Scott Galloway · 42:36
How did we get to this point where the bottom 50% of America has about the same wealth as seven families in America? And it's a direct correlation to the absolute shit kicking that unions have had and the fact that we haven't really had a minimum wage raise in about thirty years. So this is, I'd like to think that this is a firewall. Well, see, I know
Kara Swisher · 43:00
Gavin Newsom who just signed
Kara Swisher · 43:01
it into law, Uber says it doesn't apply to them, or is making the argument that it doesn't apply to their contractors.
Scott Galloway · 43:08
Oh, they've already funded, significantly funded, they've allocated 20 or $30,000,000 along with some other companies, DoorDash, etcetera, to fight this and take it to the Supreme Court. Yeah. But it's time. I mean, it's absolutely time for workers to rise up and for us to,
Kara Swisher · 43:24
know, Well, I'm it's also a member the ruined their business plans even further. Yeah. Like, and I, you know, one of the best interviews I've ever done in terms of getting someone to say something just awful, which is my goal in every interview, was when Travis Kalanick, who was the previous CEO and one of the founders of
Scott Galloway · 43:42
Yeah.
Kara Swisher · 43:42
Of Uber. I asked him what... I said, you know, your business has some financial difficulties in getting profitable. Yeah. He goes, well, know, when when we... The problem I have is that guy in the front seat, I'd like to get rid of him.
Scott Galloway · 43:56
Yeah. He's
Kara Swisher · 43:56
the He's a he's a cost. Once I get rid of him, I have a great business. Yeah. And I was like, what? And the whole audience went, what? And I'm like, like you say, go on. Yeah. And he just... It was fascinating for him to like admit because because he was evil and that's what a villain does in a Bond movie. So, I'm going to kill you now, mister Bond, by cutting you with a laser in six parts. So, so it was really interesting, but I think that that they are not gonna be able to outrun this. Do you? I don't think they will.
Scott Galloway · 44:26
No, don't think...
Kara Swisher · 44:26
Unless they get rid of the guy in the front seat, really.
Scott Galloway · 44:28
Yeah, and let's go to our losers. Losers. This is a Los Ana win. I think Amazon and Twitter with continued lack of regard for the commonwealth, the business roundtable put out this wordy statement saying, it's no longer just about shareholders, it's about stakeholders. And fifty, seventy, eighty years ago, companies were evaluated, it was prestigious to have a lot of employees. That was prestigious. It was prestigious to be seen as a really good citizen. It's paying your people well. Those were signs, those were markers, not just your share price. People probably had a stronger view of the company based on those things and didn't know what the share price is. And we've seen Twitter basically file suit in San Francisco refusing to pay that tax. Yep. Going after that, I think that's a big lose and I think also Amazon, you wanna talk about heroes, and I brought this up a lot. Amazon supposedly got very angry at questions around unionization and the push back they got from local officials here in New York, and so they quote unquote took their ball and went home and they pulled out of New York. Remember that? That was six months ago. Yeah. LinkedIn is amazing. You can go on LinkedIn and you can scrape data and you get a ton of insight. Apple has about 15 or 20 open job positions, Google a 100 open job positions in New York, Amazon has 800 open job positions in New York right now. In the last six months, since Amazon pulled out, they've increased their hiring, they've hired a thousand people at Amazon in the last six months, they've hired 500 people at AWS, That means they are on pace to bring those 25,000 jobs. Right? Why? Because Jeff Bezos was always coming here, a 54 year old man with a $160,000,000,000 wants to roll in New York, not Indianapolis or Denver or Columbus, Ohio, that was ridiculous to begin with. And guess what? They are bringing those jobs here to the greatest city in the world and you know what? That guy had to put his fucking hand back in his pocket. AOC state senator GNR saved us all $3,000,000,000 by saying, you know what boss? You're coming here, this is the greatest place in the world, we do not need to pay you for your midlife crisis. This is a huge victory for us.
Kara Swisher · 46:43
I love when you go all AOC on me. It's really nice. Not so much when you go other ways, but I'm But like it's true. Absolutely true. They didn't... We don't need to pay them. Like the idea that we that we subsidize.
Scott Galloway · 46:56
I don't know about all of you. I'm paying a lot to be here. Yeah. Aren't you paying a lot? You pay to be in New York.
Kara Swisher · 47:00
Right. Exactly. Alright. My fail is Trump tweeting. All this tweeting about Alabama, the tweeting about running in the election for 2024, and don't you love... Just love when presidents talk about subverting the constitution, Which is just Wednesday for us in The United States anymore. And that, you know, the whole Alabama thing, it was insanity. That... The only thing I was sort of like didn't know how to feel about was the whole John Bolton tweets. Because I hate John Bolton. So I was like, who do I vote for here? Like, who do I root for? Like, you know what I mean? Like, I'm
Scott Galloway · 47:32
like That's right. He's out.
Kara Swisher · 47:33
I forgot about Trump's an asshole, but that guy is a real... He's been a persistent asshole for twenty years. So, it's a real... It was an interesting... That was my thing. But this... They're tweeting about this is not... It's really weird. It's... I think looking at his mental illness is something we need... Well, we know this already, but I think it needs to be taken seriously by journalists to start to...
Scott Galloway · 47:52
Can I have a second win? I think there's a lot of good things going on right now. Really hopeful and I'm not... Alright.
Kara Swisher · 47:58
Then we're gonna go to questions.
Scott Galloway · 47:59
Or I hate my money out of and less every day. But the repudiation of Boris Johnson bypassing Yeah.
Kara Swisher · 48:08
They lied to the queen.
Scott Galloway · 48:09
One of the things I I don't like about being a democrat or I don't like about us is I think we're wimps. So, Fox Talks has a we called socialism versus capitalism. They're constantly calling us socialist. And I think it's time we started saying, you know what now, we're not socialists. As a matter of fact, worst type of socialism is cronyism, which is happening on the other side. I think we need to say no, and I'm hoping that we're having sort of a reverse d day when the British parliament, when the conservative party there, 23 members defect and go to the other side, which we haven't seen among Republicans here, with this what I'll call soft fascism. And, let's be clear, this is a soft form of fascism. Fascism is nationalism, or demonizing immigrants, a refusal to condemn violence, and that to me perfectly describes some of the actions that are happening across extremist right wing in Europe and The US. So, yeah, you call me a socialist, no, no boss, you're the fascist, And Britain just said no, and I hope that begins to infect us. When we start to push back on a president who's taking money out of our defense budget without without a discussion or legislation or any sort of discourse with our legislative body and Boris Johnson tried to do the same thing in The UK and they said, not here boss. We need to do the same thing here. We need less fascism.
Kara Swisher · 49:29
I like I like you in a lesbian... You've you've gone full lesbian, which is really nice. I wish that lesbian Lindsey Graham would do that.
Scott Galloway · 49:40
That's good.
Kara Swisher · 49:41
What? Come on.
Scott Galloway · 49:43
That's good. That's good.
Kara Swisher · 49:46
Literally, I'm like, I think everyone has the photos or something's going on there. Anyway, come on. Let's go. We're gonna have questions from the audience. Alright. Mary Anne in the audience, I don't know where you are. What can large tech platforms, Twitter, YouTube, etcetera, do to protect vulnerable communities while not accidentally preventing members of the community from reclaiming what used to be hateful slurs? What can they do?
Scott Galloway · 50:12
Do you wanna go first?
Kara Swisher · 50:13
No, you go.
Scott Galloway · 50:14
I think as long as there's a dollar bill at the end of it, they're not going to. I don't think we can expect, we can call on their better angels. I think they've shown a masterful delay in obfuscation with like a faux concern and we continue to see that here's the problem, the underlying business model and the algorithms. As a species, we like to think we're a generous empathetic people and there's a large vein of that, but we're more tribal than we are generous or empathetic. And we're very drawn to violence and conflict. And it's the ultimate business model to create a model where advertising gets to target conflict. So when we talk about engagement on these platforms, what we really mean is enragement. So there's an economic interest in letting anti vaxxers go on and talk about this stuff without stepping in and saying, you know what, this is not only not true, it could potentially be very harmful. Right? It could result in an outbreak of meningitis or what have you. And so they will always default to well, okay, rage and hate, we're worried about it, we're concerned about it.
Kara Swisher · 51:20
We'll do better.
Scott Galloway · 51:20
But don't get in the way of it. So the bottom line is we need legislation. We pay 23¢ on the dollar to DC and to our state governments such that they can prevent a tragedy of the commons. And these companies will never make that connection. So what we need to do are elect officials that hold them to the same standards and scrutiny we've held other industries and companies. But folks, they're not gonna get there When on their it's raining money, your vision gets blurred.
Kara Swisher · 51:48
Absolutely. I agree with you on that one. Alright, what will happen to Lyft and Uber drivers? Because you do predictions mostly, so what will happen to Lyft and Uber drivers?
Scott Galloway · 51:57
Well, I think all of us probably need to take fewer Ubers, you know. I don't know if it makes sense for a professor to be taking a Suburban or whatever I'm gonna be taking for $80. I should probably be angry that it takes so long to get to the airports and vote for people and be willing to pay taxes such that there's public transportation to these places. Like they've done in Europe for the last fifty years.
Kara Swisher · 52:18
Right.
Scott Galloway · 52:19
So I'd like to think the workers get a little bit more dignity, the wages go up, that we go to minimum wage. By the way, remember all the fear mongering about what happens if you raise minimum wage to $15? Yeah. That hasn't panned out anywhere. No. Hasn't panned out anywhere. So I hope, I hope it just across the board, the gig workers and everybody else just...
Kara Swisher · 52:38
That this California legislation goes national.
Scott Galloway · 52:41
Yeah. Do you think it's gonna happen
Kara Swisher · 52:42
to I do. Do. I think, you know, it's interesting. I did have a discussion with Gavin Newsom, who was Lieutenant Governor and he didn't have anything to do all day. So he'd have lunch with me. We talked about this a lot, this idea of reclassifying workers and creating a new kind of worker. So I do think this... I think California, I'll be writing about this next week in the New York Times, is really the de facto national legislator for everything. Whether it's a privacy bill, whether it's
Scott Galloway · 53:05
California, OSU.
Kara Swisher · 53:06
AV five with the car deal, the deals they're making with car. So I think in weird way, Gavin Newsom and the and the senate there is determining a lot of our regulations for tech. And Marguerite Vestager, who just got a giant job, and she got quantumly more scary for... Which she's fan... She's a badass, speaking of
Scott Galloway · 53:24
Who badass here is in a union? Anybody here in a union? When I was... I went to UCLA and
Kara Swisher · 53:31
I was. I was at the You're ready go the journal on the Washington Post. I'm not now, but...
Scott Galloway · 53:35
So, junior year at UCLA, every summer at UCLA, I had basically twelve weeks to make $2,300 so I could afford to go back to school. And I worked as a box boy at San Vicente Foods and this guy took an interest in me, and he said, do this, do this, do this, and had me fill out a bunch of paperwork, and he said, it's gonna cost you $80 up front. I'm like, I don't have $80. He's like, we're putting you in the union. And I went from $4 an hour to $11 an hour, like someone taking an interest in me and the power of unions, and by the way, everybody seemed to be fine shopping in Bel Air at San Vicente Foods, and it literally paid for my junior year of college, was somebody saying, there's dignity in work and anyone who shows up here and packs other people's groceries should get paid 8 or $9 an hour in 1986 as opposed to $4 an hour. And it... So, I got through my junior year of college and I think that needs to happen across millions of households. We need to raise... Mean, I'm really on my soapbox now, I think I would really love to see a reinvigoration of unions...
Kara Swisher · 54:34
Well, interesting that it's happening actually at Internet media companies.
Scott Galloway · 54:37
What's that?
Kara Swisher · 54:38
It's... There's been unionization efforts more anywhere else than... Well, Internet media companies, Vox had... Went unionized, were obviously working on it, BuzzFeed and Vice News and stuff like that. So, it's a really interesting time because it's the media companies that are doing that, the internet media companies. And I know it was a struggle at VOXX but they ultimately came to a deal with the unions and it was interesting. But I I also did... I... I'm not in the designation now for the VOGS Union, but but it's it's an interesting trend. We'll see. Unions are... Have been so kneecapped. It's kind of hard to imagine.
Scott Galloway · 55:13
That's what kind of happened.
— Predictions segment begins —
Kara Swisher · 55:14
Alright. Last two. 2020 tech IPO predictions, Scott Galloway.
Scott Galloway · 55:20
The biggest IPO or the most successful IPO of 2020 is gonna be Airbnb.
Kara Swisher · 55:24
Airbnb. Yeah.
Scott Galloway · 55:26
And we're gonna see...
Kara Swisher · 55:26
Are you bullish on this one? Or
Scott Galloway · 55:28
you can Airbnb slap them is gang ster. Airbnb is an incredible concept because with Uber, Uber has no moats, the core business has low margins, Airbnb is the exact opposite.
Kara Swisher · 55:39
Okay.
Scott Galloway · 55:39
You have to have global supply, that means you have to have people who are... Who know about Airbnb coming in from Copenhagen and Tokyo, so it has mode. It's well run. You you like the CEO
Kara Swisher · 55:48
and the I manager do very much. They have issues around what they do to cities and removing rental properties at big cities, but in general, he's very aware of these things and he's not just saying... What I don't get from him, I get a really strong and interesting discussion and you can really shame him which is always helpful. But I find... I don't get a... You know, we'll do better. Yeah. We've made some mistakes, but we'll do better.
Scott Galloway · 56:15
What kind of Internet do we want?
Kara Swisher · 56:16
What kind of Internet do we First amendment.
Scott Galloway · 56:19
I'm proud of our progress.
Kara Swisher · 56:20
Without knowing what the first amendment is. What...
Scott Galloway · 56:22
Yeah. And then and then it's easier to pick the losers. Uber Uber, Lyft, Tesla, Beyond Meat, all down 20 to 80% in 2020. How about you? What do
Kara Swisher · 56:33
you I think Airbnb. Airbnb. Airbnb. Maybe Pinterest? Yeah. We'll
Scott Galloway · 56:37
see. You think they'll do well, Pinterest?
Kara Swisher · 56:39
I have no idea. Yeah. Yeah. Pinterest. Yeah. You're Pinterest. I haven't paid attention in years.
Scott Galloway · 56:44
They've done well. Pinterest is Yes.
Kara Swisher · 56:46
Pinterest. Done well. Alright. Thank you so much. This is Pivot. Scott Galloway, our Lesbrough. Thank you very much.
— Predictions segment ends —
Kara Swisher · 56:57
Scott, always lovely to see you in person.
Scott Galloway · 57:00
And thanks to Lesbian to Tech for inviting us.
Kara Swisher · 57:03
Today's show was produced by Rebecca Sinanis and Eric Johnson. Eric Anderson is Pivot's executive producer. Thanks also to Rebecca Castro, Drew Burrows, and Nishat Kerwa. Thanks again to Lesbians Who Tech for having us. Make sure you subscribe to the show on Apple Podcast. If you like this week's episode, leave us a review. Thanks for listening to Pivot from Vox Media. We'll be back next week with another breakdown of all things tech and business.
