Speaker 1: Broadcasting live from the Abraham Lincoln Radio Studio, the George
Speaker 1: Washington Broadcast Center, Jack Armstrong, Joe Getty, Armstrong and Gettie
Speaker 1: and he Armstrong and Jetty.
Speaker 2: So, last week in Los Angeles, a federal judge issued
Speaker 2: an order blocking the Trump administration from carrying out controversial
Speaker 2: immigration sweeps in seven southern California counties. Well, that order
Speaker 2: has no effect up here in Northern California, where we
Speaker 2: joined a Border Patrol strike team today here in the
Speaker 2: state Capitol as they went out and enforced immigration law.
Speaker 1: Let's get right to that video. Take a look.
Speaker 2: As soon as those border patrol agents pulled up to
Speaker 2: a local home depot, suspected illegal immigrants took off running
Speaker 2: in all directions. That then led to several foot pursuits
Speaker 2: and we saw about ten people arrested in this one
Speaker 2: single location.
Speaker 1: Now that's the home depot and Flora. The only reason
Speaker 1: I ever go over to Flora is because I go
Speaker 1: to PCP Motorsports a lot to get my motorcycles worked
Speaker 1: on and that sort of thing. But I'm over in
Speaker 1: that area and it is pretty uh Spanish speaking, heavily
Speaker 1: heavy over there, so it's not shocking and home depots
Speaker 1: have seemed to be a target really all across the
Speaker 1: country for so I've never actually done this, and I'm
Speaker 1: kind of surprised I haven't, because we've needed lots of
Speaker 1: workers out at the farm for a variety of things.
Speaker 1: But so you can just show up to the home
Speaker 1: depot and there's a bunch of Spanish speaking gentlemen hanging
Speaker 1: around the parking lot who are willing to work.
Speaker 3: Who you say, I need two guys for eight hours ex.
Speaker 3: Twenty dollars an hour whatever.
Speaker 1: And they probably aren't citizens of this land, uh, nor
Speaker 1: properly registered as visitors.
Speaker 3: That's what I've heard, Jack, But the governor of cal Unicornia,
Speaker 3: the man with more lust for the oval office than
Speaker 3: a teenage boy has for the touch.
Speaker 1: Of a female l presuming they're straight. We love everyone here.
Speaker 3: Gavy blasts away, trying to escape a court order stopping
Speaker 3: their reprehensible and illegal racial profiling and illegal rests in
Speaker 3: La Border Patrol came to Sacramento to spread more of
Speaker 3: their chaos and fear they should go do their jobs
Speaker 3: at the border. Interestingly, he posted that online and the
Speaker 3: comments were almost entirely Yeah, that's what we voted for.
Speaker 1: For them to do what they're doing. Another eighty twenty issue.
Speaker 3: Ah, and of course some of the local media, including
Speaker 3: the reprehensible Sacramento will be reported that one of the
Speaker 3: individuals captured by ICE is actually a citizen of the
Speaker 3: United States.
Speaker 1: But Bill Malugin explains why they did that.
Speaker 2: In the next clip, Border Patrol went on to tell
Speaker 2: us that record checks came back already on one one
Speaker 2: of those men, showing he's a felon with a prior
Speaker 2: conviction for fentanyl trafficking. Now, agents also chased down this man,
Speaker 2: a US citizen. This is after Border Patrol said he
Speaker 2: slashed the tire on one of their vehicles. Agents eventually
Speaker 2: took him to the ground where he appeared to lunch
Speaker 2: at one of the agents, causing him to get mace
Speaker 2: in the face and placed under arrest. As he was arrested,
Speaker 2: his wife was shouting that he's a US citizen. Agents responded, well,
Speaker 2: too bad, because he slashed our.
Speaker 1: Tire, mased in the fast. That's not the way you
Speaker 1: want to spend your weekend.
Speaker 3: You get to face mace in place under arrest.
Speaker 1: What do you want them to do? Well, so we
Speaker 1: got this text. This is kind of where I am
Speaker 1: on this. Somebody said, I don't believe the polls. We'll
Speaker 1: get into the latest poll that just came out a
Speaker 1: couple of hours ago where people are getting less happy
Speaker 1: with this. But this person texted, if we let in
Speaker 1: twenty million people, there's gonna be some pain getting them out,
Speaker 1: the country will be better for it. I think I
Speaker 1: heard this from Sarahzger on the Dispatch. She's lizes polls
Speaker 1: and issues and the different sort of stuff and then
Speaker 1: the actual long term effect versus just the polling at
Speaker 1: the time. I think ultimately the Republican Party and Trump
Speaker 1: will be benefit from dealing with this, even if the
Speaker 1: polling at the time doesn't look very good. For instance,
Speaker 1: right now, the latest Raids IPSOS poll out fifty four
Speaker 1: percent of people disagreed with the statement immigration arrests at
Speaker 1: places of work are good for the country. Fifty four disagreed,
Speaker 1: only twenty eight in support. That's a pretty big gap.
Speaker 1: But again, at the end of the day, I think
Speaker 1: people are going to reward the party that finally does
Speaker 1: something about illegal immigration.
Speaker 3: I think that's a really interesting point because you do
Speaker 3: tend to forget about some of the rough patches that
Speaker 3: took place as you're accomplishing an important goal. Once that
Speaker 3: goes accomplished, what I had another thought is important. Oh,
Speaker 3: I wish the Republicans were any good at messaging. It
Speaker 3: must be because Conservatives, generally speak, are individualists and we
Speaker 3: don't particularly like being told what to say. But why
Speaker 3: not have everybody respond with some version of the Democrats
Speaker 3: let twelve million. But whatever the good accurate number is
Speaker 3: during the Biden years or Biden plus abom or whatever,
Speaker 3: the Democrats let twelve million people into the country. It's
Speaker 3: not going to be easy to fix that. Bear with us.
Speaker 1: That's a good line, That's a great line. They should
Speaker 1: all be repeating that.
Speaker 3: You're right, yeah, yeah, And I actually do believe that
Speaker 3: poll because I think so many of us interact and
Speaker 3: all over the country with folks who maybe don't have
Speaker 3: their paperwork in order, but they're doing jobs and seem
Speaker 3: to be law abiding in the rest of it. The
Speaker 3: further you get down the road toward law abiding and
Speaker 3: tax paying, the less support you're going to have. But
Speaker 3: where the critical point is where you have so little
Speaker 3: support you have to stop.
Speaker 1: I don't know or how difficult it would be to
Speaker 1: separate those out that wouldn't take either way too long
Speaker 1: or costs way too much.
Speaker 3: One other talking point I wish the Republicans to your
Speaker 3: point I wish they would settle on, is if these
Speaker 3: so called sanctuary states would turn over the criminal illegal
Speaker 3: aliens to ICE, we wouldn't have to do this.
Speaker 1: Excellent point. That would be a winning message. Excellent point.
Speaker 1: There is a breakdown on the so only twenty eight
Speaker 1: percent of Americans are in support of going into these
Speaker 1: workplaces like the home depot down the street here, only
Speaker 1: twenty eight percent. But it's a pretty big divide. Only
Speaker 1: seven percent of Democrats while fifty six percent of Republicans.
Speaker 1: But I think only fifty six percent of Republicans is
Speaker 1: pretty striking, given the fact that I saw a different poll.
Speaker 1: Trump's approval among Republicans just overall is it ninety percent,
Speaker 1: ninety percent, but on this issue it drops down quite
Speaker 1: a lot. Overall, Trump's immigration approval rating is down to
Speaker 1: forty one in this poll. He was as eye as
Speaker 1: forty seven just a month ago. It's down to forty one.
Speaker 1: He could be in the thirties very soon. But you know,
Speaker 1: to use a very tired sort of phrase, he's gonna
Speaker 1: make an omelet you got to break some eggs. I
Speaker 1: don't know how you deal with this mess without having
Speaker 1: some pretty unfortunate stories out there.
Speaker 3: And maybe force the hand of the electorate and or
Speaker 3: the Congress to say, all right, all right, all right,
Speaker 3: all right, you've made your point. We need to enforce
Speaker 3: the law. But the laws are a little broad. It
Speaker 3: doesn't have support. Let's let's refine this, let's have better laws.
Speaker 3: To my point about sanctuary jurisdictions, though, I like this
Speaker 3: next clip, now heedy too.
Speaker 2: The Border Patrol chief in charge of this entire operation
Speaker 2: tells us the federal government can and will go wherever
Speaker 2: they want, even in this sanctuary state.
Speaker 4: Well, there is no sanctuary city. Sacramento is not a
Speaker 4: sanctuary city. The state of California is not a sanctuary state.
Speaker 4: There is no sanctuary anywhere.
Speaker 1: We'll be here.
Speaker 4: You'll probably see us in many of the locations as well.
Speaker 4: We're here to stay. We're not going anywhere. We're going
Speaker 4: to affect this mission, scare the homeland. So did the
Speaker 4: Supreme Court decide to take that up? Nor did I
Speaker 4: dream that were you gonna finally deal with that? Is
Speaker 4: there such thing that guy's basically saying there's no such
Speaker 4: thing as a sanctuary city or a sanctuary state, and
Speaker 4: there is there shouldn't be.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I want to say next session, it's on the docket.
Speaker 3: Maybe I dreamt it too. That'd be weird if we're
Speaker 3: dreaming the same dreams. I'm quitting the show's gone too far. Yeah, exactly,
Speaker 3: I'm disturbed, but mostly I don't watch. You see, in
Speaker 3: my dreams, some of them can get very well, let's
Speaker 3: just say not for air.
Speaker 1: It's like briefly when we were getting each other's notes
Speaker 1: in our note portion of our iPhones. Remember that, What
Speaker 1: the hell was that? Yeah? I don't even remember.
Speaker 3: Highly troubling, Yeah, no kidding. Anyway, moving along, let's see
Speaker 3: what else do we have. Oh, this is kind of
Speaker 3: foun how come.
Speaker 1: That hasn't been set out loud more strongly by more people.
Speaker 1: There's no such thing as a sanctuary, So you can't
Speaker 1: have a sanctuary from the current federal law. That's not
Speaker 1: a thing, or you could, or or red states would
Speaker 1: start having sanctuary gun law, we allow people to get
Speaker 1: open carry here just anywhere they want, all the time,
Speaker 1: and you can have as many rounds as you want.
Speaker 1: That because we're a sanctuary gun in town.
Speaker 3: Right right again. The Republicans are so terrible with their messaging.
Speaker 3: It seems to me a pretty compelling sales pitch to say, look,
Speaker 3: we're just going to deal with the criminals. We need
Speaker 3: law enforcement everywhere to hand over the criminals and see
Speaker 3: what percentage of Americans are in favor of that. This
Speaker 3: is gonna be like everybody and at the same time,
Speaker 3: and trust me, well, anybody who's been listening to this
Speaker 3: show for a long time knows tim as hardcore border
Speaker 3: security serious immigration laws as anybody out there. But on
Speaker 3: the conservative side of the aisle, there is undeniably sympathy
Speaker 3: for the hard working go getter who disrupts their whole life,
Speaker 3: busts their ass, shows up every single day, follows the law,
Speaker 3: pays their taxes, loves their family, just happens to be
Speaker 3: from a fur in land. If they want to come
Speaker 3: correct and pay a fine or whatever and have a
Speaker 3: pathway to whatever. There's a lot of sympathy for those
Speaker 3: people on the right, and there should be. Maybe we
Speaker 3: can enact a law wherefore every person like that who
Speaker 3: we permit to stay in the country, we kick out
Speaker 3: some free loading scumbags who are American citizens.
Speaker 1: I don't care what they are. You're born in Omaha,
Speaker 1: but you're living off the taxpayer. Yeah, get out.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you're's the third generation sucking off the government's teeth.
Speaker 1: Please, no, you're out.
Speaker 5: Go to that.
Speaker 1: I'm a citizen. Well, go be a citizen somewhere else.
Speaker 1: You're a leech. Go to that El Salvador prison where
Speaker 1: they make you bend over and walk around. Well no,
Speaker 1: wait a minute, there are other alternatives, but call it.
Speaker 1: Call it what would it be?
Speaker 3: The the go getters for sit downers act.
Speaker 1: No, that's not good. I gotta keep working on it.
Speaker 1: But you get the point. I have a list of
Speaker 1: some people you can grab. I gotta hear you. I
Speaker 1: hear you. Put me in charge. I'll be fair. You
Speaker 1: probably are on the story of the Chris Martin of
Speaker 1: Coldplay does the kiss cam and the guy kisses the
Speaker 1: girl but they're having an affair and they get caught
Speaker 1: and it becomes a problem. He is a CEO of
Speaker 1: a big company, and he put out a big statement
Speaker 1: yesterday that I thought was interesting. Well, you know, put
Speaker 1: that in our groupings of apologies that we we like
Speaker 1: to read.
Speaker 3: Yeah, interesting, is one word for his statement, among other things,
Speaker 3: on the way stay.
Speaker 6: Here, the Steve Miller Band has canceled all of its
Speaker 6: tour dates because of global warming. Oh god, yeah, organizers
Speaker 6: admit it's a waste of fuel to go from Phoenix, Arizona,
Speaker 6: all the way to Tacoma, Philadelphia, Atlanta, LA.
Speaker 1: Why are you clapping for that? What he is? The
Speaker 1: A plus policeman, different concert. I can't believe cold Play
Speaker 1: with Chris Martin because he's a very u progressive musician.
Speaker 1: You know, he's married to Gwyneth Paltrow. They named their
Speaker 1: kid Apple. They believed in what was that conscious uncoupling
Speaker 1: or whatever the whole package. That's right, But he's still
Speaker 1: touring despite climate change. And I can't believe how much
Speaker 1: attention the story is getting. The whole you've probably heard it,
Speaker 1: are you're seeing it? If you watched any news yesterday.
Speaker 1: It included the story of the they do a kiss
Speaker 1: cam at their concerts like they do it baseball games,
Speaker 1: I guess, and uh, they put they put the camera
Speaker 1: on a couple who like immediately gets wide eyed and
Speaker 1: like disappear, and Chris Marcus.
Speaker 3: Usually couples see themselves and say, oh, let's kiss. It's
Speaker 3: the kiss cam and everybody yy. But this couple's like,
Speaker 3: holy crap, and everybody's yay. So here's what it sounded like.
Speaker 1: Yeah, oh, all right, come on, Ruthie. What either an
Speaker 1: affair or they're just very shut Yeah, you're right. They're
Speaker 1: either having an affair. They're very shy. The CEO of
Speaker 1: this corporation with the HR chief of his company. They're
Speaker 1: both married to other people, and uh, pretty bold in
Speaker 1: their affair. I would say to go out to this
Speaker 1: concert anyway. He felt the need because this blew up
Speaker 1: all day yesterday and social media. A statement from CEO
Speaker 1: Andy Byron, New York, New York, July seventeen. I want
Speaker 1: to acknowledge the moment that's been circulating online and the
Speaker 1: disappointment it's caused what was supposed to be a night
Speaker 1: of music and joy. Oh wow, I couldn't even when
Speaker 1: I read that, I thought, I can't believe this is
Speaker 1: where you're starting. What was supposed to be a night
Speaker 1: of music and joy turned into a deeply personal mistake
Speaker 1: playing out on a very public stage. I want to
Speaker 1: sincerely apologize to my wife, my family, and the team
Speaker 1: at Astronomery that's the company he runs. You deserve better
Speaker 1: for me as a partner, as a father, and as
Speaker 1: a leader. Wow, that's he's right. It has caused some disappointment.
Speaker 1: I love that word.
Speaker 3: His wife must be thinking, oh, he's having an affair
Speaker 3: and actually going out with her on the town.
Speaker 1: That's disappointing.
Speaker 3: And his children are thinking, oh, Papa has another wife
Speaker 3: across town.
Speaker 1: I too, am disappointed or our family is going to
Speaker 1: split up and having been through that, this will be
Speaker 1: the most devastating thing that's ever happened in my entire
Speaker 1: life as a child, and I'll never ever be the
Speaker 1: same afterwards. But how disappointing, how fun for everybody to
Speaker 1: see it happen on the Cold Play stage. This is
Speaker 1: ironic that it was supposed to be a night of
Speaker 1: music and joy. That's a weird way to look at it.
Speaker 1: This is not who I want to be or how
Speaker 1: I want to represent the company I helped build. It's
Speaker 1: about the company. I'm taking time to reflect, to take accountability,
Speaker 1: and to figure out the next steps personally and professionally.
Speaker 1: I asked for privacy as I navigate that process. Well,
Speaker 1: he probably was thinking lawyers and hr and all that
Speaker 1: sort of stuff immediately, in addition to the fact that
Speaker 1: he may have blown up his family.
Speaker 3: Having already issued a fairly mediocre apology, he decides to
Speaker 3: write a little more.
Speaker 1: This is the part's amazing. I also want to express
Speaker 1: how troubling it is that what should have been a
Speaker 1: private moment became public without my consent. Oohoo, So you're
Speaker 1: kind of angry at someone else for the way this
Speaker 1: has turned out interesting. I respect artists and entertainers, but
Speaker 1: I hope we can all think more deeply about the
Speaker 1: impact of turning someone else's life into a spectacle. You
Speaker 1: were literally in an effing stadium full of people. In
Speaker 1: what sense is that a private moment? That is hilarious? Sir,
Speaker 1: I can't believe that with a little bit like rereading it,
Speaker 1: he thought, he didn't think. You know, I probably shouldn't
Speaker 1: blame anybody for this, because I have created this situation
Speaker 1: completely on my own, acting like it's someone else's fault
Speaker 1: somehow at the end of the letters, probably not a
Speaker 1: good idea, but I don't know. Maybe that helped him
Speaker 1: sleep last night, probably in a hotel. It's a great
Speaker 1: example of how we can come up with self justifying
Speaker 1: arguments that are just completely ridiculous, because I mean, for
Speaker 1: him to claim that was a private moment, that's hilarious,
Speaker 1: but he believed it enough to write it and issue it,
Speaker 1: or that that's the real or that that's worth even
Speaker 1: bringing up at all. So if Chris Martin hadn't put
Speaker 1: the camera on you, you'd been able to have your
Speaker 1: affair and go to the concert with your lover and
Speaker 1: continue both of you lie to your families. And wouldn't
Speaker 1: that have been grand? I mean, what, wow, what a dope.
Speaker 3: Anyway, coming up, they call them the monster trucks of
Speaker 3: the Lake. They're banned in many places, and a brilliant
Speaker 3: young economist explains the economics of doing it yourself or
Speaker 3: not doing it yourself.
Speaker 1: Intriguing stuff. I like all this. Stay tuned, Armstrong and Getty,
Speaker 1: And finally, today Uber announced a partnership to deploy more
Speaker 1: than twenty thousand robotaxis over the next six years.
Speaker 6: Lyft also has a robotaxi, but it's just a regular
Speaker 6: car where the driver's covered by a blanket.
Speaker 1: That's interesting that he makes it seem Likelyft is a
Speaker 1: poor man's Uber where I was told a couple of
Speaker 1: years ago and I struggled with Uber that somebody told
Speaker 1: me no, no, no, you got to dot Lift is Target,
Speaker 1: Uber is Walmart. But then other people have told me
Speaker 1: it varies from town to town, which might be true
Speaker 1: or maybe it's all, but it's certainly not clear that
Speaker 1: Lift is like clearly lesser than Uber. I have looked
Speaker 1: for patterns and not to find them. No, I can't either,
Speaker 1: although the price office sure varies a lot sometimes so
Speaker 1: I do check both. If one comes back high, yeah,
Speaker 1: absolutely true. But that's another pattern I haven't been able
Speaker 1: to figure out. If it's just if it just happens
Speaker 1: to be a day where there's a bunch of.
Speaker 3: Lift drivers out. Yeah, but a lot of guys are
Speaker 3: both anyway. Sure there's somebody who has a grasp on this.
Speaker 3: Perhaps you can email us mail bag at armstrong e
Speaker 3: Giddy dot com. But speaking of working and paying the
Speaker 3: people to do things to work for you, I came
Speaker 3: across this essay that I thought was so great by
Speaker 3: Roland Friar. Roland is a fascinating guy. He's an absolutely
Speaker 3: brilliant Youngish economist. He happens to be on the faculty
Speaker 3: of Harvard. Among other things, he's won many awards. He
Speaker 3: first came to fame as a young black man because
Speaker 3: he published an extremely compelling analysis in twenty nineteen that
Speaker 3: we talked about at length arguing that black and Hispanic
Speaker 3: Americans were no more likely than white Americans to be
Speaker 3: shot by police in a given interaction with police.
Speaker 1: In fact, it was somewhat less likely.
Speaker 3: And that was extremely controversial, and he was called all
Speaker 3: of the things black folks are called when they dare go.
Speaker 1: Against the progressive consensus.
Speaker 3: But he's a really compelling guy and what he's writing
Speaker 3: it do you have a comment on that, Jack before
Speaker 3: before you head or Okay, he's talking about the economics
Speaker 3: of d IY do it yourself? Should you hire someone
Speaker 3: to mow your lawn or clean your house? And I
Speaker 3: thought this is great and we'll close the CENTERIC. Oh yeah,
Speaker 3: I know, and it's trust me, it pays off. We'll
Speaker 3: post this at Armstrong and getty dot com. You might
Speaker 3: get paywalled, but we'll see what we can do. He
Speaker 3: mentions that Americans are real di wires. We clean our
Speaker 3: own houses a large extent, assemble our own furniture a grill,
Speaker 3: even when we'd be better off hiring someone else.
Speaker 1: He says they are better off is a phrase that
Speaker 1: should be put in quotes, because he can argue that
Speaker 1: that's the whole point of this.
Speaker 3: Indeed, still I mow my lawn and cook most nights
Speaker 3: for my family, even though I work eighty to ninety
Speaker 3: hours a week, not counting my side hustle as an
Speaker 3: unpaid driver in sideline soccer coach for my two daughters.
Speaker 3: I'm an economist able to think through these decision decisions rationally.
Speaker 1: Yet here we are.
Speaker 3: When a friend invited me to play golf and I
Speaker 3: declined because the yard needed mowing, he couldn't hide his disbelief. Quote,
Speaker 3: you can pay someone to cut your lawn, you can't
Speaker 3: pay someone to have fun for you. He meant it
Speaker 3: as a joke. I took it as an indictment. He
Speaker 3: was calling me out on one of the most basic
Speaker 3: principles in economics, opportunity cost, meaning the things you give
Speaker 3: up when you spend your resources, including time and money,
Speaker 3: on something else. If I choose to be an astronaut,
Speaker 3: I have given up my chance to be an interpretive dancer,
Speaker 3: at least.
Speaker 1: For a while. I think that was a good choice.
Speaker 3: If I if I have limited money, explored space as
Speaker 3: opposed to world around in random ways and claimed it
Speaker 3: meant something so opportunity costs meaning the things you give
Speaker 3: up when you spend your resources, including time and money,
Speaker 3: on something else.
Speaker 1: Was he right?
Speaker 3: Maybe, But a truly economics informed approach to dy is
Speaker 3: more nuanced than it seems. It gets really interesting. It's
Speaker 3: tempting to treat decisions like this as simple arithmetic. Add
Speaker 3: up the cost of hiring help, compare it with your
Speaker 3: hourly wage, voila. In that light, it does seem crazy
Speaker 3: for a tenured professor to mow his lawn. Yes, I
Speaker 3: talked about this a year or so ago.
Speaker 1: Scott Linskim, who does the financial stuff economic stuff for
Speaker 1: the Dispatch, wrote a Colosscott long piece about that opportunity
Speaker 1: cost that really kind of convinced me toward hiring more people.
Speaker 1: Though I don't know that I have which I have
Speaker 1: a feeling this is where we're going, and I want
Speaker 1: to hear the rest of this. I bet you're right.
Speaker 1: Let's see. It's it's tempting to.
Speaker 3: Treat decisions like this simple arithmetic, as he says, it
Speaker 3: seems even crazier to do what I did as a
Speaker 3: broke grad student when I hired a daily housekeeper so
Speaker 3: I could stay focused on what mattered most research, writing, teaching,
Speaker 3: in the occasional video game, when I wasn't consumed with
Speaker 3: the first three. But that isn't really thinking like an economist.
Speaker 3: And he's one of the leaders in economics moving from
Speaker 3: this single minded idea that human beings are purely logical
Speaker 3: and purely you know, economic in terms of dollars and
Speaker 3: cents numbers, and that's the only thing that matters. It
Speaker 3: seems laughable in retrospect that that's the way economics thought
Speaker 3: for a long time.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's interesting. You know, if you were going to
Speaker 1: go with that logic, no one would ever have kids
Speaker 1: because economically it does make sense. Right.
Speaker 3: Decision making is about considering the full set of options
Speaker 3: and how much you value each one. Sometimes you may
Speaker 3: find yourself mowing the lawn when you can afford not to,
Speaker 3: or paying more than your hourly wage to hire help.
Speaker 3: Other economic concepts can illustrate why one diminishing marginal returns.
Speaker 3: The value of an extra hour isn't fixed. It depends
Speaker 3: on what came before it. If you've been working all
Speaker 3: weekend and finally carve out a free hour mowing the
Speaker 3: lawn might feel like a punishment, and avoiding that punishment
Speaker 3: would be especially valuable. But if you spent the weekend
Speaker 3: relaxing or playing with your kids, that same hour might
Speaker 3: feel restorative. The activity hasn't changed you have. He's mentioned
Speaker 3: speaking of uber and left as we were. When I've
Speaker 3: been traveling too much and I haven't seen my daughters,
Speaker 3: I'll sometimes take an uber with them instead of driving,
Speaker 3: just so we can sit in the back and catch up.
Speaker 1: Oh to me, that's money well spent. That's cute. That's sweet,
Speaker 1: isn't it. Yeah?
Speaker 3: Yeah, that brings me to a third economic layer, to
Speaker 3: consider American beliefs about identity and morality.
Speaker 1: I think this is maybe what you were hinting at, Jack.
Speaker 3: We attach pride to doing things ourselfs, and pride has
Speaker 3: value too. For some of us, mowing the lawn isn't
Speaker 3: only about the grass, time or money.
Speaker 1: It's about what it says about us.
Speaker 3: It signals I take care of my things, I don't
Speaker 3: rely on others, I'm not above the work. Sometimes I
Speaker 3: wonder if I'm pushing that more out of principle or
Speaker 3: because I want others to see me pushing it. I
Speaker 3: resisted hiring anybody to help with lawng cair, landscaping, plants, trees, etc.
Speaker 3: For a very long time for precisely that reason, and
Speaker 3: I had to admit it. And I had some fairly
Speaker 3: complicated yards that took so much time and energy it
Speaker 3: was indefensible.
Speaker 1: But I was doing it out of pride. That's interesting.
Speaker 1: I think he also got a factor in what it
Speaker 1: signals to your kids. And I don't know which side
Speaker 1: of this a person would be on. You might feel
Speaker 1: like you should signal to your kids, don't waste your
Speaker 1: time on the lawn, or you might I feel like
Speaker 1: I'm closer to this need to signal to my kids,
Speaker 1: I mowed the freaking lawn right and that noscle you
Speaker 1: on the lawn.
Speaker 3: I do what has to be done, whether I like
Speaker 3: it or not. Maybe the most important muscle any human
Speaker 3: being ever develops. In fact, I know it is beneath
Speaker 3: our pride lurks. The opportunity cost. My friend chided me
Speaker 3: about a cost that too few people consider seriously. According
Speaker 3: to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Americans spend two hours
Speaker 3: a day on household activities like cooking, cleaning, laundry and
Speaker 3: yard work. That's more time than we spend exercising or socializing.
Speaker 3: We should probably buy more of that time back, even
Speaker 3: if it means swallowing a little pride. Not everyone can
Speaker 3: or should outsources DIY activities, of course, but a great
Speaker 3: many people perform these tasks out of habit, inertia, or
Speaker 3: guilt and would be better off spending the money to
Speaker 3: get help.
Speaker 1: Well, I just one. I enjoy mowing the lawn. I
Speaker 1: just I don't think I couldn't. I don't have a
Speaker 1: lawn currently. I don't own a how so, but if
Speaker 1: I did own the house I have, I would mold
Speaker 1: al on myself. But there's other stuff, like our agent's
Speaker 1: always on me because every time I'm talking to them
Speaker 1: about personal life Stuff's just the amount of paperwork that
Speaker 1: I have to do is the loane. I'm the head
Speaker 1: of the household, and the household I'm the only person.
Speaker 1: I should hire somebody for that. I should not be
Speaker 1: spending my time hours trying to log into a website
Speaker 1: pay a stupid bill crap. Somebody should be doing that
Speaker 1: for me. That's just a waste of my life. Yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And the sentence about many people perform these tasks
Speaker 3: out of habit, inertia or guilt, and would be better
Speaker 3: off spending the money to get help.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 3: That reminds me of one of the great divides I
Speaker 3: think that you can observe in society. The left generally
Speaker 3: is big on trust your feelings, and the right is
Speaker 3: more on, you know, observe your feelings, but think about them.
Speaker 3: Your feelings are irrational and unhelpful, at least as often
Speaker 3: as they are you know, or you know, maybe it's
Speaker 3: sixty forty or forty sixty, it doesn't matter. But the
Speaker 3: idea that your feelings are always right and you should
Speaker 3: always trust them. Yeah, yeah, my husband kind of pissed
Speaker 3: me off. I'm gonna blast him and tell him exactly
Speaker 3: what I think of him. No, don't trust that feeling.
Speaker 3: It'll be gone in like ten seconds anyway. Here are
Speaker 3: some examples Roland writes of how to think through this
Speaker 3: decision these decisions Like an economist. Jane is a corporate
Speaker 3: lawyer and workaholic. Not enough hours in her day. Her
Speaker 3: rare moments are free time or precious She's got cash
Speaker 3: to burn for her paying someone to clean the house
Speaker 3: or prepared dinner isn't indulgence, it's common sense.
Speaker 1: That's an easy one.
Speaker 3: Heather is short on both time and money, and hiring
Speaker 3: a cleaner would cost more than she makes it work.
Speaker 3: Usually she hates cleaning or needs that time for something urgent,
Speaker 3: she's probably better off doing it herself. That isn't a failure.
Speaker 3: It's the most rational choice given her circumstances. Yeah, unless
Speaker 3: she really hates cleaning or needs that time, she's better
Speaker 3: off doing it herself.
Speaker 1: I did want to throw this in because we're gonna
Speaker 1: get a whole bunch of texts about this, because the
Speaker 1: last time we wrote it up about you know you
Speaker 1: and your effing yachts or whatever, about people who this
Speaker 1: is an option for Yeah, for a big giant chunk
Speaker 1: of my life. I didn't worry about these conversations because
Speaker 1: I wasn't an option to hire anybody to do anything. Ever,
Speaker 1: So you have to be in a situation where it's
Speaker 1: an option. So he gave you a pretty easy one
Speaker 1: on both ends. John is a middle class dad with
Speaker 1: modest savings and limited flexibility at work. If he wants
Speaker 1: extra time at home, he can't simply clock out early.
Speaker 1: He pays the cleaner more than he makes per hours,
Speaker 1: so on paper, it doesn't seem to add up. Yet
Speaker 1: it buys him time to read to his kids, or
Speaker 1: help with homework, or simply be less stressed after a
Speaker 1: long shift. It might be the smartest money he spends
Speaker 1: all week. He isn't maximizing his present disposable income, but
Speaker 1: he's boosting his lifetime utility. Yeah, that's where I was.
Speaker 1: I'm getting a person to clean the house, which I
Speaker 1: still rubs me the wrong way. It just it's not
Speaker 1: in my DNA. But it became clear to me that
Speaker 1: it was cutting into time with the kids to do
Speaker 1: various things. And I can't justify that. If I were
Speaker 1: on my own, no freaking way, I would be higher.
Speaker 1: Now I was cleaner to do this, I would do
Speaker 1: it myself. But I just I couldn't. I couldn't justify
Speaker 1: saying I'm sorry, I can't go for a bike ride.
Speaker 1: I got to finish this laundry. I just I couldn't.
Speaker 1: I couldn't justify that. But it does bother me. My
Speaker 1: kids sometimes have a bit of an attitude about the
Speaker 1: house cleaner didn't do something right or whatever, and I
Speaker 1: don't like that.
Speaker 3: I don't that I totally hear you. You are absolutely
Speaker 3: justified in hiring a housekeeper. Are your kids absolutely justified
Speaker 3: in having one?
Speaker 1: No? I know what a quandary.
Speaker 3: I don't even like to admit that Judy and I
Speaker 3: have a house cleaner, especially because she does not get
Speaker 3: along with our butler at all.
Speaker 1: Two of them. They have a thing going way back.
Speaker 1: There's just no solving it.
Speaker 3: And and Sleeve Boy, my servant who merely buttons the
Speaker 3: little button that's like mid arm that's so difficult to button.
Speaker 3: He hears them bickering and he can't concentrate on his work,
Speaker 3: and then I have to punish him.
Speaker 1: Oh my god, just cite a long running joke on
Speaker 1: the Armstrong a Gedddy show. I have known people, you know,
Speaker 1: and it's none of my business. I have known people
Speaker 1: that complain to me about their financial situation and have
Speaker 1: people that do this stuff. And I think, Okay, your
Speaker 1: paycheck to paycheck, you're barely making it. Don't have someone
Speaker 1: clean your house. Maybe do it yourself. But you know what,
Speaker 1: wh he's they're on Michael. I just remember Joe has
Speaker 1: that guy who's a footstool as well. Oh yeah, remember
Speaker 1: the human footstools, right, he's part time.
Speaker 3: He's just during, you know, the latter part of the
Speaker 3: week when I'm getting tired and really need a footstool
Speaker 3: and the adjustable kind of mechanical kind aren't good enough.
Speaker 3: I like to be able to say footstool boy, footstool
Speaker 3: boy when it comes.
Speaker 1: With you, backup slightly higher, please, thank you, comes with you,
Speaker 1: whatever room you go into, it's very Yeah, footstool boy.
Speaker 1: We're moving to the den now. Oh my god, that
Speaker 1: is the worst any thoughts in any of this text
Speaker 1: line four one, five two nine KFTC. We are thrilled
Speaker 1: to have you here.
Speaker 5: Alcatraz Prison the Rock an infamous symbol of law and
Speaker 5: order in American history, and President Trump wants it reopened.
Speaker 1: It could hold anything. This is a terrific facility needs
Speaker 1: a lot of work.
Speaker 5: Fox News joined Attorney General Pam Bondi and Interior Secretary
Speaker 5: Doug Bergham for an exclusive tour of the rock, now
Speaker 5: part of a national park.
Speaker 7: Alcatraz Is is the brand known around the world uh
Speaker 7: for being a effective at housing people that are in incarceration.
Speaker 3: Pam Bondy and Doug Bergham are both very bright people,
Speaker 3: and to hear them struggling to come up with any
Speaker 3: explanation whatsoever of what they're doing is hilarious.
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, I'm just keeping it real.
Speaker 3: As the kids say, actually traveled Alcatraz is amazing.
Speaker 1: It could hold anything. She says, actually traveled clear across
Speaker 1: the country, then had to take the boat out Talcatraz
Speaker 1: in San Francisco to vis just a key aspect of
Speaker 1: the question before us.
Speaker 4: And.
Speaker 1: Then act like this is gonna happen. Okay, any who
Speaker 1: just came across this story.
Speaker 3: You know, the truth is very briefly, Alcatraz is much
Speaker 3: much more significant as a tourist location than as a prison.
Speaker 3: It was a prison for relatively short amount of time,
Speaker 3: and it captures the imagination because it's remote and you
Speaker 3: take a boat ride out there and it's fun.
Speaker 1: I want to talk about CBS firing Colbert. That's an
Speaker 1: interesting one if it was financial and not political. Man,
Speaker 1: the timing shirt certainly doesn't work in your favor for
Speaker 1: that narrative. But I want to talk about this at
Speaker 1: some point. Australia is the first major country clearing the
Speaker 1: path for a social media age checks, or really age
Speaker 1: checks of any kind online that they think will work,
Speaker 1: which obviously you could apply to social media and porn
Speaker 1: and all kinds of different things. Maybe we'll talk about
Speaker 1: that a little bit later. I came across this thread
Speaker 1: I thought was really good. I was actually actually from
Speaker 1: Matt Tybee, who we really liked, the journalist Matt Tybee.
Speaker 1: He just said, post your favorite NPR ridiculousness. I love that.
Speaker 1: On the day that the taxpayer funding for NPR and
Speaker 1: PBS got ya, and the mainstream and left is claiming
Speaker 1: like it's some sort of attack on free speech or whatever.
Speaker 1: Good lord. Actually, Tom Cotton, Senator Tom Cotton, Republican, said
Speaker 1: this would be like yanking the funding if there was
Speaker 1: taxpayer funding from bright Bart News and it got yanked.
Speaker 1: Except for Bred, he said, except for Breitbart's closer to
Speaker 1: mainstream than NPR is. I haven't read breit Bart regularly
Speaker 1: in a long time, but NPR is so far out
Speaker 1: there it's unbelievable. Anyway, here's just some examples, people bringing
Speaker 1: up old tweets or whatever. This is probably the biggest one.
Speaker 1: From a couple of years back. The NPR Public editor
Speaker 1: tweeted out, why haven't you seen any stories from NPR
Speaker 1: about the New York Post? Hunter Biden story read more
Speaker 1: in this week's newsletter, in which he said, we don't
Speaker 1: want to waste our time on stories that are not
Speaker 1: really stories, and we don't want to waste the listeners
Speaker 1: and readers time on stories that are just pureist actions
Speaker 1: about the Hunter Biden laptop. Nice job, NPR. Here's one
Speaker 1: from NPR. A new pole finds forty percent of respondents
Speaker 1: believe in a baseless conspiracy theory that the coronavirus was
Speaker 1: created in a lab in China. There's zero evidence for this.
Speaker 1: Scientists say the virus was transmitted to humans from another species.
Speaker 1: Thank you for that one, NPR. Oh, this is a
Speaker 1: good one that held up well about emojis a while back.
Speaker 1: Some white people may choose to use the yellow thumbs
Speaker 1: up emoji because it feels neutral, but academics argue it's
Speaker 1: actually racist and is trying to get away from your
Speaker 1: white privilege.
Speaker 3: Hows an NPR story. People have no idea how hilarious
Speaker 3: you are.
Speaker 1: They're the network that says LATINX Armstrong and Getty