WEBVTT - Episode 17: The War on Small Business with Carol Roth 0:00:00.200 --> 0:00:02.800 Up next The Truth with Lisa both part of the Game, 0:00:02.840 --> 0:00:08.680 which research government lockdowns decimated small businesses during the pandemic, 0:00:09.320 --> 0:00:13.240 destroying the livelihoods of millions of Americans. Many of these 0:00:13.240 --> 0:00:16.360 hard working men and women still have not recovered, and 0:00:16.400 --> 0:00:19.040 none of them are at fault. The blame lives with 0:00:19.120 --> 0:00:23.079 politicians and their bureaucratic goons who arbitrarily deemed some workers 0:00:23.200 --> 0:00:27.920 essential and others expendable. Today I expose the government's war 0:00:28.000 --> 0:00:31.560 in the backboat of America and how COVID escalated a 0:00:31.600 --> 0:00:34.640 problem that's been ongoing for years. This is The Truth 0:00:34.920 --> 0:00:47.400 with Lisa Booth. Ye, welcome back to The Truth with 0:00:47.520 --> 0:00:50.519 Lisa Booth. I'm Lisa Booths, and this week we're covering 0:00:50.520 --> 0:00:53.480 a topic that too many Americans are familiar with, how 0:00:53.560 --> 0:00:57.120 small businesses in the middle class have suffered under government lockdowns. 0:00:57.440 --> 0:01:00.240 Too often, leaders in government believe that they have a 0:01:00.360 --> 0:01:03.960 godlike capacity to make brilliant decisions for the stupid masses. 0:01:04.200 --> 0:01:06.959 They think they're superior to you, to me, both morally 0:01:06.959 --> 0:01:09.959 and intellectually, even though their job is to serve us 0:01:10.000 --> 0:01:13.960 the people. Remember we're their boss. Now. With the coronavirus, 0:01:14.000 --> 0:01:17.560 politicians and bureaucrats. We saw them grab power in shocking 0:01:17.640 --> 0:01:21.520 and unprecedented ways, and with that power, they picked winners 0:01:22.240 --> 0:01:26.000 and they picked losers, deciding which businesses they liked and 0:01:26.040 --> 0:01:28.680 which ones they disliked, which workers were essential, and which 0:01:28.720 --> 0:01:32.000 ones were expendable. And what came next was devastation. The 0:01:32.040 --> 0:01:34.959 government imposed lockdowns across the country in the name of 0:01:35.040 --> 0:01:40.240 fighting the pandemic. Small businesses struggled to survive, and tragically, 0:01:40.280 --> 0:01:42.720 many of those didn't. Many people lost the ability to 0:01:42.760 --> 0:01:44.640 put a roof over their kids heads or to feed 0:01:44.680 --> 0:01:47.000 their family. And those that did. Many of the businesses 0:01:47.000 --> 0:01:48.840 that stayed open or were able to stay open, a 0:01:48.880 --> 0:01:51.920 lot of them had to layoff employees. Millions of Americans 0:01:51.920 --> 0:01:54.760 have suffered, and many of them in their businesses still 0:01:54.760 --> 0:01:58.600 have not recovered. To really understand what happened and where 0:01:58.640 --> 0:02:01.200 we should go from here, I want to bring on 0:02:01.280 --> 0:02:04.000 Carol Roth to the show to discuss this assault on 0:02:04.080 --> 0:02:08.320 small businesses and the middle class. She's an entrepreneur and investor, 0:02:08.360 --> 0:02:12.200 a best selling author, and a TV personality. She's also 0:02:12.200 --> 0:02:15.520 a self described recovering investment banker, and she has a 0:02:15.600 --> 0:02:18.679 really important new book that is out titled The War 0:02:18.760 --> 0:02:22.040 on small business how the government used the pandemic to 0:02:22.160 --> 0:02:25.920 crush the backbone of America. I'm pleased to welcome Carol 0:02:26.000 --> 0:02:28.640 Roth to the show. Uh, this is a conversation that 0:02:28.720 --> 0:02:32.440 needs to happen. You know, Carol, what what really interested you? 0:02:32.440 --> 0:02:34.200 You know, why? Why did you want to write this book? 0:02:35.800 --> 0:02:38.920 So I've been a long time small business advocate. I 0:02:38.919 --> 0:02:41.760 wrote a book ten years ago about how hard it 0:02:41.840 --> 0:02:44.840 is to be a small business owner and all the risks, 0:02:44.880 --> 0:02:47.160 and I never really thought the number one risk was 0:02:47.200 --> 0:02:49.720 going to be the federal government coming in and shutting 0:02:49.760 --> 0:02:52.920 you down by mandate. Um. So I was actually approached 0:02:53.120 --> 0:02:57.560 very early in the pandemic by HarperCollins, who wanted a 0:02:57.560 --> 0:03:01.119 real kind of in depth economic take on what was 0:03:01.400 --> 0:03:05.880 clearly going to be historic. And as I watched this unfold, 0:03:06.400 --> 0:03:08.400 I kind of wrote three and a half different books 0:03:08.400 --> 0:03:11.120 to be perfectly honest, and it ended up at like 0:03:11.160 --> 0:03:13.440 a hundred and sixty thousand words and they're like, no, 0:03:13.520 --> 0:03:16.520 you need to call that back. But the through line 0:03:16.560 --> 0:03:20.600 through all of it was really how small businesses who 0:03:20.680 --> 0:03:23.960 are the backbone of the economy, and that that's just 0:03:24.040 --> 0:03:26.920 not not just a moniker. They're nine point nine percent 0:03:27.200 --> 0:03:30.639 of all business entities, they're about half the GDP, they're 0:03:30.639 --> 0:03:34.080 about half the jobs. So so this foundation of the 0:03:34.160 --> 0:03:39.440 economy got completely screwed over, and winners and losers were picked, 0:03:39.800 --> 0:03:43.360 and they were picked not based on data and science, 0:03:43.400 --> 0:03:46.040 but the government picked those winners and losers, who was 0:03:46.040 --> 0:03:48.920 going to thrive, who was going to fight to survive, 0:03:49.360 --> 0:03:53.680 based on political clout and connections, and then use that 0:03:53.760 --> 0:03:57.880 to enable the most historic wealth transfer that we've seen 0:03:57.880 --> 0:04:00.240 in our lifetime. So that seemed like a pretty big 0:04:00.280 --> 0:04:04.720 story to me. Um And I'm actually flabbergasted that nobody 0:04:04.760 --> 0:04:07.720 else seems to be talking about it. Why don't people 0:04:07.760 --> 0:04:11.280 care more? You know? I think the people look at 0:04:11.320 --> 0:04:16.919 the macro headlines and it looks like the economy is recovering. 0:04:16.920 --> 0:04:19.680 It looks like things are doing great, But they don't 0:04:19.720 --> 0:04:23.000 realize if you kind of peeled back the onion, what 0:04:23.080 --> 0:04:27.280 that looks like. They don't realize that four hundred thousands 0:04:27.320 --> 0:04:30.880 small businesses had closed permanently by June of last year. 0:04:30.920 --> 0:04:33.640 We don't even have a good updated number. We know 0:04:33.720 --> 0:04:38.320 that millions more are struggling to survive. They don't realize 0:04:38.640 --> 0:04:43.160 that the people who patronize those businesses transferred those dollars 0:04:43.200 --> 0:04:47.480 to big companies like Amazon, like Walmart, like Target. They 0:04:47.480 --> 0:04:51.560 had record revenue. They don't understand the federal Reserve, which 0:04:51.640 --> 0:04:54.479 is opaque by design, and the fact that they put 0:04:54.560 --> 0:04:58.279 eight trillion dollars on their balance sheet and forced interest 0:04:58.360 --> 0:05:01.320 rates down back to zero, and how with all of 0:05:01.320 --> 0:05:05.920 these things that enabled sex seven technology companies to increase 0:05:06.000 --> 0:05:09.240 by three point for trillion dollars in value last year, 0:05:09.560 --> 0:05:12.039 and that it was a record year for initial public 0:05:12.120 --> 0:05:15.760 offerings and special purpose acquisition companies in terms of the 0:05:15.760 --> 0:05:18.279 amount of money that they raised. So I think that 0:05:18.400 --> 0:05:22.480 because the financial aspect of it is so opaque, and 0:05:22.520 --> 0:05:26.039 you have so many media cheerleaders who are running running 0:05:26.040 --> 0:05:30.240 interference for for politicians, and you look at the headlines 0:05:30.279 --> 0:05:31.960 and it's it's easy to say, oh, like oh, it 0:05:31.960 --> 0:05:35.240 sounds like things are are getting back in order, and 0:05:35.279 --> 0:05:38.880 they don't realize that this huge transfer of wealth from 0:05:39.000 --> 0:05:42.120 main street to wall streets happened and really this is 0:05:42.240 --> 0:05:46.760 clamping down on economic freedom and wealth creation opportunities. Well, 0:05:46.760 --> 0:05:49.960 and you had mentioned so pre pandemic small businesses accounted 0:05:50.000 --> 0:05:52.440 for you know, half of the GDP and half of 0:05:52.480 --> 0:05:54.600 the employment in the country. What does that look like 0:05:54.720 --> 0:05:57.560 now and what's the broader impact of that. Yeah, it's 0:05:57.560 --> 0:06:00.280 a it's a really good question. Um, we know on 0:06:00.440 --> 0:06:04.200 the employment front that one of the things that happened 0:06:04.360 --> 0:06:07.279 in terms of the design of you know, how the 0:06:07.360 --> 0:06:10.479 government was going to quote unquote care for you from 0:06:10.520 --> 0:06:13.480 you know, the mandates that they created, is that they 0:06:13.480 --> 0:06:16.040 did a lot of things that made it very difficult 0:06:16.440 --> 0:06:18.960 for people to go want to go back into the workforce. 0:06:19.040 --> 0:06:22.320 One of the things is this enhanced unemployment benefits, So 0:06:22.480 --> 0:06:25.360 not the money that your employer or in some states, 0:06:25.480 --> 0:06:28.120 you pay in out of each check for unemployment, but 0:06:28.200 --> 0:06:31.680 on top of that, they gave you a bonus for 0:06:31.800 --> 0:06:35.719 being unemployed, obviously decreasing the incentives they want to go 0:06:35.760 --> 0:06:39.560 back to work. They sent out stimulus checks, not necessarily 0:06:39.600 --> 0:06:43.279 based on your current need, but based on some arbitrary 0:06:43.360 --> 0:06:47.159 number from a previous year. They shuttered school, so if 0:06:47.200 --> 0:06:49.839 if you were a parent that had kids, you know, 0:06:49.839 --> 0:06:51.560 you couldn't get your kids back in school, you might 0:06:51.560 --> 0:06:53.240 not have been able to go back to work. So 0:06:53.440 --> 0:06:58.080 they the government basically is now competing with small businesses 0:06:58.920 --> 0:07:03.120 for employees. And we have nine point three million jobs 0:07:03.120 --> 0:07:07.480 in this country. That businesses can't fill. And that's very 0:07:07.560 --> 0:07:11.760 much being shouldered um by the small business community who 0:07:11.800 --> 0:07:16.680 are raising wages, offering signing bonuses, doing whatever they can, 0:07:16.760 --> 0:07:20.600 and they still can't get people to come back, um 0:07:20.640 --> 0:07:23.120 into employment. As far as you know what they're going 0:07:23.160 --> 0:07:25.120 to make up of the g DP, we don't have 0:07:25.720 --> 0:07:30.120 those numbers yet, but um there is a project called 0:07:30.120 --> 0:07:34.160 Opportunity Insights that's run in conjunction with Harvard that said 0:07:34.240 --> 0:07:38.880 something like almost of the small businesses had been closed. Now, 0:07:39.240 --> 0:07:42.440 knowing the numbers like I do, I don't think that's 0:07:42.480 --> 0:07:45.160 of the thirty point two million small businesses, but it 0:07:45.160 --> 0:07:48.200 could be of the six million employer businesses. So even 0:07:48.240 --> 0:07:51.920 if it's you know, two million businesses that are permanently 0:07:51.960 --> 0:07:54.760 closed and not contributing to the GDP and that money 0:07:54.840 --> 0:07:57.800 is going to the big businesses, that's a huge shift 0:07:58.120 --> 0:08:00.680 from main street to all streets well and ufortunately you know, 0:08:00.720 --> 0:08:02.880 we live in a society where sometimes people can be 0:08:03.000 --> 0:08:05.600 you know, sort of inherently selfish. If it doesn't impact them, 0:08:05.640 --> 0:08:07.560 they don't really care. So for the folks, you know, 0:08:07.640 --> 0:08:09.880 let's say someone doesn't know a small business owner, they 0:08:09.880 --> 0:08:11.840 don't have a family member that's a small business owner. 0:08:11.840 --> 0:08:14.480 They don't feel like they should care about this issue. 0:08:14.800 --> 0:08:17.200 Why should they care? Why does this impact their life? 0:08:17.200 --> 0:08:19.320 Why does this impact the economy, Why does this impact 0:08:19.360 --> 0:08:22.480 the country. Yeah, it goes back to this bigger battle 0:08:22.600 --> 0:08:27.000 that we're seeing play out between the centralization and central power. 0:08:27.640 --> 0:08:29.480 And you know, it used to be we were much 0:08:29.560 --> 0:08:34.360 closer to a free market system and free market capitalism, 0:08:34.400 --> 0:08:37.439 despite what some people think, just basically means freedom and 0:08:37.559 --> 0:08:41.599 choice and transparency and a level playing field where the 0:08:41.640 --> 0:08:45.439 government is just protecting your individual rights and your property rights. 0:08:45.960 --> 0:08:49.760 And unfortunately, central planning is a couple of people making 0:08:49.800 --> 0:08:52.320 the decisions on behalf of everyone and using force and 0:08:52.360 --> 0:08:57.160 coercion and control. And we've been moving along that spectrum. 0:08:57.240 --> 0:09:00.520 If you think about the economy and those two half, 0:09:00.559 --> 0:09:04.200 you have half the economy that is the small businesses. 0:09:04.320 --> 0:09:08.280 As I said pre COVID thirty point two million. They're decentralized, 0:09:08.360 --> 0:09:12.520 they're independent, there is no concentration of power. Uh, they're 0:09:12.640 --> 0:09:15.920 very difficult to control, which is very good um and 0:09:15.960 --> 0:09:19.000 that creates economic freedom and wealth creation opportunities for a 0:09:19.000 --> 0:09:22.120 broad set of people. The other half the economy is 0:09:22.160 --> 0:09:26.240 like ten to fifteen thousand big companies. And as you 0:09:26.240 --> 0:09:28.800 can imagine, if you're a politician and you're trying to 0:09:28.800 --> 0:09:32.559 consolidate power, who is it easier to align with and 0:09:32.559 --> 0:09:35.559 and get and you know, get in your pockets and 0:09:35.559 --> 0:09:38.400 have them make contributions and and you know, kind of 0:09:38.440 --> 0:09:42.280 being a coalition with the handful of big businesses or 0:09:42.320 --> 0:09:45.360 the thirty point two million small businesses. So if you 0:09:45.480 --> 0:09:49.520 don't want there to be more centralized power, and uh, 0:09:49.559 --> 0:09:51.160 you know, I imagine in terms of all the things 0:09:51.160 --> 0:09:53.679 that you discussed about the size of the government, the 0:09:53.720 --> 0:09:55.640 amount that they spend, the laws, you know, all those 0:09:55.720 --> 0:09:58.760 kinds of things, you should not want the government to 0:09:58.880 --> 0:10:01.760 be doing more things than have more power. If you 0:10:01.760 --> 0:10:05.880 start getting rid of this the centralized portion of the economy, 0:10:06.240 --> 0:10:09.640 it just makes that central portion larger and bigger and 0:10:09.679 --> 0:10:13.679 harder to combat. And it's it's basically slides us across 0:10:13.760 --> 0:10:18.400 that scale closer to socialism. And that's something that should 0:10:18.400 --> 0:10:20.960 scare everybody. Well, I think that's a great point, you know, 0:10:20.960 --> 0:10:23.880 and you talked about the enhanced unemployment benefits and you 0:10:23.920 --> 0:10:27.120 had mentioned socialism just now. I mean, we've essentially created 0:10:27.400 --> 0:10:30.160 a you know, a country that is dependent on the 0:10:30.160 --> 0:10:32.920 federal government on a scale that you know, maybe we 0:10:32.559 --> 0:10:35.600 we we never have before in history, and so you're right, 0:10:35.640 --> 0:10:38.959 that does move us closer to a socialist type country 0:10:38.960 --> 0:10:41.960 where we're we're consolidating power at the top with the 0:10:41.960 --> 0:10:45.440 big corporations and you know, big government as well. And 0:10:45.600 --> 0:10:47.640 do you think that is why? I mean, lately we've 0:10:47.640 --> 0:10:51.000 seen corporations insert themselves in more and more things, more 0:10:51.000 --> 0:10:54.520 and more issues, for instance, going after Georgia over their 0:10:54.600 --> 0:10:57.079 voting law. Do you think that correlates to what we've 0:10:57.080 --> 0:10:59.679 seen over the past year as big businesses has been 0:10:59.720 --> 0:11:03.040 allowed to grow at the expense of small business. The 0:11:03.080 --> 0:11:06.320 fact that they're involved in everything, whether it is, like 0:11:06.360 --> 0:11:10.320 you said, voting laws, whether it's Mark Zuckerberg standing up 0:11:10.320 --> 0:11:12.520 and saying I think you need to regulate the tech 0:11:12.600 --> 0:11:17.600 companies Jeff Bezos and Amazon coming out and pushing for 0:11:17.640 --> 0:11:21.000 a higher minimum wage. They're doing all of these things 0:11:21.080 --> 0:11:25.040 because they know that it helps with that consolidation of power, 0:11:25.559 --> 0:11:29.120 and in some cases it's anti competitive to small business 0:11:29.160 --> 0:11:32.200 because we all think raining in the big guys is 0:11:32.280 --> 0:11:33.880 going to be a good thing and it's going to 0:11:33.960 --> 0:11:37.360 help the little guys. That's the excuse they use every 0:11:37.400 --> 0:11:40.120 single time, and it's just not true. I mean, if 0:11:40.120 --> 0:11:44.400 we go back to the Great Recession financial crisis, the 0:11:44.480 --> 0:11:49.400 banks did some things that were very, very risky. They 0:11:49.840 --> 0:11:52.920 didn't work out. It ended up taking down the entire 0:11:53.000 --> 0:11:56.319 economy and affecting all of our lives. And they were 0:11:56.360 --> 0:11:59.720 told they were too big to fail. They got taxpair 0:11:59.800 --> 0:12:02.280 my me. But you know, we're going to slap them 0:12:02.320 --> 0:12:04.480 on the wrist and we're gonna regulate them, and that's 0:12:04.480 --> 0:12:06.600 going to raid them in. And so we came up 0:12:06.920 --> 0:12:10.960 with this owner usk set of laws called Dodd Frank. Well, 0:12:11.000 --> 0:12:13.200 what was the outcome of DoD Frank As I lay 0:12:13.200 --> 0:12:16.800 out in the book, it ended up being so expensive 0:12:16.840 --> 0:12:21.000 and so difficult to comply with that it decreased the 0:12:21.120 --> 0:12:24.440 number of starts of small community banks from like a 0:12:24.520 --> 0:12:27.400 hundred a year to three to put a bunch of 0:12:27.440 --> 0:12:32.400 small business banks out of business. And as you can imagine, 0:12:32.400 --> 0:12:35.920 the smaller banks that have less assets under management are 0:12:35.920 --> 0:12:38.760 the ones who are lending too small businesses. So small 0:12:38.800 --> 0:12:42.120 business lendings fell off a cliff. At the same time, 0:12:42.160 --> 0:12:46.040 because there was less competition from small companies, you had 0:12:46.080 --> 0:12:50.200 these big banks that grew even more and they increased 0:12:50.200 --> 0:12:53.480 the lending to big companies. So we have this legislation 0:12:53.559 --> 0:12:55.720 that was supposed to reign in these big banks that 0:12:55.800 --> 0:12:58.319 did bad things, and all it did was give them 0:12:58.360 --> 0:13:00.800 free reign and end up hurting some all business more. 0:13:01.200 --> 0:13:04.720 And so you know, it's very tempting to say, oh, 0:13:04.880 --> 0:13:07.559 we're gonna we're gonna use the government to to go 0:13:07.679 --> 0:13:10.800 after these big guys. They're all in it together, they're 0:13:10.840 --> 0:13:14.400 all on the same side. So how do we rain 0:13:14.480 --> 0:13:17.760 them in? Yeah, I mean this is the like multi 0:13:17.880 --> 0:13:21.560 trillion dollar question. I mean, we need to move back 0:13:21.600 --> 0:13:25.120 along the spectrum closer to a free market, and we 0:13:25.160 --> 0:13:29.680 need to tear down the purview of the government, um, 0:13:29.760 --> 0:13:32.360 which is obviously not an easy thing to do. And 0:13:32.400 --> 0:13:35.240 it's interesting a lot of um you know, the folks 0:13:35.280 --> 0:13:38.320 who back different ideas, they tend to back a candidate 0:13:38.360 --> 0:13:40.840 and think that like getting their guy or their gal 0:13:40.920 --> 0:13:43.120 in the system is all of a sudden going to 0:13:43.160 --> 0:13:47.480 shift everything. But this is so systemically broken. Um, I 0:13:47.520 --> 0:13:50.960 think we need to do more suing. Frankly of the government. 0:13:51.160 --> 0:13:53.280 I mean, they have put so many laws in place, 0:13:53.320 --> 0:13:58.079 they've done so many things that have overstepped their constitutional boundaries. 0:13:58.360 --> 0:14:00.720 And think about you know what happened with COVID. You 0:14:00.720 --> 0:14:04.880 you subjugated property rights of small business owners for the 0:14:04.880 --> 0:14:08.280 good of society, and you didn't give them appropriate compensation. 0:14:08.520 --> 0:14:11.000 Eminent Domain says, if you're going to take their property, 0:14:11.080 --> 0:14:14.000 you owe them to do compensation. So I think we 0:14:14.080 --> 0:14:17.880 need to start challenging these things and courts because a 0:14:17.960 --> 0:14:21.080 tiny fraction of a fraction of a percent of all 0:14:21.200 --> 0:14:24.520 the laws see challenges. And I think if we start 0:14:24.560 --> 0:14:27.640 to strip away those rights, obviously that in and of 0:14:27.680 --> 0:14:31.040 itself will help to reduce the size of the government, 0:14:31.640 --> 0:14:35.680 but will also perhaps keep some future politicians from going 0:14:35.680 --> 0:14:38.120 down that road, knowing that you know that's going to 0:14:38.240 --> 0:14:41.240 ultimately be challenged and be a no go. But we 0:14:41.360 --> 0:14:45.600 have been too complacent as individuals. I mean the fact 0:14:45.640 --> 0:14:49.960 that small business owners even agreed to these lockdowns effect 0:14:50.240 --> 0:14:54.960 that so many Americans agreed to these mandates. Um. You know, 0:14:55.320 --> 0:14:59.040 these weren't laws, they were mandates, and they agreed and 0:14:59.120 --> 0:15:02.120 just said, Okay, well we're going to do this. Um. 0:15:02.200 --> 0:15:05.880 You know that's not us. We have to actively preserve 0:15:06.000 --> 0:15:09.840 our freedom. So on the small business side, you educate yourself, 0:15:09.840 --> 0:15:13.560 you understand these things, um, and then that helps to 0:15:13.560 --> 0:15:15.920 take action. And I think you know another thing that 0:15:16.000 --> 0:15:17.880 I lay out in the book that's really important that 0:15:17.920 --> 0:15:20.600 needs to be reined in, which could probably be done 0:15:20.640 --> 0:15:25.640 through Congress, is reigning in the federal reserve. How how 0:15:25.680 --> 0:15:29.600 can a small business compete against the Amazons of the world. 0:15:30.720 --> 0:15:33.600 So it depends if you're talking about in a free 0:15:33.640 --> 0:15:37.240 market or with the help of the government, to the 0:15:37.280 --> 0:15:40.800 government giving Amazon special favors. Because if you remember when 0:15:40.840 --> 0:15:44.880 Amazon was going to move their headquarters a couple of 0:15:44.960 --> 0:15:48.080 years ago, they ran around and they did this beauty pageant, right, 0:15:48.200 --> 0:15:51.040 So they're showing up in all these different locations and 0:15:51.080 --> 0:15:52.800 they're saying, okay, well, if we moved to your city, 0:15:52.880 --> 0:15:54.680 like what will you give us, Well, give us your 0:15:54.720 --> 0:15:57.680 firstborn child, will you give us, you know, naming rights. 0:15:57.720 --> 0:16:02.160 It's like The Bachelor or something exactly exactly. So they're 0:16:02.160 --> 0:16:04.240 doing all these things, and of course they ended up 0:16:04.280 --> 0:16:07.640 going with the places that they were planning to go anyway, 0:16:07.680 --> 0:16:10.600 but they use that to extract editional benefits, like if 0:16:10.680 --> 0:16:13.240 I'm going to go open up a pizza parlor somewhere, 0:16:13.320 --> 0:16:14.800 or at least so you're gonna go open up a 0:16:14.840 --> 0:16:17.960 cup kick shop, like nobody's getting us naming rights, like 0:16:18.000 --> 0:16:20.080 we probably can't even get somebody to return our call. 0:16:20.480 --> 0:16:23.120 We're gonna get all, you know, these these licenses that 0:16:23.200 --> 0:16:25.360 we have to get an insurance, that have to jump 0:16:25.360 --> 0:16:27.520 through a bunch of hoops, and nobody's going to be 0:16:27.560 --> 0:16:30.560 there to help us. So it's that kind of stuff 0:16:30.880 --> 0:16:34.120 that tilts the field and it makes it almost impossible 0:16:34.160 --> 0:16:36.640 for a small business to compete in terms of you know, 0:16:36.720 --> 0:16:39.560 if you took those away, and it's just free market competition. 0:16:40.360 --> 0:16:42.960 As a small business, one of the biggest things that 0:16:43.000 --> 0:16:46.360 you have is the personal relationship with the customer, and 0:16:46.480 --> 0:16:52.160 building loyalty isn't transactional, right, It's based on relationships, and 0:16:52.240 --> 0:16:56.360 so small businesses do have certain areas where they can 0:16:56.440 --> 0:16:59.920 really outshine the big companies because they have the upper 0:17:00.000 --> 0:17:04.280 ttunity to generate those personal relationships with customers, which are 0:17:04.359 --> 0:17:08.639 incredibly meaningful. UM. But eventually, you know, if you have 0:17:08.760 --> 0:17:12.720 to contend with all of these other governmental issues, that 0:17:12.840 --> 0:17:16.399 affects your pricing, UM, that affects your cost of employees, 0:17:16.480 --> 0:17:19.600 that affects your ability to even open a business, that 0:17:19.840 --> 0:17:23.360 affects your building, your ability to be deemed essential. Um. 0:17:23.800 --> 0:17:27.360 That's that's a no win situation. And so that's why 0:17:27.400 --> 0:17:30.920 we have to get the government out of the interference 0:17:30.920 --> 0:17:32.880 in the market, Carol, we have to take a quick 0:17:32.880 --> 0:17:38.000 break back on the other side. One thing a lot 0:17:38.000 --> 0:17:41.080 of conservatives are sort of grappling with right now is 0:17:41.240 --> 0:17:43.120 you know, you look at Google, you look at Amazon, 0:17:43.280 --> 0:17:45.840 you look at big Tech. I mean, they're just so big. 0:17:45.880 --> 0:17:48.199 They have grown in size and scope. They've grown over 0:17:48.240 --> 0:17:50.639 the past year as we're discussing right now at the 0:17:50.680 --> 0:17:54.439 expensive small business. So I mean it's almost you know, 0:17:54.480 --> 0:17:56.800 the question is, really, are are they too big for 0:17:56.880 --> 0:17:59.119 the free market to you know, work itself out like 0:17:59.359 --> 0:18:02.480 they've they've has gotten too too big for that. You know. 0:18:02.560 --> 0:18:05.320 So if you go back in history and you look 0:18:05.760 --> 0:18:09.679 at any point in time, there's always some companies that 0:18:09.720 --> 0:18:14.119 were deemed too big, and most of them have gone 0:18:14.440 --> 0:18:17.760 out of business or been replaced. Um. If you look 0:18:17.800 --> 0:18:21.240 at the Dow Jones companies, I think there's just a 0:18:21.320 --> 0:18:24.479 handful maybe like three of them that were there, you know, 0:18:25.320 --> 0:18:29.480 fifty plus years ago. So you know, there is this 0:18:29.640 --> 0:18:34.880 natural change over in business that's allowed to happen. But 0:18:34.960 --> 0:18:39.840 since we've had so much um enhanced interference in the 0:18:39.920 --> 0:18:44.080 stock markets, and we've had so much enhanced interference in 0:18:44.200 --> 0:18:48.520 capitalism from the government. Um, there really has been these 0:18:48.600 --> 0:18:52.479 extra advantages that give them this unique scale that we 0:18:52.560 --> 0:18:56.320 haven't seen before. So I do feel like if we 0:18:56.760 --> 0:18:59.840 got out of the way, that would help to shrink 0:19:00.000 --> 0:19:03.040 our footprint. UM. So that's one thing to contend with. 0:19:03.160 --> 0:19:06.040 I think the other thing from an antitrust standpoint, just 0:19:06.119 --> 0:19:09.520 because there's so much money going around, is if you 0:19:09.600 --> 0:19:14.360 think that normally when they look at antitrust and they say, okay, 0:19:14.520 --> 0:19:17.439 well you can't buy up businesses you know, in the 0:19:17.480 --> 0:19:21.320 same industry, or you can't buy up um, you know, 0:19:21.400 --> 0:19:25.719 a supply chain so that there's no other competition. I 0:19:25.760 --> 0:19:28.639 do think we're at the point where it's least worth 0:19:28.760 --> 0:19:34.840 discussing if you're dominating in you know, like every single industry. 0:19:35.280 --> 0:19:37.960 You know, is that something that where there's a concern 0:19:38.000 --> 0:19:43.840 as well. But I also am blatantly untrust untrustful I 0:19:43.840 --> 0:19:47.960 guess of that scenario because we know the people who 0:19:48.000 --> 0:19:52.800 are going to write that legislation aren't doing it because 0:19:52.920 --> 0:19:56.280 they're worried about the big business and they care about 0:19:56.359 --> 0:20:00.600 you know, us as individuals or small businesses. So the 0:20:00.720 --> 0:20:03.720 question is what things are they doing in that legislation 0:20:03.800 --> 0:20:08.000 to have the unintended consequences, And so that's where I 0:20:08.119 --> 0:20:11.679 become very concerned, is you know, if they're going to 0:20:11.760 --> 0:20:14.760 quote unquote break them up or not allow you know, 0:20:14.840 --> 0:20:17.639 certain murders, or not allow them into certain business lines, 0:20:18.040 --> 0:20:21.399 you know, what does that mean for everybody else? And 0:20:21.480 --> 0:20:23.960 I think that's that's a question that we always need 0:20:24.000 --> 0:20:27.480 to be asking well, and not to be hyperbolic, but 0:20:27.520 --> 0:20:30.000 I mean, it seems like we're heading into a scenario 0:20:30.040 --> 0:20:33.320 where Jeff Bezos has more power than Joe Biden might 0:20:33.359 --> 0:20:39.200 even I would imagine that, and I hate them both, 0:20:39.240 --> 0:20:40.960 so I'd rather them not in either them had power. 0:20:41.400 --> 0:20:47.400 Wealthy individuals um, definitely, I think are working in connection 0:20:47.720 --> 0:20:52.600 with the governmental officials. I think that the concern from 0:20:52.600 --> 0:20:57.280 that sort of power dynamic UM is that the business 0:20:57.320 --> 0:21:00.600 folks are probably a lot smarter the folks that are 0:21:00.600 --> 0:21:06.120 in Congress, So there is not really a stretch, right. 0:21:06.480 --> 0:21:10.680 So yeah, so I feel like that they're probably driving 0:21:11.280 --> 0:21:14.760 um the agendas to a large part behind the scenes, 0:21:14.800 --> 0:21:17.240 but we do need to be careful about this. And 0:21:17.280 --> 0:21:20.000 again this it goes to like strategic thinking and under 0:21:20.240 --> 0:21:25.760 unintended consequences. The country that printed the most billionaires over 0:21:25.800 --> 0:21:30.639 the last year was not the United States, it was China. 0:21:30.840 --> 0:21:33.240 And so you have to remember, you know, when you 0:21:33.280 --> 0:21:36.680 get concerned, oh should we be, you know, concerned about 0:21:36.720 --> 0:21:39.680 the wealth of you know, Jeff Bezos or about Bill 0:21:39.720 --> 0:21:44.399 Gates or Warren Buffett, that this isn't just a national issue. 0:21:44.440 --> 0:21:48.119 And if we start to meddle in that, then you 0:21:48.200 --> 0:21:51.639 have the Chinese people who have all the power. And 0:21:51.680 --> 0:21:54.800 again I mean this in terms of communist Chinese people, 0:21:54.840 --> 0:21:57.879 not Americans who are Chinese origin or whatnot, but you know, 0:21:57.920 --> 0:22:02.639 the actual communist party members who have all of the 0:22:02.720 --> 0:22:07.200 capital and then can come in and buy up America 0:22:07.240 --> 0:22:09.719 and be sort of, you know, kind of trojan horse 0:22:10.880 --> 0:22:15.480 their way through the power structure here. So you know 0:22:15.520 --> 0:22:18.560 that we have to remember, like I know, as Americans 0:22:18.560 --> 0:22:20.800 sometimes we think we're like the only game in town, 0:22:20.960 --> 0:22:24.520 that we're the entire world, but we're not. And so 0:22:24.800 --> 0:22:27.880 things that you know affect us right now that we're 0:22:27.880 --> 0:22:31.000 looking at, don't forget about you know, all of these 0:22:31.040 --> 0:22:35.320 other powers out there, um that have gotten really wealthy 0:22:35.320 --> 0:22:38.240 by the way, since we exported capitalism to them. So 0:22:38.359 --> 0:22:41.680 thank thank the the United States were basically making sure 0:22:41.720 --> 0:22:46.320 that the Chinese people benefited to your detriment um. But 0:22:46.760 --> 0:22:48.440 you know, we have we have to be really careful 0:22:48.440 --> 0:22:51.280 about that because you know, you can thumb your nose 0:22:51.480 --> 0:22:55.240 at US company doing x y z. Uh, it's doubly 0:22:55.280 --> 0:22:58.600 worth of if communist company x y Z comes here 0:22:58.640 --> 0:23:01.119 to do that. That's a good point, uh, and something 0:23:01.160 --> 0:23:02.760 to think about. You know. I think one thing that 0:23:02.800 --> 0:23:06.480 really frustrates me in the conversation surrounding small businesses and 0:23:06.520 --> 0:23:08.560