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Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff you should know, a production of iHeartRadio.

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Speaker 2: Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh and there's Chuck.

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Speaker 2: It's just the two of us, the dynamic duo doing

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Speaker 2: our thing. Training wheels are off. This is stuff you

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Speaker 2: should know.

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Speaker 1: Can I have a brief preamble?

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Speaker 2: Oh? Please?

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Speaker 3: Well, I know people skip around our show. Some adherents

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Speaker 3: listen to every single one, of course, which we appreciate.

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Speaker 3: But some people pick and choose, just like I do

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Speaker 3: with my favorite show sometimes. But I want to urge

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Speaker 3: people to listen to this if at first they're like

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Speaker 3: debt cancelation boring, because you know, economics is not my

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Speaker 3: jam at all. But like I realized that having an

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Speaker 3: understanding of global debt and debt cancelation, it's really a

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Speaker 3: pretty fundamental. Like having that fundamental understanding really helps you

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Speaker 3: understand so much about politics and global economy. And just

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Speaker 3: when you hear that stuff on the news and you

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Speaker 3: don't get it, I think it's really easy just to think, like, oh,

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Speaker 3: America is paying everyone's debts, right, and that's.

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Speaker 1: Just not how it works.

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Speaker 3: And to have a real understanding of that, I just

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Speaker 3: think makes you more well armed as a human.

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Speaker 2: I think that was an excellent preamble. Man.

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Speaker 1: Thanks, this is really good. Livia crushed this article, just

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Speaker 1: absolutely crushed.

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Speaker 2: It was so clearly in her wheelhouse, and I was

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Speaker 2: actually approached to thinking it was going to be interesting,

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Speaker 2: and it turned out to be one of the most

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Speaker 2: fascinating things I've researched in a very long time.

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Speaker 1: Ohough, are you going to say it turned out to

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Speaker 1: be super boring for me?

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Speaker 2: No, I'm really into this because you're right, like, when

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Speaker 2: you peel this back, you're looking at the inner machinations,

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Speaker 2: the most basic functioning of the global economy that there is.

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Speaker 2: This is it, this is what it all runs on

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Speaker 2: what we're about to talk about, and it's hugely important.

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Speaker 2: And there's an idea that the West has been taking

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Speaker 2: advantage and I'm going to accidentally say the West a lot.

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Speaker 2: There's a lot of different ways you can talk about

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Speaker 2: the different income countries. Apparently, like the World Health Organization

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Speaker 2: says low and middle income countries. Yeah, the United States

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Speaker 2: and Europe would be higher income countries. Some people say

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Speaker 2: developed and undeveloped. There's a lot. It's like a minefield basically.

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Speaker 2: So I'm going to accidentally say the West a lot,

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Speaker 2: which is not correct anymore, but it still gets the

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Speaker 2: point across.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, and I think Livia not I think, I know,

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Speaker 3: she went with the term global South to refer to

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Speaker 3: what were we think of as generally lower to middle

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Speaker 3: to lower income countries. She did make that up, but

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Speaker 3: that's you know, it's a collection of largely sort of

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Speaker 3: Latin American, some Asian and African countries which we're going

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Speaker 3: to be talking about, so we'll probably mix and match.

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Speaker 1: I'll probably say global South a lot.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a I mean, I've seen that virtually everywhere

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Speaker 2: as well. I think the low and low middle income

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Speaker 2: countries called licks and mix as like it's super wonky. Yeah,

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Speaker 2: it is a little cute for what we're talking about, because,

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Speaker 2: I mean, what we are talking about is the idea

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Speaker 2: that has become more and more widespread that the global North,

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Speaker 2: which I just recently referred to as the West, has

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Speaker 2: long been exploiting the global South, basically taking advantage of

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Speaker 2: it for its natural resources, cheap labor, and then using

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Speaker 2: that money to enrich itself, right, not really funneling much back.

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Speaker 2: And then when it does funnel it back to the

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Speaker 2: global South, it does so with strings attached or interest

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Speaker 2: rates in the form of loans, bonds, that kind of thing.

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Speaker 2: And there's this idea that, like, that's just totally unfair,

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Speaker 2: that that this playing field has started out from the

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Speaker 2: get go so imbalanced that the only responsible, human, humane

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Speaker 2: thing to do is to cancel the debt of some

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Speaker 2: of the poorest countries in the world.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, it's kind of that simple, you know,

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Speaker 3: there's this idea, and libby us is a great, just

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Speaker 3: sort of example to bring it home. When someone steals

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Speaker 3: your credit card or steals your identity and racks up

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Speaker 3: a bunch of money in your name, you don't have

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Speaker 3: to pay for that. That is something that you're not

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Speaker 3: on the hook for. And there's this called odious debt.

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Speaker 3: There's a lot of people that think, you know, we

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Speaker 3: should apply that same logic to sovereign debt. And this

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Speaker 3: isn't a new idea. This idea has been around for

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Speaker 3: about one hundred years or so a little more than that,

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Speaker 3: with the idea of the Spanish American War coming to

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Speaker 3: an end when the US gets control of Cuba from Spain,

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Speaker 3: but Spain, as the colonizer, had racked up a ton

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Speaker 3: of debt on the back of Cuba and the US.

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Speaker 3: And we'll talk about the power structure of why they

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Speaker 3: were able to do this. It was basically because they

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Speaker 3: had the power through the Paris Peace Treaty and said, hey, Cuba,

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Speaker 3: this is your fault, this is Spain's fault, so you

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Speaker 3: shouldn't be as a relatively poor nation, you shouldn't be

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Speaker 3: on the hook for this. So Spain's got a step

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Speaker 3: up and pay and the US had the power, you know,

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Speaker 3: at the time, they had the upper hand in that agreement.

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Speaker 3: So in the Paris Peace Treaty, Spain was kind of

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Speaker 3: forced into taking on that debt.

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Speaker 1: But that's not how it always works, right.

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Speaker 2: No, there's another example that kind of demonstrates the other

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Speaker 2: way it can go, which is with the African National Congress,

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Speaker 2: which was headed by Nelson Mandela in the post apartheid

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Speaker 2: South Africa, and they they were the successor to the

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Speaker 2: apartheid government and they took on all of South Africa's

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Speaker 2: existing debt. Well, they considered that debt odious because a

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Speaker 2: lot of that debt had been borrowed to spend on

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Speaker 2: military and police to keep the population in line and

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Speaker 2: to enforce apartheid, which had been globally rejected. Even little

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Speaker 2: Stevie wasn't into apartheid at the time. But so they said,

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Speaker 2: this is odious debt, like we're not going to pay this,

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Speaker 2: We shouldn't be expected to pay this. This is money that

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Speaker 2: we would be paying back that was borrowed to keep

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Speaker 2: us repressed. How does that make any sense? And the

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Speaker 2: thing is is there's no international law that recognizes the

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Speaker 2: odious debt doctrine. It's more like a come on, guys, like, seriously,

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Speaker 2: let's use our common sense. But common sense doesn't always

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Speaker 2: like jibe with capitalism. Fortunately for the African National Congress,

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Speaker 2: the people who were heading South Africa under Nelson Mandela,

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Speaker 2: they had a huge ally in the Soviet Union at

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Speaker 2: the time, so they were actually like, yeah, Soviet unions

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Speaker 2: like these guys aren't going to pay their debt back

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Speaker 2: and the world is just going to go along with it.

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Speaker 2: The problem is the Soviet Union crumbled and the African

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Speaker 2: National Congres ended up having to pay that apartheid debt

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Speaker 2: back because they no longer had the backing of a

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Speaker 2: superpower any longer.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, so that's a good sort of post preamble post amble.

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Speaker 2: It was a pamble.

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Speaker 3: It's a pamble that brings us to this idea, which

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Speaker 3: is post colonialism, and what do we do about this?

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Speaker 3: And it is pretty pretty much agreed upon by any

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Speaker 3: rational thinker that Europe plundered the world for five hundred

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Speaker 3: years or so, give or take.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, Europe and the United States.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, well yeah, Europe, which the United States, which which

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Speaker 3: came from Europe.

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Speaker 1: Okay, I'm kind of lumping us all in at that point.

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Speaker 2: I got you.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, And that plundering basically led to where we are today.

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Speaker 3: It put all these different countries on different paths, one

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Speaker 3: toward prosperity and one path toward being poor.

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Speaker 1: And there's a better word for that. What's the word

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Speaker 1: opposite of prosperity, impoverished? Impoverished. That's a good one, That's

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Speaker 1: what it was I was thinking. But it's even better.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, And I mean the way that that happened was

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Speaker 2: the the global North came to the global South and

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Speaker 2: said we're going to take all of your natural resources

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Speaker 2: by force. And that was just straight up colonialism.

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Speaker 3: Right, Well, natural resources is one thing, but then also

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Speaker 3: and we're going to make you do help us do

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Speaker 3: it on the backs of enslaved people. I mean, we

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Speaker 3: talked about slave labor, and then later on it became

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Speaker 3: you know, cheap labor, which is kind of where we

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Speaker 3: are now. But at first it was there was just

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Speaker 3: no money being exchanged. Is Hi, we're going to take

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Speaker 3: your stuff. You're going to help us take your stuff.

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Speaker 3: And this is going to lead all of these different

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Speaker 3: countries around the world down two very different paths. And

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Speaker 3: the argument is basically like, hey, today, and we'll get

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Speaker 3: way way more into the weeds on this stuff. But

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Speaker 3: this is what led us to where we are today.

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Speaker 3: So the debt forgiveness of these countries isn't just like, oh,

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Speaker 3: you know, you're poor country and we're a rich country,

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Speaker 3: so we got to pay your debts. It's no, we

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Speaker 3: got rich off of your backs for hundreds of years.

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Speaker 3: And so the R word, if you want to bring

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Speaker 3: up something like reparations, is not like a fine that

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Speaker 3: you've paid for being a bad country. It is it's

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Speaker 3: almost like a better and this is people are probably

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Speaker 3: going to kill me for this. But a better way

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Speaker 3: I think to think about it is a long overdue

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Speaker 3: payment for labor.

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Speaker 2: I think that's the fairest way to look at it.

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Speaker 2: Because the other ways of looking at it makes it

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Speaker 2: seem like that the global South are needy who are

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Speaker 2: getting handouts from the global North who are being heroic

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Speaker 2: by giving them handouts.

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Speaker 1: Right, So, yeah, which is not true.

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Speaker 2: No, I agree with I agree with you. I think

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Speaker 2: that that's a really good way to look at at reparations,

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Speaker 2: especially through post colonialism. And the other thing is a

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Speaker 2: lot of people argue against things like reparations based on

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Speaker 2: the idea that, like you kind of touched on it,

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Speaker 2: that this is something that happened in the past. Man,

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Speaker 2: I didn't enslave anybody. I didn't like go exploit the

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Speaker 2: Congolese for their rubber trees and cut their hands off

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Speaker 2: when I caught them stealingly. I didn't do that. My

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Speaker 2: grandparents didn't even do that. I had nothing to do

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Speaker 2: with that. So colonialism, straight up colonialism where you go

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Speaker 2: in and use force and invaded country and say all

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Speaker 2: your stuff is ours now and we're using you as

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Speaker 2: slave labor. That went away largely in the nineteenth century,

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Speaker 2: definitely by the twentieth century, but it was replaced by

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Speaker 2: the same end exploitation. It was just dressed up slightly differently.

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Speaker 2: So like we saw with the United Fruit Company helping

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Speaker 2: overthrow the Guatemalan government, the elected Guatemalan government that we

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Speaker 2: talked about in our Edward Burnet's pr episode, Like it

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Speaker 2: was kind of like that. We would go around, and

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Speaker 2: by we, I mean the Global North. We would go

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Speaker 2: around and destabilize other countries, governments and economies to our

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Speaker 2: benefit if they weren't friendly to the kind of trade

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Speaker 2: and exploitation we wanted from them, right and then we

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Speaker 2: would see to it that somebody else would get installed.

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Speaker 2: Sometimes people just straight up got assassinated, but it wasn't

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Speaker 2: wholesale slavery and slaughter like it had been in colonial days.

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Speaker 2: So that was post colonialism. Today again, the same thing

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Speaker 2: is going on. We're exploiting and extracting the resources from

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Speaker 2: the global South for the use and enrichment of the

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Speaker 2: global North at firesale prices, and then we're selling the

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Speaker 2: things that we use those resources to make back to

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Speaker 2: the global South at greatly inflated prices, which is called

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Speaker 2: the trade inequality. And that is how we're keeping the

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Speaker 2: global South impoverished.

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Speaker 1: Right now, All right, that's a great boy, you just

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Speaker 1: summed up the whole thing.

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Speaker 2: We're done.

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Speaker 3: Then I'll tell you what this is. Early for a break.

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Speaker 3: But let's take a break and we'll talk about this

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Speaker 3: great through line example that Livia included of the Democratic

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Speaker 3: Republic of Congo. Right after this, we should know.

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Speaker 2: Lar childs of h.

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Speaker 4: Y s k as w s k as good.

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Speaker 3: All right, So Livia used this great example, and I

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Speaker 3: love it when in an example in an article like

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Speaker 3: this can serve as a through line through the whole thing.

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Speaker 3: And this this kind of does here and there, which

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Speaker 3: is really helpful for a dumb dumb like me who

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Speaker 3: doesn't really get econ. But I got this, so I

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Speaker 3: know if I can get this, that anyone can. But

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Speaker 3: the Democratic Republic of Congo, which used to be Zaire,

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Speaker 3: let's go back to the old days of the late

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Speaker 3: nineteenth century. They were and are a very rich country

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Speaker 3: in resources, copper, cobalt, diamonds, oil, you name it, lots

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Speaker 3: of rich, rich stuff. In the nineteenth century, King Leopold

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Speaker 3: of Belgium said, hey, the rest of Europe, why don't

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Speaker 3: you let me go down there and basically enslave this

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Speaker 3: country and use it for production of rubber and ivory.

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Speaker 3: And sure, we may kill ten million people, like half

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Speaker 3: of the population but just think of the money that's

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Speaker 3: waiting for us if we do this, and Europe said

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Speaker 3: it sounds good to me, go have at it. Flash

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Speaker 3: forward about sixty something years and they won independence in

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Speaker 3: nineteen sixty and a prime minister was democratically elected named

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Speaker 3: Patrice Lamumba. Six months later, La Mumba was killed in

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Speaker 3: a coup that was supported by our old friends in

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Speaker 3: Belgium and the United States because of a suspicion of

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Speaker 3: being in bed with the Soviet Union. A general takes

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Speaker 3: power Mobuto Cesci Seiko and through the support of the

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Speaker 3: US and other I guess richer Western countries, basically spent

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Speaker 3: about three decades lining his pockets with money and from

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Speaker 3: except for about twenty seven years from seventy to ninety seven,

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Speaker 3: the nation's debt went from five percent of the GDP

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Speaker 3: to one hundred and fifty percent.

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Speaker 2: Right. And the reason the debt went up so much

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Speaker 2: is because, like you said, he's lining his pockets. And

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Speaker 2: the other countries from the Global North that were lending

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Speaker 2: this money to drc knew that he was lining his pockets.

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Speaker 2: They didn't care because he could turn around and use

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Speaker 2: his country's natural resources to pay off these debts that

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Speaker 2: he was using to enrich himself while his people were

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Speaker 2: impoverished and starved. The thing is is like that is

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Speaker 2: on cesse seiko, sure, right, but also on the lenders,

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Speaker 2: the financiers, who knew what he was doing and did

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Speaker 2: not care about what happened to the people of the

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Speaker 2: Democratic Republic of Congo. They just cared that they had

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Speaker 2: a steady flow of natural resources, and that right there,

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Speaker 2: that's that's as far as capitalism goes. That's fine, there's

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Speaker 2: no moral hazard to that. But the thing that makes

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Speaker 2: this moment in history different than say, the nineteen sixties,

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Speaker 2: is we've now come to question that part of capitalism.

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Speaker 2: Some people question capitalism as a whole, and you can

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Speaker 2: do that, But I tend to think that capitalism itself

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Speaker 2: is not an inherently flawed system, but that it has

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Speaker 2: some really flawed capes that are hung around at shoulders.

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Speaker 2: I don't know why I went with capes, but you

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Speaker 2: get the point, right, And one of those is the

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Speaker 2: idea that corporations should maximize profits at all costs without

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Speaker 2: any regard to morality or global citizenship. It doesn't matter,

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Speaker 2: So those corporations can't really be lumped in in any

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Speaker 2: legal sense, because they're just doing corporations too, being psychopaths

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Speaker 2: who are out to maximize profits as much as possible.

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Speaker 2: So that's where we're at. Like a lot of people

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Speaker 2: just stop at blaming sesse Seiko for being as corrupt

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Speaker 2: as it comes and plundering his own nation, but they're

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Speaker 2: not also like panning to the left a little bit

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Speaker 2: to see the larger picture, And that's what you have

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Speaker 2: to do when you really are examining global sovereign debt

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Speaker 2: crises like we're in right now.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, for sure. So this is kind of going on

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Speaker 3: a timeline. So that was the sixties and into the seventies.

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Speaker 3: Now we go, which will lead up to the eighties

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Speaker 3: debt crisis. In the seventies, if everyone who knows history

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Speaker 3: knows that.

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Speaker 1: That was a bad time for oil, I guess a

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Speaker 1: good time.

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Speaker 3: If you're an exporter, oil prices went through the roof,

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Speaker 3: and if you are an importer of oil, this is

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Speaker 3: going to have a ripple effect, and it did all

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Speaker 3: across the world to basically ramp up inflation, raise the

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Speaker 3: cost of fuel, which affects the cost of a lot

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Speaker 3: of other things. Because of a domino effect. And the

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Speaker 3: other side of this is these oil rich countries that

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Speaker 3: were now exporting. Not only were they getting all this

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Speaker 3: dough and enriching themselves from the oil. Fine, that is

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Speaker 3: what it is. They then said, hey, we can now

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Speaker 3: be a lender and lend money to these poorer countries

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Speaker 3: and some of these Latin American countries that are really

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Speaker 3: kind of growing fast, and who cares about the risk

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Speaker 3: involved and everyone sending up warning signs. We're the lender

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Speaker 3: and we're going to make a ton of interest off

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Speaker 3: of this dough that we now have because of the

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Speaker 3: oil that we are selling to them.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, that would be a familiar pattern that would emerge.

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Speaker 2: But that oil thing that you were talking about, for

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Speaker 2: non exporting countries like the United States, that was a

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Speaker 2: real problem because we saw just very recently in the

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Speaker 2: last several months, when oil prices go up, all prices

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Speaker 2: go up because everything's so dependent on oil. And that

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Speaker 2: happened in the early eighties too, So inflation started to

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Speaker 2: get so far out of hand. I think it reached

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Speaker 2: like fourteen percent. What was it we were like screaming

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Speaker 2: about recently, like six or eight, which was bad enough.

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Speaker 2: This is fourteen percent, So the guy who ran the

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Speaker 2: Federal Reserve, Paul Vulker, committed what's now known as the

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Speaker 2: Vulgar Shock. He jacked interest rates up so suddenly and

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Speaker 2: so high, I think, up to twenty percent, that it

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Speaker 2: immediately triggered a global recession. And it definitely did, within

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Speaker 2: a couple of years, wedge everybody out of that global recession.

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Speaker 2: It stabilized that inflation, brought prices down, things got back

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Speaker 2: to normal. But you had to be a really rich

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Speaker 2: country to weather that fairly. Well. If you weren't a

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Speaker 2: rich country, you were screwed. And so these countries that

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Speaker 2: had already racked up tons of debt now had high

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Speaker 2: interest rates and low currency values and were expected to

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Speaker 2: pay these loans back. So if you were on like

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Speaker 2: a three point two percent or a four percent interest

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Speaker 2: rate on an eighty billion dollar loan, you owed three

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Speaker 2: point two billion dollars to service that loan. If it

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Speaker 2: went up to twenty percent interest rates, you suddenly owed

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Speaker 2: fifteen billion dollars to service that loan. So Mexico, Brazil,

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Speaker 2: a bunch of other countries, I think twenty seven of

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Speaker 2: them said we can't pay these debts any longer. This

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Speaker 2: is not sustainable and frankly, it's now become odious because

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Speaker 2: of this Volker shock that we didn't do anything to do,

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Speaker 2: but now we're suffering because the US decided to plunge

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Speaker 2: everyone into a global recession to help itself.

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Speaker 3: Right, So this is going on. All these countries have

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Speaker 3: thrown up their hands basically and said we just can't.

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Speaker 3: Like it's not you know, we're not saying, oh, we

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Speaker 3: don't want to pay that, like we literally can't afford to,

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Speaker 3: and that people started beating the drum, like you said

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Speaker 3: on odious debt again and activists started speaking up. Peru

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Speaker 3: is a great example that you mentioned. In nineteen eighty five,

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Speaker 3: the president of Peru, Alan Garcia, said, you know what,

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Speaker 3: We're not going to pay any payments on our debt

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Speaker 3: in excess of ten percent of our export revenues and

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Speaker 3: that's the only way to keep our country solvent basically,

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Speaker 3: which helped them out in the short term. But then

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Speaker 3: all of a sudden, you're doing that, and every financial

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Speaker 3: institution all over the world looks and says, we can't

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Speaker 3: trust Peru anymore, we can't do business with them, and

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Speaker 3: we can't invest in Peru if we're a company or

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Speaker 3: corporation looking to invest in foreign economies, and that triggered

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Speaker 3: a hyperinflation there by the end of the eighties. And

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Speaker 3: so all of this mess is happening in the eighties,

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Speaker 3: and finally, finally two organizations stepped in and said, we

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Speaker 3: got to do something about this. The International Monetary Fund,

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Speaker 3: the IMF, and the World Bank stepped in. These are

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Speaker 3: two organizations founded post World War two. In part, the

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Speaker 3: World Bank was to help dig Europe out of the

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Speaker 3: economic devastation they suffered during the war, and the IMF

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Speaker 3: initially was just to sort of encourage all countries to

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Speaker 3: get along economically. But then after this, the IMF and

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Speaker 3: the World Bank basically became a lender, a multilateral public lender.

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Speaker 3: That's complicated to sort of explain how that all works,

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Speaker 3: but let's just leave it at It was controlled still

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Speaker 3: by these northern countries, the UA in other rich countries.

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Speaker 2: And it still is. And bear this in mindful when

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Speaker 2: we talk about today. The IMF is partly funded by

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Speaker 2: rich countries called the Paris Club, which includes the United

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Speaker 2: States and most European democracies. Right, it's nice, it does.

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Speaker 2: It sounds like the kind of place i'd want to

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Speaker 2: hang out. Yeah, I want to go have a sip

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Speaker 2: of something with my pinky in the air, you know exactly,

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Speaker 2: So just put that, put that in your bonnet and

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Speaker 2: smoke it later. Right. The IMF is funded in part

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Speaker 2: by democracies and governments around the world. Okay, so the

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Speaker 2: IMF and the World Bank changed their mandate. They decided

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Speaker 2: now that they were going to basically aid in development

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Speaker 2: around the world, but especially focusing on lower income, middle

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Speaker 2: income countries to help them. And this is the view

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Speaker 2: of the economists that the IMF and their supporters to

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Speaker 2: help these impoverished nations learn to be better capitalist economies

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Speaker 2: and as a result become a self sustate and self supporting,

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Speaker 2: basically creating neoliberal economies where there was say socialist economies

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Speaker 2: or other types of economies opening them up for business.

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Speaker 2: And so they would start sending these loans to these

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Speaker 2: countries that really attractive interest rate, sometimes as low as

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Speaker 2: like no interest whatsoever, in which case it was basically aid,

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Speaker 2: but there were strings attached, and they were things like

401
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Speaker 2: increase your tax revenue, stop social spending. All those state

402
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Speaker 2: owned enterprises you have, you need to privatize them to

403
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Speaker 2: open it for competition, and most importantly, you need to

404
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Speaker 2: open up your whole country, get rid of trade restrictions,

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Speaker 2: all that stuff, open them up to international business so

406
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Speaker 2: we can come in as unfettered as we want to.

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Speaker 2: And by the way, to help you understand all this

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Speaker 2: and do all this, we're going to send our own

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Speaker 2: Western economists and advisors to teach you how to do this.

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Speaker 2: And some of those advisors and their successors you showed

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Speaker 2: up in the eighties are still there. They never laughed.

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Speaker 2: They're just part of like that nation's government. Basically.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, these were called structural adjustment programs or SAPs, ironically,

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Speaker 3: and you know, the proponents would argue what you just

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Speaker 3: talked about, and then people that didn't think it was

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Speaker 3: such a great idea would say, well, this is just

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Speaker 3: sort of a new version of the same thing, right,

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Speaker 3: And which is why they call it neo colonialism. It's

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Speaker 3: you coming in and saying, hey, we want to use

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Speaker 3: your resources and tap your country or sap your country,

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Speaker 3: but you got to spend the money that we're lending

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Speaker 3: you at cheap rates of the way we say. A

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Speaker 3: lot of countries got on board during the nineteen eighties.

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Speaker 3: It also led to a lot of unrest and a

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Speaker 3: lot of protests. In nineteen eighty five, to go back

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Speaker 3: to our example of the DRC, they had these economic

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Speaker 3: policies implemented by the IMF. By nineteen eighty five, the

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Speaker 3: Washington Post did a report that basically said, their hospitals

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Speaker 3: and their schools are decimated. Malnutrition is going through the roof.

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Speaker 3: Activists once again started rearing their heads. There was one

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Speaker 3: guy who I think this bears maybe a deeper dive

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Speaker 3: at some point, but his name was Thomas Sankara, and

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Speaker 3: he was the president of a West African nation called

434
00:24:21,200 --> 00:24:26,040
Speaker 3: Burkina Fasso in the early eighties and a leftist guy

435
00:24:26,680 --> 00:24:31,280
Speaker 3: who basically was beating the neo colonialism drum. And in

436
00:24:31,359 --> 00:24:33,320
Speaker 3: July of eighty seven, he gave a big speech at

437
00:24:33,359 --> 00:24:37,040
Speaker 3: the Organization of African Unity where he said, everyone joined

438
00:24:37,080 --> 00:24:41,879
Speaker 3: with us, and let's not pay this debt to our colonizers.

439
00:24:42,119 --> 00:24:45,199
Speaker 3: Let's remember that idea. Let's get that going again. A

440
00:24:45,200 --> 00:24:48,720
Speaker 3: few months later, he was assassinated in a bloody coup

441
00:24:48,840 --> 00:24:52,200
Speaker 3: from his former friend who became his rival, a guy

442
00:24:52,200 --> 00:24:54,639
Speaker 3: who still doesn't own up to being a part of

443
00:24:54,680 --> 00:24:55,600
Speaker 3: this like to this day.

444
00:24:57,000 --> 00:24:57,680
Speaker 1: His name was.

445
00:24:57,920 --> 00:25:00,960
Speaker 3: And I heard a few ways of pronouncing, but I'm

446
00:25:00,960 --> 00:25:04,280
Speaker 3: going to blaze compare compare.

447
00:25:05,520 --> 00:25:06,080
Speaker 2: I like that.

448
00:25:06,600 --> 00:25:09,199
Speaker 3: It was kind of tough, but you know, so what

449
00:25:09,280 --> 00:25:17,639
Speaker 3: happens is a leftist organizer, president advocate against this speaks

450
00:25:17,720 --> 00:25:21,280
Speaker 3: up and is promptly killed, and then that country promptly

451
00:25:21,320 --> 00:25:22,960
Speaker 3: rejoins the IMF and World Bank.

452
00:25:24,000 --> 00:25:27,439
Speaker 2: Yeah, and sank Kara he was very dangerous because he

453
00:25:27,720 --> 00:25:32,040
Speaker 2: was starting to make real waves. If all those African

454
00:25:32,119 --> 00:25:34,160
Speaker 2: nations join together and just said we're not paying you back,

455
00:25:34,800 --> 00:25:37,640
Speaker 2: tens hundreds of billions of dollars would have just evaporated

456
00:25:37,720 --> 00:25:42,199
Speaker 2: for the Global North right. So that's why he was assassinated.

457
00:25:42,640 --> 00:25:46,480
Speaker 2: But he left this legacy of looking at sovereign debt

458
00:25:46,600 --> 00:25:51,040
Speaker 2: among low income nations in a certain way that some

459
00:25:51,080 --> 00:25:53,600
Speaker 2: people still kind of see it through today, and which

460
00:25:53,600 --> 00:25:55,800
Speaker 2: is kind of the lens we're looking at it through

461
00:25:55,840 --> 00:26:01,439
Speaker 2: in this episode, which is that it's like the colonizers

462
00:26:01,600 --> 00:26:07,240
Speaker 2: coming into a country, exploiting it, leaving and then sending

463
00:26:07,880 --> 00:26:12,360
Speaker 2: a bill to the country right to repair the damage

464
00:26:12,400 --> 00:26:17,040
Speaker 2: done by colonialism. That that's essentially what's going on with

465
00:26:17,119 --> 00:26:22,359
Speaker 2: the Global North lending money interest to the global.

466
00:26:22,000 --> 00:26:24,840
Speaker 3: South right, and in the case of Sinkara at the time,

467
00:26:26,119 --> 00:26:28,840
Speaker 3: and it's good that he's you know, been sort of canonized,

468
00:26:28,840 --> 00:26:29,600
Speaker 3: I guess now.

469
00:26:29,480 --> 00:26:33,760
Speaker 1: But is that the right word. Yeah, okay.

470
00:26:35,840 --> 00:26:38,120
Speaker 3: At the time, basically it's send the message to all

471
00:26:38,160 --> 00:26:41,360
Speaker 3: other countries, like you see what happened to him when

472
00:26:41,400 --> 00:26:43,040
Speaker 3: you when you rise up and try and take a

473
00:26:43,080 --> 00:26:46,240
Speaker 3: stand against this kind of thing, and it basically quashed

474
00:26:46,320 --> 00:26:51,399
Speaker 3: things until the nineties when Bono got to be in

475
00:26:51,480 --> 00:26:51,919
Speaker 3: his bonnet.

476
00:26:53,280 --> 00:26:58,040
Speaker 2: Yeah, so that's a that's a really interesting thing that happened,

477
00:26:58,080 --> 00:27:01,600
Speaker 2: and it happened almost exclusive because of Bono. There was

478
00:27:01,640 --> 00:27:03,719
Speaker 2: a guy named Martin Dent who was a professor at

479
00:27:03,760 --> 00:27:06,639
Speaker 2: Keele University in the UK, and in the early nineties

480
00:27:06,680 --> 00:27:09,480
Speaker 2: he came up with this idea that, hey, the millennium's coming,

481
00:27:09,800 --> 00:27:11,679
Speaker 2: let's use it as a chance to like wipe the

482
00:27:11,760 --> 00:27:14,639
Speaker 2: debt free. Because in Jewish tradition there used to be

483
00:27:14,640 --> 00:27:16,840
Speaker 2: something called the Jubilee. We've talked about it before. I

484
00:27:16,880 --> 00:27:18,399
Speaker 2: don't remember what it was. I think we did one

485
00:27:18,440 --> 00:27:22,240
Speaker 2: on the Rolling Jubilee. Maybe maybe, But it's this idea

486
00:27:22,280 --> 00:27:25,920
Speaker 2: that every fifty years in Jewish culture, all debts would

487
00:27:25,960 --> 00:27:30,840
Speaker 2: be wiped free, right, And they were saying okay, yes, yeah, okay,

488
00:27:31,119 --> 00:27:33,320
Speaker 2: And so they were saying Dent was saying, hey, let's

489
00:27:33,359 --> 00:27:35,200
Speaker 2: just do this. We could totally do this and start

490
00:27:35,200 --> 00:27:38,199
Speaker 2: the millennium fresh and everybody on more of an equal footing.

491
00:27:38,480 --> 00:27:41,720
Speaker 2: And Bono is like, I like that a lot. And

492
00:27:41,800 --> 00:27:47,879
Speaker 2: he took this up and very nice. Sorry, he championed it. No,

493
00:27:47,880 --> 00:27:48,919
Speaker 2: no need for apologies.

494
00:27:48,920 --> 00:27:49,600
Speaker 1: I had that one.

495
00:27:50,200 --> 00:27:54,919
Speaker 2: He championed this whole idea and I don't want to

496
00:27:54,920 --> 00:27:58,680
Speaker 2: say single handedly, but largely was responsible for the eradication

497
00:27:58,760 --> 00:28:01,600
Speaker 2: of about one hundred and thirty billion dollars worth of debt.

498
00:28:01,840 --> 00:28:05,520
Speaker 2: He did almost single handedly just by going and talking

499
00:28:05,520 --> 00:28:07,879
Speaker 2: to the right people getting them on board.

500
00:28:08,119 --> 00:28:08,399
Speaker 1: Yeah.

501
00:28:08,400 --> 00:28:12,200
Speaker 3: I mean, there are a lot of stories of Bono's

502
00:28:12,280 --> 00:28:16,720
Speaker 3: charm in these rooms with these people that range from

503
00:28:16,960 --> 00:28:24,640
Speaker 3: you know, brutal dictators to far far right religious zelots

504
00:28:24,680 --> 00:28:27,480
Speaker 3: like Bono gets in the room with those guys. Bonna

505
00:28:27,560 --> 00:28:31,359
Speaker 3: is a Christian, very very Christian man, super Catholic, very Catholic.

506
00:28:31,440 --> 00:28:32,639
Speaker 3: I'm reading his book still now.

507
00:28:32,640 --> 00:28:33,080
Speaker 1: It's great.

508
00:28:33,560 --> 00:28:35,920
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, what's it called Catholic? Me Catholic?

509
00:28:36,000 --> 00:28:40,200
Speaker 1: You by Bona it is. I was trying to think

510
00:28:40,200 --> 00:28:42,680
Speaker 1: of another riff on that, but that nailed it. It's

511
00:28:42,720 --> 00:28:45,360
Speaker 1: called Surrender, I think, but really good book. Anyway.

512
00:28:45,640 --> 00:28:49,120
Speaker 3: Bono is a guy that can have a lot of

513
00:28:49,160 --> 00:28:51,360
Speaker 3: sway when he gets in a room with someone. And

514
00:28:51,400 --> 00:28:55,720
Speaker 3: he got together with Christian groups, with NGOs, with Republicans

515
00:28:55,720 --> 00:28:58,120
Speaker 3: and Democrats and all kinds of people from all over

516
00:28:58,120 --> 00:29:00,480
Speaker 3: the world, people he had to apologize for being in

517
00:29:00,520 --> 00:29:03,280
Speaker 3: the same room with, you know, because he thought he was,

518
00:29:03,440 --> 00:29:05,600
Speaker 3: you know, doing some good and he was and got

519
00:29:05,600 --> 00:29:09,520
Speaker 3: a lot of people on board, tens of millions of supporters.

520
00:29:10,240 --> 00:29:13,760
Speaker 3: It launched formerly in nineteen ninety six, and this was

521
00:29:13,800 --> 00:29:16,360
Speaker 3: called Jubilee two thousand. I don't think we mentioned the

522
00:29:16,360 --> 00:29:18,600
Speaker 3: official name. I think it's called what's it called now?

523
00:29:20,440 --> 00:29:22,400
Speaker 2: Just yes, that's much better.

524
00:29:22,480 --> 00:29:24,320
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a great name. I like Jubilee two thousand.

525
00:29:24,400 --> 00:29:25,560
Speaker 1: That has a fun ring to it.

526
00:29:26,120 --> 00:29:28,280
Speaker 2: Sure, and I think it served its purpose for a while.

527
00:29:28,600 --> 00:29:31,680
Speaker 3: But because of things like the Christian group involvement, you

528
00:29:31,760 --> 00:29:33,000
Speaker 3: had Republicans on board.

529
00:29:33,040 --> 00:29:33,920
Speaker 1: In some cases.

530
00:29:35,040 --> 00:29:38,720
Speaker 3: There was a guy named Spencer Bacchus from Alabama, a

531
00:29:38,760 --> 00:29:41,960
Speaker 3: rep there that basically said, hey, this will cost each

532
00:29:42,000 --> 00:29:47,160
Speaker 3: American a dollar twenty a year to get children out

533
00:29:47,200 --> 00:29:50,280
Speaker 3: of hunger all over the world. And it's not that

534
00:29:50,360 --> 00:29:53,280
Speaker 3: much money. Some people were slower to come around, but

535
00:29:53,520 --> 00:29:56,800
Speaker 3: even people that were slower to come around eventually said, well, listen,

536
00:29:56,800 --> 00:29:59,520
Speaker 3: they're probably not going to pay it anyway, so maybe

537
00:29:59,560 --> 00:30:01,080
Speaker 3: we should get on board with another plan.

538
00:30:02,200 --> 00:30:04,920
Speaker 2: Right, not everybody?

539
00:30:04,960 --> 00:30:05,120
Speaker 4: Did.

540
00:30:05,400 --> 00:30:10,040
Speaker 2: I read this American Heritage contemporaneous article that was like this,

541
00:30:10,280 --> 00:30:13,520
Speaker 2: this is reckless, especially for the GOP. It's going to

542
00:30:13,600 --> 00:30:16,560
Speaker 2: cost America billions of dollars and for what And now

543
00:30:16,600 --> 00:30:18,960
Speaker 2: in retrospect, it's like that article has an age very

544
00:30:18,960 --> 00:30:25,120
Speaker 2: well for humanity, that's what actually And so Spencer Bacchus,

545
00:30:25,160 --> 00:30:27,040
Speaker 2: he's a real hero here, like he made this his

546
00:30:27,160 --> 00:30:30,280
Speaker 2: mission and he actually reached across the island, worked with

547
00:30:30,320 --> 00:30:35,200
Speaker 2: Maxine Waters, an arch liberal, and got what was called

548
00:30:35,200 --> 00:30:38,200
Speaker 2: the Jubilee Act passed finally in two thousand and eight.

549
00:30:38,720 --> 00:30:42,360
Speaker 2: And it was a hugely bipartisan act that wiped out

550
00:30:42,400 --> 00:30:46,160
Speaker 2: a lot of debt that America held. And by America

551
00:30:46,560 --> 00:30:49,600
Speaker 2: being a part of this and other European nations being

552
00:30:49,600 --> 00:30:52,479
Speaker 2: a part of this, other nations started to follow. Like

553
00:30:52,520 --> 00:30:56,080
Speaker 2: Bono would say, the IMF got on board, the World

554
00:30:56,080 --> 00:30:59,360
Speaker 2: Bank got on board, and so suddenly a lot of

555
00:30:59,440 --> 00:31:02,600
Speaker 2: money that the global South. Oh, the global North was

556
00:31:02,760 --> 00:31:03,840
Speaker 2: just wiped out.

557
00:31:04,800 --> 00:31:09,480
Speaker 3: Yeah, Bona said, every country deserves to live free of poverty.

558
00:31:09,520 --> 00:31:10,880
Speaker 3: Every street should have a name.

559
00:31:11,520 --> 00:31:12,840
Speaker 2: Do it in the name of love.

560
00:31:14,880 --> 00:31:16,840
Speaker 1: Oh wow, we could really go down a rabbit all here.

561
00:31:17,240 --> 00:31:23,040
Speaker 2: Yeah, on your knees, boy, I'm not sure that fits.

562
00:31:23,480 --> 00:31:28,560
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's pretty good. So seventy percent, I believe was

563
00:31:28,640 --> 00:31:32,240
Speaker 3: the number. Initially, the debt was going to be reduced

564
00:31:32,240 --> 00:31:36,440
Speaker 3: by seventy percent for thirty three different countries in Africa,

565
00:31:36,520 --> 00:31:42,120
Speaker 3: Latin America, and Asia, and the US agreed to more

566
00:31:42,160 --> 00:31:47,120
Speaker 3: debt cancelation. I think there was a Jubilee debt campaign

567
00:31:47,120 --> 00:31:51,360
Speaker 3: in the UK that stepped up between twoenty twenty fifteen

568
00:31:51,760 --> 00:31:53,880
Speaker 3: that was about one hundred and thirty billion dollars worth

569
00:31:53,920 --> 00:31:57,160
Speaker 3: of debt canceled. And we do should we should point out,

570
00:31:57,200 --> 00:32:00,320
Speaker 3: Liviya very and I'm glad you did this. Reminded that

571
00:32:00,960 --> 00:32:04,080
Speaker 3: it's not a dollars dollar thing, like you can spend

572
00:32:04,800 --> 00:32:07,680
Speaker 3: one hundred million bucks to maybe cancel a billion dollars

573
00:32:07,720 --> 00:32:09,840
Speaker 3: in debt sometimes, right, because.

574
00:32:09,600 --> 00:32:12,200
Speaker 2: You're taking into kind of all the interests and researchructing

575
00:32:12,280 --> 00:32:15,280
Speaker 2: and all that stuff involved, you're just they really just

576
00:32:15,280 --> 00:32:17,360
Speaker 2: owe you one hundred million in principle, but it ballooned

577
00:32:17,440 --> 00:32:19,400
Speaker 2: up to a billion dollars. But as far as that

578
00:32:19,440 --> 00:32:22,400
Speaker 2: lower income country is concerned, that's a billion dollars. They

579
00:32:22,400 --> 00:32:24,080
Speaker 2: don't have to pay where to you, it was just

580
00:32:24,120 --> 00:32:26,160
Speaker 2: one hundred million, just one hundred million.

581
00:32:25,960 --> 00:32:30,320
Speaker 3: Yeah, exactly. So that's basically what happened in the sort

582
00:32:30,360 --> 00:32:33,200
Speaker 3: of two thousands is all these countries got on board.

583
00:32:34,440 --> 00:32:37,720
Speaker 3: The framework was sort of led by the US for

584
00:32:37,840 --> 00:32:41,120
Speaker 3: the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries initiative from the World Bank

585
00:32:41,120 --> 00:32:45,000
Speaker 3: and the IMF, and you know, it worked pretty good

586
00:32:45,200 --> 00:32:49,000
Speaker 3: through the two thousands and twenty ten's for the most part.

587
00:32:49,920 --> 00:32:50,360
Speaker 1: It helped.

588
00:32:50,440 --> 00:32:53,360
Speaker 2: It did, and as a matter of fact, it was

589
00:32:53,520 --> 00:32:55,800
Speaker 2: helped not just by that initiative. So that was a

590
00:32:55,800 --> 00:32:58,800
Speaker 2: big deal, right, Like we shouldn't really breeze past it.

591
00:32:58,800 --> 00:32:59,959
Speaker 2: It was a big deal. There was a lot of

592
00:33:00,080 --> 00:33:03,800
Speaker 2: heart behind it, a lot of genuine like humanity from

593
00:33:03,880 --> 00:33:06,200
Speaker 2: countries that held a lot of debt that just said, okay,

594
00:33:06,240 --> 00:33:09,320
Speaker 2: we're going to forgive this for the greater good. But

595
00:33:09,360 --> 00:33:12,080
Speaker 2: there was another thing that happened too, which was the

596
00:33:12,080 --> 00:33:16,320
Speaker 2: global financial crisis of two thousand and seven and eight. Right,

597
00:33:16,440 --> 00:33:21,320
Speaker 2: the big meltdown from the US housing market bubble. That actually,

598
00:33:21,360 --> 00:33:25,600
Speaker 2: because the US FED was so interested in combating the

599
00:33:25,640 --> 00:33:28,960
Speaker 2: effects of that and the recession that followed, they dropped

600
00:33:29,040 --> 00:33:33,360
Speaker 2: interest rates like crazy to like basically zero, and so

601
00:33:33,440 --> 00:33:36,720
Speaker 2: that meant that international lending rates were also really low too,

602
00:33:36,880 --> 00:33:39,280
Speaker 2: which led to easy money. A lot of people could

603
00:33:39,280 --> 00:33:41,080
Speaker 2: borrow money. There were a lot of rich countries that

604
00:33:41,120 --> 00:33:44,160
Speaker 2: had lots of money to lend, and countries that wanted

605
00:33:44,160 --> 00:33:46,160
Speaker 2: it could borrow it for really cheap. And it was

606
00:33:46,200 --> 00:33:49,480
Speaker 2: so cheap you could borrow money to pay back the

607
00:33:49,560 --> 00:33:52,080
Speaker 2: other money you just borrowed. It was kind of like

608
00:33:52,200 --> 00:33:52,920
Speaker 2: that set up.

609
00:33:53,200 --> 00:33:56,640
Speaker 1: I was just leverntry at the time. Yeah, I did

610
00:33:56,760 --> 00:33:57,600
Speaker 1: exactly that.

611
00:33:57,680 --> 00:34:01,280
Speaker 3: I got a stated in come loan for our first

612
00:34:01,280 --> 00:34:04,880
Speaker 3: house by just walking in there and saying, we make

613
00:34:04,920 --> 00:34:07,600
Speaker 3: this munch of money, and they went, sounds great. And

614
00:34:07,720 --> 00:34:09,440
Speaker 3: we had a bunch of credit card debt and we

615
00:34:09,520 --> 00:34:13,160
Speaker 3: rolled that into that loan because we had overborrowed for

616
00:34:13,400 --> 00:34:15,279
Speaker 3: a lot of different reasons, not because we were just

617
00:34:15,480 --> 00:34:18,600
Speaker 3: living the high life emily early because early business investment

618
00:34:18,600 --> 00:34:21,200
Speaker 3: and stuff like that. But we rolled all that into

619
00:34:21,480 --> 00:34:26,480
Speaker 3: one big thing, and so I can, like you can

620
00:34:26,560 --> 00:34:29,239
Speaker 3: use the example of an individual, and it's kind of

621
00:34:29,239 --> 00:34:30,480
Speaker 3: the same as these countries.

622
00:34:30,760 --> 00:34:33,879
Speaker 2: It's the exact same thing. It's all the same principles,

623
00:34:34,080 --> 00:34:37,240
Speaker 2: it's even largely the same mechanisms with the same people

624
00:34:37,320 --> 00:34:40,360
Speaker 2: involved as far as lenders go. It's just on a

625
00:34:40,400 --> 00:34:44,080
Speaker 2: global scale or like a like an individual scale. But

626
00:34:44,120 --> 00:34:46,839
Speaker 2: it's that's a great point. It's virtually the same thing.

627
00:34:47,640 --> 00:34:50,640
Speaker 2: So with all of this easy money, people started racking

628
00:34:50,719 --> 00:34:53,480
Speaker 2: up more and more and more debt because it seemed

629
00:34:53,480 --> 00:34:55,560
Speaker 2: like the spigot was never going to turn off, which

630
00:34:55,600 --> 00:34:57,839
Speaker 2: is always like, when you start thinking the spigot's never

631
00:34:57,840 --> 00:34:59,560
Speaker 2: going to turn off, you should stop immediately.

632
00:34:59,680 --> 00:35:01,680
Speaker 1: Yeah, because that means that the spigot.

633
00:35:01,360 --> 00:35:03,719
Speaker 2: Turning off is right around the corner, and everybody's gonna

634
00:35:03,719 --> 00:35:05,960
Speaker 2: get caught with the hot potato. And that's essentially what

635
00:35:06,040 --> 00:35:07,080
Speaker 2: happened when COVID hit.

636
00:35:07,200 --> 00:35:08,960
Speaker 1: You're mixing metaphors in a great.

637
00:35:08,760 --> 00:35:11,200
Speaker 2: Way around the corner with the hot potato.

638
00:35:11,600 --> 00:35:14,520
Speaker 1: You know, spiggots and hot potatoes. And I don't know

639
00:35:14,520 --> 00:35:15,320
Speaker 1: what's coming next.

640
00:35:15,840 --> 00:35:18,799
Speaker 2: There's probably some baseball metaphor or something. Okay, you know,

641
00:35:19,040 --> 00:35:22,680
Speaker 2: you get caught with three loans and you're out. I'm

642
00:35:23,000 --> 00:35:25,239
Speaker 2: I'm really I'm off my game, Chuck. I used to

643
00:35:25,280 --> 00:35:27,960
Speaker 2: be so much better at this, and then you kids.

644
00:35:28,360 --> 00:35:29,000
Speaker 1: You're killing it.

645
00:35:29,400 --> 00:35:32,319
Speaker 2: I feel like it's evaporated a little bit, just temporarily,

646
00:35:32,400 --> 00:35:33,200
Speaker 2: but a little bit.

647
00:35:33,320 --> 00:35:34,319
Speaker 1: No, No, you're crushing it.

648
00:35:34,719 --> 00:35:36,520
Speaker 2: Okay, Well, I say that we take a little break.

649
00:35:36,520 --> 00:35:39,320
Speaker 2: I'm going to recollect myself. And we've reached the COVID

650
00:35:39,400 --> 00:35:47,839
Speaker 2: pandemic having a huge impact on that debt, definitely large

651
00:35:47,840 --> 00:35:48,560
Speaker 2: hous of each.

652
00:35:50,880 --> 00:36:01,040
Speaker 4: Sksh sks tough.

653
00:36:00,840 --> 00:36:07,440
Speaker 2: You should know. So COVID nineteen strikes, and all of

654
00:36:07,480 --> 00:36:10,360
Speaker 2: a sudden, that money dries up because everybody needs money,

655
00:36:10,520 --> 00:36:14,240
Speaker 2: and like all countries, lower income, middle income, high income

656
00:36:14,280 --> 00:36:18,120
Speaker 2: countries are all borrowing money because business as usual has

657
00:36:18,200 --> 00:36:19,360
Speaker 2: just stopped, right.

658
00:36:19,920 --> 00:36:22,240
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean health care costs are going through the roof,

659
00:36:23,120 --> 00:36:25,960
Speaker 3: business is going into the toilet, and trade has gone

660
00:36:25,960 --> 00:36:28,640
Speaker 3: into the toilet, not completely, but for a large part.

661
00:36:29,320 --> 00:36:32,680
Speaker 3: And so the world all of a sudden was thrust

662
00:36:32,760 --> 00:36:38,360
Speaker 3: into a global financial crisis. And I love that Olivia

663
00:36:38,440 --> 00:36:40,440
Speaker 3: even used your word. She used upshot.

664
00:36:40,920 --> 00:36:42,520
Speaker 1: I saw that it's wear enough.

665
00:36:43,960 --> 00:36:46,759
Speaker 3: The upshot, though, is now because of all this, they're

666
00:36:47,360 --> 00:36:49,239
Speaker 3: all of these countries, not all of them but many

667
00:36:49,280 --> 00:36:51,400
Speaker 3: of these countries that we've been talking about are in

668
00:36:51,440 --> 00:36:55,200
Speaker 3: more debt than ever before. The debt burden of nations

669
00:36:55,200 --> 00:36:58,840
Speaker 3: classified as developing nations went from two point one trillion

670
00:36:59,239 --> 00:37:02,399
Speaker 3: in two thousand to four point one trillion in two

671
00:37:02,440 --> 00:37:05,960
Speaker 3: thousand and nine to eleven point one in twenty twenty one.

672
00:37:06,440 --> 00:37:09,880
Speaker 2: That's crazy. And then like the external debt to gross

673
00:37:09,960 --> 00:37:13,719
Speaker 2: national income ratio among those countries external debt is all

674
00:37:13,800 --> 00:37:18,560
Speaker 2: the foreign held debt to their gross national income went

675
00:37:18,600 --> 00:37:21,520
Speaker 2: from seventeen percent in twenty ten to forty eight point

676
00:37:21,640 --> 00:37:25,360
Speaker 2: five percent twenty twenty one. Daggering number it is, and

677
00:37:25,400 --> 00:37:27,960
Speaker 2: it's a really scary number too, especially if your country,

678
00:37:28,160 --> 00:37:31,160
Speaker 2: like I need to feed my people and I need

679
00:37:31,200 --> 00:37:34,040
Speaker 2: some money, and now it's the money's dried up because

680
00:37:34,040 --> 00:37:37,000
Speaker 2: some of these wealthier countries are borrowing two and that

681
00:37:37,000 --> 00:37:39,200
Speaker 2: that also means that they need the money that I

682
00:37:39,239 --> 00:37:42,359
Speaker 2: already owe them, So they're not going to be very

683
00:37:42,360 --> 00:37:45,920
Speaker 2: interested in forgiving debts right now, especially post COVID. So

684
00:37:45,960 --> 00:37:48,440
Speaker 2: it put everybody in a really precarious situation that we're

685
00:37:48,480 --> 00:37:51,080
Speaker 2: still in now. And it followed the same thing that

686
00:37:51,160 --> 00:37:54,960
Speaker 2: happened in nineteen eighty two inflation happened, which meant that

687
00:37:55,000 --> 00:37:56,920
Speaker 2: the value of the dollar went down and value of

688
00:37:56,920 --> 00:37:59,600
Speaker 2: international currency went down, so it made it more expensive

689
00:37:59,600 --> 00:38:02,720
Speaker 2: to pay your debts. And then also or you needed

690
00:38:02,760 --> 00:38:05,399
Speaker 2: more money to pay the same amount. And then also

691
00:38:06,320 --> 00:38:09,200
Speaker 2: as interest rates went up, that meant that it was

692
00:38:09,320 --> 00:38:11,960
Speaker 2: unsustainable to service a debt, just like it was in

693
00:38:12,080 --> 00:38:15,080
Speaker 2: nineteen eighty two. It just got too expensive. In countries

694
00:38:15,120 --> 00:38:17,080
Speaker 2: now are doing the same thing. They're saying, I don't

695
00:38:17,120 --> 00:38:20,879
Speaker 2: know what we can do to pay this, we need help.

696
00:38:21,440 --> 00:38:22,680
Speaker 1: Yeah, and a lot of it.

697
00:38:22,760 --> 00:38:24,880
Speaker 3: You know, when you break it down, it's really important

698
00:38:24,880 --> 00:38:28,160
Speaker 3: to look at where this money's coming from, because it

699
00:38:28,320 --> 00:38:32,479
Speaker 3: used to be a lot more like IMF multilateral sort

700
00:38:32,520 --> 00:38:36,440
Speaker 3: of lending now. I think there was one estimate LIVA

701
00:38:36,440 --> 00:38:41,040
Speaker 3: included that African countries about thirty five percent of their

702
00:38:41,080 --> 00:38:45,440
Speaker 3: external debt to private creditors which have interest rates more

703
00:38:45,480 --> 00:38:49,480
Speaker 3: along the lines of five percent twelve percent to Chinese creditors.

704
00:38:49,520 --> 00:38:51,960
Speaker 3: They've China has really stepped in to fill a void,

705
00:38:52,080 --> 00:38:54,640
Speaker 3: So just kind of keep your eye on that. At

706
00:38:54,640 --> 00:38:58,680
Speaker 3: about two point seven percent, thirteen percent to other governments,

707
00:38:58,719 --> 00:39:02,080
Speaker 3: in thirty nine percent to those multilateral institutions that we've

708
00:39:02,120 --> 00:39:04,279
Speaker 3: been talking about at a rate of about one point

709
00:39:04,360 --> 00:39:09,520
Speaker 3: five percent, so more money in private debt, less money

710
00:39:09,520 --> 00:39:12,960
Speaker 3: and multilateral institutions. And if you're talking about two or

711
00:39:13,000 --> 00:39:16,879
Speaker 3: three percentage points on hundreds of billions of dollars, that's

712
00:39:16,920 --> 00:39:17,880
Speaker 3: a huge difference.

713
00:39:18,440 --> 00:39:20,600
Speaker 2: Yeah. And the reason you're like, well, why don't they

714
00:39:20,640 --> 00:39:23,640
Speaker 2: just get it all from the IMF, Well, those private

715
00:39:23,760 --> 00:39:26,480
Speaker 2: lenders they have high interest rates, but they don't come

716
00:39:26,480 --> 00:39:30,319
Speaker 2: with strings attacked exactly raising taxes on your people and

717
00:39:30,360 --> 00:39:33,640
Speaker 2: not spending on social programs anymore. If they're just using

718
00:39:33,719 --> 00:39:37,520
Speaker 2: market conditions, right and saying, well, your country's this risky,

719
00:39:37,560 --> 00:39:39,560
Speaker 2: so we're going to charge this interest rate on'll do it.

720
00:39:39,640 --> 00:39:42,040
Speaker 2: Chic with it, right, But the IMF will say, we'll

721
00:39:42,080 --> 00:39:43,719
Speaker 2: charge you a low interest rate, but you also have

722
00:39:43,760 --> 00:39:47,719
Speaker 2: to completely restructure your economy to a way we say. So,

723
00:39:48,040 --> 00:39:51,960
Speaker 2: there's pluses and minuses of both. But that those private

724
00:39:52,040 --> 00:39:55,000
Speaker 2: lenders becoming bigger and bigger in the last couple decades

725
00:39:55,080 --> 00:40:01,239
Speaker 2: is really distressing because the collectively private lending now rivals

726
00:40:01,320 --> 00:40:04,840
Speaker 2: like the Paris Club as far as geo political global

727
00:40:04,920 --> 00:40:09,239
Speaker 2: influence goes. And that's that's distressing to me. You might say, well,

728
00:40:09,280 --> 00:40:11,880
Speaker 2: it's not like the Paris Club and other wealthy nations

729
00:40:11,880 --> 00:40:13,719
Speaker 2: did a very good job when they were in control.

730
00:40:14,840 --> 00:40:17,480
Speaker 2: They were still in some way, shape or form like

731
00:40:18,800 --> 00:40:21,680
Speaker 2: subject to the to the people back home in their votes. Right,

732
00:40:22,360 --> 00:40:25,799
Speaker 2: there's at least still nominally that with with you know, corporations,

733
00:40:25,800 --> 00:40:29,799
Speaker 2: there's nothing but their shareholders. It's just it's different to me,

734
00:40:29,880 --> 00:40:33,200
Speaker 2: and I'm not entirely comfortable with it. But the upshot

735
00:40:33,239 --> 00:40:36,840
Speaker 2: is there's now private lenders that own entire chunks of

736
00:40:36,880 --> 00:40:41,839
Speaker 2: whole nation's economies. Like there's a commodities group called Glencore.

737
00:40:42,280 --> 00:40:45,600
Speaker 2: I think they're out of Switzerland. They own a third

738
00:40:45,640 --> 00:40:49,799
Speaker 2: of Chad's national debt a third, and they they are

739
00:40:49,920 --> 00:40:54,520
Speaker 2: very happy to give Chad that money because Chad has

740
00:40:54,560 --> 00:40:58,319
Speaker 2: secured that debt with its natural resources. So if Chad

741
00:40:58,320 --> 00:41:01,200
Speaker 2: can't pay its debt via money, glink Core says, just

742
00:41:01,200 --> 00:41:03,560
Speaker 2: give us some crude oil, and they do very frequently.

743
00:41:03,960 --> 00:41:08,480
Speaker 1: How much of the national debt that they owe of karens.

744
00:41:09,320 --> 00:41:12,440
Speaker 2: I know, sorry, no, I like it. And I'm like,

745
00:41:12,520 --> 00:41:15,080
Speaker 2: I'm surely saying Chad right right, it's not.

746
00:41:15,120 --> 00:41:17,640
Speaker 1: Shod or I think it's Chad.

747
00:41:18,040 --> 00:41:19,640
Speaker 2: I think that's what I've always heard too.

748
00:41:19,719 --> 00:41:20,719
Speaker 1: That's what I've always heard.

749
00:41:21,200 --> 00:41:23,719
Speaker 3: Because of the COVID pandemic, the Group of twenty, the

750
00:41:23,719 --> 00:41:27,520
Speaker 3: G twenty organization basically said, you know, we can suspend

751
00:41:28,560 --> 00:41:33,200
Speaker 3: some interest payments because of COVID, but that's a suspension

752
00:41:33,280 --> 00:41:36,680
Speaker 3: of interest. It's not absolving any kind of debt at Also,

753
00:41:37,080 --> 00:41:39,240
Speaker 3: it's just kind of like a temporary band aid, of course.

754
00:41:40,440 --> 00:41:42,439
Speaker 3: And you know, basically where the point now where there

755
00:41:42,560 --> 00:41:47,760
Speaker 3: is not any sort of straightforward, non case by case

756
00:41:48,239 --> 00:41:53,759
Speaker 3: way to make restructuring a country's debt happen. It makes

757
00:41:53,760 --> 00:41:56,240
Speaker 3: it really tough to sort of figure out an easy

758
00:41:56,239 --> 00:41:58,359
Speaker 3: solution for sure.

759
00:41:58,440 --> 00:42:00,480
Speaker 2: And before, I mean it was convoluted enough when you

760
00:42:00,560 --> 00:42:02,600
Speaker 2: just had like the IMF and the World Bank and

761
00:42:02,640 --> 00:42:05,200
Speaker 2: the nation's funding them arguing over who did what or

762
00:42:05,280 --> 00:42:08,160
Speaker 2: needs to do what. Now you have China who may

763
00:42:08,280 --> 00:42:09,799
Speaker 2: or may not talk to you or come to the

764
00:42:09,800 --> 00:42:12,279
Speaker 2: table if you ask them to. And then you have

765
00:42:12,320 --> 00:42:14,640
Speaker 2: the private lenders who are like, hey, we're just in

766
00:42:14,680 --> 00:42:18,080
Speaker 2: it for the money here, we don't want to do

767
00:42:18,200 --> 00:42:21,560
Speaker 2: any kind of debt forgiveness. And because you've got all

768
00:42:21,560 --> 00:42:25,279
Speaker 2: these different players all and all of them need to

769
00:42:25,320 --> 00:42:28,839
Speaker 2: come together for debt cancelation to happen. It does make

770
00:42:28,880 --> 00:42:31,520
Speaker 2: it much more difficult because if the private lenders just

771
00:42:31,560 --> 00:42:35,840
Speaker 2: step back and say, yeah, United States, Paris Club, IMF,

772
00:42:35,880 --> 00:42:39,080
Speaker 2: World Bank, you guys forgive a bunch of those debts

773
00:42:39,120 --> 00:42:41,960
Speaker 2: down there in Africa, and then they'll have money to

774
00:42:42,040 --> 00:42:44,960
Speaker 2: pay the debts for the stuff we lent them at

775
00:42:45,000 --> 00:42:47,680
Speaker 2: the same rates that we lent it to before. So

776
00:42:47,840 --> 00:42:52,640
Speaker 2: what you're essentially having on this global international finance scale

777
00:42:53,239 --> 00:42:59,760
Speaker 2: are rich governments bailing out private lenders when their loans

778
00:43:00,360 --> 00:43:04,200
Speaker 2: come under jeopardy to protect those corporate profits. And those

779
00:43:04,280 --> 00:43:08,760
Speaker 2: governments that fund the IMF fund it with taxpayer money.

780
00:43:09,520 --> 00:43:14,120
Speaker 3: That's right, And the private lenders there's not much of

781
00:43:14,120 --> 00:43:15,239
Speaker 3: a downside for them, is there.

782
00:43:15,600 --> 00:43:18,120
Speaker 2: No, not at all. They can just lend, lend, lend,

783
00:43:18,160 --> 00:43:20,120
Speaker 2: and they know that eventually the IMF and the World

784
00:43:20,160 --> 00:43:22,799
Speaker 2: Bank's going to bail these people out because there's softies

785
00:43:22,800 --> 00:43:26,000
Speaker 2: and suckers who can't see some people starve at the

786
00:43:26,719 --> 00:43:31,800
Speaker 2: in exchange for better access to some or diamonds.

787
00:43:31,480 --> 00:43:32,240
Speaker 1: Right exactly.

788
00:43:33,000 --> 00:43:38,120
Speaker 3: There's another way that debt has can be canceled out,

789
00:43:38,120 --> 00:43:41,240
Speaker 3: and that's becoming more and more popular these days, although

790
00:43:41,239 --> 00:43:42,920
Speaker 3: on a pretty small level. If you look at the

791
00:43:42,920 --> 00:43:50,600
Speaker 3: big picture is debt relief for nature incentives, for natural

792
00:43:50,600 --> 00:43:56,359
Speaker 3: incentives and conservation incentives. Basically groups coming in. Sometimes it's

793
00:43:57,040 --> 00:43:59,880
Speaker 3: it's usually a private group, like and Belize the Nature

794
00:44:00,040 --> 00:44:03,360
Speaker 3: Conservancy came in in twenty twenty one and said, and

795
00:44:03,440 --> 00:44:07,239
Speaker 3: of course this is this is small beans in the

796
00:44:07,239 --> 00:44:09,920
Speaker 3: big picture, but it's happening. And they said, hey, why

797
00:44:09,920 --> 00:44:13,839
Speaker 3: don't you will reduce your external debt by about ten

798
00:44:13,920 --> 00:44:17,239
Speaker 3: percent of your GDP in exchange, you got to put

799
00:44:17,239 --> 00:44:21,200
Speaker 3: about four million bucks a year into marine conservation or

800
00:44:21,239 --> 00:44:23,799
Speaker 3: another country might step up and say, hey, will help

801
00:44:23,840 --> 00:44:27,200
Speaker 3: preserve this coral reef and put money toward that if

802
00:44:27,239 --> 00:44:31,920
Speaker 3: you cancel some of our debt. Climate change, that's another

803
00:44:32,080 --> 00:44:36,239
Speaker 3: you know, it's not necessarily colonialism how you might traditionally

804
00:44:36,280 --> 00:44:39,280
Speaker 3: think of it, but there is an argument going around

805
00:44:39,280 --> 00:44:42,600
Speaker 3: more and more that hey, these richer northern countries are

806
00:44:42,600 --> 00:44:46,399
Speaker 3: the ones that are destroying the environment for the most part,

807
00:44:46,560 --> 00:44:49,920
Speaker 3: and these poorer countries are the ones that are suffering

808
00:44:49,960 --> 00:44:52,600
Speaker 3: and don't have the kind of money to help themselves

809
00:44:52,640 --> 00:44:55,319
Speaker 3: like we do. So like that shit factor in as well.

810
00:44:56,040 --> 00:44:59,080
Speaker 2: Yeah, like if you see things like you do, colonialism

811
00:45:00,000 --> 00:45:02,080
Speaker 2: can easily apply that to climate change too, Like, why

812
00:45:02,080 --> 00:45:06,120
Speaker 2: should these countries who contributed almost nothing to climate change

813
00:45:06,600 --> 00:45:08,439
Speaker 2: but are going to suffer for it have to pay

814
00:45:08,440 --> 00:45:11,120
Speaker 2: for it themselves. That doesn't make any sense because of

815
00:45:11,200 --> 00:45:13,640
Speaker 2: where they are. And then there's even worse than that,

816
00:45:13,680 --> 00:45:17,200
Speaker 2: there's this terrible circular logic where those countries that are

817
00:45:17,239 --> 00:45:20,400
Speaker 2: going to get hit the worst by climate change and

818
00:45:20,480 --> 00:45:22,960
Speaker 2: need the most money to spend on bracing themselves for

819
00:45:23,000 --> 00:45:26,680
Speaker 2: climate change are then the riskiest countries to lend to

820
00:45:26,880 --> 00:45:29,960
Speaker 2: because they're most susceptible to climate change, so it costs

821
00:45:30,000 --> 00:45:33,280
Speaker 2: them the most to borrow money to protect themselves against

822
00:45:33,360 --> 00:45:37,000
Speaker 2: climate change. Yeah, that's the situation that we're in right now,

823
00:45:37,160 --> 00:45:38,520
Speaker 2: and so a lot of people have kind of moved

824
00:45:38,560 --> 00:45:42,160
Speaker 2: on from colonialism to Okay, this climate change thing is

825
00:45:42,200 --> 00:45:43,920
Speaker 2: actually a real thing, and it's not the fault of

826
00:45:43,960 --> 00:45:47,000
Speaker 2: the global South. It's the global norse responsibility to pay

827
00:45:47,000 --> 00:45:49,440
Speaker 2: for the mess it created, and the global North is

828
00:45:49,480 --> 00:45:51,760
Speaker 2: not necessarily on board with that at this time.

829
00:45:52,120 --> 00:45:54,040
Speaker 3: Yeah, and to kind of put a button on what

830
00:45:54,080 --> 00:45:58,560
Speaker 3: I mentioned earlier about the R word, there's a historian

831
00:45:58,600 --> 00:46:02,480
Speaker 3: at the University of West Indies, Hillary Beckles, who did

832
00:46:02,520 --> 00:46:05,480
Speaker 3: some back of the envelope calculations. I'm sure it was

833
00:46:05,480 --> 00:46:07,920
Speaker 3: more rigorous than that. I don't want to achieve in it.

834
00:46:08,080 --> 00:46:12,920
Speaker 3: But basically said, in the Caribbean alone, Europeans got about

835
00:46:13,080 --> 00:46:15,719
Speaker 3: two hundred years of free labor to the tune of

836
00:46:15,760 --> 00:46:20,160
Speaker 3: about eight trillion dollars. So don't think of it again

837
00:46:20,200 --> 00:46:24,120
Speaker 3: as a reparation. But it's like it's just, hey, we'll

838
00:46:24,160 --> 00:46:30,600
Speaker 3: pay you for all that work that happened for two centuries. Basically,

839
00:46:31,560 --> 00:46:33,319
Speaker 3: it's a long overdue bill and we're going to pay

840
00:46:33,360 --> 00:46:33,680
Speaker 3: it now.

841
00:46:34,200 --> 00:46:36,640
Speaker 2: So if you think that eight trillion is eye popping,

842
00:46:36,719 --> 00:46:41,160
Speaker 2: get this. There's a twenty twenty two study by some

843
00:46:41,280 --> 00:46:44,960
Speaker 2: academics I think out of Austria and Spain, and they

844
00:46:45,000 --> 00:46:48,440
Speaker 2: found that in the year twenty fifteen alone, the global

845
00:46:48,480 --> 00:46:52,760
Speaker 2: North appropriated from the global South. You ready, twelve billion

846
00:46:52,800 --> 00:46:55,960
Speaker 2: tons of raw materials, eight hundred and twenty two million

847
00:46:56,000 --> 00:47:00,719
Speaker 2: hectares of land I think two hundred or twenty one

848
00:47:00,800 --> 00:47:04,839
Speaker 2: exit jewels of electricity. Surely that's an enormous amount, right

849
00:47:05,520 --> 00:47:08,480
Speaker 2: in three hundred and ninety two billion hours of labor.

850
00:47:09,160 --> 00:47:12,040
Speaker 2: This is twenty fifteen only that was worth to the

851
00:47:12,040 --> 00:47:16,720
Speaker 2: global North ten point eight trillion dollars between nineteen nineteen

852
00:47:17,200 --> 00:47:21,440
Speaker 2: twenty fifteen, that total two hundred and forty two trillion

853
00:47:21,520 --> 00:47:25,080
Speaker 2: dollars of wealth that was essentially extracted from the South

854
00:47:25,120 --> 00:47:27,359
Speaker 2: by the North. And you say, well, hey, wait a minute,

855
00:47:27,400 --> 00:47:30,480
Speaker 2: we're not using slave labor anymore. We're not just going

856
00:47:30,520 --> 00:47:34,000
Speaker 2: in there at gunpoint and extracting those gems and those

857
00:47:34,000 --> 00:47:37,239
Speaker 2: oil anymore. And no, it's true, but it's what I

858
00:47:37,320 --> 00:47:41,040
Speaker 2: was talking about earlier. There's now trade inequality where we

859
00:47:41,120 --> 00:47:43,919
Speaker 2: pay very cheap prices for the raw materials and then

860
00:47:44,200 --> 00:47:46,760
Speaker 2: sell it much much higher prices back to the people

861
00:47:47,000 --> 00:47:49,319
Speaker 2: we got those raw materials from. We don't give them

862
00:47:49,320 --> 00:47:52,000
Speaker 2: a fair price for what this stuff we're taking from

863
00:47:52,000 --> 00:47:55,560
Speaker 2: them is actually worth. And that's the problem, that's the

864
00:47:55,640 --> 00:47:57,279
Speaker 2: current problem right now. And that's why a lot of

865
00:47:57,280 --> 00:48:00,359
Speaker 2: people say, Okay, this stuff is so imbalanced. This debt

866
00:48:00,520 --> 00:48:03,640
Speaker 2: to have to pay for being impoverished by the North

867
00:48:03,960 --> 00:48:06,200
Speaker 2: doesn't make any sense, and we should cancel it. And

868
00:48:06,239 --> 00:48:08,120
Speaker 2: I mean, I think it's pretty clear where I land

869
00:48:08,160 --> 00:48:10,879
Speaker 2: on that, but there's plenty of other people who are like, look, man,

870
00:48:10,920 --> 00:48:14,080
Speaker 2: I don't even feel good about paying on social spending

871
00:48:14,120 --> 00:48:17,080
Speaker 2: in my own country right let alone another country, and

872
00:48:17,320 --> 00:48:19,319
Speaker 2: those people are going to be very difficult to get

873
00:48:19,320 --> 00:48:22,800
Speaker 2: on board, but it can happen. Bono did it before,

874
00:48:22,840 --> 00:48:23,640
Speaker 2: he can do it again.

875
00:48:24,280 --> 00:48:28,120
Speaker 3: Yeah, And the only thing I'll say is, like, if

876
00:48:28,160 --> 00:48:30,399
Speaker 3: you end up coming down on the other side of this,

877
00:48:32,400 --> 00:48:36,920
Speaker 3: that's fine, if you've done the research and you understand

878
00:48:36,960 --> 00:48:41,359
Speaker 3: the complications of world economies.

879
00:48:41,440 --> 00:48:43,360
Speaker 1: Like what you shouldn't do.

880
00:48:43,360 --> 00:48:46,480
Speaker 3: Though, is just think, oh, well, it's as easy as

881
00:48:46,520 --> 00:48:48,680
Speaker 3: like everyone's on America's teat.

882
00:48:50,160 --> 00:48:50,440
Speaker 2: Right.

883
00:48:50,560 --> 00:48:53,520
Speaker 3: You know, it's more complicated than that. If you don't

884
00:48:53,520 --> 00:48:56,400
Speaker 3: agree in the end, fine, but at least like do

885
00:48:56,480 --> 00:48:59,480
Speaker 3: the heavy lifting of learning about it and then make

886
00:48:59,560 --> 00:49:01,480
Speaker 3: up your mind and don't just take sort of the

887
00:49:01,600 --> 00:49:04,839
Speaker 3: lazy way out. So you got anything else, I got

888
00:49:04,840 --> 00:49:07,959
Speaker 3: nothing else, just a quick I made a Karen joke

889
00:49:08,400 --> 00:49:11,120
Speaker 3: and a Chad joke. I love Karen's and Chads, and

890
00:49:11,160 --> 00:49:13,880
Speaker 3: I think that is all so dumb, but real Karens

891
00:49:13,880 --> 00:49:15,920
Speaker 3: and Chads have had a hard time with that stuff.

892
00:49:17,360 --> 00:49:19,279
Speaker 3: And I didn't want to add to that. And I

893
00:49:19,320 --> 00:49:21,040
Speaker 3: wasn't saying someone as being a Karen. I was just

894
00:49:21,080 --> 00:49:24,120
Speaker 3: sort of a tangential joke. But I hope that didn't

895
00:49:24,160 --> 00:49:26,319
Speaker 3: cause any harm or stress very nice.

896
00:49:26,400 --> 00:49:29,840
Speaker 2: Chuck. I think that that buttons this episode up quite nicely.

897
00:49:30,000 --> 00:49:31,319
Speaker 1: Stand by the joke. That was pretty good.

898
00:49:32,920 --> 00:49:35,399
Speaker 2: Since Chuck stands by his joke, that means, of course,

899
00:49:35,440 --> 00:49:36,960
Speaker 2: the listener mail has been triggered.

900
00:49:40,680 --> 00:49:45,840
Speaker 3: Great great email about from Gwenn Creamines. I wish it

901
00:49:46,040 --> 00:49:49,360
Speaker 3: was I would explain a lot about creamins and amusement parks.

902
00:49:49,360 --> 00:49:52,200
Speaker 3: But just quickly, a couple of corrections we have heard,

903
00:49:53,000 --> 00:49:55,080
Speaker 3: not corrections, but we have heard a loud and clear

904
00:49:56,000 --> 00:50:00,400
Speaker 3: from the wolf packers that wolf pack is a Iver's

905
00:50:00,520 --> 00:50:03,120
Speaker 3: ed term. It seemed like in a lot of different

906
00:50:03,160 --> 00:50:05,080
Speaker 3: places in the United States, So.

907
00:50:05,719 --> 00:50:08,520
Speaker 2: I can't believe it. We've not heard from more people

908
00:50:08,560 --> 00:50:10,520
Speaker 2: about a single thing in recent memory.

909
00:50:10,600 --> 00:50:11,760
Speaker 1: Yeah, a lot of wolf packers.

910
00:50:12,400 --> 00:50:15,440
Speaker 3: And also we got the I said something about the

911
00:50:15,480 --> 00:50:18,120
Speaker 3: inventor of the segue writing off a cliff That was

912
00:50:18,200 --> 00:50:21,480
Speaker 3: not the inventor. That was the at the time owner

913
00:50:21,920 --> 00:50:25,840
Speaker 3: of the Segway company, man named Jimmy Hesseltin apparently, who.

914
00:50:25,719 --> 00:50:26,959
Speaker 1: Was a really really good guy.

915
00:50:27,440 --> 00:50:27,960
Speaker 2: Yeah.

916
00:50:28,000 --> 00:50:33,680
Speaker 3: So a bunch of people recommended this podcast episode February sixteen,

917
00:50:33,760 --> 00:50:37,239
Speaker 3: twenty twenty three, episode called The Hero Who Rode his

918
00:50:37,280 --> 00:50:42,040
Speaker 3: segue off a cliff, from the podcast Cautionary Tales with

919
00:50:42,120 --> 00:50:42,760
Speaker 3: Tim Harford.

920
00:50:43,040 --> 00:50:44,760
Speaker 1: Haven't listened yet, but it sounds great.

921
00:50:45,080 --> 00:50:47,760
Speaker 2: Very nice. Yeah, I heard from our friend Van Nostrin

922
00:50:47,840 --> 00:50:50,520
Speaker 2: about that, like almost immediately after the episode came out,

923
00:50:50,840 --> 00:50:52,359
Speaker 2: that it wasn't him. We got it wrong.

924
00:50:52,560 --> 00:50:55,719
Speaker 3: Oh and also quickly, since we're talking about corrections, there's

925
00:50:55,719 --> 00:50:58,400
Speaker 3: this great video on YouTube that explains the whole Fabio

926
00:50:58,960 --> 00:51:02,319
Speaker 3: goose situation, and it was way more involved than I thought.

927
00:51:02,400 --> 00:51:05,160
Speaker 3: Fabio claimed at the time it was not a goose

928
00:51:05,160 --> 00:51:07,840
Speaker 3: and it was a piece of camera equipment because he

929
00:51:07,880 --> 00:51:09,560
Speaker 3: had a camera on the front of that ride on

930
00:51:09,640 --> 00:51:12,120
Speaker 3: opening day to film it, and that he tried to

931
00:51:12,120 --> 00:51:15,840
Speaker 3: sue production company. Production company said it was not camera equipment,

932
00:51:15,840 --> 00:51:17,760
Speaker 3: it was a duck or a goose or whatever.

933
00:51:18,200 --> 00:51:19,600
Speaker 1: So I don't know at the end of the day,

934
00:51:19,920 --> 00:51:21,560
Speaker 1: if that ever really bore out.

935
00:51:22,360 --> 00:51:24,680
Speaker 2: Does it really matter what's true? If the internet thinks

936
00:51:24,680 --> 00:51:25,200
Speaker 2: it's a duck.

937
00:51:26,120 --> 00:51:28,280
Speaker 3: Nobody wrote in about that, by the way, I found

938
00:51:28,280 --> 00:51:31,600
Speaker 3: that just through investigation. Nice all right, finally, listener mail,

939
00:51:31,760 --> 00:51:34,439
Speaker 3: Hey guys, my dad was a humorous guy, always telling

940
00:51:34,520 --> 00:51:36,799
Speaker 3: jokes and pulling pranks. My mom and dad divorced when

941
00:51:36,800 --> 00:51:39,680
Speaker 3: I was a teen, but they remained friends best friends.

942
00:51:39,680 --> 00:51:41,920
Speaker 3: In fact, they just both agreed to go their separate

943
00:51:41,920 --> 00:51:45,840
Speaker 3: ways romantically. Dad never remarried. For as long as I

944
00:51:45,840 --> 00:51:48,439
Speaker 3: can remember, even when they were still married, his joke

945
00:51:48,640 --> 00:51:51,080
Speaker 3: was that he wanted to be cremated and his ashes

946
00:51:51,120 --> 00:51:54,400
Speaker 3: mixed in account of paint, and my mother's bedroom ceiling

947
00:51:54,480 --> 00:51:57,640
Speaker 3: be repainted with that paint. This is a joke that

948
00:51:57,719 --> 00:52:00,640
Speaker 3: lasted decades. He repeated it every time he had a

949
00:52:00,719 --> 00:52:03,399
Speaker 3: chance to, with my mom rolling her eyes. My dad

950
00:52:03,400 --> 00:52:06,800
Speaker 3: passed away in twenty ten. We planned a military honor service,

951
00:52:06,840 --> 00:52:09,200
Speaker 3: had him cremated, and had a memorial service at the

952
00:52:09,239 --> 00:52:12,600
Speaker 3: local veterans park. I purchased five Pewter tens, divided the

953
00:52:12,640 --> 00:52:15,200
Speaker 3: cremaines for each of his children, and we had the

954
00:52:15,239 --> 00:52:18,000
Speaker 3: service and presented the urns to my siblings. My mom

955
00:52:18,000 --> 00:52:20,560
Speaker 3: approached afterward and asked if it would be possible for

956
00:52:20,600 --> 00:52:23,080
Speaker 3: her to get some cremaines to put in an urn.

957
00:52:23,480 --> 00:52:26,640
Speaker 3: At this point I reached in my pocket and pulled

958
00:52:26,680 --> 00:52:29,120
Speaker 3: out a sample paint jar from home depot and handed

959
00:52:29,160 --> 00:52:31,879
Speaker 3: it to her. Told her Dad wanted her to have this.

960
00:52:32,320 --> 00:52:34,680
Speaker 3: Of course, I did give her a real urn with

961
00:52:34,840 --> 00:52:38,200
Speaker 3: real cremaines. The paint was unaltered, but until the day

962
00:52:38,200 --> 00:52:41,200
Speaker 3: of her passing in twenty seventeen, my dad's earned proudly

963
00:52:41,239 --> 00:52:44,480
Speaker 3: rested atop this paint. Can on My mother's mantle is

964
00:52:44,520 --> 00:52:47,120
Speaker 3: a tribute to the longest running joke in the family,

965
00:52:47,160 --> 00:52:48,160
Speaker 3: fully executed.

966
00:52:48,360 --> 00:52:52,920
Speaker 1: Sweet that's great. That's from Zach Mitchell in Saint Louis.

967
00:52:53,200 --> 00:52:55,640
Speaker 2: Hats off to you, Zach. That was That was a

968
00:52:55,640 --> 00:52:57,759
Speaker 2: good one, So thank you for writing in to tell

969
00:52:57,800 --> 00:53:00,440
Speaker 2: us about it. And I'm putting my I HAVE back

970
00:53:00,520 --> 00:53:02,239
Speaker 2: on so I can take it off to you one

971
00:53:02,239 --> 00:53:02,640
Speaker 2: more time.

972
00:53:02,760 --> 00:53:05,400
Speaker 3: Absolutely sorry to hear about your parents, but that was

973
00:53:05,600 --> 00:53:08,279
Speaker 3: a great way to honor your dad and for sure

974
00:53:08,400 --> 00:53:09,799
Speaker 3: kind of have fun with your mom.

975
00:53:10,239 --> 00:53:11,759
Speaker 2: Well, if you want to be like Zach, can take

976
00:53:11,840 --> 00:53:14,439
Speaker 2: us on a roller coaster ride of a motion where

977
00:53:14,480 --> 00:53:16,440
Speaker 2: there may or may not be a duck that flies

978
00:53:16,480 --> 00:53:19,799
Speaker 2: into our face. You can do so via email A's

979
00:53:19,840 --> 00:53:24,560
Speaker 2: Stuff podcast at iHeartRadio dot com.

980
00:53:25,480 --> 00:53:28,319
Speaker 1: Stuff you Should Know is a production of iHeartRadio. For

981
00:53:28,440 --> 00:53:32,600
Speaker 1: more podcasts my heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,

982
00:53:32,719 --> 00:53:34,560
Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.