Hendrix or Buffett

Summary

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Armstrong & Getty On Demand

Episode: "Hendrix or Buffett" – May 11, 2026

Main Theme & Purpose

In this episode of "Armstrong & Getty On Demand," Jack Armstrong and Joe Getty discuss a range of current political, economic, and cultural topics with their signature blend of satire and skepticism. Dominant subjects include the Iran nuclear negotiations, insider trading scandals tied to political events, interstate migration and wealth shifts in the U.S., the risks of universal income and automation, and the surprising popularity of communism among younger generations. There's also space for their riffs on food challenges, American migration trends, and reflections about purpose and downtime in society.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Iran Nuclear Negotiations and Trump’s Style

• Opening Segment (01:18 – 05:45)
  • The hosts play and dissect a characteristic Trump soundbite regarding Iran, noting his "unique speaking style," at times describing it as "rambling" (02:05, Joe Getty). Trump refers to Iranian negotiators as "moderates and lunatics," and asserts he won't allow Iran to obtain nuclear weapons:
    • Quote: “They can't have a nuclear weapon. They would use it within an hour after getting it.” – Guest Commentator (as Trump), (03:39)
  • The hosts mock the legitimacy of the Iran negotiations, comparing it to preposterous haggling (“I’ll offer you $1 and you have to throw in your wife…” – Jack Armstrong, 05:31).
  • Insight: Frustration at cyclical, performative diplomacy and the futility of negotiations as played out in public.

2. Insider Trading & Oil Market Manipulation

• Insider Trading Segment (05:45 – 13:40)
  • Discussion of an ABC report on suspicious, precisely timed oil trades linked to presidential announcements about Iran. Armstrong and Getty express skepticism that such trades could be anything but fueled by inside information:
    • “These people are actual psychics or they’re getting inside information, obviously.” – Jack Armstrong (07:44)
  • The conversation expands to the prevalence of government-adjacent insider trading in Washington, DC:
    • “Within 25 miles of Washington D.C., what percentage of that net worth is generated by insider information about the functioning of government? … It’s significant.” – Jack Armstrong (09:15)
  • Anecdotes about accidental “insider” insights illustrate the blurry line between clever observation and illegality.

3. The Big Blue-to-Red State Wealth Transfer

• Tax Policy & State Migration (13:47 – 24:34)
  • Armstrong and Getty analyze IRS data showing substantial wealth and population loss from high-tax "blue" states (California, NY, IL, NJ, MD) to lower-tax "red" states, with Texas, Florida, and South Carolina as major beneficiaries.
  • Quote: “Over $2 trillion in income fled high tax blue states for low tax red states in just the last 11 years, essentially the Trump and Biden years.” – Financial Guru, paraphrased by Joe Getty (19:31)
  • The hosts lampoon New York’s (and other states’) leaders for blaming tax flight on lack of patriotism rather than policy (“How would that work exactly?” – Jack Armstrong on dragging expats back, 21:41).
  • Insight: They argue these migratory and monetary trends are predictable results of blunt fiscal policies and increasingly punitive local taxation.

4. Food Challenge Detour

• Comic Relief (14:18 – 17:57)
  • A playful exchange about “impossible” food challenges (giant burgers, massive ice cream sundaes), including the Heart Attack Grill’s “quadruple bypass burger,” and reflections on the uniquely American appeal/absurdity of such feats.
  • “It’s so Vegas. It’s perfect. It’s perfectly, horrifically American and perfectly fine.” – Jack Armstrong (17:26)
  • Serves as a moment of comic relief and a nod to broader American culture.

5. Speculative Futures: Universal Basic Income, AI, & Social Change

• Society & Economy (26:18 – 31:47)
  • The hosts engage in a philosophical riff about the future impact of AI, automation, and (hypothetical) universal basic income on American life and migration.
  • Contemplate a society where scarcity vanishes, and everyone “just gets a check and you just hang out with your friends” (31:24, Joe Getty).
  • They worry about the societal costs of “too much downtime,” referencing musicians’ struggles with excess idle time ("Being a musician, downtime is one of the worst things that can happen to you as a young person." – Jack Armstrong, 36:24).

6. Rise in Popularity of Communism

• Political Analysis (32:20 – 34:41)
  • Senator John Fetterman voices concern over increased openness to communism within the U.S., which hosts and guests find alarming.
    • Quote: “Communism killed 100 million people in the 20th century... How is it gaining popularity?” – Joe Getty (35:33)
  • Armstrong & Getty connect this trend to the broader “politics of envy” and the cyclical allure of populist ideologies.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Iran Negotiations:

  • “Trump has such a unique speaking style… sometimes known as rambling.” – Joe Getty (02:00)
  • “It's practically a parody of negotiation.” – Jack Armstrong (04:55)

• On Insider Trading:

  • “You wouldn’t wait until 15 minutes before he comes out to make his announcement.” – Jack Armstrong (08:19)
  • “If with my insider trading I end up with less money, that's no good.” – Joe Getty (13:09)

• On Blue State Wealth Loss:

  • “Well, just recently, billionaire bigwigs Ken Griffin, Mark Rowan... are taking thousands of jobs out of the Big Apple... as a direct consequence of Mayor Mundani’s tax the rich antics.” – Jack Armstrong (22:00)
  • “We got 250 good years. There's no reason to be ashamed. It's like Tom Brady retiring in his 40s.” – Jack Armstrong (09:52)

• On Migration Trends:

  • “South Carolina saw the biggest influx per capita, equal to just over 1% of its population…” – Jack Armstrong (24:14)

• On Universal Income & AI:

  • “If everybody just got a million dollars a year, where would you live? What would the housing market look like?” – Jack Armstrong (27:29)
  • “Who’s gonna build it? Dude’s like, f you, I’m not building your house. I got a million dollars a year not working.” – Jack Armstrong (28:35)

• On the Popularity of Communism:

  • “Conservatively, communism killed 100 million people in the 20th century… How is it gaining popularity?” – Joe Getty (35:33)

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• Opening Trump/Iran Discussion: 01:18 – 05:45
• Insider Trading & Oil Markets: 05:45 – 13:40
• State Wealth Migration: 13:47 – 24:34
• Food Challenge Segment: 14:18 – 17:57
• Universal Income & AI Future: 26:18 – 31:47
• Communism’s Resurgence/Fetterman Clip: 32:20 – 34:41
• Final Thoughts: 35:13 – End

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Conclusion

This episode provides a whirlwind tour of current American political, economic, and cultural tensions—from the farcical nature of international negotiations and the murky ethics of high-level insider trading, to the downstream effects of tax policy on interstate migration, and the uncertainties of a rapidly automating future. Armstrong & Getty use biting humor, skepticism, and vivid analogies to make complex issues approachable and spark deeper questions, all while never taking themselves too seriously. The episode closes with a sobering reminder about the lessons of history and a warning about ideological amnesia, wrapped around the duo’s trademark irreverence.

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Transcript

[Jack Armstrong]

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[Jack Armstrong]

Broadcasting live from the Abraham Lincoln Radio

[Joe Getty]

Studio at the George Washington Broadcast Center,

[Jack Armstrong]

Jack Armstrong and Joe Getty. Armstrong and Getty.

[Joe Getty]

And now here's Armstrong and Getty.

[Guest Commentator]

So you have the moderates and you have the lunatics. And I think the moderates are more respected. The lunatics want to fight till the end. You know, there will be a very, it will be a very quick fight. But I call them, you have, just like our country, we have lunatics too. We have, I call them lunatics. I call them stupid people too. But in Iran, they have the moderates that dying to make a deal. And then you have the lunatics. And I guess they're a little bit afraid of the lunatics, but. And why not? The, the level of ferocity for protests, you know, the people are watching it. They want to go out on the streets. They have no weapons. They have no guns.

[Joe Getty]

Trump has such a unique speaking style,

[Jack Armstrong]

the sometimes known as rambling,

[Joe Getty]

but they are, yeah, they are lunatics and they are very, very violent lunatics. Anyway, Trump, and this is all just in the last few minutes, Trump's taking questions in the Oval Office. He does this all the time. So he's got a bunch of women standing around behind him and it's probably like, you know, National Women at Work day or something like that. And they come into the office and he signs some declaration. Then he takes questions from reporters and they gotta stand there with smiles on their faces while he takes all kinds of complicated questions and says crazy. Yes.

[Jack Armstrong]

The best one was last week when he had all the little kids in for the presidential fitness Thing. And he went on and on about in like a really blatant, you know, graphic, hardcore way about the war with Iran. Yeah. And in front of the kids who are standing there wide eyed.

[Joe Getty]

Anyway, more from Trump.

[Guest Commentator]

You know, I'm willing to, I'm willing to say terrible expression, take a bullet. It's a terrible expression, especially when it's used by me. But I am, I'm willing to take a bullet for the country. And I said, look, the stock market is going to go down, but we're going to have a threat of lunatics having. Lunatics having a nuclear weapon. I deal with them. I deal with them. I say it to them. I say, you people are crazy. I deal with them. They talk differently. I say, you're crazy, you're crazy people. You're nuts. You're not having a nuclear weapon. They think they can talk me into it and they don't do very well with it, but they know how I feel. They can't have a nuclear weapon. They would use it within an hour after getting it.

[Jack Armstrong]

You know, I wish he'd mix in a little religious fanatic. Maybe he wants to stay away from that. But I'm glad to hear his resolve is, is apparently unflinching as it is.

[Joe Getty]

Sure seems to be on the whole they can't have a nuclear weapon thing. Sure seems to be good. And yeah, he, he needs to be solid on that. But if you didn't follow it over the weekend, the brief version is, you know, we, we sent them our one page memorandum that included, you don't get a nuke, we're gonna grab the enriched uranium. Straightens me open. Their response was, we control the strait and we still get a nuke. And Trump said, that's ridiculous. I reject it wholeheartedly. So we'll see where it goes from here.

[Jack Armstrong]

What do you think is happening behind the scenes?

[Joe Getty]

I gotta believe it's a constantly changing, evolving situation where the players involved don't even know who's got the power at any given moment.

[Jack Armstrong]

Okay, behind the scenes there in Iran, I meant like among us and our allies. Do you think we're getting all our ducks in a row for a new round of ass whoopings?

[Joe Getty]

Yes. Yeah.

[Jack Armstrong]

I mean, because anybody who sees a glimmer of hope in these negotiations has better vision than I do. I mean, it's just ridiculous. It's practically a parody of negotiation. I mean, you just laid out quite accurately, folks, I'm here to backtrack. You laid out quite accurately the exchange of proposals over the weekend that Sounds like a parody.

[Joe Getty]

Yeah, it really does. Of something you would call a negotiation.

[Jack Armstrong]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Joe Getty]

Well, I'd like to buy your car for $1. I'm not selling my car for a dollar. Negotiations are ongoing.

[Jack Armstrong]

Yeah. Or, you know, I'll offer you $1 and you have to throw in your wife. Well, the car costs $50 million and you have to cut off your hand. So let's start. Negotiations are ongoing. Exactly.

[Joe Getty]

What?

[Guest Commentator]

Okay.

[Joe Getty]

Different topic. Same theme, though. I mean, the same backdrop. The war in Iran. We've talked about this some. It's gotten a lot of news coverage. People who somehow are getting info and then being able to trade stocks, particularly around oil, and making lots of money having information the rest of us don't have. ABC News took a look at this last night.

[News Reporter]

Sources tell ABC News the Justice Department is investigating $2.6 billion of suspiciously timed oil trades tied to the Iran war. In at least four cases, oil traders bet prices would drop right before they actually did. Investigators now probing whether they'd received inside information.

[Joe Getty]

So hint they did. That's Trump's Justice Department that's looking into this. They go on with the examples of people making trades right before Trump comes out and makes an announcement.

[News Reporter]

On March 23, just 15 minutes before President Trump announced he would postpone attacks on Iran's power grid, traders bet more than $500 million oil prices would fall. After the President's announcement. That's exactly what happened. Same story. On April 7, hours before Trump announced the ceasefire, nearly $1 billion in bets that oil would drop, and it did. Twenty minutes before Iran announced the Strait of Hormuz would reopen, traders bet $760 million that oil would fall. It happened. And on April 21, 15 minutes before Trump extended the ceasefire, $430 million in bets came in and paid off.

[Joe Getty]

So this is not like all the nuclear scientists have disappeared in the last three years. Here's Jim Jones is 62 years old and died. And no, this is not one of those. You take some random, random data points and build a narrative around. That's just completely bs.

[Jack Armstrong]

These people are actual psychics or they're getting inside information, obviously. 15 minutes here, 20 minutes there. Are you that. Please stop. Was consensus or research or trends or whatever, you'd have lots and lots of bets of that sort kind of ramping up as you get to within a couple of days, blah, blah, blah. Please, 15 minutes before the announcement. Stop it.

[Joe Getty]

Even if it was people who think Trump always tacos, I'm willing to bet money on he always Tacos. You wouldn't wait until 15 minutes before he comes out to make his announcement.

[Jack Armstrong]

Well, right. And a lot of those announcements are not even like promoted.

[Joe Getty]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Jack Armstrong]

They're not scheduled per se.

[Joe Getty]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. It's not a. At 9 o' clock today, Trump will announce whether or not we're going to proceed with the war. That don't, that's not the way they, they unfold.

[Jack Armstrong]

Right, right. Yeah.

[Joe Getty]

He just out of nowhere when the deadline was 5 o' clock tonight, all of a sudden he will, in the Oval Office like he is right now. He'd say, I'm going to extend it for another two days. And people bet on that 15 minutes before he said that. So, I mean, that is 100%. Somebody got the heads up. The only thing I don't get is if it's, if it, if Trump's involved, why would he spread it around to, Wouldn't he keep it tighter to people he knows, family?

[Jack Armstrong]

Maybe he is. I don't know. How many people do they think are involved?

[Joe Getty]

I don't know.

[Jack Armstrong]

I don't know. Man, that's a lot of money.

[Joe Getty]

Yes, it is. Well, there's something really, really uncool going on here.

[Jack Armstrong]

Yeah, clearly. Well, it's, I'm sure folks are yelling at their radio right now that that's become. Well, here's a question. I'm going to present this as a question of the net worth of all of the rich people. Define that. How you want. Within 25 miles of Washington D.C. what percentage of that net worth is generated by insider information about the functioning of government? Lots of money. It's significant. Yeah, it's like oil is to Texas. I mean, it's a chunk.

[Joe Getty]

That's, it's.

[Jack Armstrong]

Yeah, I don't know. We, we. Hey, 250 years is a good run. There's no reason to be ashamed. It's like Tom Brady retiring in his 40s. Disappointing. But let's be realistic. We got 250 good years.

[Joe Getty]

I got a question for you. See if I can find it here. Somebody text today. Is this insider trading question the other day?

[Jack Armstrong]

I wish I knew anything worth trading on. Boy, would I, I would insider trade like a. Some bitch.

[Joe Getty]

Let's see if I can find this. They overheard something.

[Jack Armstrong]

Are there any prediction markets on whether we will use a certain word? Because I will sell out. I mean, you kumquat, you name it. Probably the funniest word in the English language, kumquat.

[Joe Getty]

So somebody texted me this the other day, hey, if I Overheard the VP of a big oil company telling a politician about a stock that may or may not make money. Is it insider trading if I buy the stock or just lucky eavesdropping? What if you just. Oh, they're not in the industry at all. Oh no, they were just at a social thing and apparently have good ears.

[Jack Armstrong]

I don't think there's any such thing as second hand insider trading because you are not, you know, they did not intentionally share that information with you for the purpose of trading. You just heard it.

[Joe Getty]

That's what I said too. And I was hoping my advice was correct and they don't end up in prison. Sorry about that. I was wrong. You should have asked Chad GPT instead of me, a disc jockey.

[Jack Armstrong]

If I'm outside an oil refinery and a guy runs out saying it's a fire, it's going to burn the whole place down. And I trade on that. That's not insider trading, that's observation. It's keeping your ear to the ground.

[Joe Getty]

Exactly.

[Jack Armstrong]

Yeah, trade away.

[Joe Getty]

But if I trade tens of millions of dollars worth of oil stock 15 minutes before Trump announces he's extending a ceasefire or something like that, something's going on.

[Jack Armstrong]

You know, I should, I probably shouldn't admit to this. I'm going to end up in a cell next to Martha Stewart many years ago. A friend. As usual, every story told on the Armstrong and Yeti show is entirely fictional.

[Joe Getty]

This is an entertainment program.

[Jack Armstrong]

A friend who is in why don't I say the automotive business said, take a look at my company's stock. Now's a really good time to buy. We've broken through on the blankety blank. Except it was more vague than that. But you know, I'm reasonable.

[Joe Getty]

That's pretty insider y trading to me.

[Jack Armstrong]

I took the message. He essentially said, look, my company stock is about to go way up.

[Joe Getty]

And did you? And did it?

[Jack Armstrong]

I did some. I didn't go heavily into it because I didn't have very much money, but it went up a very little bit for a while. Then it went down again and I think was below the level it had been when I bought it.

[Joe Getty]

Moving up Fun out of insider trading insider trading ever.

[Jack Armstrong]

Thanks for nothing.

[Joe Getty]

No, if with my insider trading I end up with less money, that's no good.

[Jack Armstrong]

Maybe he was selling the stock short. It was a pump and dump scheme and I was, I was the jump.

[Joe Getty]

He's going around talking out of the side of his mouth to everyone he could find. He's at the bagel place. So I work for ACME industry. And I'm just, just, just letting you know I got a pickup truck.

[Jack Armstrong]

It's 400 miles per gallon. Bye bye. Moving up. Pump a nump jump. That's right. That's how it goes.

[Joe Getty]

And you think, well, he told me out of the side of his mouth. So it must be, it must be pretty, pretty secret stuff coming up.

[Jack Armstrong]

Mentioned this a couple times. Finally going to clear away a little time for it. The unbelievable. Well, unbelievable that word is used incorrectly. At least I did. The utterly predictable and perfectly believable flow of taxpayer revenue from blue states to red states. Who would have predicted that? Oh, we did.

[Joe Getty]

We got lots on the way. Stay here.

[Jack Armstrong]

Armstrong and Getty.

[Joe Getty]

Tina Charles, the WNBA's all time leading rebounder announced that she is retiring. Charles credits her rebounding success to WNBA players missing a lot. I thought that was funny.

[Jack Armstrong]

Wow. It's bad basketball. Was that punchline, sir?

[Joe Getty]

Talking about eating challenges? Because my son wants to do one this summer. Something on vacation where you go, where you get a T shirt or your picture on the wall or something like that.

[Jack Armstrong]

Wow.

[Joe Getty]

This is one of those that nobody's ever done.

[Jack Armstrong]

So.

[Joe Getty]

But I just thought it was still interesting. It's a, it's at a, it's at a place called that Bar in Danville, California, which isn't that far from me. I like the name of the bar, that Bar. And they have a. That burger. It's roughly a foot in diameter with two Angus patties, one of which has a hole in the middle holding a grilled cheese sandwich.

[Jack Armstrong]

Wait a minute.

[Joe Getty]

I like that as a touch. We drill a hole in the middle of one of the patties and fill it with a grilled cheese sandwich. Who thought of that? I don't know. Topped with four cheeses, cheddar, American pepper jack and Swiss and a woven bacon patty. Anyway, I've got a picture of it if you would like to see it.

[Jack Armstrong]

There's a lot there. Yeah, I mean, you know, just the description.

[Joe Getty]

Well, here's a picture of it. And you got to notice the guy behind him for. Behind the burger for a little perspective. That is a large burger.

[Jack Armstrong]

No, that's a big one.

[Joe Getty]

But so another option.

[Jack Armstrong]

Did you say nobody's eaten that though?

[Joe Getty]

Yeah, yeah, exactly.

[Jack Armstrong]

I'm surprised.

[Joe Getty]

Kind of takes the fun out of it.

[Jack Armstrong]

I mean it's huge, obviously. But if somebody ate the. What was the steak? The legendary steak from Texas.

[Joe Getty]

I mean the old 96. That was completely undoable and somebody did it. So 12% of people do it.

[Jack Armstrong]

Wow.

[Joe Getty]

There's A place called the kitchen sink San Francisco Creamery. It's an ice cream place and it's in Walnut Creek actually. Eight extra large scoops of ice cream, three bananas.

[Jack Armstrong]

Wow.

[Joe Getty]

Toasted almonds, cherries, and a mountain of whipped cream. The whipped cream would actually be the hardest part for me.

[Jack Armstrong]

Whoa.

[Joe Getty]

Served in an actual sink style bowl. You finish it in 30 minutes, you get the meal free and a commemorative T shirt on the wall of fame. And people do it semi regularly. So the last person to do it the fastest did it in 19 minutes. But it looks, it looks doable, but you would feel horrible. So I think that might be our best bet to early, early opportunity.

[Jack Armstrong]

Yeah. Something 1 in 10 ish strikes me is the real sweet spot for a. Can you eat it, you get a T shirt.

[Joe Getty]

I agree. Doable, but really hard because if half of people do it, it's not that. If nobody does it, there's just no point. Yeah, I like the old 96er. You probably heard about the quadruple bypass burger. This got a lot of attention when it first came out at the heart attack grill in Las Vegas. Everybody thought it was just so politically

[Jack Armstrong]

incorrect to you by a chick dressed as a nurse, right?

[Joe Getty]

Yes. Four half pound patties cooked in lard topped with eight slices of cheese and piles of caramelized onions. Challengers wear a hospital gown and finishers get wheeled out in a wheelchair. And the the waitresses are dressed as nurses.

[Jack Armstrong]

It's so Vegas. It's perfect. It's perfectly, horrifically American and perfectly fine.

[Joe Getty]

Sure, if you want to do that sort of thing.

[Jack Armstrong]

Heart disease actually claims 100,000 lives. Blah, blah, blah. It'll be fine. We joke about the things we fe and we eat giant burgers.

[Joe Getty]

I like the idea of drilling a hole in one patty and putting a grilled cheese sandwich in there for no reason whatsoever.

[Jack Armstrong]

A grilled cheese sandwich? That's odd.

[Joe Getty]

Yes.

[Jack Armstrong]

So they're calling it the biggest wealth transfer in American history. What? And it's not the usual one. I'm talking about thieving from our children by overspending our tax dollars and accumulating horrific debts. It's not happening on Wall Street. It's happening in u Hauls will tell you about the tax dollars leaving the blue states and heading to the red ones. Armstrong and Getty.

[Joe Getty]

So the things we've learned don't run onto tarmacs in the middle of the night at major airports.

[Jack Armstrong]

Well, if you run onto it, don't stay there.

[Joe Getty]

Don't bird watch in landfills in Argentina. These are all things we've learned.

[Jack Armstrong]

Wow. If you missed our rant about how mind bogglingly, inexplicably stupid the media's fixation on hantaviruses, it was in an earlier hour. Grab it the podcast Armstrong and get on demand. Michael, get the get the Price is Right clip ready for us for a little couple of moments from now, going to be talking about money. And this is, you know, I was trying to describe or trying to figure out how to present this. And it occurred to me as I'm walking back to the studio that this is either so obvious to you, you can't understand why it would have to be explained, or you can't accept it at all. To me, explaining how a lot of blue states had made it so difficult to conduct business and taxed people of high earning levels so aggressively that they're leaving and they're losing revenue. It's like somebody said to me, you know, I had a friend and I like to punch him in the face randomly and sometimes, sometimes I'd poke his eyes and I really enjoyed that. And now he won't call me back. It's like, of course not. Well, here's a financial guru commenting. This is the biggest wealth transfer in American history. Not happening on Wall street, it's happening on u hauls. Over $2 trillion in income fled high tax blue states for low tax red states in just the last 11 years, essentially the Trump and Biden years. And the blue state solution, he points out, is to raise taxes again. But it's really quite stunning. The 31 Trump states have gained $2.2 billion in earner revenue, just earnings. And the Harris states, including D.C. have lost just short of $2 billion. In fairness, there are few blue states like Colorado, Washington, Oregon that have gained a little bit of income, partly because a lot of folks are fleeing California to those states because they like the west coast or the west in general, and they think, well, it's probably less bad. But yeah, I mean you've got the five worst. Maryland lost 120 billion. This is small print and I'm old. New Jersey lost 212 billion. Illinois left 399 billion in earnings. California 503 billion and New York, New York, Donnie, $660 billion. And a lot of that is backloaded toward more recently.

[Joe Getty]

And that's why you got the governor, I guess, talking about how it's unpatriotic to not stay and pay your taxes, which is one of the craziest theories I've ever heard.

[Jack Armstrong]

And her one bizarro statement that yotta, you want to help your country in New York, go down to Palm beach and drag people back. How would that work exactly? But a couple at least. Well, just recently, a billionaire. Bigwigs. If you're into finance, you probably know the names. Ken Griffin, Mark Rowan. They're taking thousands of jobs out of the Big Apple and moving out as, quote, a direct consequence of Mayor Mundani's tax the rich antics. And there are serious fears in New York that a big money exodus is on the way. Mum Donnie poked Griffin. You may recall this. He did a video outside Griffin's place in New York in midtown. He used it as a backdrop to drum up support for a proposed tax on luxury second homes in the city and actually named Griffin and everything. An appalled Griffin first threatened to scrap a big giant development on Park Avenue, then told CNBC on Tuesday that the creepy video spurred him to expand his firm's hub in Florida. Quote, we will add far more jobs in Miami over the next decade as an immediate and direct consequence of the mayor's poor decision here with respect to his posting of that video. And as blah, blah, blah, many New York leaders, including Governor Hochul, have publicly and privately warned Mandani's rabble rousing is going to cause even more and more of this. So I won't bother with the other guy's story, but it's thousands of jobs and billions of dollars in revenue which can be taxed there.

[Joe Getty]

So we've all heard the joke, proposition, thought experiment, whatever it is, where, how about we divide into two countries, you know, the conservatives and the socialists are the people on the left and we'll see how we're all doing in 10 years. Looks like we're maybe kind of trying that.

[Jack Armstrong]

Yeah, yeah.

[Joe Getty]

Because the, the, the blue states people are leaving. Not only are they high tax, they're high services. And how are you going to pay for those Right.

[Jack Armstrong]

And enormous pension liabilities? And when those evil birds come home to roost, what are they going to do? Raise taxes again on the quote, unquote rich, you need to pay their fair share. Finally, you can find anybody a couple of interesting stats. Texas and Florida continue to draw the largest number of new residents. But South Carolina, where I spend a great deal of my time, is growing faster than any other state as a percentage, as more Americans continue to relocate across the country. This is all according to IRS data. Broad shift toward the South. You've heard about that. As Americans say they're making the move for lower taxes, more jobs, higher quality of life. South Carolina saw the biggest influx per capita, equal to just over 1% of its population in. What's the time period of that? Surely that can't be a year.

[Joe Getty]

The worst thing is if you'd. I want to discover some place that doesn't ever catch on because I've been places before that catch on.

[Jack Armstrong]

Yeah.

[Joe Getty]

And then everybody comes and ruins it.

[Jack Armstrong]

Yeah, yeah, that does.

[Joe Getty]

Californians come and want to change the laws for some weird reason I don't remember the Idaho.

[Jack Armstrong]

Oh my God. Yeah, don't California, my Idaho slash Colorado, slash Texas, for what it's worth. Back to that, that first poll, that first chart. South Cacalac, which is not a huge state, but with the influx of residents, they gain more than 29,000 new tax filers and roughly $4.1 billion in income for a smallish state. And they mentioned this shift is likely to boost local economies in the state as new residents bring spending power and help fill open jobs and growing industry, not to mention tax revenue. Texas and Florida are big, so they're much. So they're the number one terms of sheer people. But Texas led with, oh, these are 20, 23, which is last numbers that the IRS has ready 56,473 new residents, followed by Florid with 55,000 or so. The gains come as some of the nation's most expensive states, which are run by Democrats, are seeing the biggest losses. California is down more than 100,000 tax filers, not people tax filers.

[Joe Getty]

Yeah, that's a good way to count tax filers as opposed to if you're growing through illegal immigration or whatever else

[Jack Armstrong]

in New York by nearly 72,000 tax filers, as South Carolina, for instance, gained 29,000.

[Joe Getty]

You know, a topic I haven't heard anybody bring up. So we thought when Covid hit and a lot of people went zoom, and there was some belief there for a while that that might be permanent, that people would be able to move wherever they wanted, at least out of urban centers and that sort of stuff might restructure everything. That didn't work out because so many places have decided, nah, we like it better when you're here at work and all that sort of stuff. But if AI happens the way they predict it and nobody's working and everybody's got, you know, universal high income or whatever, and you just don't have a job flat at all, wonder what that will do to the distribution of people around the country. I mean, if you not. Not only do you not have a zoom job, you don't Have a job at all, you really could live wherever the hell you want.

[Jack Armstrong]

Yeah.

[Joe Getty]

Wonder what that will do to society.

[Jack Armstrong]

Well, yeah, this gets back to our thought experiment of a couple of weeks ago about what would a, an economy look like if there's no scarcity. But of course they're not making more land, as they say. You can develop land, but I mean, so everybody would want to live in San Diego, right? I mean, because it would probably come down to climate and scenery and recreation and that sort of thing.

[Joe Getty]

I don't know. Different people choose different stuff, I guess. True enough.

[Jack Armstrong]

But if it gets too crowded, the pleasure drops, right? And if it gets too expensive, I mean, you just. Scarcity will always exist when it comes to, you know, only one guy can live in the penthouse at the top of a building.

[Joe Getty]

Right? So I just, I've never heard anybody even brush up against this topic.

[Jack Armstrong]

But if, if everybody, you know, maybe I should hit my, my AI with this instead of the other thing I asked it, which was, what would an economy with no scarcity look like? And the thing was like, dude, you're blowing my mind. If everybody made grossed a million dollars a year, you'd have to make 2 million to gross. A million, roughly. But if everybody just got a million dollars a year, where would you live? What would the housing market look like?

[Joe Getty]

Wouldn't they start charging $150,000 for a car, though, because everybody has so much money?

[Jack Armstrong]

And who's gonna build it? Dude's like, f you, I'm not building your house. I got a million dollars a year not working.

[Joe Getty]

Well, robots will build it.

[Jack Armstrong]

Oh, robots, yes. But I mean. Okay, so I don't know, maybe, you know, we were talking about South Carolina

[Podcast Advertiser/Host]

or

[Jack Armstrong]

like, we love this Sierra Nevada. The beautiful mountains of Northern California. We had a place for a long time in the Gray Eagle area, which is beautiful. It's up in. It's sparsely populated Yuba county, if you want to Google it. But if everybody could afford to build like a home with an unbelievable view there, it would no longer be it.

[Joe Getty]

Correct.

[Jack Armstrong]

It would be a completely different place. So, I mean, choked with traffic. The idea of some of those little mountain towns being, you know, like, yeah, don't go, honey, it's rush hour. It'll take an hour to get across town. What does that look like?

[Joe Getty]

I don't know. I don't understand how this works.

[Jack Armstrong]

Yeah, neither does anybody else. But we got to beat China. It's all I know. Damn Chinese. Has there ever been less certainty about what five years will look like? The middle of World War II.

[Joe Getty]

I don't even think then.

[Jack Armstrong]

Nah. Fascist regimes look like. I mean if you're a Jew in the middle of World War II, you might be, you know, pretty nervous about it. But Dan, we.

[Joe Getty]

And we, you know, the free world recognized pretty early on we're going to win. It's just going to take a long time and it's going to be ugly. But I don't think there's ever been a period of history where and not like completely restructure society. Right.

[Jack Armstrong]

What?

[Joe Getty]

You can't even imagine where you're having these kind of stoner conversations. I just.

[Jack Armstrong]

Well, right. Because. Yeah. My idiotic grasping for an example. You had an idea what housing would be the middle of World War II.

[Joe Getty]

I got a 14 year old and a 16 year old. My 14 year old 5 years will be 19. We have no idea what the world's gonna look like. What do you tell a kid to do? Study your something something or it might be a complete waste of time. And I mean a complete waste of time. Does you know value whatsoever to learn the things you're learning?

[Jack Armstrong]

Work on your foot speed and gun fighting skills. Might be right for the, the coming utopia, the Mad Max utopia. Or it's going to be Valhalla and everybody's going to be happy just sitting around strumming guitars and writing poetry. For whom? Nobody wants to hear it. Everybody's writing poetry. If everybody's a poet, no one's a poet.

[Joe Getty]

My youngest has interest and wants to do stuff. But my eldest said, I'm just going to party all the time. It's going to be awesome. So he's just looking forward to it. He's going to. He's hoping he's going to get out of high school and be a year or two away from the. Everybody gets a check and you just hang out with your friends. What are you doing today? Going to the beach or the forest or wherever you live, mountains, Whatever you do. Going to the pool, Going to the bar Every day for the rest of your life.

[Podcast Advertiser/Host]

Yeah, maybe Fifth of Hennessy.

[Jack Armstrong]

Sounds great. Signed Jimi Hendrix. Say that to him. He'll be like, what? Who? Wow.

[Joe Getty]

How about sounds great. Jimmy Buffett, who did it his whole life. Jimmy Buffett worked like a fiend. He's walking around barefoot, drinking margaritas.

[Jack Armstrong]

He pretended to be that it was all a lie.

[Joe Getty]

Okay, we will finish strong.

[Jack Armstrong]

Next, Armstrong and Getty.

[John Fetterman]

I know how to pay the bills as a Democrat right now and my colleagues and people that are running whether for the Senate or The House, they are literally running on Trump, and it's absurd. And we are getting to that point, and I refuse to engage in that extreme, those terms. And we have to find a better way forward.

[Joe Getty]

That's Fetterman, Senator Fetterman of Pennsylvania, him of the hoodie, who we couldn't have hated more when he ran for office. And he said John Fetterman would be

[Jack Armstrong]

the adult in the room.

[Joe Getty]

And he ends up being every Republican's favorite Democrat. He's almost certainly either not going to run, or if he is, he's going to lose in Pennsylvania as a Democrat. And he has said specifically he will not become a Republican because he's not a Republican.

[Guest Commentator]

So,

[Joe Getty]

I mean, he votes with The Democrats, like 90% of the time or something like that, but he. He doesn't have the same views on Israel and all kinds of different things.

[Jack Armstrong]

He's not woke. He's just a liberal.

[Joe Getty]

Yeah, exactly. Here he is talking about communism getting

[Jack Armstrong]

more popular, but the idea that communist is not a dirty word. I think we need to pause here and say, okay, this is a watermark. This is a watershed mark, a moment in American history where we should pay attention. And my guess is communism is only to get more popular.

[John Fetterman]

Well, I sure hope not, because bad ideas refuse to die. And now that's coming back. And a lot of this, the Trump and the backlash is making more and more things possible in the Democratic Party. And I'm consistently going to resist that kinds of extremes and those extremes that cost us in 2024. We all have to remember that we need to have an election against both sides. We're accountable for both sides.

[Joe Getty]

The fact that communism has gotten more popular and Bill Maher and Senator Fetterman both agree it's probably going to continue to get more popular is horrifying.

[Jack Armstrong]

Yeah, the politics of envy, which is, you know, your socialism, democratic socialism, blah, blah, blah. That's what animates all of it. Super popular right now. It just always leads to the same place, which is shared misery as Churchill and Thatcher and Sowell and anybody with two brain cells to rub together gets. But it's an easy sell.

[Joe Getty]

How much time we got, Michael? We got this. More of this conversation. No, no, it's final thoughts. We're out of time.

[Jack Armstrong]

Oh, damn it.

[Joe Getty]

Oh, I'll throw in my commune about communism, which you've hear to final thoughts with Armstrong and Getty. You'll get the facts. They're sharp and steady. Tune in tomorrow. Don't you forget it. For more from Armstrong and Yetiful. If I had the ability to hand out Grammys. I'd give somebody a Grammy for that. Here's your host for Final Thoughts, Joe Getty.

[Jack Armstrong]

Let's get a final thought from everybody on the crew, beginning with Michelangelo pressing the buttons in the control room. Michael, final, final thought.

[Joe Getty]

When I was younger, Jack, I would

[Jack Armstrong]

have loved to have joined you on that road trip to get to those

[Joe Getty]

restaurants, but I can't eat that at all anymore.

[Jack Armstrong]

I'm just too old.

[Joe Getty]

Would you have wanted a meat sort of thing or an ice cream? Ice cream. Ice cream, yeah.

[Jack Armstrong]

Wow. Jack, final thought for us.

[Joe Getty]

A bit of a downer. Final thought, but just throwing it in after that Bill Maher, Senator Fetterman conversation. Conservatively, communism killed 100 million people in the 20th century. Conservatively, it could be, according to a lot of historians, much higher number than that. But more than any of the wars any anything hundred million people died at the hands of communism. How is it gaining popularity?

[Jack Armstrong]

What do you have to do to get a bad reputation? Yeah. My final thought, getting back to the universal high income thing and laying around and partying and writing songs. Martin Scorsese is the executive producer about a great new documentary of a great new documentary about Robbie Robertson and the band, one of our favorite bands, and how drugs and alcohol tore them apart and ruined them as a creative force and as human beings. It's because they had so much downtime. Being a musician, downtime is one of the worst things that can happen to you as a young person.

[Joe Getty]

Armstrong and Yeti wrapping up another grueling four hour workday.

[Jack Armstrong]

So many people.

[Guest Commentator]

Thanks.

[Jack Armstrong]

So little time. Go to armstrong and getty.com for the hot links. Drop us a note mailbagarmstrongandgetti.com Grab some Angie Swag. Our Enforce the Law T shirt. Very popular.

[Joe Getty]

We'll see you tomorrow. God bless America.

[Jack Armstrong]

Armstrong and Getty. Oddly, his excrement also contained two other earrings which were not part of the Tiffany Hall. And nobody's quite sure how those got inside him.

[Joe Getty]

Wait a second.

[Jack Armstrong]

Right.

[Joe Getty]

Well, is he saying, look, I stole those diamonds and swallowed them. I have no idea where those earrings came from.

[Jack Armstrong]

This is weird. You planted those. Armstrong and Gettys. Yes you can. A five minute quick and easy calorie burning workout.

[Joe Getty]

Give it a try.

[Jack Armstrong]

Come join our sweat sesh on Tick tock.