The Relationships Professor: “This Is An Emergency!” The Number Of Men Having No Sex Increased 180%! (Why This Is Dangerous & How We Fix It)

0:00:05 Someone dies in the UK every 90 minutes 76 percent of these are male. What is going wrong?
0:00:09 If you were to point to a single point of failure, it would be the Scott Galloway
0:00:15 Entrepreneur best-selling author Professor one of the most desired minds when it comes to business and life
0:00:20 He is about the obsession of how to be better as individuals and as a society
0:00:25 Society tells you especially I think as a man that your worth is highly correlated to your economic success
0:00:29 But for the first time a 30 year old isn’t doing as well as his or her parents
0:00:35 Men under the age 40 are 24% less wealthy the average age of a first-time home buyer is 47 now
0:00:39 It’s an online dating you have to swipe right a thousand times to get a single coffee
0:00:41 It’s one in seven men doesn’t have a single friend
0:00:47 They’re gonna have men having relationships with the sheets the most dangerous person in the world a lonely
0:00:53 Young broke male and we’re producing millions of them and that can lead to very ugly places for the economy in society
0:00:59 What is the impact this is having on women women have become better educated and they’re making more money
0:01:04 It means that the quote-unquote pool of viable mates for women is going down every year
0:01:06 And a lot of these men are finding role models online
0:01:12 Yeah, this is a real issue that this is a group that’s struggling on the far right people like Trump a criminal
0:01:17 Putin murderer on the far left as far as I can tell their vision of masculinity is to act more like a woman
0:01:20 I don’t think that’s right either. We need a new vision for modern masculinity
0:01:23 Do we need individual solutions or do we need societal solutions?
0:01:28 My solutions are pretty straightforward and this is the one I’m working through and will definitely get me in the most trouble
0:01:43 It’s quite clear that there is a crisis in
0:01:46 Society in
0:01:53 Different areas. I called a friend of mine who is called Simon Gunning before this conversation literally 10 minutes ago
0:01:57 He heads up one of the largest mental health charities in the UK
0:02:02 And they specifically focus on suicide. They do a lot of work with men and I said to him
0:02:04 Can you tell me the latest stats on?
0:02:11 Suicidality amongst men and purposelessness and those kind kinds of things and he said to me someone dies by suicide in the UK
0:02:14 Every 19 minutes 76% of these are male
0:02:17 But there’s 25 attempts for every death
0:02:24 It’s the single biggest cause of death for men under 45 and it’s the single biggest cause of death for 15 to 49 year olds and
0:02:31 The category of 19 to 35 year olds is twice as likely to report being in a crisis
0:02:39 Personally than any other group and lastly 16 to 24 year olds are currently the fastest growing group in history to exhibit
0:02:42 Suicidality
0:02:47 What is going wrong in the way we’ve designed and the way that we’re executing upon this vision of society? I
0:02:52 Think even the way we frame the problem is incorrect
0:02:56 And that is when we talk about if you were to say
0:03:03 That women are three times as likely as men to kill themselves
0:03:07 I think we would talk about the problem through the lens of it being a societal issue
0:03:15 And we would immediately move to what investments and change in behavior and education would address that problem
0:03:20 When we say young men are killing themselves at three times the rate as young women
0:03:26 We use terms like accountability or say things well if they just opened up more about their emotions
0:03:31 Or they need to get their act together and that is we’ve decided when it comes to men
0:03:37 Compassion is a zero-sum game and that if you feel bad for men
0:03:45 It immediately kind of outs you as someone who might be anti women or who’s gotten red pill because the void
0:03:48 The statistics are just
0:03:53 staggering four times more likely to be addicted twelve times more likely to be incarcerated and
0:03:59 Because nobody was talking openly and honestly about those very real issues
0:04:06 That void created opportunity for what I think are some unproductive voices to fill that void and start speaking to these men and
0:04:12 Naturally a lot of people now have a gag reflex when I hear people talking about the problems around them
0:04:18 So the first is we need to frame the problem as this is a real issue that requires and deserves compassion
0:04:24 And our sympathy, you know, it’s not a zero-sum game civil rights in her white people
0:04:31 game marriage didn’t in any way diminish heteronormative marriage and so the first is to have a conversation that this is a group that’s struggling and
0:04:39 To stop using terms like accountability and somehow blaming them for their own problems here the 19-year-old male should not pay for the sins of
0:04:45 His father or grandfather now and my Yoda on this is Richard Reeves
0:04:49 But basically it comes down to kind of three things. The first is biological
0:04:56 Our prefrontal cortex does not mature as fast as a woman’s an 18-year-old woman from an executive function standpoint is
0:05:02 Like a 20-year-old male. So or put another way two seniors in high school applying to college
0:05:10 The woman is essentially competing against a 16-year-old and that is her prefrontal cortex had that executive function that he has
0:05:13 She had it at 16. So we’re seeing
0:05:23 Double the number of women graduating from u.s. Colleges as men because it’s 60 40 ratio when they start and then the ratio only gets worse because more men drop out
0:05:29 That still is an incredible on ramp to influence and economic security and these men aren’t getting on that on ramp
0:05:33 So there’s biological reasons. There’s also I think the education system is just biased against men
0:05:42 Boys are five excuse. Excuse me a boy is twice as likely on a risk-adjusted basis or behavior-adjusted basis to be suspended for the exact same activity
0:05:47 As a girl who’s brought into the principal’s office for the exact same infraction
0:05:50 You’re sitting in front of me as a as a guy
0:05:55 You’re twice as likely to be suspended for cheating on your chemistry test as if you as a girl coming in
0:06:00 A black boy is five times as likely to be suspended as a girl
0:06:05 So we still have we have a real bias now part of that is that 90 percent
0:06:08 of primary school teachers are women there are more
0:06:15 Fee there are more female fighter pilots per capita than there are male kindergarten teachers
0:06:18 men are not going into early stage education
0:06:20 and
0:06:23 This is really important because you have an entire cohort
0:06:26 of boys
0:06:30 Who grow up the single if you were to point to a single a single point of failure
0:06:36 Where all of this starts if you said where did this young man come off the tracks?
0:06:41 If you tried to identify one signal through all the noise it would be the following
0:06:44 When the boy no longer has a male role model
0:06:50 And with incarceration with male abandonment and with a lack of teachers in primary school
0:06:56 You have an entire generation of young men who grow up having never had a male role model
0:07:01 And so a lack of male role models an education system that is biased against them
0:07:07 And then I think economic policies whether it’s the outsourcing of manufacturing jobs
0:07:13 The transfer of wealth from young to old people and you think well the fact that someone over the age of 70 is
0:07:20 72 wealth here than they were 40 years ago and someone under the age of 40 is 24 less wealthy that affects men and women
0:07:24 I think it’s especially hard on men because I think men are still
0:07:30 Primarily evaluated in terms through the lens of their economic
0:07:32 of vitality
0:07:37 So they’re biologically behind women have an education system biased against them
0:07:41 And we have economic policies that have created a great deal of shame
0:07:47 And rage and the last point I would just say is for the first time in europe and america’s history
0:07:51 A 30 year old is not doing as well as his or her parents were at 30
0:07:58 And that creates just tremendous shame and rage. I mean look at the housing market the average age of a first time homebuyer
0:08:00 Is 47 now
0:08:03 In 1980 the average age of a first time homebuyer was 29
0:08:06 Young people have been sequestered from whatever you call
0:08:12 You know loosely speaking the american dream or the or you know the the uk dream. So
0:08:14 the odds are just
0:08:18 The the forces in the face of young men
0:08:23 Abs just become greater and greater and it’s manifesting in a lot of different ways
0:08:26 lower marriage rates lower birth rates and
0:08:32 Skyrocketing and suicide should also add that suicide is way up among teen girls
0:08:36 Because of social media. So different challenges at different ages
0:08:42 You’re committing a lot of your time to both talking about this but writing about this subject matter
0:08:48 Why why does it matter so much to you personally of all the things because you’re one of those individuals
0:08:51 and I spoke to your team and they kind of echoed this that
0:08:53 is very diverse in
0:08:57 their ability to speak about subject matter you could talk about investing or money or
0:09:00 business or
0:09:03 happiness, but for some reason you’ve honed in it seems
0:09:05 in part
0:09:09 To solve this challenge that young men specifically are facing. Why?
0:09:12 Why you?
0:09:14 Well
0:09:16 Did you have two parents? Yes
0:09:21 Okay, so I had a single mother. I was installing shy because I’m that guy
0:09:28 I’m that guy that that as a kid like lost didn’t have didn’t have a male role model
0:09:29 um
0:09:35 We were in what I affectionately call an upper lower middle class household. My mother lived and died a secretary
0:09:39 um, I just could have easily come off the tracks and
0:09:41 almost did a few times
0:09:44 and because government stepped in and because
0:09:47 Because of things like Pell grants which are
0:09:54 um financial aid for kids in the lower, I think quartile of income earning houses because the University of california
0:10:00 Uh saw themselves as public servants not as luxury brands and they led in 76 of applicants
0:10:03 You know and I got rejected the first time
0:10:06 So I was one of the 24 that didn’t get in and then I got in again
0:10:09 But the big hand of government lifted me up and also
0:10:14 I had men a lot of strange men step in a stockbroker
0:10:20 A baseball coach a neighbor. I had all these wonderful men kind of step in
0:10:23 and between
0:10:27 The warm embrace of government in america that you still have unremarkable people
0:10:29 uh men who stepped in
0:10:33 You know, this is nothing but for me. I relate to these young men
0:10:35 and
0:10:38 I see an opportunity. There aren’t a lot of people
0:10:44 I think I just think the problem is so much greater than the emotion in the bandwidth
0:10:46 And the resources being allocated to it
0:10:53 And it’s just simply, you know, kind of a nod to the the institutions and the men that helped me
0:11:00 Um, so and also be blunt. It’s a commercial opportunity. It’s a chance to talk about something
0:11:04 That’s it’s a white space. It’s so obvious
0:11:09 If you think of it yourself as a thought leader, you want to be fearless and you want to move the needle on stuff
0:11:11 So this for me was just
0:11:16 You know, slowly but surely you just look at the data and it all leads to one place and that is
0:11:17 um
0:11:20 young men have fallen further faster
0:11:23 than any cohort in america and europe
0:11:27 And and it needs to be addressed and talked about
0:11:33 This idea that it all comes back to do you have a male role model in your life links
0:11:39 Interestingly to a lot of the data that says we’re less likely to be married than ever before we’re less likely
0:11:44 Even I was reading some stats around when our first kiss happens and a man’s first kiss used to happen
0:11:46 I think it was around 18. It’s now
0:11:53 On average into their early 20s. Everything seems to be moving further and further and back. So from that I deduce that the chance that
0:12:02 A young man would have a male role model in their life is probably deteriorating as well because there’s less marriages. There’s seems to be
0:12:03 um
0:12:05 The prospects of dating seem to have dropped as well
0:12:09 So is that correlation between these two things in some in some respect?
0:12:13 Yeah, there’s
0:12:15 What’s strange is so you don’t have kids, right? No
0:12:21 What’s weird about raising kids now is that my mom was worried about me getting into too much trouble
0:12:26 I think what’s fairly common now among parents is we’re worried our kids aren’t going to get into enough trouble
0:12:30 And that is we see the power of unsupervised play
0:12:33 we see the power of
0:12:37 Maybe sneaking into a movie and getting caught, you know, we see just
0:12:40 Uh, the the that it’s important that at some point
0:12:43 Kids are going to experiment with alcohol and drugs and kind of better
0:12:48 They ease into it as opposed to never do anything and then end up at college their freshman year and
0:12:51 Just can’t you know can’t handle the onslaught of it
0:12:53 so
0:13:00 You know, I think that there’s something about the concierge and bulldozer parenting that where we use so many sanitary wipes on a kid’s life
0:13:03 That they don’t develop their own immunities
0:13:05 um
0:13:08 40 percent of harvard’s incoming freshman class are virgins
0:13:10 and
0:13:11 uh
0:13:13 I worry that I mean
0:13:18 This is going to sound strange. We have too little teen pregnancy. What do I mean by that?
0:13:21 Um unplanned teen pregnancy is a bad thing
0:13:28 but we have we have had such dramatic falls in that and uh drunk driving accidents, which is great
0:13:32 But what it signals quite frankly is that kids are so over programmed
0:13:38 and have such a lack of um socialization now the number of high school teenagers
0:13:41 That sees their friends every day has been cut in half
0:13:47 That we’re slowly but surely sequestering from each other and when we do that we become less mammalia
0:13:51 We’re mammals. We’re literally if you have dogs dogs are happiest when they’re lying on top of you
0:13:53 The worst thing you can do to a dog is leave it alone all day
0:13:56 and what we’re doing the young people’s we’re kind of
0:14:01 They are leaving others and themselves alone all day. We’re separating from each other. We’re becoming less social
0:14:04 and there’s a group of men
0:14:06 who um
0:14:13 Aren’t received well at school don’t find a source of pride auto shop metal shop wood shops gone away
0:14:15 they
0:14:16 They go online to date
0:14:24 They the majority of them get rejected if you’re average attractiveness and online dating you have to swipe right 200 times to get a single coffee
0:14:31 If you set up five coffees you’ll get one will actually show up four the five will ghost you and decide later on
0:14:33 They don’t actually want to meet up
0:14:39 So a young man of attractive of average attractiveness and online dating has to swipe right a thousand times
0:14:43 So he gets validation for one coffee. He gets validation that he has no worth the other sex
0:14:45 He loses confidence
0:14:50 He starts engaging with people because he has less opportunities from random encounters where he has to develop those skills
0:14:53 and slowly but surely he sequesters
0:14:56 From society and at some point
0:15:02 He just is not not really savable. He just never develops those skills those skills around friendship
0:15:07 Or romantic relationships in the united states one in seven men doesn’t have a single friend one and four
0:15:13 Uh one and four can’t name a best friend in addition marriage has become now a luxury item
0:15:17 If you’re in the upper quartile of income herning households
0:15:22 There’s a three and four chance you’re going to get married if you’re in the lower quartile the lowest quartile
0:15:25 There’s only a one and four. There’s a three and four chance. You will never get married
0:15:32 So we have a group of the most dangerous person in the world. We’re producing millions of them and that is a lonely
0:15:34 young broke male
0:15:36 and
0:15:39 Just bridging into ai. I think the biggest danger in ai
0:15:44 That people are worried about it becoming sentient. I don’t buy any of that or super weapons
0:15:48 I think that’s a problem that we’ve managed through those things by weapons etc before
0:15:51 I think the biggest problem that ai presents is that
0:15:59 big tech presents a series of low calorie low risk entry points into what feels like a reasonable facsimile of a relationship
0:16:04 I think i’m making friends online. No, but you’re not really experiencing friendship
0:16:13 I think i’m in a relationship with somebody. Well, are you are you really i’m learning? No, you’re not you’re gambling on coinbase or robin hood
0:16:15 and rather than
0:16:21 Endure the rejection and try and develop the skills and make the effort and it is an effort and involves rejection
0:16:23 of going out into the physical world
0:16:26 And revealing yourself as someone who’d like to be friends with another man
0:16:29 Express romantic interests take those risks
0:16:36 We’re developing these digital analogs of life that create low entry low risk relationships
0:16:39 And you think well, that’s not necessarily a bad thing
0:16:45 But it is because it leads to depression because the reason why romantic comedies are two hours and not 20 minutes
0:16:48 Is that life is about the victory?
0:16:51 of taking risks enduring rejection
0:16:54 and having a small business that works
0:16:56 about about
0:16:58 Approaching someone and getting the interview
0:17:05 Cold emailing someone and getting getting a coffee and quite frankly pursuing someone and developing the skills
0:17:11 And deciding to put on a clean shirt and maybe shower more often and maybe hit the gym every once in a while
0:17:15 And maybe text when you’re not sure how this person feels about you
0:17:22 And figure out a way to interact with someone around the nuance nuance and develop the skills around human sexuality
0:17:28 Such that you can develop a relationship. That is the victory. That’s the payoff after the two hours
0:17:32 And fewer and fewer men are engaging in those risks and that victory
0:17:39 And I think that ai in combination with sex bots is going to create an industry
0:17:42 Where men start having relationships with algorithms and dolls
0:17:49 Supposedly the sex bot industry is going to be bigger than the domestic box office receipts of all movie theaters in the us within five to six years
0:17:52 So we’re going to have men
0:17:58 Having relationships with machines and dolls as opposed to as opposed to other other
0:18:04 Humans and I think it’s just it creates a a level of depression
0:18:07 I think her should be required watching for
0:18:12 Every teen male and I think every every teenager in in high school
0:18:18 Should have a course as part of health on mating dynamics where they teach especially young men
0:18:22 That approaching a woman in expressing her manic interests
0:18:26 While making her feel safe is a skill and there’s nothing wrong with that
0:18:30 In that the end game a relationship a partner a romantic
0:18:32 partner
0:18:34 Is one of the keys to a happy life?
0:18:38 And I think most studies bear that out and we are sequestering
0:18:41 For a variety of reasons men from the opportunities
0:18:44 To have those relationships and it also impacts women
0:18:48 But what we’re seeing with women is two and three under the age of 30 have a boyfriend
0:18:52 Only one in three men have a girlfriend because women are dating older
0:18:56 They want more economically and emotionally viable men
0:18:59 On the point of sex box. It’s almost
0:19:06 It’s almost impossible for me to see how that doesn’t become a huge part of male dating
0:19:12 You know, I was speaking to Mustafa Solomon who was the one of the co-founders of Mustafa. Yeah, yeah
0:19:18 Yeah, one of the co-founders of deep mind which sold to google and in his new book the coming wave
0:19:23 He talks about how all of these breakthroughs in technology one of which is ai one of which is robotics
0:19:29 Is going to sort of intersect with the ability to have literally someone in your house
0:19:33 Who can not only clean, you know, clean your house and do the dishes and
0:19:36 Make your lunch, but also can love you
0:19:43 In whatever artificial form that love comes they can agree with everything you say they can encourage you and they can have sex with you
0:19:45 and
0:19:48 Dare I say and I’m sure this might be clipped by somebody
0:19:52 There is a certain cohort of men who would rather choose that than nothing
0:19:58 And when they’re faced increasingly with that choice, it feels really inevitable to me to see how they would choose
0:20:01 um, some of them would choose a sex spot or
0:20:04 Something to that effect to fill that void
0:20:09 We can all relate to that we all we all make that type of decision
0:20:15 In different increments a lot of times it’s easier to say i’m just going to stay home and watch netflix and take an edible and
0:20:18 porn order in and maybe
0:20:22 Maybe watch porn instead of go out and engage in the
0:20:28 Expense the emotional trauma the effort the skills i have to provide
0:20:33 To try and establish something resembling a real world relationship
0:20:36 and rejection is enormously
0:20:38 painful and
0:20:40 You know, I think teaching
0:20:43 young people
0:20:49 I think that’s a great thing to be able to do and I think that’s a great thing to be able to do
0:20:56 And I think that’s a great thing to be able to do and I think that’s a great thing to be able to do
0:21:00 And I think that’s a great thing to be able to do and I think that’s a great thing to be able to do
0:21:06 And I think that’s a great thing to be able to do and I think that’s a great thing to be able to do
0:21:10 And I think that’s a great thing to be able to do and I think that’s a great thing to be able to do
0:21:13 Because this what’s going to happen. He’s going to wake up tomorrow and he’s going to realize he’s fine
0:21:17 And he’s going to develop a little bit of callous over that that emotion
0:21:20 And I think you’re an entrepreneur
0:21:22 and
0:21:27 And I’ve been an entrepreneur my whole life. I was single most of my adult life. I don’t know. I don’t know your relationship status
0:21:29 But if you’re an entrepreneur
0:21:33 And you’re single you’re used to enduring rejection and that is the key to success
0:21:36 That’s the absolute key
0:21:40 Because the only thing you know that that has happened in someone who’s very successful
0:21:45 professionally and personally is they have developed the skills to endure rejection
0:21:48 That that’s just it. No one bats a thousand
0:21:52 You approach strange women in a strange place most of the time
0:21:56 It’s going to be awkward and sometimes it’s going to be humiliating because you’re going to get rejected
0:21:59 You want to start a business
0:22:01 You keep asking people for money
0:22:04 You keep asking employees to join you keep asking for customers and clients
0:22:07 And the only thing I can guarantee you is a shit ton of rejection
0:22:11 The ability to endure that rejection
0:22:13 Is absolutely the key to success
0:22:16 More so than talent
0:22:19 More so than I even I wouldn’t say hard work. I’d say grit is right up there
0:22:22 But your ability to endure rejection is the
0:22:26 You know, if you want to punch above your weight class economically or romantically
0:22:32 Then get out a spoon and get ready to eat shit. That is a prerequisite to that kind of success
0:22:35 And technology is enabling people to say
0:22:41 Well, why subject yourself to that risk? You can you can engage in something
0:22:45 That feels sort of similar without any risk at all
0:22:51 And over the long term, it’s just such a bad trade. I mean you were talking about porn
0:22:55 porn is the largest unsupervised experiment on young men that we’ve ever had
0:22:57 and it’s largely unsupervised because
0:23:02 There isn’t a lot of academic research on it because most academics don’t want to be known as the porn professor
0:23:05 So there really is a lack of research around it
0:23:09 And when I coach young men the first thing I do kind of my go-to is I get their phone
0:23:13 I look at screen time and I’m like, okay, let’s think of your what do you have as a young person
0:23:17 You have a lack of financial capital, but you have a lot of human capital and that’s really important time
0:23:21 So we’re going to think about your time as money and we’re going to decide how we’re going to invest it
0:23:27 Let’s look at your current portfolio of investments and I ask them to unlock their phone and I say I won’t be judgmental
0:23:29 in between twitter
0:23:31 tiktok
0:23:33 porn coinbase
0:23:38 It’s so easy to find a minimum of 10 and sometimes up to 50 hours a week
0:23:41 And we’re going to reallocate it
0:23:43 And we’re going to reallocate it to other things
0:23:47 And one of the things we’re going to reallocate it to is like first we got to make some money
0:23:50 Are you making any money? You got to make some I don’t care if it’s flipping on an uber app
0:23:53 I don’t care if it’s becoming an instacart a dasher
0:23:57 The best way to make a lot of money is to start making a little bit because you start developing the skills
0:23:59 And the hunger for more money, right?
0:24:02 The second is we’re going to take some time
0:24:04 And we’re going to try and invest in
0:24:09 Organizations or activities that put us in the company of random strangers
0:24:13 Not just potential romantic interests, but friends mentors
0:24:17 You know, that’s that’s super, you know, that’s super important
0:24:21 And one of the keys to developing what i’ll call the mojo
0:24:24 to
0:24:26 Take those risks around romantic relationships
0:24:29 Is to moderate your consumption of porn
0:24:36 One of the only reasons I graduated from UCLA was because one of my motivations for going to class
0:24:41 Was not only that I wanted to learn not only that I needed to learn to graduate
0:24:42 I was a terrible student
0:24:46 But the prospect of potentially meeting a woman
0:24:52 Who I could take to one of my fraternity parties or that ultimately might be interested in me romantically and sexually
0:24:56 And if I’d had the access to porn that young men have now
0:25:01 I’m not sure that mojo would have been as great to get out of the house as often
0:25:06 So just to tell young men not to engage in porn. I think it’s sort of ridiculous
0:25:12 But look at it analytically and think okay, would you be more inclined to get out of the house?
0:25:17 Take those risks engage in the victory engage in what it is to be a man and be a mammal
0:25:24 If you had reallocated some capital and ensured that that fire was still there
0:25:29 So modulating I think modulating porn and more generally spending less time
0:25:31 online
0:25:33 Every digital version of your life
0:25:37 Is a shittier vision of the analog version that could happen
0:25:42 Now but everyone said I’d rather have I’d rather have shitty
0:25:49 Shitty kind of okay TV that’s just mind-numbing as opposed to putting in the effort to to to do something great, but
0:25:54 I think it’s more than just porn. I think it’s all of it. Why leave the house
0:26:02 Why endure that sort of rejection effort expense? It’s not just so expensive to go out, right?
0:26:04 So but I think porn is one of those things that
0:26:09 Young men need to modulate and find in you know, such that they get their mojo
0:26:17 This all has knock-on effects for women and I think the data is also suggesting that the crisis amongst men is causing
0:26:20 In many situations a crisis
0:26:21 for women as well
0:26:26 Because we both you know men and women exist in an ecosystem that needs to be somewhat balanced
0:26:28 um
0:26:30 So I’d like to talk about the impact this is having on women
0:26:33 One of the things I found interesting
0:26:36 It’s actually because of a young young woman came up to me in a bookshop
0:26:38 I was just there looking for my own book as you don’t just because it just come out
0:26:44 And she said something to me that a lot of women that have approached me or DM’d me have said quite frequently
0:26:46 Which is she’s over the age of 30 now
0:26:49 She’s committed much of her life to her career
0:26:52 She’s single
0:26:54 She’s tried dating apps and she
0:26:56 Doesn’t enjoy it
0:27:02 And I part of me started to think about the fact she might be caught in a sort of generational gap where they used to meet in person
0:27:05 But now the the generation below her meet online
0:27:12 Um, and she concluded what she was saying to me with the fact that she believes or she’s starting to believe that maybe there’s something wrong with her
0:27:19 Because she’s over the age of 30. She’s single. She can’t find a partner. She told me she’s never had a boyfriend
0:27:21 She’s killing it in her career
0:27:25 And she was in that bookshop looking for advice from a book
0:27:31 And I feel compelled because I know she listens to this podcast to
0:27:37 Ask as many people as I can the question to find an answer for her because there’s someone very close to me in my life
0:27:41 Who I literally text when I left the bookshop and I said I’ve just met you in the bookshop
0:27:47 Every sentence that that woman said to me in the bookshop is the exact word for word even like I’ve tried going to the gym
0:27:48 And that’s not working
0:27:52 Is the same as a close friend in my my life one of my best friends has said to me as well
0:27:55 And there’s not just one in my personal life. There’s three or four
0:27:58 Well, we all know women
0:28:05 I’m sure this happens to you all the time really interesting high character successful attractive women
0:28:07 Usually in their 30s sometimes in their 40s
0:28:09 who will say
0:28:11 I can’t find anyone to date
0:28:15 And it’s not that they can’t find anyone to date. It’s that they can’t find anyone that want to date
0:28:21 And there’s some dynamics here. The first is can I just interject to validate your point there? She also said to me
0:28:25 I’m not willing to drop my standards. Well, and and and
0:28:29 It’s like Warren Buffett said the key to a healthy marriage is low expectations
0:28:35 The what’s happening is and I think his name is chris. Williams. He kind of reminds me you he’s this handsome young
0:28:40 Podcaster who’s blowing by all us old guys, you know chris. Yeah, I knew chris. Anyways, he doesn’t he does a fantastic job
0:28:42 And I’ve learned a lot from him
0:28:46 But he calls it the high heels effect and that is every year for the last 50 years
0:28:53 Women have become better educated and they’re making more money and urban centers. They’ve now under the age of 30 blown by
0:28:57 They’re now making more money more single women in the u.s. Own houses and single men
0:29:04 They’re getting taller every year and the reason he uses height is that 50% of women say they won’t date a guy shorter than them
0:29:07 It’s probably more like 80% and even if they’re not cognizant of it
0:29:12 Just anthropologically subconsciously they’re just usually not attracted to men shorter than them
0:29:15 Because they have something telling them that this
0:29:18 Individual is less likely to be able to physically protect you
0:29:22 So you’re just at a disadvantage from a height standpoint
0:29:27 Now metaphorically women are getting taller every year and men are getting shorter, right?
0:29:35 Men mate socioeconomically horizontally and down women horizontally and up, but when the pool of men who are socioeconomically
0:29:38 senior to women
0:29:42 It just means that the quote-unquote pool of viable mates for women
0:29:48 Is going down every year and women have been told they can have it all and what I found is you can’t have it all
0:29:52 Um, or let me put this away. You can have it all you just can’t have it all at once
0:29:56 And that uh to focus on their careers, which by the way, I think is a good thing
0:30:00 I think economic viability is just super important for everyone including women
0:30:04 Um, but the reality is as they have gotten taller men have gotten shorter
0:30:11 So there’s just less pairing society has a tendency to evaluate a woman’s success through the lens of her romantic success
0:30:13 Not as much for men
0:30:18 People look at you and think and I don’t know your relationship sass, but people are like guy who’s killing it
0:30:21 He’s killing it and he’s single. Oh my god. It’s good to be Stephen Barley
0:30:28 A woman in her 30s who’s killing a professional is alone. It’s like super successful, but
0:30:33 Your your single status is a feature for women
0:30:36 It’s seen as a bug and you both might be just as lonely
0:30:42 But it’s it’s or you might be engaging in and I’m projecting you have no idea what your situation is here
0:30:48 But there’s this dynamic where the men who are in the top 10 percent can engage in Porsche polygamy
0:30:51 and that is women
0:30:52 um
0:30:55 With online dating now believe there’s nothing wrong with this
0:31:00 That and I’m going to be this isn’t going to get me in trouble, but let’s rate everybody
0:31:01 Most people will have
0:31:06 A knowledge that some people are more attractive than others and they find certain people less and more attractive
0:31:12 A woman of average attractiveness can have a relationship and when I say a relationship that’s code for sex
0:31:15 With someone who’s in the top 10 percent
0:31:19 But that individual is probably not going to establish a long-term relationship
0:31:26 And because of the lack of friction and connection and meeting people via text message or online dating the top 10 percent of men
0:31:29 are getting 80 to
0:31:33 80 plus percent of the opportunities for short-term relationships or sex
0:31:39 So they can engage in what’s called Porsche polygamy and that there’s not a lot of motivation for them to establish long-term
0:31:43 Relationships which leads to bad behavior and a lack of household formation
0:31:49 So the guys that most women want and believe that they should be in a relationship with
0:31:53 Are the least likely to establish a long-term relationship?
0:31:55 And then the bottom 90
0:31:59 Either have little or absolutely no interest from women
0:32:04 So I want to be clear. No woman is responsible for servicing a man
0:32:11 But what I think has happened is this dynamic where because online has given everyone access to everyone
0:32:14 The majority of women are all interested in the same group
0:32:17 And this group is now
0:32:20 Much less likely to engage in a long-term relationship
0:32:26 And the result is just there’s a disproportionate number of men and women who quite frankly
0:32:28 Are just lonely
0:32:32 But men have a tendency when they don’t have a romantic relationship
0:32:37 To not only not have that romantic relationship, but then they have fewer friends
0:32:39 They go out less
0:32:41 They’re less professionally successful
0:32:45 You know, if I didn’t have a mate who told me we need to stay for a house
0:32:47 I’m not sure I wouldn’t have been smoking pot and drinking every night
0:32:51 You know, she was like if you want to continue to have a relationship and have sex with me
0:32:54 You’ve got to get your shit together
0:32:57 That’s a men young men need that
0:33:01 They need the guardrail of a romantic interest
0:33:08 The cocktail or the the peanut butter and chocolate of a household where one person is more risk aggressive
0:33:11 you know, that’s really important
0:33:15 Pushing the boundaries of what can be done and then another person who’s more practical
0:33:20 And that oftentimes goes into gender roles not always and sometimes as flip
0:33:22 But that’s a powerful combination
0:33:29 One plus one really does equal three and across every species you see that the majority of really wonderful things
0:33:35 Including offspring but other things in terms of building a society are a mix of different attributes
0:33:40 And so we have just fewer and fewer of that peanut butter and chocolate and households. There are now
0:33:42 more people
0:33:49 Not only living alone, but living with their parents than ever before because they’re not establishing this relationship. So it has
0:33:53 It’s absolutely bad for women, but typically typically
0:34:01 Women still are economically successful still find places to put that love and quite frankly don’t start killing themselves or killing others
0:34:09 So it’s not that it’s any any any any less bad, but the knock-on effects tend to be less bad for society
0:34:12 and I went through the research from
0:34:19 The Pew research but also from the sort of centres of disease control just to clarify some of these numbers for women as well and
0:34:21 They they cement everything you’ve said
0:34:24 Only 13 percent of women over 30
0:34:26 were married
0:34:32 In 1970 that number has now risen to almost half the divorce rate for women over 30 has doubled in the past 50 years
0:34:38 In 1970 only 10 percent of women over 30 were childless today that number has risen to almost 30 percent
0:34:43 In 1970 only 28 percent of women over 30 were earning more than their husbands today
0:34:49 That number has risen to almost 50 percent and in 1970 only 12 percent of women over 30 were living alone
0:34:54 Today that number has risen to 35 percent and on the point of loneliness
0:34:58 I was looking at how many men versus how many women have a best friend and it’s
0:35:05 It’s multiples more so multiple more women I find still have relationships regardless of this state of affairs
0:35:08 because they they’re better at as you say forming social connections in
0:35:12 non-romantic relationships with other women than men are so
0:35:15 it’s a pretty it’s a pretty um
0:35:20 Bleak picture and maybe most importantly of all there’s a clear direction of travel here
0:35:25 And if you extrapolate out that direction of travel, we don’t get to a good place population decline
0:35:32 You spoke of it and how that lopsided society depression mental health suicide. So the question becomes for me
0:35:36 What would you advise young men you talked about money? I thought that was really interesting
0:35:42 So maybe we start there personal finance and establishing that I’m a young man. So say 21 years old
0:35:45 um
0:35:49 What what have I got to do with my money? Where should I be putting it? How should I be earning it?
0:35:52 Mm-hmm. So
0:35:58 I think the three legs of this tool we’re going back to a real like reallocating capital as a young man one star making some money
0:36:01 to put yourself in
0:36:07 In environments where you might have a random encounter with a stranger also and I know you engage in this
0:36:11 We’re going to reallocate four to six hours a week to physical fitness
0:36:13 um
0:36:14 feeling strong
0:36:16 feeling
0:36:18 um in shape
0:36:23 Is one there’s studies coming out now that it’s supposedly 50 better than pharmaceuticals and talk therapy
0:36:28 Two you’ll be more attractive to mates. You’ll feel better about yourself. You’ll be more kind
0:36:31 Uh, I think that is incredibly
0:36:34 powerful, but in terms of economic success and I’m
0:36:39 I have a book coming out on march on this. I think there’s a basic algorithm to financial security
0:36:45 Our economic security the first is focus and that is focus find something
0:36:48 I don’t I hate the term follow your passion
0:36:52 Because typically people mistake passion for a hobby and they think oh
0:36:55 I should be a dj or I should be an athlete or I should open a restaurant
0:37:00 And they choose industries with the unemployment rate is 90 plus percent
0:37:03 You know the riders are on strike in hollywood the number. There’s 180 000
0:37:06 people in the
0:37:08 Actors union sag or aftra
0:37:15 and the percentage of them that uh, don’t or that make more than 24 000 a year to qualify for health insurance
0:37:20 Is um, 12 and a half percent. So I would argue that there’s under
0:37:23 Or unemployment for nine and ten actors
0:37:29 So find something you’re good at that that where there’s an employment rate of more than 90 percent
0:37:35 And I want to be clear some people follow their passion and it pays off hugely jz followed his passion is now a billionaire
0:37:39 But I tell young men assume you’re not jz find something you’re good at
0:37:44 That has more than a 90 plus percent employment rate, which is 99 percent of professions
0:37:46 and then
0:37:52 Invest the requisite 10 000 hours perseverance grit willingness to break through hard things willingness to suffer injustice
0:37:54 which is a guaranteed attribute of the workplace
0:38:02 And get really really good at something or at least having have a path to being great to something also in terms of being attractive to potential mates
0:38:08 There’s very few things that are more attractive if you’re not already economically successful than a plan
0:38:13 This is my plan, right? That’s what I think romantic potential brantic partners want
0:38:15 You don’t need to be a ball or you don’t need to be driving
0:38:19 A Porsche you need to have a plan and that plan might change that plan may not work out
0:38:21 We got to have a plan
0:38:24 So the first is we’re going to focus and we’re going to find something we’re good at
0:38:27 And not only something we’re good at but something
0:38:29 People will pay us for
0:38:32 That’s the first thing you got to make money
0:38:37 But the second component the key to wealth isn’t isn’t as much how much money you make
0:38:41 It’s your ability to live a little bit like a stoic and live below your means
0:38:45 And that’s one thing I always did. I always live below my means. I never had debt
0:38:47 I never used credit cards for stuff
0:38:49 And that is incredibly hard in our society
0:38:52 where
0:38:53 every
0:38:56 talented person and now AI and algorithms
0:39:00 Are finding you at a moment of vulnerability and convincing you that you need a new set of
0:39:08 On trainers that oh wait, it’s worth it to upgrade from economy to economy comfort to economy plus to business class
0:39:10 I mean, it’s just
0:39:17 The the market’s ability in a capitalist market to find you a product you must have when you have any disposable income
0:39:22 Is just remarkable. There are so many amazing ways
0:39:24 to spend money in london and york
0:39:27 That to not spend at all
0:39:30 And or not spend more than all
0:39:32 is real
0:39:34 discipline that is
0:39:39 That shows incredible character at a young age. You need to live like a stoic
0:39:41 Your your advantage as a young person
0:39:46 Is quite frankly to live in a fucking shoebox and spend no money on rent
0:39:49 Spend no money. I used to make it a game one summer
0:39:52 At ucla and this was more out of
0:39:55 Survival or need but if I didn’t make $3,300
0:40:01 Between my junior and senior year at ucla. I wasn’t going back to college. I owed the fraternity a ton of money
0:40:03 I wasn’t gonna be able to pay my tuition
0:40:06 So I had 11 weeks to make $3,300 and I figured out
0:40:11 If I just lived in the fraternity in a shitty little room that I was paying no money for
0:40:14 And I only ate top ramen bananas and milk
0:40:16 I could save I could I could live on
0:40:20 $10 a week. That was my total budget and I could do it
0:40:24 And when you’re a young man and not like that, it was still a fun summer
0:40:31 I would still go we would pool money and go buy a case of schmitty beer and then on sunday
0:40:36 Sunday nights we’d go to sizzler this tacky restaurant in la for a brune special
0:40:42 Malibu chicken and all you can eat salad bar and I used to go with the other members of the crew team and just clear them out
0:40:44 And spend three hours gorging
0:40:50 But we still had a good time. But when you’re young, I think you want to lean into this great thing where you don’t have to spend money
0:40:52 It is impossible not to spend money
0:40:56 When you get a little bit older and you start collecting dogs and kids
0:41:01 You can’t sleep on someone’s couch. You can’t sleep in a shitty apartment. You can’t walk to work
0:41:03 You can’t live on top ramen and bananas
0:41:05 so the ability
0:41:10 To gamify and really try and live below your means and then that creates an army of capital
0:41:17 And that army of capital goes out for you and starts making money for you when you’re in your sleep and that goes to specific investment advice
0:41:19 The first is and people don’t like to hear this
0:41:27 Do away with the notion that you are brighter than anyone else and going to be able to figure out individual stocks or investments that allow perform the market
0:41:31 I can’t convince you of that a hundred percent and some of it is fun
0:41:35 And if you want to learn about a stock and you want to buy invidia or you want to buy
0:41:37 Doja coin
0:41:42 Fine, but try not to do it with more than 30 percent of your saved money
0:41:46 Try to take two thirds plus of your saved money and put it in low cost
0:41:49 ETFs and index funds
0:41:53 Because here’s the thing our flaws of species is we don’t realize
0:41:58 How fast time goes because the majority of us for the majority of history have died before the age of 35
0:42:02 We can’t process how fast time is actually going to go
0:42:05 When you go past 35 at the age of 39
0:42:11 We stop we have no longer have the ability to process the way we change in terms of our own physical appearance
0:42:16 So from the age of 39 on and I can validate this every time you look in the mirror you’re like
0:42:18 Fuck what is that?
0:42:25 Because you can’t process what is happening to you because for the majority of your species history you weren’t around post 39
0:42:31 You and I hopefully will be sitting here in 20 years or over a beer and i’m going to look at you
0:42:37 I’m like how fast did it go and you’re gonna like Jesus like a blink and so if I said to you
0:42:42 Steven give me 20 give me find out a way to save a thousand bucks
0:42:47 A thousand bucks and in a blink it’s going to be worth six thousand because I have this magic box
0:42:54 How hard would you try to get as many as much of that capital to put in that box the power
0:43:01 The power of diversification and time because if you diversify I can get you six eight percent a year
0:43:06 Right every day 51 percent of stocks go up 49 percent go down
0:43:10 But if you invest in any five s and p stocks over 10 years and don’t trade them
0:43:15 No one has ever lost money 85 percent of day traders lose money
0:43:17 If you buy five stocks put them away
0:43:20 And never look at them again
0:43:24 Ten years later. No one has ever lost money. So diversification and this is where I really screwed up
0:43:26 I didn’t understand the power diversification
0:43:29 Successful people fall into the trap of thinking i’m a baller
0:43:36 I’m smarter than everyone. I’m going all in on sysco because everybody wants internet infrastructure
0:43:41 I’m going all in on amazon if you went all in on amazon in 99 in 24 months
0:43:43 You had lost 90 percent of your principal
0:43:50 Even amazon the best companies in the world if you look back the majority of them have had 24 month periods where they went down
0:43:56 90 percent, but if you’d held on you’d held on and you didn’t day trade and you didn’t look at your stocks
0:43:58 You’d be up 30 or 50 x now
0:44:05 So the power of diversification and also a recognition that time is just going to go so much faster than you think
0:44:08 So focus find something you’re good at that people will pay you for
0:44:10 Live like a stoic
0:44:15 Save you know spend less than you save so you can develop an army of people who are
0:44:19 Killing it or killing people and invading the earth while you’re in your sleep
0:44:26 Recognizing the power of diversification and then appreciating how fast time will go and not trading stocks
0:44:33 Just let time take over if we give every baby and this is a potential solution to what I think is going to be an
0:44:37 Oncoming crisis among seniors or too many of them that we can’t take care of
0:44:42 If we gave for 40 billion dollars from the u.s budget we could give every baby seven thousand dollars
0:44:47 And I think we treat them like infants and we put it in a savings account etfs diversified
0:44:52 By the time they’re 65 just with that seven thousand dollars if you didn’t let them touch it or trade it
0:44:54 It’d be worth a million bucks
0:44:59 So the fastest way to get every senior a million bucks and granted it’s 65 years from now
0:45:05 Would be to give every baby seven thousand dollars and that just shows you the power of compound
0:45:07 interest and time and diversification
0:45:10 I think it’s fairly simple those four things
0:45:15 But they’re not easy to do easy to do but everyone can do them almost everyone can do them
0:45:21 And for anybody who really is you know, they’ve got I don’t know three thousand dollars in their savings account
0:45:26 They have never invested a penny before in their life. They don’t know any of the terminology
0:45:31 We just used they don’t know vanguard means they don’t know what low fees mean. What is the simple way of
0:45:39 Getting them on the right track from that point of I drive taxis. I’ve got three thousand dollars in my bank account or five hundred dollars
0:45:41 What do I do?
0:45:46 Go to charleshwab or public.com open an account and first off find out
0:45:50 Um, the equivalents in the uk are like hard grief lands down
0:45:53 Um, you can do a lot of this stuff on a lot of different apps
0:46:02 Where you’re picking a fund, right? You go into spy or go into an index or an etf that buys a bunch of stocks for you
0:46:04 make sure it’s low fees
0:46:11 And find out and I wish I knew more about the tax law here find out if your employer or the government offers you
0:46:18 Some sort of tax advantage vehicle in the u.s. It’s it’s roth and 401ks. We have isa. We have a retirement
0:46:22 System where you can invest in your retirement and you have to understand that shit
0:46:27 And if you don’t understand it find your daughter or someone who can explain it to you
0:46:35 And then the key is just start and put it in an etf or an index fund that tracks the entire market
0:46:42 Low cost low fees and find out if you have access to anything that’s tax advantage, but the key
0:46:45 The key is to start they only have a hundred dollars
0:46:49 Well, christ that again that hundred bucks
0:46:54 In 20 or 30 years will be a thousand or more and not only that it gets you
0:47:01 It gets you a taste for flesh, you know, like I remember I went on my first safari and they said
0:47:07 The lot, you know, unfortunately, we have one lion attacking human and now all of them appear to have a taste for human flesh
0:47:13 They never used to go after humans before but once they get a taste for human flesh like oh, this tastes pretty good
0:47:16 Let’s start killing people killing and eating people
0:47:22 Just a hundred bucks and then you wake up and you’re like, oh, it’s worth 108. It’s worth 112
0:47:29 You get a taste for the flesh of how powerful money and time and investing is and just start
0:47:31 Also, I think it starts to make you feel
0:47:38 In a weird way, I think it makes you feel and I and and I’m just saying this because I can relate to it as a man
0:47:44 I think it makes you feel masculine to feel like I’m taking care of myself. I’m strong enough to live below my means
0:47:47 Discipline isn’t it? Yeah, I it’s like working out
0:47:50 You just feel better about yourself and I think
0:47:53 Living below your means and creating an army of capital
0:47:56 Everyone talks about starting a business at scale so they can make money in their sleep
0:48:02 That’s their goal. You can make money in your sleep by saving it and investing it. But the key is just to start
0:48:07 Scott every time you mention male role models your demeanor changes
0:48:09 a little bit
0:48:18 Say more and I I see the emotion and passion in your face. Yeah, I mean I like I said, I could have easily come off the tracks and all these
0:48:23 Wonderful men from different parts of my life. I mean
0:48:26 this is um
0:48:27 one of my
0:48:32 One of my books the algebra of happiness was optioned to be turned into a series and the series was going to be like an
0:48:34 R rated version of modern family
0:48:37 Because this was the reality of my life. I live with my mother
0:48:41 And her boyfriend for seven years who was a male role model for me
0:48:47 We were that family that they don’t talk about in movies or dramas and that is we were the second family
0:48:52 Terry was married with kids and every other weekend he used to come spend with me and my mom
0:48:55 And you immediately think this is a bad person
0:49:00 He was wonderful to me. He was a great role model. He was generous. He was kind
0:49:04 He taught me a lot about what it meant to be successful and a good person
0:49:06 and
0:49:10 After him and my mom broke up. He reached out and kind of tried to stay involved in my life
0:49:13 you know, I had
0:49:15 I had men like that. I remember meeting men
0:49:22 I met a camp counselor who would just stay in touch with me and he was in technology and he taught me a little bit about
0:49:27 Programming and here’s the thing. Here’s the thing Steven and this is I mean the bottom line is
0:49:35 When we go to solutions the number one solution for what ails young men is other men and that is
0:49:38 If we want better men, we have to be better men
0:49:44 And I think the ultimate expression of masculinity where it shows you’re powerful. You’re strong. You’re smart
0:49:48 Is when you get involved and irrationally passionate about the well-being of another child
0:49:54 That is that shows you have hit a certain level of success and unfortunately
0:49:59 I was on bill mar. I’m doing a lot of name dropping right now and I said that and bill mar immediately went
0:50:04 Well, I I’m not going to get involved in every any 15 year old boys life. They’re going to think I’m a pervert
0:50:08 And the reality is the catholic church and michael jackson have fucked it up for all of us
0:50:11 And that is 99.9 9 9 percent
0:50:15 of paternal and fraternal love that men want to
0:50:19 Display and get involved in a young man’s life
0:50:21 is positive
0:50:26 And society has taught us to be suspect of those men and it’s a real shame
0:50:28 because
0:50:30 those random
0:50:33 Generous men who came into my life
0:50:37 were were were instrumental instrumental in
0:50:44 In my development and turning into a productive citizen. I think a lot of men have those
0:50:53 The inclinations and that desire to get involved and in the good news is these young men in need of guidance are everywhere
0:50:56 sometimes it’s just your friends kids because biologically
0:51:01 Kids start pulling away from their parents because they need to to get out
0:51:06 You know leave the nest so they start thinking anything your dad says is just wrong and stupid
0:51:10 But your dad’s friend when he says the exact same thing
0:51:12 You kind of nod your head and it makes sense
0:51:16 And young men who need guidance are everywhere
0:51:21 Everywhere, you know, my nanny’s kid is struggling. Your friends kids
0:51:25 Are struggling young boys are struggling. I get emails
0:51:29 every day from dozens of young men who are clearly just like
0:51:32 Good kids trying to figure it out
0:51:37 They’re just trying to figure it out and they want a little bit of reassurance and a little bit of guidance
0:51:40 In someone just to tell them that they matter, right?
0:51:42 but yeah, but
0:51:46 That the number of men just randomly with no self-interest
0:51:50 Who got involved in my life was just I mean literally a gift. It’s several of them
0:51:53 And a lot of these men are finding
0:51:58 role models online like andrew tape who is many people describe as a symptom of this
0:52:01 Of this crisis
0:52:03 um
0:52:08 Is there anything that andrew tape says that you fundamentally agree with
0:52:15 I I I understand there’s there’s a lot that you have a different opinion on but what is what is it that he says that you think has holds merit
0:52:21 Uh, I’ll go for that. I think the majority what andrew tape says is probably positive
0:52:27 It starts from a really good place take accountability for your actions be in great shape be action oriented
0:52:31 But it then kind of comes off the rails
0:52:38 And then one of the ways you kind of take accountability or take action is to try start treating women as property
0:52:40 is to
0:52:42 sign up for my
0:52:44 class on how to trade crypto
0:52:48 Which makes trump university look like harvard. I mean it’s just
0:52:51 It’s a bit of a grift
0:52:53 And I also think that it
0:52:59 What starts off as positive and that’s most the most quite frankly that’s the most dangerous thing about it because you can imagine a young boy
0:53:06 A young man just agreeing with most of it. And so then they adopt the last 10 or 20 percent, which quite frankly is just really ugly
0:53:10 It’s just misogyny. What do you think about the bugatti and the lamborghini and
0:53:18 Hey, look a young man wanting to acquire items that signal power and strength such that I’m wearing a panorai watch that I haven’t wound in 10 years
0:53:27 Okay, how’s that any different? Right because I want to signal my attractiveness and and and and success to strangers, right?
0:53:31 So, yeah, that’s I I get it. I get it. But you know
0:53:34 The baller the guy who ends up with more
0:53:38 What I’ll call lasting opportunities and quite frankly more mating opportunities
0:53:43 Is the guy who buys a toyota and is saving money and is the first guy in his cohort to buy a house
0:53:46 I think the majority of people are less impressed
0:53:51 By your things than you think they’re thinking about your shit less than you’re thinking about it
0:53:55 I think people are really impressed with discipline and a plan
0:54:03 I used to believe I think up until maybe two years ago that I no longer was in search of
0:54:09 Status to some degree, but maybe like 70 percent. I believe this because I no longer have lots of material possessions
0:54:14 You won’t catch me and I mean you other than the car that you arrived here in that’s the nicest possession I own
0:54:19 I don’t have sports cars. I don’t have luxury items or watches or anything
0:54:23 And then I read a book by a guy called will store who’s been on this podcast
0:54:25 I’m sure the book’s behind me somewhere
0:54:30 Who told me that we just are the the status games that we play just change over time
0:54:34 So instead of logos, we care about the size of the boat or even jack
0:54:41 In his profession as the director of this podcast is playing a status game of cameras and production quality
0:54:47 And that really changed my perception. I used to be quite judgmental once I’d lost all my Louis Vuitton and all the stuff that I used to buy
0:54:51 Of people demonstrating status and I arrived at the conclusion that it’s actually
0:54:56 Innately human it’s it’s part of belonging and feeling valuable amongst our tribes
0:55:01 Is playing these status games and I guess that’s what the baghadi is a metaphor of it’s
0:55:04 The the wealthiest man on the world
0:55:09 Uh bernard arneau and it’s usually the bernard or musk, but the wealthiest man in the world figured out that
0:55:13 You know, we want to feel
0:55:18 Basic instincts the most basic instinct is survival, but a close second is propagation
0:55:20 What’s that mean?
0:55:24 Sex thanks and so the way you communicate your worth as a maid
0:55:30 Is by one showing that you have a Bugatti because what it means is i’m successful and strong
0:55:35 And if you have sex with me your kids are more likely to survive than if you have sex with someone driving a Honda
0:55:40 And women spend a great deal of money on ergonomically impossible shoes and expensive
0:55:46 creams and lotions that elevate the height of their cheekbones because supposedly that means
0:55:49 If you mate with them their kids are less likely to be prone to infection
0:55:57 So this all comes to propagation and it shows me any product that has a margin gross margins of greater than 70 or 80 points
0:56:02 I’m going to show you a product that does one or two things makes feel closer to god
0:56:05 I think the slope on the back of the 9/11. I think the mesh
0:56:08 And a boutique of a net a bag. I think the
0:56:14 You know sometimes great art that can really steal you you look at something and you think god that just gives me a moment of presence here
0:56:19 That’s because over time the place we saw really really beautiful things
0:56:21 were sequestered to
0:56:26 Venues that had a religious overtone to them the moss the temples the churches the most beautiful artisans in the world
0:56:30 We’re commissioned to come in and say paint the frescoes on the ceilings here
0:56:33 Because we want to give people the impression that this is where god lives
0:56:39 And people started believing them when they heard the music and they saw the beautiful robes and the candles and the art
0:56:44 So when we are around really beautiful things we just feel closer to god
0:56:49 And then the the other maybe more powerful thing is it signals our worth as a mate
0:56:55 And the desire to be more desirable as a mate such that the next generation is smarter starter faster
0:56:57 Just never goes away
0:57:01 And the wealthiest man in the world or it abates as you get older, but it doesn’t I don’t think it really goes away
0:57:07 But the wealthiest man in the world is tapped into our need to feel closer to god or be more
0:57:11 Um attractive to potential mates. So I have a question back to you. Where do you spend your money?
0:57:15 Great question
0:57:19 Businesses so investing investing starting companies one of my
0:57:25 New chapter of my life where I’m starting companies and appointing CEOs or investing
0:57:31 Investing very early on in shaping the company. I have a lot of my money in the s&p 500
0:57:34 So just in in funds
0:57:35 um
0:57:40 I have some money in ethereum, which has been there for six years five six years now. It’s done very well for me
0:57:43 So you’re more evolved than I am
0:57:45 um
0:57:50 You know, I’m one of the reasons I bought a home in aspen. I think it’s so I could tell people I own a home in aspen
0:57:54 I’m I’m everyone has a certain level of addiction
0:57:56 You’re either addicted to trans fats
0:57:59 thc alcohol
0:58:03 Codependent relationship online shopping, whatever it is. I’m addicted to other people’s affirmation
0:58:09 And one of the ways I get that affirmation is I don’t want to say I don’t flaunt my economic success
0:58:13 I don’t own a car and I don’t I don’t wear blingy things or anything like that
0:58:15 But I do find myself telling people
0:58:18 you know
0:58:23 Just obnoxious douchebag things I hear myself talking about stuff that connotes my wealth
0:58:27 So I still haven’t gotten past that. I mean, I still do that
0:58:32 I definitely still do that and I still and I and I the minute it comes out of my mouth
0:58:38 I think you’re still an asshole. Oh, and I then I do it again. I hear myself saying it. Oh my god. That’s just so
0:58:42 Nobody needs to know that. Why is it important you that these strangers know this?
0:58:46 And I still can’t I still can’t get past it. It’s still
0:58:51 Society tells you especially I think as a man that your worth is highly correlated to your economic success
0:58:57 And so the reason I have an iphone I I think we all have iPhones because we want to communicate our worth as a mate
0:59:02 If you have an android phone, you’re kind of signaling to the rest of the world that life hasn’t panned out the way you’d hoped
0:59:05 That if you had been just a little bit more successful
0:59:13 You’d have an ios, right? Seriously. It’s like carrying a discover card. I have an amix black card that you want to talk about a douchebag
0:59:18 I spent 7500 a year for a card. I don’t even know what the benefits are
0:59:22 But I want when I’m out around food and alcohol and strangers
0:59:27 I want to throw down blacks so they think wow the professor is a baller
0:59:31 I like him. I want to be his friend or I want to have sex with him
0:59:36 And it’s ridiculous and the fact that every 12 months I get a 7500 charge
0:59:40 For carrying a card. That’s a different color
0:59:45 And I mean I hear that and you know what I’ve done it for 20 years. I’m gonna do it for another 20
0:59:50 So I don’t it’s kind of like do as I say not as I do
0:59:53 What’s interesting is to kind of suss out at least become aware of these things
0:59:59 And to limit them because I have a modulate. Yeah, and I I think when they offered me the black card I have
1:00:05 I’m like sponsored by amix or something, but um, you probably get paid to carry a black card. That’s the difference
1:00:09 But no, I still looked at the financial decision and there was this one tier where it’s like
1:00:12 We’ll give you a concierge. I’m like I have a full-time assistant. I have multiple assistant
1:00:16 He’s gonna call some stranger in Dallas and ask where to eat. I mean, I just he just don’t do that
1:00:20 I think I just went for the cheap option that comes with no perks, but you get the card
1:00:26 I’m still sure I’m paying something for it. But um, what I’m saying there is it’s for me. I thought just get better
1:00:31 You’re never going to be perfect. I’m still going to have these like insecurities and try and show off here and there
1:00:35 But just try and get better and try and you know have less regrettable
1:00:41 Moments and just by saying to myself listen. Have you gotten better over the last five years? I go. Yeah, you know
1:00:45 The direction of travel is good. Mm-hmm. I think that’s what matters
1:00:48 Well, that is that’s what it is to be an evolved
1:00:50 person and to be human and being you know
1:00:55 You think about marketing the key to marketing is a b testing and just trying to get better and better and better
1:00:59 And that’s what we’re trying to do as humans. So I evaluate your weaknesses and your strengths and say
1:01:03 Where could I be investing more in divesting and what types of behavior?
1:01:08 Uh, do I want do I want to start out? I just think that’s what it means to be a good person
1:01:12 Discipline and purpose and motivation a lot of young people that will come up to you
1:01:15 I’m sure and come up to me often ask this question
1:01:19 Which seems to be like an invalid question, but they’ll say something like how are you always motivated?
1:01:23 Or how do I find discipline? Maybe they’re on the show for playing video games
1:01:29 They looking up at a screen at someone they admire and they just think I can’t find what that that person seems to have that
1:01:32 Sort of consistent tenacity towards a goal
1:01:38 I sometimes wonder if in areas of our lives where we’re lacking the discipline and the consistency we’re searching for
1:01:43 Do we just need a little bit more pain? I’ve sat here and interviewed hundreds of people and you you often find these
1:01:50 These rock bottom moments are the catalyst for a change in direction in someone’s life and when they’re not there yet when their
1:01:55 Parents aren’t threatening to kick them out of the house or their their best friends turn against them and tell them listen
1:01:58 If you don’t change your act, you’re not going to be a friend with us anymore
1:02:04 It seems like just the correlation I’ve seen is that there’s a moment of rock bottom or pain
1:02:08 Where the incentive structure changes and people go fuck. I have no choice now
1:02:11 The pain of staying the same becomes greater than the pain of making the change
1:02:17 I think that’s right. I think most success involves sort of it’s not just sort of gradual up into the right
1:02:20 There’s some shock value there. I think of george w bush
1:02:26 You know talks about his wife laura. I think the same thing happened to his vice president at some point
1:02:32 They were you know alcoholics and basically their wives their respective wives both of them both case said
1:02:35 I’m leaving you unless you stop drinking and kind of once they stop drinking their lives
1:02:38 They’re professionally and personally just took off
1:02:43 Uh for other people. I mean, I think I think there are moments like that for almost
1:02:49 Anyone who’s been successful or maybe not maybe it’s incremental. It’s just high character people keep plugging away
1:02:51 alcohol though
1:02:53 Interesting subject. We’ve not spoken about
1:02:56 Yeah, so I think a lot about alcohol
1:03:01 First so first stuff. I just made acknowledge. I love alcohol and I’m really good at
1:03:02 um
1:03:06 Like Winston Churchill, I believe I’ve gotten more out of alcohol than scotten out of me
1:03:12 And I think there’s this myth of addiction that everyone who drinks or does you know engages in thc
1:03:17 Is probably ended up living under a bridge or be economically ruined. I don’t think that’s true at all
1:03:19 I think that the majority of people who engage
1:03:25 With substances do so and maybe not a productive way, but in at least a way that’s not going to ruin their lives or their careers
1:03:28 And I’d like to think I’m one of those people
1:03:35 Having said that if you look at the studies around happiness, especially the largest study the grant study
1:03:36 where they
1:03:39 segment people into quintiles from the happiest or the least happiest
1:03:44 The most common attribute across the cohort of the least happiest was alcohol
1:03:52 And what I suggest what I advise every person, especially young people, especially young men who are more prone to addiction to do
1:03:54 Is to do an audit of your addictions
1:03:57 And to go through everything and say all right
1:04:03 Everyone has a certain level of addiction. What are things I just do a lot of that I could probably do a little bit less of
1:04:08 And then decide what would happen and the test isn’t well
1:04:12 Am I living under a bridge or am I addicted? That’s not the test for addiction
1:04:16 The test is would I be just a little less shitty at things if I did less of it
1:04:19 When I got really serious about my career
1:04:24 When I got really serious about trying to develop the economic security to take care of my mother
1:04:26 I
1:04:29 Substantially decreased my intake of alcohol and I didn’t do any drugs
1:04:32 and I found that
1:04:36 part and parcel of developing the professional and economic success I wanted at an early age
1:04:39 Involved a level of just sheer commitment
1:04:42 That alcohol wasn’t conducive to
1:04:47 It was when I got into businesses later where there were more about relationships and had more opportunities to go out
1:04:49 Where alcohol kind of crept back in
1:04:54 But I don’t think it’s a bad strategy to decide that you’re going to work
1:04:58 And work out and invest in trying to meet people
1:05:00 And that alcohol
1:05:04 Alcohol can serve as a decent lubricant as a young person to helping meet other people
1:05:06 It’s just easier to approach strangers after one or two drinks
1:05:12 Um, but I don’t think it’s a bad strategy when you’re trying when you’re on the up curve
1:05:15 Really trying to make a lot of progress fast. I mean think of your professional career
1:05:22 It’s like a rocket the majority of the fuel is just is is spent trying to get out of the soupy atmosphere
1:05:25 And then once if you can get out of the atmosphere into the orbit
1:05:28 That professional momentum will take you a long way
1:05:35 But it’s really hard and costly to get out of that atmosphere the inner orbit
1:05:41 And when you’re really trying to kill it and you just need to be kind of all in on your career
1:05:46 Yeah, that’s probably a point where you want to air on the side of doing less rather than more
1:05:52 One of the things I’ve always mulled with is when we think about the stats we’ve discussed in the crisis and the issues in society
1:05:54 yeah, um
1:05:58 The direction of travel and how we’re living our lives more digital more alone more lonely
1:06:00 um
1:06:07 More dependent on processed foods and sugars and other chemicals to keep ourselves seemingly balanced
1:06:12 That it feels like the solution must be quite deep systemic in the way that we’re designing our society
1:06:18 So I the question I’ve always wondered is do we have to just like rip up the entirety of the blueprint of how society is designed
1:06:21 To solve for these problems loneliness depression
1:06:24 Sexlessness all of those subject matters
1:06:28 I don’t think so. I think the solutions are simpler
1:06:37 Then then the incumbents want to admit in corporations a key component of entrenchment is the delusion of complexity
1:06:40 you know
1:06:47 Twitter and google and meta will say that the hate speech and the polarization that they’ve created in the teen depression
1:06:49 are
1:06:55 Kind of indicative of broader problems in our society and are these really complex problems and they kind of stare thoughtfully into
1:06:58 The camera week we got to solve these problems together
1:07:00 yet
1:07:06 Will they kick one account off of twitter the real donald trump an election to misinformation goes down 40 to 60 percent in one day
1:07:10 If they age gated social media, I think you would see a dramatic decline
1:07:15 in teen depression if you remove section 230 protections
1:07:19 I think youtube would find ways to stop radicalizing young men on youtube
1:07:22 I think the solutions are simpler than
1:07:28 They’re simpler, but they’re expensive and specifically they’re expensive against the people in charge
1:07:31 And that is rich people in corporations and I’ll give you an example
1:07:34 If you were to try and reverse engineer
1:07:36 the problems in our society
1:07:43 To kind of one blast zone one ground zero. I think it’s what we said before. I think it’s that for the first time in our society
1:07:50 In a democrat in democracies it’s happened in the u.s. It’s about to happen across the majority of the 28 countries in the uo in the u
1:07:54 For the first time a 30-year-old isn’t doing as well as his or her parents
1:08:01 That’s a fundamental breakdown in the compact between a family and a society and they get angry and they blame the government
1:08:04 Or they start demonizing and then someone fills that void and starts demonizing other groups and says
1:08:08 Oh, it’s not your fault. It’s their fault and that can lead to very ugly places
1:08:12 In history. So my solution is my solutions are pretty straightforward
1:08:16 If you have the average 70 year old is 72 wealth here
1:08:20 Then they were 40 years ago and the average person under the age of 40 is 24 less wealthy
1:08:25 And the percentage of wealth is a percentage of gdp controlled by people under the age of 40 has been cut in half
1:08:32 And a house is 12 times more expensive than it was 40 years ago, but their income is only 6x what it used to be
1:08:39 We have too much money being crowded into not only the rich but the old
1:08:44 And if you want if you want to solve if you were to try and have one
1:08:51 Answer that would address not all of it, but really take a dent out of obesity addiction
1:08:53 deaths of despair
1:08:55 male abandonment
1:08:56 divorce
1:08:57 depression
1:09:03 If we raised and I don’t know the numbers here, but if we raised in the united states the minimum wage if we tripled the minimum wage
1:09:06 I think you would go a long way
1:09:13 To solving a lot of those problems. I think putting more money in the pockets of young people
1:09:17 And reducing the rage and the shame and the deaths of despair
1:09:24 And the would go so far to solving loneliness. I think it’s pretty basic at the end of world war two
1:09:27 The top tax rate was 92 percent
1:09:33 We just decided rich people are here to reinvest in the middle class when reagan entered office and when thatcher entered office
1:09:38 The top tax rates were about 70 percent by the time reagan left office. It was 27 percent
1:09:42 What we’ve seen across studies the university of california riverside in uc-berkeley
1:09:47 Did studies on minimum wage and in washington state california new york where they dramatically raised minimum wage
1:09:52 The incumbents will tell you the sky’s going to fall businesses are going to go out of business people are going to stop hiring
1:09:56 It’s going to expedite them trying to figure out a way to buy the new
1:10:01 Burger tron to to make burgers not humans and what they found was the opposite
1:10:08 That when you increase minimum wage even dramatically it grew the economy in jobs because here’s the wonderful thing about lower middle income people
1:10:10 When you give them money
1:10:16 They spend it and so the multiplier effect is more stimulative than when you crowd money into the top 1 percent
1:10:22 So if a magic wand first thing a dramatic increase in minimum wage
1:10:27 And there’s very things very few things we could do that would have this much impact without increasing the deficit
1:10:31 And it’s time we have employment unemployment at historic lows
1:10:35 So the employment market could absorb an increase in mandatory minimum wage
1:10:42 As a percentage of of gdp wages have never been lower yet corporate profits have never been greater
1:10:49 So yeah, uh, corporate profits would be hit. Yeah, the markets might go down and it would absolutely be worth it
1:10:53 This is this is ground zero. That’s where we start. We’re going
1:10:56 Capitalism is about a dignity of work
1:11:02 And because there’s such a demand there’s now 1.7 open jobs for every one person seeking a job in the us
1:11:04 I think it’s 1.3 to 1 in the u.m
1:11:10 In the uk we need to put more money in the hands of lower and middle income households full stop
1:11:14 How many kids have you got scott? I’ve got two 13 and 16 year old boys
1:11:18 What is it you the advice you give them about the world? They’re coming into there
1:11:25 Their adolescents and they’re going to be off dating and all of those things if you if you had to equip them with I’m sure you do
1:11:30 What are the messages you’re trying hard to either directly equip them with or indirectly?
1:11:34 It infect them with in terms of values and principles for life
1:11:40 Um, for your oldest, you said he’s 13. My oldest is 16. My youngest is 13. Okay. So 16 years old. Jesus
1:11:42 That’s when it all starts happening
1:11:46 So what I try and do is like I think about all right
1:11:51 Uh, I want to show the these kids that I want to be kind to strangers
1:11:56 Right, you know, just I want to be I want to work hard. I want to
1:11:58 I want to have good manners
1:12:02 I want to try and occasionally someone says something
1:12:04 Service person or whatever is rude to me
1:12:07 And my ego is when I was your age
1:12:12 I felt like I always needed to restore the world’s balance and no one could be disrespectful to me
1:12:16 Or I got back in their face and now I realize occasionally you just take it occasionally just take it
1:12:21 That’s what it means to be a man. I try to be physically strong. I work out. I try to get them working out
1:12:26 I’m just trying to show them stuff because I find it’s very hard when they get to a certain age
1:12:30 To advise them. They don’t want to hear it. So I’m trying to be that guy
1:12:34 Um, and you know, but it’s not
1:12:40 I have an easier time advising other 16 year olds in mine because mine is healthfully
1:12:45 Pulling away from me and I’ll come back. But right now he’s pulling away
1:12:48 What is what is masculinity? Isn’t that you’re writing a book at the moment, right?
1:12:53 You’re writing two books at the moment about various subject matters. What can you tell us about what you’re writing about?
1:12:59 Yeah, well, I’m finished with the algebra of wealth book. I’m just starting the book on masculinity, but I think we need
1:13:06 Per our previous comments. I think some unfortunate voices have filled this void around masculinity and I think we need
1:13:07 um
1:13:10 A new vision for modern masculinity on the far right
1:13:15 I would argue that those forces have conflated masculinity with cruelty
1:13:23 I think people like trump and putin and elon musk are looked to as role models for masculinity for a lot of good reasons
1:13:26 But I think being a murderer putin
1:13:28 a criminal trump
1:13:32 Or someone who has 11 kids none of whom he’s living with
1:13:34 musk
1:13:36 I think that is exactly what it means to not be a man
1:13:39 and when I try and
1:13:44 Try for kate the three legs of the stool of masculinity and I’m still working through this
1:13:47 And I’m curious if you have any thoughts, but I come up and then so on the far right
1:13:51 Let me back up the wrong vision of masculinity on the far left
1:13:55 As far as I can tell their vision of masculinity is to act more like a woman
1:14:00 I don’t think that’s right either. It’s like boy. How do men how do men become better men?
1:14:06 Act more like a woman. I mean, I don’t think that’s not only what men in society aren’t looking for. I don’t think that’s what
1:14:09 Women are looking for. I think if there’s a fire
1:14:15 Or russian soldiers pour over the ukrainian border you want some of that big dick energy
1:14:21 And I also think that women are attracted to generally speaking. This isn’t true across the spectrum
1:14:24 We’re having a really important conversation and everyone deserves respect
1:14:26 but I think
1:14:28 demonstrating a certain level of
1:14:35 Unabashed masculinity is really important in in romantic relationships
1:14:41 And for me the pillars or the three legs of the stool masculinity trying to distill it down to three things our first
1:14:44 protector
1:14:45 I think that
1:14:50 I was in seattle at the western hotel and I was checking in and there was an alarm went off and they said
1:14:54 They closed the elevators and said we a smoke alarm has gone off on the 11th floor
1:14:57 and these firefighters about
1:15:01 Nine minutes later showed up caring each of them must have been caring
1:15:07 80 pounds of equipment and axes and all sorts of shit and it was nine men and one woman
1:15:12 And they don’t look at the cameras to see if there’s a raging fire on the 11th floor
1:15:19 They just bombed to the 11th floor. They’re just there to protect people. Like yeah, we might die firemen is actually more dangerous than being a cop
1:15:21 It’s more dangerous than being in the military
1:15:23 But they are there to protect you
1:15:30 And whether it’s the military or things or cops or people or or a head of household that’s providing economically
1:15:36 I think being a protector is a key component of masculinity and I also want to say that masculinity is not
1:15:43 Isolated to people born as males. I think a lot of women demonstrate masculinity. I think it’s a wonderful attribute. I personally
1:15:49 End up being more drawn to friends who have more feminine characteristics, which are also wonderful
1:15:53 But generally speaking if we’re going to have an adult conversation around gender
1:16:02 And gender roles and masculinity. I think we need to acknowledge that 90 95 of us will have an easier time embracing these types of behaviors
1:16:07 More commonly associated with people born as males and born as females
1:16:13 But the modern vision of protection the modern vision of protection needs some nuance and that is
1:16:17 The trans community
1:16:22 I think most men don’t understand at their heart don’t really understand the trans community
1:16:24 Don’t understand the notion
1:16:31 That parents and a doctor might decide that a 15 year old should have surgery and go through transition with hormones
1:16:33 I think the majority of men
1:16:38 Don’t when that hits them don’t understand it. And I think that lack of understanding can lead to
1:16:42 Unconscious discrimination and bias
1:16:45 And I think part of being a real protector
1:16:49 Is to acknowledge that you don’t need to understand stuff
1:16:51 to
1:16:54 Protect people and that is I think our first inclination should be as men
1:16:57 This is a community. Maybe I understand this. Maybe I don’t maybe
1:17:05 Maybe I do know trans people. I don’t know trans people to clear out the politics of it clear out your misunderstanding
1:17:07 This is a community
1:17:11 That is taking a lot of shit. Even you could argue being persecuted
1:17:17 Your first role as a man in his masculinity is to move to protect them full stop
1:17:21 That’s what we do. We protect people and we err on the side of protection
1:17:27 And I think that is a really I think that’s a really nice attribute to start from a level of protection
1:17:32 When you see someone being hurt, you don’t need to understand the situation
1:17:35 You see someone getting beaten up in a subway
1:17:40 If you see a fight about to break out in a bar, you don’t need to understand the situation
1:17:44 You move to protect to protection full stop. That’s what we do as men
1:17:47 the second is provider
1:17:50 Um 70 percent of divorce filings are from women
1:17:56 And it’s usually a function of three things the guy loses his business has a mental breakdown or goes bankrupt
1:18:00 Men are still look to to be the economic provider
1:18:03 and that’s not to say that
1:18:09 In part of that is to embrace this wonderful progress women have made and sometimes acknowledge many times acknowledge
1:18:15 That the women or your partner is just better at this whole money thing and being supportive and getting out of her way
1:18:19 Because your job is just to ensure play a role that you can provide for the family
1:18:22 um, and then
1:18:24 Getting to a point where you can take care of yourself
1:18:26 Take care of your family
1:18:29 And then start to expand the circle and start taking care of extended family
1:18:34 Start taking care of the community donations philanthropy. I think that’s a real
1:18:40 To be a provider for people that ultimately you don’t know is a form of masculinity, right to plant
1:18:47 To plant the seeds of trees or you know that uh, you will never sit under the shade of which you’ll never sit under
1:18:50 And then the final one is pro creator
1:18:53 And this is the one i’m working through and will definitely get me in the most trouble
1:19:00 But I do think that part of masculinity is being the initiator in a romantic relationship and pursuing romantic relationships
1:19:04 And there’s a difference between pursuit and being a predator
1:19:07 And if you don’t understand the difference you’ve got much bigger problems
1:19:12 And because of some well publicized and heinous abhorrent acts where men
1:19:15 Abuse their power
1:19:19 um now we conflate any sort of initiative
1:19:25 Or or aggression around establishing a romantic relationship as predatory and I don’t think that’s true
1:19:28 I think men’s role
1:19:33 In being more aggressive around romantic relationships and even aggressive is a tough word being the initiator
1:19:37 I think that is part of masculinity. I think that’s part of success
1:19:40 um one of the things
1:19:43 You know, I hope my boys I try I think I told you this last time I was here
1:19:47 When I used to go down and do any more because it just got too much
1:19:50 But I used to force my kids whenever we went out to talk to a stranger
1:19:56 And we’d sit outside our house with my 13 year old very upset because he hadn’t talked to a stranger
1:20:00 I wasn’t gonna let him back in the house. I’m like just go pet the dog. Just say hi anything
1:20:03 But that ability to initiate
1:20:09 Contact professionally personally whatever it is. I think it’s fundamental to success
1:20:15 And so I think guys need to early on hopefully get comfortable with approaching strangers
1:20:22 Yeah, including including strange strange potential romantic partners because the stats are showing that about 50 percent of
1:20:25 People who end up in relationships made their first contact online
1:20:27 and it’s funny I had a
1:20:29 podcast that we did about
1:20:32 Dating I weren’t going to too much context. I don’t want to reveal the guests
1:20:37 But a lot of the comments on that podcast were from young men that were really I think pissed off with me to be honest
1:20:38 for not
1:20:42 speaking to the person who had created the dating app and telling them
1:20:50 Highlighting the plight of men in the dating industry as you’ve said with the the amount of swipes a man needs to do to find a mate
1:20:52 I need to give a message to those men
1:20:55 I understand it and let’s move to solutions. So the first is
1:21:00 If you’re in the top 10 percent of quote-unquote attractiveness on a risk-adjusted level around
1:21:06 Economic success care women are attracted to men for three reasons. The first is their ability to provide
1:21:09 The second is how smart they are
1:21:12 And the third is how kind they are personality
1:21:19 Yeah, and also intellect can come through in personality the fastest way to communicate intellect is humor has to be clever
1:21:25 I’ve always thought and I’ve yeah, I’ve always thought if I can make a woman laugh. She’ll go out throw out with me
1:21:30 And here’s the problem. So if you’re in the top 10 percent go online
1:21:33 It’s going to be champagne and cocaine and a mardi gras women for you
1:21:34 I mean just
1:21:37 You’re gonna you’re going to kill it if you’re in the bottom 90
1:21:41 The reality is the online dating market is a humiliating experience for you
1:21:45 Because the majority of women and their right can have some contact or interest
1:21:47 From the top 10 percent
1:21:51 Maybe they’re not looking who are looking for a series of short-term relationships and maybe a long-term relationship
1:21:54 but for the bottom 90 of men
1:21:58 Especially the bottom half have just been shut out. They get no activity online
1:22:06 The wonderful thing about human sexuality is there’s a ton of x factors the way you smell the way you move your humor
1:22:09 Your smile, right the way
1:22:15 Your your passion for a specific topic the depth of intellect whatever it might be
1:22:19 There’s just the magic and mystery of the soup of human sexuality
1:22:22 Is so strange and it’s wonderful
1:22:27 But there’s one ingredient that soup that comes through online for men its money and for women its looks
1:22:29 That’s it
1:22:30 and so
1:22:32 It’s great if you are in the top-desire
1:22:37 For those things for either sex, but if you’re with us in the bottom 90
1:22:44 It’s about the magic and mystery of sexuality that can be expressed in person
1:22:47 And what you find especially with relationships that begin at work
1:22:54 One will say I wasn’t interested in him and then I saw him present in a meeting or I saw how smart he is
1:23:00 Or I saw what an interesting person she is and how funny she is these things are really hard to get across online
1:23:05 And so we need to put more more money in the pockets of young people
1:23:09 We need more third spaces and opportunities for them to meet each other the number of high school kids that see their
1:23:14 Friends every day has been cut in half. We’re no longer talking to our neighbors. We’re no longer going to work
1:23:20 So where are people supposed to meet and find out that? Yeah, maybe he’s not rich. Maybe she’s not hot
1:23:25 But I’m into this person. I want to go out with them. I want to kiss them
1:23:30 But I’ve got so much optionality in both those cases that it seems that I value that less, right?
1:23:34 We used to just live in you know, the options were my village now. They are the internet everybody
1:23:37 But when we gave access to everybody everybody’s now under the
1:23:40 I mean typically you’re right. We were sequestered
1:23:44 You went to temple or church and there were kind of eight single people four men and four women
1:23:50 And they sort of paired off based on call it a multiple of reasons there are they figured out their weight class
1:23:56 Now it’s like well, I don’t have access to eight people. I have access to 8,000
1:24:00 So why wouldn’t I expect that I’m going to get in the top desk? And what you find
1:24:04 Is that the metrics are so crude and base online
1:24:08 That I mean we just end up I would I would
1:24:13 Task people saying who have met someone online or who have met someone offline
1:24:17 Do you think you would have been attracted to that person their online profile?
1:24:22 Like if you saw a picture of him and then said this is what I do would that be like? Yeah, that’s the one
1:24:28 And that’s the beautiful thing about and it’s important. We we need more opportunities for people to bump into each other
1:24:31 and and and not
1:24:33 decide
1:24:39 To give them the opportunity to kind of fall in in lust and in love over time for different reasons
1:24:42 that can only be communicated in person because
1:24:45 Us in the lower 90 that’s our only hope
1:24:52 And if you just graduate from Dartmouth and you got a job at google and your rolex accidentally slips into your profile picture on tinder
1:24:54 You’re all set
1:24:59 99% of us are not on the top 1% we’re not working for google can’t afford a rolex
1:25:01 So you got to bring something else
1:25:04 And it’s important to develop those skills a good rap
1:25:09 Iron your goddamn shirt blow dry your hair work out a little bit like you know
1:25:14 Figure out a way that when you get if you have the opportunity to meet someone in person over and over
1:25:19 That they’re going to be impressed by you and then it’s slowly butchering and they got more than impressed by this person
1:25:21 You know, I’d like to have a relationship with them
1:25:24 And we’re creating fewer and fewer contexts
1:25:28 For that to happen if we’re not if we’re not even going into work
1:25:34 Right if we’re not volunteering if we’re not going to church like where on earth do we we’re not going to the movies
1:25:34 We’re not going to the mall
1:25:37 I used to walk around when I was 17 a senior in high school
1:25:40 We go into westwood village and we would just walk around we’re too young to drink
1:25:45 We’d get an ice cream and we’d walk around and we’d see a group of girls from palisades high school
1:25:51 I went to uni and about the fourth time we passed them one of us would take the leap and start talking to them
1:25:54 Like where does that happen now for young people, right?
1:26:00 So I think it’s economic economic policies and creating more third spaces. I would like national service
1:26:04 I know a lot of friends from israel who met their spouses their business partners
1:26:09 Their mentors in military service. I don’t think it should just be military
1:26:12 It could be service around helping seniors or health care
1:26:19 But we need to give them more money and more opportunities to bump into each other and fall in love
1:26:21 With each other and be attracted to each other
1:26:24 For the reasons that are unique
1:26:26 smell
1:26:28 Can’t smell someone online
1:26:32 And not like that. You don’t even know what smells you’re going to be attracted to you don’t even know
1:26:35 And so unless you bump off a bunch of people
1:26:38 Um in person
1:26:41 We’re just not going to have nearly as many connections and not nearly as many relationships
1:26:44 But I think there are pretty straightforward solutions here
1:26:47 Don’t you think work is the most obvious opportunity?
1:26:53 I think when we think about social settings where we bump into people like churches and pubs and you know
1:26:57 A lot of the things that used to live on the high street that have now found a home online
1:27:01 Don’t you think there’s a huge opportunity for employers to create that sense of
1:27:06 Bonding the oxytocin the relationships that forged in the hallways of the office
1:27:12 By bringing people together because I have to say I have always believed that and even though the world went
1:27:14 That way
1:27:17 With the remote working thing my teams
1:27:20 Including all of the teams the 30 people that work at the Diary of a CEO team
1:27:22 We’ve always been in office
1:27:27 And I’ve made I wrote a letter to them actually a year ago explaining this idea of freedom within parameters where you’re trusted to
1:27:28 Make the best decisions for your life
1:27:32 But centrally one of our core beliefs is that of course we’ll do some of our best working coffee shops on beaches
1:27:38 But being together will make the stress less stressful. It’ll make the work more meaningful
1:27:40 It’ll make our lives more fulfilling
1:27:45 So I sent that letter to the team and I’ll they’re all hit like they’re all listening to this either upstairs or in here
1:27:46 Or in the office down the road
1:27:49 It was the best reaction I’ve ever had to any letter I’ve ever sent to my team
1:27:55 In terms of fire emojis and clapping because I explained why and the first principles underneath my belief
1:28:01 Made we’re about them and it was it wasn’t just we’re coming in Tuesday and Wednesday because I’m the CEO and we’ll do what I say
1:28:08 It was I understand that connection and it’s why I’ve always done this podcast in person even through the pandemic is
1:28:13 Going out of fashion, but it ain’t going out of our sort of maslovian hierarchy. Yeah
1:28:16 Yeah, look a lot there so
1:28:21 I spoke at the wall street journal europe conference the the
1:28:24 Piece of content that’s gotten more viral than almost anything i’ve ever done
1:28:31 I got just a ton of shit for and pushback and I said they asked me advice to young people and I started off I said
1:28:34 Um, if you’re young you should never be at home
1:28:37 Home is for sleep
1:28:43 And you should be out and professional and romantic success is a function of the amount of time you spend outside of your house
1:28:45 And so they clipped
1:28:48 A young person you should never be at home home is for sleep
1:28:54 And thousands of tiktoks with people doing stitches showing themselves making cupcakes
1:29:00 Or watching Netflix and basically and then they chime in and say screw you scotgaller. Why do we listen to these idiot boomers?
1:29:08 Uh, because they’re saying look, I love home going out is expensive. My apartment is so expensive that I want to be at home
1:29:10 anyways that
1:29:13 The workplace one and three relationships begin at work
1:29:19 It’s a fantastic place to meet and fall in love and because of some abhorrent behavior
1:29:20 um
1:29:22 It’s gotten a bad rat
1:29:27 And if you’re going to have an organization the number one source of retention for a company comes down to one question
1:29:31 Do you have a good friend at work? I go to weddings all the time of people who met at work
1:29:34 So but there’s some nuance here
1:29:40 The first is around remote work remote work is an unbelievable unlock for caregivers
1:29:43 Now as people take care of kids people taking care of their parents people trying to take care of themselves
1:29:46 Or quite frankly don’t have the money
1:29:50 To live near work. And so to give them the opportunity to work from home
1:29:55 A few or four of the five days a week or five is a big unlock
1:30:00 And it’s something I think we should have a caregiver classification where we try and invest in afford more flexibility
1:30:02 If you’re under the age of 30
1:30:05 Or 40 much less 30
1:30:07 The office is a feature not a bug
1:30:09 and
1:30:12 Where we need though, there’s some nuance here and that is we need to modulate
1:30:17 The kind of tech environment or some of the tech environment where it turned into kind of this Baknalia and people
1:30:23 You know having sex in the you know the coat room and tequila everywhere. That’s probably a little too much
1:30:29 But in my companies, I’ve always created on a regular basis a social environment for people to meet
1:30:34 And most of it’s just socializing with mentors and colleagues and making friends
1:30:39 But sometimes people start the path towards mating and that’s wonderful
1:30:41 Because if all of a sudden
1:30:48 There is no workplace or you’re discouraged because hr would just rather nobody ever have sex at work. It just solves a lot of problems
1:30:52 You’re taking out a third of the mating opportunities
1:30:53 a third
1:30:58 And so where are young people supposed to meet if you’re if you’re into work and you want to have influence
1:31:01 and you want to do well and you want to develop economic security so you’re working all the time
1:31:08 And it’s remote. Where on earth are you supposed to meet somebody and quite frankly sometimes
1:31:14 Some of the most attractive attributes of you to potential romantic partners can be best demonstrated professionally
1:31:19 Now there’s some nuance and i’m on a bunch of public company boards and we deal with this all the time
1:31:21 I think above a certain
1:31:24 level of seniority
1:31:27 Your fly’s up and locked. It’s just not permitted
1:31:30 But in terms of young people at a similar
1:31:34 Uh similar seniority or they’re all junior
1:31:37 You know, my attitude is
1:31:38 Have at it
1:31:43 Meet fall in love fall out of love, you know, whatever it might be. I think that’s a
1:31:46 I think that’s a wonderful thing and I think community
1:31:49 In friendship and meeting people at work
1:31:52 I have a rule at my company a property media
1:31:57 And we’re only 14 people now if any four of them are ever together
1:31:59 They get my credit card
1:32:01 And I mean they don’t have physically have it
1:32:05 But if the four of you are at are out of play
1:32:10 Uh a football match or you decide to go to toloom, which they have done
1:32:14 On a thursday night or whatever it’s on me
1:32:17 because
1:32:19 That investment in community and friendship
1:32:24 Is worth it. It’s a great retention tool and it also is important for culture
1:32:28 So I think we I think that the ability to meet people at work
1:32:35 Is really important. You just have some nuance there the the 50 year old ceo is making millions of bucks a year. Sorry boss
1:32:41 Off-campus and when we hear that it was you thought it was consent. No, you fucked up. You’re out
1:32:44 We told you this right here. We told you right from the get go
1:32:47 And I think it’s important to educate people about the nuance of it
1:32:50 But to to tell people
1:32:55 Young people that they shouldn’t in an intense situation where we tell them to work this hard in a competitive economy
1:33:01 To tell them that they shouldn’t form relationships and sometimes lead to romantic relationships. It’s just naive
1:33:06 And and to your point we’ve taken away an enormous
1:33:10 Arena or venue for making those connections which were lacking. So
1:33:13 My senses workplace relationships
1:33:18 In 99 percent of the time are a positive. They’re a feature not a bug
1:33:21 I appreciate the nuance as well that you applied to that situation because I don’t have
1:33:24 Children yet. I have a clear bias
1:33:26 that that um
1:33:30 I’ve realized is there and I did play forward the scenario where I have say I had four or five children now
1:33:35 How I’d have to adjust or how I’d want the companies that I run to adjust to me
1:33:40 And so I have to kind of reflect that in the companies now because there are people in my my teams even this team that have
1:33:46 Multiple children and I think that’s where the importance of that freedom part in the freedom of within parameters thing where where
1:33:53 Okay, we have a set of god sort of guidelines of how we work together that bring us together and for that synchronous collaboration and bonding
1:33:58 But also we appreciate that if we want to retain our best people we need to keep them over all of the seasons of life
1:34:03 We need to be a great place to work through pregnancy fatherhood. You name it
1:34:08 Um, yeah, I could tell when you were saying that it’s great to be a young company where no one’s had kids yet
1:34:10 And the majority of people haven’t had kids
1:34:12 That’s not sustainable and show me
1:34:19 A ceo who is mandated back to office. I’m going to show you a guy who has someone else taking care of his kids
1:34:21 Has the money to live near work?
1:34:24 Right. Whereas a lot of people don’t
1:34:30 So the the back-to-office mandates have usually been dictated by someone who’s in a real position of privilege
1:34:34 And I’d like to see a new classification of worker called a care worker
1:34:38 Where if you’re taking care of people you just are afforded more flexibility
1:34:41 Also, we need to have an adult conversation
1:34:45 If you are working remotely the majority of the time you’re going to make less money
1:34:49 Getting into work is hard. It’s expensive to cry sacrifice
1:34:54 And you get rewarded for it if your job can be if you can move to bolder colorado
1:34:57 If your job can be moved to bolder it can be moved to bangalore be clear
1:34:59 the ceo of a big conglomerate running the
1:35:02 The european unit can be more talented
1:35:06 Than the person running the americas, but if headquarters is in the americas
1:35:11 The ceo of the americas is much more likely to get the top job that you know ceo of the whole company
1:35:18 Uh in every in every um promotion. There’s two or three people or more who are qualified for that promotion
1:35:21 The person who gets it
1:35:28 Is a function of the decider and the decider is going to pick the person you have the strongest relationship with and relationships are a function of proximity
1:35:32 So before you collect dogs and kids get into the office
1:35:40 We have a closing tradition on this podcast where the last guest leaves a question for the next guest not knowing who they’re going to be living it for
1:35:44 And your question was actually left by daniel ac
1:35:48 Oh daniel i’ve never told anybody that that before but it’s a special occasion
1:35:50 um
1:35:58 The question he’s left for you is with ai coming in
1:36:01 Perhaps replacing many jobs
1:36:06 What parts of humanity will become more important?
1:36:10 And what will matter less?
1:36:20 So first off i’m an ai optimus. I think this catastrophizing around ai is narcissism
1:36:25 Technologists like to believe that their technology is the single point
1:36:27 of
1:36:34 Salvation for humanity or is going to destroy humanity. It’s just narcissism. I don’t I don’t think ai is going to save or destroy humanity
1:36:41 Um the people who are most valuable are the ones who get out ahead of this technology
1:36:47 Versus what we did with big tech. We let weaponization of elections team depression
1:36:51 Polarization get out ahead of the regulation. So I think the most important people
1:36:55 uh, this is going to sound lame our government officials that
1:36:58 Uh are thoughtful and say we won’t get fooled again
1:37:01 And we’re going to regulate this technology
1:37:07 But when the people that are making the technology are actually it seems to be going to government and saying we need a regulation here
1:37:10 They didn’t do that in web 2 with social networks and stuff
1:37:12 But those people like sam altman even elon musk was at the
1:37:15 washington the other day
1:37:17 Pushing for legislation that for me
1:37:20 Says something
1:37:22 Yeah, what it says steven is that they’re full of shit
1:37:26 Because when sam altman calls for regulation in front of congress, this is their go-to
1:37:31 I can pull up clips of sheryl sandberg and marx ackerberg saying we welcome regulation
1:37:34 We need this is their go-to and keep in mind these people are
1:37:38 massively over consulted by some of the smartest comms people in the world
1:37:44 Sam altman says I want regular and I believe sam. He’s really earnest. He looks like a young nice man
1:37:49 And concurrently he has lobbyists in the in europe trying to suppress regulation against ai
1:37:52 I mean, this is just such bullshit
1:37:55 This notion that stopped me before I kill again
1:38:00 And then they have armies of lawyers and lobbyists and paint the money paint the
1:38:06 Towns of dc and brussels and money to stave off any regulation despite their calls for regulation
1:38:11 There hasn’t been a single point of regulation and I speak to a lot of senators and elected officials
1:38:14 And they just roll their eyes and go
1:38:17 Senator Amy klobuchar has been trying to pass antitrust regulation to break up big tech
1:38:23 That is that would be the easiest way to oxygenate both of our economies would be to take these incredible companies
1:38:28 Break them up and you’d see shareholder growth growth and jobs growth and tax base more startups
1:38:31 These things have just gotten way too powerful
1:38:38 But when she has antitrust legislation while sundar pershai will say thoughtfully we should look at regulation and
1:38:44 You know that we definitely are open to regulation. We’re talking to our partners. That’s their go-to. Meanwhile, there are more
1:38:46 full-time lobbyists
1:38:51 Working and living working and living in washington dc. Then there are sitting u.s senators
1:38:54 So this is their go-to stop me before I kill again
1:38:59 Right. I want to be regulated and wouldn’t you know not a single pass of regulation has passed
1:39:01 And it’s is it because government can’t get their act together?
1:39:04 Maybe or is it because
1:39:10 They want to give the public the impression that they’re good people such that there’s a lack of public uprising people love these products
1:39:12 and
1:39:17 Our elected officials are just outgunned with some of the best and brightest lawyers and lobbyists
1:39:20 Who are have literally
1:39:22 overrun
1:39:24 dc and brussels
1:39:27 So this whole call or openness to regulation
1:39:31 It’s jazz hands. It’s a head fake
1:39:33 So I don’t
1:39:37 Um, but back to the original question. I really hope that some of the best and brightest
1:39:40 And young staffers who understand ai
1:39:42 um
1:39:44 Get out ahead of this
1:39:45 um
1:39:47 and
1:39:48 the
1:39:51 You know, this is we’re going to see the first
1:40:00 Real externality of ai in q1 and q2 of next year and it’ll it’ll I believe and I’ll go something like the following
1:40:06 Putin’s spending 70 billion dollars and losing tens of thousands of lives every year on a failed invasion of ukraine
1:40:12 And he can the fastest way to victory for him is really simple
1:40:15 Is the election of donald trump?
1:40:20 He’s won if donald trump is inaugurated in january of 2025
1:40:23 Putin has won the war in ukraine
1:40:27 And if i’m putin, I figured that out pretty quickly
1:40:35 And instead of sending 70 billion why wouldn’t I just spend seven billion on troll farms and ai tested information that will create deep fakes
1:40:37 The deep position biden and harris for 2024
1:40:41 And I have an amoral management team
1:40:45 Who despite their calls for regulation and their concerns about the commonwealth
1:40:49 Will cash these checks and then post inauguration
1:40:56 Of a president just feel awful about all the ai generated misinformation that skewed these elections
1:41:04 So we’re about to see a misinformation lala palooza in the first half of next year that takes ai
1:41:09 Uh a murderous autocrat that is losing a war in ukraine
1:41:14 And amoral management. I don’t think these are bad people, but when it’s raining money it kind of
1:41:19 You decide well, oh, there’s a problem here. There might be election misinformation
1:41:21 We can’t figure out who’s paying for all of this
1:41:24 We don’t want to implement the technology to
1:41:28 Watermark ai because that would be censorship
1:41:36 And we’re definitely not going to agree to remove our protections from 230 based on ai generated content that’s been elevated algorithmically
1:41:41 No, let’s cash their check. Let’s cash their dam check and then we’ll revisit what this all means
1:41:44 So I think
1:41:45 aggressive
1:41:51 Regulatory oversight. I’m sick of calling on the better angels of ceo. So I’m sick of for them that waiting to show up
1:41:53 We live in a capitalist society
1:41:58 To make more money is to be more loved broader selection set of mates people like you you can give money away
1:42:02 So why wouldn’t you want to be more loved so you will ignore the externalities of your business?
1:42:05 And to a certain extent that’s what a for-profit company is supposed to do
1:42:07 It’s supposed to make as much money as it can within the confines of the law
1:42:10 so the most important people around ai
1:42:15 Are our elected leaders who need to get out ahead of this issue as opposed to
1:42:23 You know, realizing that one in eight teenage girls in the uk directly site instagram is a form of their self-esteem problems
1:42:26 That often leads to suicidal ideation and self-harm
1:42:29 We need to get we need to get out in front of this one
1:42:36 So boring the boring important people here are the regulators the 62 percent of people that say they feel lost and directionless though
1:42:39 I reflect on what sam altman’s doing with this
1:42:46 Universal basic income program and a few of these very smart ai people speak to universal basic income being the outcome
1:42:52 I we will hand money to people in society because there’ll be such little work for people to do
1:42:54 This is what I hear
1:42:59 Um that we’ll need to support them in some way. So we’ll give them money and my worry has always been that
1:43:04 As you said the pursuit the journey the victory the rejection
1:43:08 All of those things being central to our sense of like purpose and forward motion and progress
1:43:13 Um is does that disappear in a world where we’re just giving people universal basic income?
1:43:16 The idiocracy vision i don’t buy into it
1:43:22 We’re all just going to be on a couch watching netflix because there’s not a need for for labor anymore first off
1:43:25 People don’t need work what they need is purpose
1:43:29 So a lot of times when people are economically secure and they need purpose they go to work for nonprofits or they do something
1:43:31 That’s not economically driving them
1:43:37 So you can find purpose without work, but having said that there’s a cadence to all technological innovation and it goes something like this
1:43:42 There’s catastrophizing that it’s going to do away with all middle-class jobs automation and the auto industry
1:43:45 And in the short term there is some job destruction
1:43:52 And then but we couldn’t have envisioned heated seats or car stereos and employment goes up because there’s new ways to leverage technology
1:43:58 And I think the same is going to happen with ai there’s going to be some industries and there’s going to be some job destruction
1:44:04 But the opportunities for new businesses in ai and its intersection with healthcare education
1:44:07 It’s going to create a lot of jobs now. There’ll be some losers and some reshuffling
1:44:11 But I just don’t buy I think I think ai is actually going over the long term
1:44:14 I think it’s going to increase employment. It’s just going to make them more
1:44:19 productive and higher paid and the people who don’t adopt ai is not going to take your job
1:44:22 Someone who understands ai is going to take your job
1:44:25 but every technology in history has ultimately
1:44:29 Usually been some job destruction on the short end
1:44:32 You know one in three people in america used to make their living in farming
1:44:38 And so we were worried about all these technologies to increase output. Guess what now it’s only one in 25
1:44:39 But employment has gone up
1:44:44 But we make we make our money now from what we describe as if you think about both of our careers
1:44:46 Like some form of intelligence
1:44:52 Whether that’s you know, so that’s what I think none of those revolutions have taken on human intelligence
1:44:56 I think they’ve taken on our muscles. Yeah, I think about the farming example you gave there
1:45:00 But this feels like the first revolution. That’s like taking the last thing I have which is
1:45:03 My intelligence
1:45:08 If someone said to me once with some ai expert on this podcast, just imagine there’s someone through that wall there steve
1:45:13 Not only could they was their intelligence 10,000 percent or 10,000 times
1:45:16 broader than yours, but they could think
1:45:19 A million times faster than you can think
1:45:23 Who are you there’s a real arrogance to think that you are going to control it
1:45:29 Or that you will be able to perform better it as a podcast or as a author or as a
1:45:32 CEO
1:45:34 Or as an investor
1:45:39 You know and that frame I go is that going to be a reality that there will be a species or a being or
1:45:45 Whether it exists on a microchip or whatever that is can think a million times faster than me and is 10
1:45:52 Thousand times more intelligent than me. Yes. I go. Yes in a world of robotics. Well that
1:45:56 Species be able to move around as well. Yes. Okay. Well, it needs to be run
1:45:58 Not really because everything’s connected to the internet anyway
1:46:02 And I go, so where do I fit in that world? Like what am I I understand? I’ll be
1:46:06 Good at releasing oxytocin by hugging my dog and my girlfriend
1:46:11 But beyond that I go, where do I even with driving? I think driving is the biggest employer in the world and
1:46:16 It’s playing out the scenario where you remove all the drivers from uber and lorry drivers
1:46:20 And then they pull up at a gas station and that’s their food is served by speaking to a
1:46:25 A large language model and then it spits out the back end. I go, where is
1:46:28 You know, that’s that’s been my
1:46:30 It’s kind of like a black hole in my head. I don’t really know what comes after that
1:46:34 Yeah, but we’ve seen it before and so in the us the largest
1:46:40 Employer or the most popular or the biggest number of jobs among the non-college educated as truck driver
1:46:45 Autonomous driving just makes sense for long-haul trucking. I think that’s where it’s going to start
1:46:50 and what we’ve been really bad at in the past is figuring out how to take some of the
1:46:57 Incremental income created by that increased productivity and reinvested back in people in terms of retraining or as you said just giving them money
1:47:02 But you can’t stop it. I mean you can you can hold it at the gates for a little while
1:47:07 but eventually the dam bursts and trying to keep technology in a bottle just doesn’t just doesn’t work
1:47:12 But at the same time, I think that autonomous driving over the long term is going to create a lot of jobs
1:47:19 And because people it’s going to free up time the people who understand how to program and repair autonomous vehicles or drive this
1:47:23 You know figure out the software or the lobbyists trying to convince san francisco to
1:47:27 I mean, there’s just going to be a lot of jobs what it comes right down to is to be more competitive
1:47:31 But the people who have those skills are going to make more money and then the people who make that money
1:47:35 Are going to want to have nicer things and houses from people who need to show up
1:47:40 I you can make a lot of money as a welder right now and this goes to one of my solutions only three percent
1:47:46 Of people in the u.s. On linkedin the title is apprentice and the uk in germany
1:47:51 It’s 11 in germany 50 of the population has some vocational certification in the u.s. It’s five
1:47:56 We need much more not only vocational training, but we need to stop shaming it
1:48:02 If you build a house you’re going to see that anyone who has these types of skills actually makes a really good living
1:48:05 And I don’t know if ai is coming for those jobs
1:48:13 So in the information sector the communities that have had champagne and cocaine and it’s been disco for 30 years programmers
1:48:19 Services people or lawyers those people are going to probably get hit disproportionately hard
1:48:25 But the incremental productivity gains, I mean productivity isn’t everything but in the long run it’s almost everything
1:48:27 That’s a paul krugman post
1:48:32 This is supposedly going to increase productivity in the u.s. Over the next 10 years 1.2 percent
1:48:35 That’s probably going to translate to trillions of dollars in incremental
1:48:42 Value, so i’m just not I think this is I think again i’m looking forward to the conversation of 20 years
1:48:47 I think ai is going to create more jobs and more opportunities than it’s going to destroy. I’m an ai optimist I
1:48:55 You definitely inspired my thinking to be a little bit more optimistic there because you’re right thinking forward if we were in
1:48:57 I don’t know the industrial revolution
1:49:00 I never would have been able to I could think about the things we’d lose
1:49:04 But I couldn’t think about the things that we’d stand to gain through innovation and disruption and the internet
1:49:07 That was to come and all these other things. It’s really hard for us to think about
1:49:11 What will exist in the future and the opportunities?
1:49:15 But it’s really easy for us to think about the things we’ll lose within that the coming revolution
1:49:18 Because I just couldn’t just point at them because they’re all around me
1:49:22 But I can’t point at things that i’ve never seen before if you knew what i’m saying. So um
1:49:28 Thank you Scott. Thank you again for returning. Um the conversation we had last time was so enjoyable for for me
1:49:31 But I just I use my friends my like my five friends and my little
1:49:35 WhatsApp group as a barometer for the great conversations
1:49:40 I look at the metrics of course the watch time the retention all those things but so many of my really close friends said
1:49:47 He is just brilliant. Oh, thanks for that. Thanks for saying that that this is the truth. I can maybe make the friends that said that and um
1:49:49 and it’s
1:49:51 And it’s not just the
1:49:54 Extend in the depth of knowledge you have it’s you’re a wonderful communicator
1:49:57 You’re hilarious and you’re hilarious in the most
1:50:00 Almost it seems unintentional
1:50:03 But it’s a skill that that very few people are blessed with and you’re blessed with that skill
1:50:08 It’s just telling really interesting stories in such a compelling funny way that hold people
1:50:11 And you don’t need to shout and scream to do it which I think is a real talent that you have
1:50:16 So thank you for coming back here. Thank you for um moving to the uk means that we can have these conversations more often
1:50:19 And i’m so excited for your book in march about wealth
1:50:22 I feel like a lot of people need that and even
1:50:24 I’m especially excited for your book about masculinity
1:50:28 I’ve so so passionate about that subject matter that I almost thought I need to write a book about that
1:50:32 So knowing you’re writing it means that I definitely won’t because you’ll do
1:50:34 That’s the motivation. I gotta get it
1:50:37 Well, I know a lot of people I know a lot even like chris williamson’s I know a lot of these people
1:50:39 Have told me they’re gonna write a book about it
1:50:42 Which speaks to the need and my best friend in my chat actually said to me
1:50:47 Because I say what I’ve got this this two book deal with penguin. I need a second book. He was like
1:50:51 I would love someone to write about what it is to be a man these days. There’s gonna be a ton of them
1:50:54 Yeah, there’s gonna be a ton of them, but just let me thank you for the kind words
1:50:57 Which is let me say when I’m on the road for more than two or three weeks
1:50:59 First thing I do is I go come home and I go see my kids
1:51:02 I usually get home late at night and I can sometimes and it’s sad
1:51:08 I’ll notice they’ve grown because I haven’t seen them in two or three weeks. I’m like, oh my god. He’s actually grown
1:51:10 I haven’t seen you in 13 months
1:51:13 You have blown up
1:51:20 Like I know I didn’t know who you were. I’m seeing you in airports. I’m seeing you across media in america
1:51:28 So I can’t tell you like I peek into the room and I look at you sleeping. You have grown a foot. So congratulations. My sense is you’ve had
1:51:34 You’ve hit a tipping point. So congratulations to you and the team. It just feels like you guys are killing it
1:51:37 Thank you so much. Um
1:51:40 I am the face of this operation, but
1:51:45 You probably can understand that I wouldn’t be able to function without people that would just like me
1:51:50 And that’s exactly what I have. That’s what I have in jack who was here from the very jump when we had zero podcasts
1:51:56 And nobody knew who we were that’s what I have in the team jemima and all of the the broader team. So thank you so much
1:52:01 I um, we’re doing our very best to make things better. Um, and you you were actually a huge, uh,
1:52:08 A huge lift in our success because that first conversation we had did so well with a huge new new audience in the united states
1:52:13 And the momentum has for us continued from there. So thank you scott. Thank you for your time. Very precious. Appreciate it
1:52:15 Thank you stewin
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1:52:38 (upbeat music)