening 0:20:42.640 --> 0:20:45.360 to Bloomberg Business Week. From one big thinker to another. 0:20:45.520 --> 0:20:48.119 We're talking Scott Galloway, also a familiar name to the 0:20:48.160 --> 0:20:50.479 Bloomberg Business Week audience. I'm just gonna put it out there. 0:20:50.480 --> 0:20:52.480 It's a conversation I've been looking forward to for a 0:20:52.520 --> 0:20:55.280 long time. He tackles Facebook and Apple both as you 0:20:55.320 --> 0:20:57.919 know in the news this week, and which of the 0:20:58.080 --> 0:21:01.600 four need to be broken up to unlock value. You'll 0:21:01.640 --> 0:21:03.880 find out which war he's talking about. This is Bloomberg. 0:21:12.359 --> 0:21:15.879 You're listening to Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Messer and 0:21:15.960 --> 0:21:21.199 Bloomberg Quick Takes Tim Stinovich from Bloomberg Radio. So this 0:21:21.280 --> 0:21:23.480 was a conversation Tim that you and I were looking 0:21:23.520 --> 0:21:25.840 forward to for a long time in our world, and 0:21:25.880 --> 0:21:27.640 we know this. There are just some folks that need 0:21:27.680 --> 0:21:30.840 no introduction, and that includes Scott Galloway, author of a 0:21:30.840 --> 0:21:33.720 bunch of books, including the New York Times bestseller The 0:21:33.840 --> 0:21:36.760 for the Hidden DNA of Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Google, 0:21:36.760 --> 0:21:40.280 and most recently Post Corona, From Crisis to opportunity. He 0:21:40.320 --> 0:21:42.359 writes a lot he does. He's also, of course, a 0:21:42.400 --> 0:21:45.080 professor of marketing at n y U Stern School of Business. 0:21:45.119 --> 0:21:47.760 Some people know him as Prof G. He's also founded 0:21:47.760 --> 0:21:51.400 several companies, including rent Envelope and Profit He Never Holds Back. 0:21:51.520 --> 0:21:53.720 Also host of the upcoming The Prop G Show on 0:21:53.760 --> 0:21:56.640