Andrew Yang Still Wants To Give You $1,000

Summary

Podcast Summary

Podcast: Offline with Jon Favreau
Episode: Andrew Yang Still Wants To Give You $1,000
Host: Jon Favreau (A)
Guest: Andrew Yang (B)
Date: July 25, 2026

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Overview

In this candid episode, Jon Favreau welcomes Andrew Yang—entrepreneur, former presidential candidate, and Forward Party founder—for a wide-ranging conversation on the intersection of artificial intelligence, the future of work, Universal Basic Income (UBI), and political reform. Yang discusses his once-radical, now-prescient warnings about AI job loss, the challenges and practicalities of implementing UBI, and his unorthodox efforts to reach new audiences, like competing on the game show “Nation’s Dumbest.” They also talk politics, the dysfunction of the two-party system, and Yang’s critiques of the Democratic Party.

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Key Discussion Points

1. Andrew Yang on "Nation’s Dumbest" and Reaching New Audiences

[04:51–10:42]

• Yang appears as a contestant on the reality trivia show “Nation’s Dumbest.” The premise is that each week’s trivia winner leaves, and the last remaining contestant is the “nation’s dumbest.”
  • “I realized that if I turned it down, it was primarily because I would be uncomfortable with it or daunted by it. I wouldn't be turning it down for the right reasons.” (B, 07:35)
  • “I say yes to doing podcasts that are much less cool than this one. ... there are a lot of things you do that just disappear. But this is going to get in front of millions of people.” (B, 09:31)
• Yang argues reaching non-political, mainstream audiences is vital in a fragmented, siloed media environment.
  • “So if you could reach someone just trying to relax at home with their kids after a hard day's work, I thought that was a win.” (B, 10:42)

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2. Early Warnings on AI and Job Loss

[10:42–18:09]

• Yang’s 2020 campaign focused on the threat of AI-driven job displacement—widely dismissed at the time but increasingly mainstream now.
  • “I feel really, really despondent that we are in the place we are... It's going to suck up tons of value... and millions of Americans are going to look up being like, what happened to my job?” (B, 11:20)
  • “Oh yeah, we're going to debate it even as they fucking disintegrate beneath our feet.” (B, 12:57)
• On measuring current layoffs:
  • Explains that data is misleading because “the easiest people to fire are the ones you haven’t hired yet,” as companies avoid new hires due to AI efficiency.
  • “Noble Mobile has 100% not hired Junior engineers... because of AI.” (B, 13:44)
• Critiques the simplistic logic that workers can easily reskill or transition to new sectors.
  • “It's bullshit when we said the coal miners were gonna become coders. It's bullshit now. Like it's bullshit when we said the factory workers are gonna become nurses. Like it's bullshit now when we say college grads are all gonna become handymen.” (B, 16:31)

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3. Universal Basic Income and Policy Responses

[21:10–35:09]

Taxing AI and Raising Revenue

• Yang supports instituting a value-added tax (VAT) or a “token tax” on AI and tech companies to fund redistribution.
  • “If you solve that, then you can get more of the value into people's hands. The economy might be $31 trillion now. AI is going to grow the top line... the issue is that most people are not going to feel those benefits.” (B, 21:10)

Universal Basic Income: Why $1,000?

• Stands by UBI (“Freedom Dividend”), but acknowledges it would likely need to be increased due to inflation and social changes.
  • “Might have to ratchet that up a little bit.” (B, 22:11)
• Argues that universal programs are more practical than trying to target aid to specific groups affected by AI.
  • “We’re just shitty at targeting the gains. And if you start trying to target, you end up in a TAA type problem.” (B, 25:54)
• Ownership alternative: Yang is open to models that grant people shares or upside in tech/AI companies, but wants immediate, direct help (“a check, not just stock”).
• Explores complementary or alternative policies: shorter work weeks and “wellness bucks” (a new form of government-issued credit incentivizing health, caregiving, and creativity).
  • “To me, the only satisfactory vision is that we make it so that I have a place to go based upon things that A, I want to do and B, that we need more of.” (B, 30:56)
  • “At this point, we should all be getting paid to go to the gym... and the personal trainer... should also be getting paid. And they could be paid in wellness bucks.” (B, 32:26)

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4. The Political Crisis and Dangers of AI-driven Inequality

[36:11–39:23]

• Yang fears the “chasm” between technological change and political adaptation will unleash social unrest, scapegoating, and conflict.
  • “...this chasm in the middle is going to consist of us all freaking out, our kids coming home, getting depressed and dysfunctional, feeling they don't have a place in the world, and eventually we start killing each other.” (B, 35:58)
• AI-driven inequality will deepen polarization and threaten democracy. Urges government to act as a “counterweight” to tech/capital.
  • “AI is going to supercharge [wealth inequality]. I mean anyone sane can see that.” (B, 37:13)
  • Advocates a “grand bargain” among government, private sector, and citizens to prevent disintegration.

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5. Forward Party, the Two-Party System, and U.S. Political Reform

[39:23–49:30]

• Yang describes why he left the Democratic Party to found the Forward Party, citing the Dems’ poor branding in much of the country and the dysfunction of the two-party system.
  • “You have maybe 30 of the 50 states where the Democratic brand is quite underwater. Negative. And by the way, it's gotten a lot worse since '21.” (B, 39:40)
  • Sees opportunity for independent/third-party candidates in states where the “D” brand is toxic.
  • “If you look at a place like Montana, it really could be the reverse where you, Seth Bodnar, one on one with the Republican... but if you throw a D next to the candidate's name, you probably can't compete.” (B, 41:59)
• Forward Party’s vision: Not an ideological home, but “political infrastructure for positive, principled independents.”
  • “We have principles around being data driven, solutions oriented, rule of law, listen to vote totals, adhere to the Constitution...” (B, 45:16)
  • Yang sees independent U.S. Senators as a key breakthrough.

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6. 2028 Democratic Field and Dean Phillips

[52:00–57:03]

• Yang predicts that the 2028 Democratic nominee will likely be a governor outside the Biden administration (names include Newsom, Shapiro, Moore, Pritzker, Whitmer).
• Expresses anger at the Democratic Party’s approach to 2024, blaming it for not allowing a competitive primary and for shunning Dean Phillips’s challenge to Biden.
  • “Watching all the Democrats A, fall over themselves to get out of Joe's way and B, shiv Dean in the way that they did. It was just such a calamity and missed opportunity for the country.” (B, 53:22)

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7. Will Yang Run Again?

[57:03–60:58]

• Yang is non-committal about 2028 but open, balancing his desire to “do the most good” with skepticism about third-party presidential probabilities.
  • “I'm unlikely to actually be president. And I'm also not someone who's terribly motivated by that... It's more, you know, it's like, I love this country. Can I help it?” (B, 58:57)
• Sees AI as both potentially disastrous and a nearly unique opportunity to “flip from scarcity to abundance.”

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8. AI Policy and Political Will

[60:58–62:30]

• Worried that even reform-minded politicians won’t move fast enough or act boldly enough on AI.
  • “I think a lot of them get it. The question is, what are we going to do about it in what time frame?... I'm not sure that's going to happen with even some of my favorite people in this field winning.” (B, 61:10)

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9. Noble Mobile: Tech for Less Tech

[62:30–67:38]

• Yang founded Noble Mobile, a phone service that incentivizes reducing screen time by paying users half back for unused data.
  • “And the average Noble Mobile user is using 17% less screen time than they did previously...” (B, 66:07)
  • Also hosts “offline parties” where attendees check their phones at the door; Yang connects this to the broader mission to reclaim focus from digital distractions.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On AI-Caused Unemployment:
  • “The easiest people to fire are the ones you haven't hired yet." (B, 13:44)
  • "This time is different. It’s going to be terrible.” (B, 16:31)
• On Reskilling:
  • “It's bullshit when we said the coal miners were gonna become coders. It's bullshit now.” (B, 16:31)
• On UBI vs. Targeted Aid:
  • “We're just shitty at targeting the gains. And if you start trying to target, you end up in a TAA type problem.” (B, 25:54)
• On Wellbeing and Human-Centered Economy:
  • “At this point, we should all be getting paid to go to the gym... and the personal trainer... should also be getting paid. And they could be paid in wellness bucks.” (B, 32:26)
• On Politics and Division:
  • “The path of least resistance is disintegration, conflict, strife, hatred, like the whole nine.” (B, 37:13)
• On Political Reform:
  • “We are political infrastructure for positive, principled independents.” (B, 44:38)

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Timestamps of Key Segments

• [04:51–10:42] Yang on “Nation’s Dumbest” and the importance of mainstream exposure
• [10:42–18:09] Yang’s warnings on AI job loss, reaction, and why he was ignored
• [21:10–35:09] Taxes on AI, UBI, and human-centered economic policy options
• [36:11–39:23] Dangers of AI-driven inequality and social unraveling
• [39:23–49:30] Forward Party, the two-party system, and independent candidates
• [52:00–57:03] 2028 Democrats, party dysfunction, reflections on Dean Phillips
• [57:03–60:58] Yang on his own political future and philosophy
• [62:30–67:38] Yang’s new venture, Noble Mobile, and reclaiming life from screens

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Tone and Style

The conversation is informal, sharp, and peppered with humor. Yang mixes sobering economic and political analysis with personal anecdotes and playful asides. Favreau brings a tone of curiosity, skepticism, and solidarity, repeatedly pressing Yang on policy feasibility and electoral realities.

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Bottom Line

Andrew Yang doubles down on his warnings about the economic disruption posed by AI and automation, calling for urgent and expansive interventions like UBI and creative approaches to redefining the value of labor, well-being, and community. He remains critical of the current political system’s ability to respond—and is actively experimenting, both inside and outside politics, with ways to prepare society for the transition ahead.

Transcript

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[B]

We've all been conditioned to market logic. We're like, look, we all have to be positive contributors in the market economy. And if you become obsolete, then you must rescale yourself. And now everyone's gonna become a welder, electrician or whatever. And it's bullshit. It was bullshit when we said the coal miners were gonna become coders. It's bullshit now. Like it's bullshit when we said the factory workers are gonna become nurses. Like it's bullshit now when we say college grads are all gonna become handymen.

[A]

Right?

[B]

Especially when 60% of college graduates are women and 2.8% of electricians are women. So it's like you look at that math and be like, oh what?

[A]

I'm Jon Favreau and you just heard from today's guest, Andrew Yang. You might remember Andrew's 2020 presidential campaign where he came from nowhere to end up on the Democratic primary debate stage, mostly based on his Universal Basic Income proposal to give every American a monthly $1,000 check. He also spent that campaign warning people that AI was coming to take all of our jobs. Well, here we are. Yang was unsuccessful in that campaign, but it turns out he was ahead of his time on AI. So when I heard he was in la, I wanted to invite him on to talk about how he sees AI now, whether he still thinks his old UBI proposal is the right way to deal with the coming job displacement and how our political system should deal with it all. You might also remember that after his 2020 bid, Yang left the Democratic Party to start the Forward Party, the goal of which is to elect independent minded candidates and reform the electoral system. So I wanted to dig into that as well and get his thoughts on the Democratic Party as it stands today. We also talked about his new book of essays, hey Yang, Where's My Thousand Buc? And for fun, why he's decided to join the cast of a new television game show, Nation's Dumbest. It was a fun, freewheeling conversation that I hope you'll find interesting. We'll get to it in a moment, but before we do, if you're not yet a paying member to Friends of the Pod, what are you doing? In addition to it being the best way to support your favorite pro democracy independent media company, becoming a paying subscriber gets you access to this show ad free as well as ad free episodes of all your favorite podcasts. Plus Friends of the pod. Get access to special behind the paywall shows like Pod Save America Only Friends, Dan Pfeiffer's Polar Coaster, and our least offline podcast terminally online. Head on over to crooked.com friends to subscribe today. All right, here's Andrew Yang. Andrew Yang, welcome to Offline.

[B]

Hey, thanks for having me. It's great to be here.

[A]

All right, I gotta start with the nation's Dumbest yes, because I have watched the first episode.

[B]

What a place to start.

[A]

So for people who don't know, you are a contestant on a new reality game show called Nation's Dumbest, along with celebrities like Carmen Electra, Jojo Siwa, Steve O from Jackass. It's currently airing Wednesdays at 9pm on Fox.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

So it's a series of trivia challenges where the winner each week gets to leave the show.

[B]

Yup.

[A]

And then the last contestant standing is the nation's dumbest.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

One episode has aired. You did not win the first week. Yes, I know you can't divulge. You were close. You were one of the final two.

[B]

Oh, thank you for watching.

[A]

I know you can't divulge what happens tonight. Wednesday though, people will be hearing this episode on Sunday. How are you feeling about doing the show now that the first episode has been out in the world?

[B]

Well, thanks for asking, John. I did get a bunch of text messages being like, hey, I'm seeing you on TV at this show. That is not your usual activity. I feel good about it because I made friends with Ice T and Steve O and Dr. Drew and Matt Leiner and a bunch of the other contestants. Because you're trapped. It's sor of an intense environment. Hilaria Baldwin asked me, have I been on a reality TV show before? And then I said, only if you count running for president. And then everyone got a laugh out of that. So it's been a good experience. The best part is that I watched the first episode with my kids who are 10 and 13, and it was one of the few things we've come together and watch as a family. And the kids were like, oh, you didn't know that? Or you did know that. And so that was actually a joy.

[A]

I know. I watched with my 6 year old and he had a few answers. He knew some. The trivia is, it's interesting. It's maybe like middle school level trivia, but some of it is harder than you think. There were questions that I got, but I was like, if I was there under all the pressure, I could see myself fucking that up.

[B]

Well, thank you for understanding, Jon, because it's true. You're surrounded by these floodlights and there are 20 camera people and they're like, Yang, like I'm going to describe this exercise. What is it?

[A]

I'm just like, oh, that was a hard one.

[B]

Thank you for saying, do you, do

[A]

you feel extra pressure on the show?

[B]

Because I feel to not be a dumb ass. Is that what you're saying yes, which I appreciate.

[A]

I feel like they. They, like, sought you out to try to. I don't know, like, because they have, you know, some people you don't expect to be that smart. You're on there. And some of the other contestants are like, you're the presidential candidate. You better get this right.

[B]

Yeah, I certainly feel some more pressure. And I joke that my career will be over if I wind up being the nation's dumbest, officially, like, losing to everybody. But I realized when. So first they reach out to me and I have a call with the producers asking them, why me for the show. And they said, we're looking for a politician or journalist that people don't hate. Which was very flattering. And think you'd be good for this. It's like, are you smarter than a fifth grader? And I realized that if I turned it down, it was primarily because I would be uncomfortable with it or daunted by it. I wouldn't be turning it down for the right reasons. I had some friends saying, don't do it. You're going to look dumb. It's going to be bad for your image. And I was like, these are not excellent reasons to say no. It feels like I'd be wussing out. So I said yes. I definitely had second thoughts during some of the tapings about that decision and major life decisions that preceded it. But now watching it as a family, it's actually been really fun. And different friends have gotten a kick out of it.

[A]

Look, my co host and co founder John Lovett went on Survivor and only lasted one episode. And that is the greatest gift of content to me and Tom, that would

[B]

be the gift that keeps on giving. You show that clip over and over again.

[A]

Somewhat serious question about it. Like, I've heard you say that one reason you thought the show was worth doing is that a primetime network audience reaches a lot more people than political shows like this, or at least a different audience than those shows. How do you think about getting attention? And what kind of attention is valuable? Or is it all valuable because as a presidential candidate who came out of nowhere and ended up where you did, you clearly figured out something about how to capture people's attention at a time when it's become an incredibly scarce resource.

[B]

Yes, that's why I have a thriving consultancy on that very thing. No, I don't. Yeah, I say, and I wrote this in my substack, I say yes to doing podcasts that are much less cool than this one. I mean, there's like a real one And I knew that a couple million people, minimum, were gonna watch this Fox reality TV show. And when I ran for president. It's funny, John, you know when you're on a needle mover and. Because people on the street will say to you, like, hey, I saw you on this, or I heard you on that, and you're like, oh, that one actually reaches normal people. And then there are a lot of things you do that just disappear immediate. And so I thought, well, look, this is going to get in front of millions of people. And I've been in Iowa and Ohio and Michigan, and a lot of those people are not tuning into political news. But that server at the diner could be like, hey, saw you on this, saw you on that. And so it felt valuable in that way, because I think one of the issues we have is the fragmentation of media and the siloing and the polarization, everything else. So if you could reach someone just trying to relax at home with their kids after a hard day's work, I thought that was a win.

[A]

The thing you got attention for during your 2020 presidential run was your prediction that automation and AI were coming for millions of jobs and people treated you like, in your words, the magical Asian man from the future.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

Now Dario Emodi says it. Sam Altman, Bernie Sanders. Why do you think your prescient warning wasn't taken more seriously back then?

[B]

Well, I don't knock anyone or blame anyone, because back then, saying artificial intelligence was going to come seemed kind of like Terminator or sci Fi. Now it's very much with us. I came here in a waymo. I don't know what that says about me. Anyone here ridden or not written?

[A]

I've ridden in one.

[B]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. They're everywhere here. And I feel like a lot of my stuff in 2019, 2020, aged very well, a little bit too well. And when I get asked now, it's like, hey, how are you feeling? I feel really, really despondent that we are in the place we are. I think this is gonna be terrible for many, many Americans. It's going to suck up tons of value into this super vortex of AI capital, data centers, processing power, and millions of Americans are going to look up being like, what happened to my job? Why is my kid home from college and doesn't have a job that requires a degree? And it makes me angry and sad on behalf of those families. So I'll be a little more lighthearted for a sec. So I was with Dave Chappelle, who introduced me and said, here's A guy who got everything right in 2020, but no one listened because he's Asian and then got a laugh. I mean, I made the case that I made to the best of my ability. And now the truth is that I feel more troubled by our institutional inability to respond to the problems of our time than I do anything else.

[A]

Yeah, and especially true around AI. I mean, there is some debate still over the scale of the job loss that's coming.

[B]

Oh yeah, we're going to debate it even as they fucking disintegrate beneath our feet. You know what I mean?

[A]

Well that's.

[B]

I should laugh because it's terrible.

[A]

You know, I think you said back in February you think that millions of white collar workers are going to lose their jobs in the next 12 to 18 months due to AI. You know, the data sort of tells a couple different stories. Yale's budget lab has been tracking this monthly and they show 55,000 explicitly AI attributed layoffs last year. That represents just under 5% of all layoffs. On the other end of the spectrum, Stanford finds employment for young workers in AI exposed jobs down 13 to 20%. Even that larger number measures the problem in tens of thousands. So if you think like millions are coming, what are the numbers? What are the current studies and measurements missing?

[B]

Sure. The easiest people to fire are the ones you haven't hired yet. And I run a company, Noble Mobile, we have offline parties, I mean people co branding. Yeah, we come back to that. Sure. And Noble Mobile has 100% not hired Junior engineers and data analysts and other folks that we would have hired just a few months ago because of AI. And if you extrapolate that through the economy, Noble Mobile is not a huge company, but there are millions of companies like us who are each saying, you know what, I don't think I am going to hire that whippersnapper. Instead I'm going to have this person use AI tools. And that's happening 100%. I mean, we're here in Los Angeles and I think there are a combination of things that are happening to la. But I would argue that AI is one of the forces that's hurting media production and studios and folks who used to show up to work and shoot in these studio lots every day. So I'm very happy to be the guy who's like, look, I think it's millions and then have that conversation. And if someone comes to me later and is like, yo Yang, it was really only 700,000. Haha.

[A]

Then the millions weren't until 5 years from now.

[B]

Yeah, yeah, it's like, oh, you screwed up by 18 months. You know, because there are so many people who have been right there saying we're going to decimate a bunch of jobs who now have changed their tune. And they haven't changed their tune because they actually think differently. It's because they've been told, yo, stop freaking people out. Like, people are very negative on AI. The approval rating I saw was 26%. It's like incredibly unpopular. Two different people threw a Molotov cocktail and shot at Sam Altman's house. And so there genuinely was a coming together where they were like, we have to stop freaking people out about job loss. Everyone then like the CEO of Goldman Sachs writes a New York Times op ed being like, everything's gonna be fine. Meanwhile, I talked to someone internally, Goldman Sachs, who's like, oh yeah, we're gonna fire 40% of our own people. So you know, who do you wanna believe? It aggravates me. So many people are full of it on this because they'll public and then, you know, their organization's doing something different.

[A]

Well then the other argument you hear is yes, the transition's going to be rough. And transitions between, you know, economic revolutions often are. But what happens is new jobs are created where old jobs disappear. What's your level of confidence that that also happens this time around? Or is this a transition that is different than industrial to post industrial to information economy and all that?

[B]

Yeah, this time is different. It's going to be terrible. I have numbers that I can attach to these things if people are interested. I'll throw one number out there. There may be 2.9 million Americans who work in call centers doing customer service still to this day. And AI is going to do number on that. We can see that very, very clearly. And then imagining that those people are going to get reskilled to what exactly? Like no one really knows. And you then look at the 2 to 3 million Uber drivers. Maybe it's like a partial income, but still might be keeping their family afloat. Those are the obvious ones. There are a bunch of inobvious ones ripping through various orgs. And I think the entire comparison Industrial Revolution is very, very limited and dumb, honestly. I mean, but I hear it all the time. I mean, you're kind of straw manning it too, because we've all been conditioned to market logic. We're like, look, we all have to be positive contributors in the market economy. And if you become obsolete, then you must rescale yourself. And now everyone's going to become a welder, electrician or whatever. And it's bullshit. It was bullshit when we said the coal miners were going to become coders. It's bullshit now. It's bullshit when we said the factory workers are going to become nurses. Like it's bullshit now when we say college grads are all going to become handymen. Especially when 60% of college graduates are women and 2.8% of electricians are women. So it's like you look at that math and be like, oh, what's going to happen here? It's like, is everyone just going to change who they are so that

[A]

you

[B]

can sense where I am on this particular topic?

[A]

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[B]

Yeah, I like a token tax. I think it's very direct and measurable. I like a value added tax. And we're the only major economy that doesn't have one. It's very hard to game your way out of. If you're a major company, it would include AI in the data centers. And more and more value is going to flow towards these global tech companies. And we're not going to see meaningful tax revenue. So that's really the, the problem to solve. If you solve that, then you can get more of the value into people's hands. The economy might be $31 trillion now. AI is going to grow the top line. It's just the issue is that most people are not going to feel those benefits in a meaningful way. So there are two mechanisms. One is how do you get the tax revenue? And number two, how does that, that family feel like it's going to benefit them?

[A]

And do you think so obviously your big proposal is universal basic income.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

$1,000 a month.

[B]

Yep. Freedom Dividend. Might have to ratchet that up a little bit.

[A]

I was going to say. So that was my next question. Is UBI still the answer? Is it the only answer? If we're taxing these AI companies now, then what do we do with it?

[B]

We should distribute it it quickly and broadly to the American people. And I'll tell a story which I don't think it's in my book, which I appreciate you listening to, of course. And have you written a book, John?

[A]

I have.

[B]

I thought so.

[A]

I have.

[B]

So did you get a note from your publisher saying, hey, AI wants to absorb your book into the Borg and they want to pay you $2,500 for the privilege? Have you got, did you get that letter?

[A]

Did you get that yet? Unless someone got it that I didn't think I got it. It might have been right before. Yeah, not yet.

[B]

So the point is that our data right now is getting sold and resold for about $300 billion a year, and no American seeing a dime of that. AI models are now the foundation of these multiple trillion dollar companies that are ipoing. And most Americans are not going to see a dime of that unless they somehow get access to the ipo, et cetera, et cetera. And so having that value get returned to the American people, if you think about it in those terms, actually very, very sens. Becomes increasingly necessary as all of this accelerates, would be my argument.

[A]

I'm just trying to think of how this actually works, because right now the revenue of all of the AI companies combined is what, few hundred billion dollars globally? That's right now. And so the worry is that the value from the companies comes after the jobs are gone.

[B]

Right? Totally.

[A]

And again, that like, you know, so Ubi, that's your old proposal. That's 1,000amonth. That's like a, what, $3 trillion proposal a year?

[B]

Yes. It comes to a lot less than that because of existing benefits and a bunch of other things.

[A]

Right.

[B]

But let's say order of magnitude like that, that's what we're talking about. I think that's the kind of move that we should make right now. US GDP might be 84,000 ahead. So if you think about something for each American to get, if you were to say 12,000 or 15,000, that might sound like a lot of money if you compare it to other things that we currently have coming out of the government. But if you Compare it to $84,000 in GDP per person with an up arrow attached to it because of AI, it's going to get to 90,000, it's going to get to 100,000. So at what point do you go to Americans and say, okay, you know, 100,000 ahead, everyone's getting 15. And that's going to help us manage the greatest economic and technological transformation in the history of our species? Yeah, you know, like, that is what I mean. That's what we're looking at right now.

[A]

I understand the political argument for a universal program like this. When we're talking a transformation of this scale and a problem this large, do you worry that handing out $1,000 a month or a couple thousand, whatever it scales up to, to people who are pretty wealthy, is taking away resources that could be targeted to helping people through this transition in other ways than just giving them cash? Or maybe it's even giving people who need it more cash. Or maybe it's not even the level of the amount of money. Maybe it's targeting it towards a specific group of people who are going to be more likely to be displaced by a than other people.

[B]

Yes. All right, check it out.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

If you look at our history, the major other time where we saw this displacement was the Trade Adjustment Assistance taa, which was meant to help the displaced manufacturing workers when we started kicking their jobs to Asia, let's say.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

And we were bad at actually targeting and delivering that at that time, when you could actually point to the town in Ohio and say, okay, we're gutting this factory. Let's try and help people with AI, it would be very, very difficult to target in any intelligible way because you have a little company here, you have a big company there, you have folks never being hired. And so when you start looking at the difficulty of targeting and that any intelligent system is drawing in money from the big winners anyway, whether it's through a value added tax or an AI tax, then you don't care. And using the most extreme example, it's like if Jeff Bezos gets an extra 2,000amonth, but we're bringing in tens of millions of dollars or more from either his company's activities or him personally, then you don't care about sending the dude $2,000, especially if it eases the administration problem and it makes it seem fair, politically palatable, appealing to folks. We're just shitty at targeting the gains. And if you start trying to target, you end up in a TAA type problem. I'd urge anyone who thinks that we can do this to go look at the history of what happened with the TAA program, because it did not go well, and that was easier to identify than what we're looking at now.

[A]

Yeah. And you lose efficiency and it's just, it's harder to target.

[B]

It's really sad when you actually see what happened with that program. The displaced manufacturing workers in Ohio and Michigan where you had a giant waiting list of people to sign up and they never end up getting benefits. Then even if did get through the program, the impact wasn't what people hoped for.

[A]

Why? Why tax and a check rather than ownership giving everyone ownership of the AI companies?

[B]

And the upside, I'm open to anything.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

You know, it's like, I know that's

[A]

like some of the proposals too is like, you know, everyone gets a little piece of the upside. And I don't know what you thought about that.

[B]

Yeah, no, no, I'm open to it. I think that one of the fears I have, I will say, and one reason I love starting a conversation with something like universal Basic is that let's say the people via the government now become shareholders of some of these companies. And then we can all be like, yay, we got shares. And then the stewards of that are like, okay, we're going to chill and see and wait. And then like, I get rid of your jobs, but then I'm still not feeling any benefits, even though technically like my government. Because we have, you understand it, we have two problems in this current environment. One is, is where is the value flowing in and then how is it coming back out?

[A]

So then the other, like, the other option that's sometimes seen as like an alternative to UBI is like redistributing work. Right. And not just money. So there's job guarantees, shorter work week, work sharing like they've done in Germany. Wage insurance. What do you think about all those?

[B]

Again, I'm very, very open minded and I love a shorter work week. Love that. The one I dislike the most is something like of a job guarantee because I think you wind up with bullshit make work jobs, people justifying. Yeah, it's like, oh, so my joke with Bernie, we were talking about in 2020 and he was for a jobs guarantee and I was for universal basic income. And my joke was, why not distribute gray overalls while you're at it? And like a pickaxe, that's where this land. But I understand the spirit of it and I do have an Asian joke here which is like, I'm Asian, so I love work. I love people working. I just think people ideally are creating work for themselves, starting initiatives, organizations, nonprofits, working in their faith community, like doing things that they want to do and that they're Passionate about the big challenge of this era, John is trying to define an economy around human flourishing at a time when our labor will not be meaningful in terms of economic output. And that's a very hard thing to actually accept.

[A]

Well, it is. Then it's like, but then I think that the problem is so big that, I mean, unless we are giving people, you know, a 70, $80,000 a year salary through UBI, which is, I mean, that's incredibly, incredibly expensive. Like, how are we, like, do you see a future where like no one's working? Like, where like 90% of the of the labor is automated and AI is doing it? Like, how, how severe do you think it gets?

[B]

Yes. So I'm 51 and what I say to people is that, that I'm at an age where if I don't get dumber in a given month, it was a good month, meanwhile AI might get twice as smart during that month. So saying that, oh, if I take this course or do this, I'm going to be able to compete is stupid. It's like the goal posts are just sprinting away from me by the time I even get to the starting block. It's crazy. So then, then after you accept that, then it becomes a question of, okay, how do we make it so that people have a place to go for structure, purpose, fulfillment, community, values, training. When I wake up in the morning, what am I going to do? To me, the only satisfactory vision is that we make it so that I have a place to go based upon things that A, I want to do and B, that we need more of. And the three things that most of us can agree on in this dimension would be health and wellness, education, nurturing and caretaking, and arts and creativity. Okay, these are three things that most people can look at and be like,

[A]

okay, like I, even AI won't completely eliminate the need for those things.

[B]

Well, here's the thing is that AI could, for example, do the art much better than I could. But that is not necessarily the point. We're going to redefine the economy.

[A]

This is more about personal fulfillment.

[B]

Yes. These are things that we have decided we value as a society because right now we're in this most dangerous of times, which is what we actually value as a society is just getting shit done. Capital, efficiency, and we've all brainwashed ourselves into hustle mode and grindy, grindy, I'm an ass. All the stuff stuff. And then if someone falls by the wayside, we have mock sympathy for them for like a split second. Be like, oh, it sucks for them. And then be like, oh, well, you know, turn away. Meanwhile, in this case, AI is going to get many, many more of us. And it has nothing to do with my intellect or education or work ethic or character. Just doesn't matter. It's like, it's better than me. And so what we have to do is we have to say, okay, AI is going to do a lot of robots, going to do a lot of work very powerfully and effectively. So what do we care about? What do we want more of? What do we want to spend our time doing? So one of the illustrations I pose is that at this point, we should all be getting paid to go to the gym. You know, it's like instead of us paying, we should be getting paid. And then the personal trainer who's there all energetic there to whip us into shape and whatnot, should also be getting paid. And they could be paid in wellness bucks. And then they could take those wellness bucks and then use it on a salad or use it to go to the game or use it and they could get recognized for the wellness bucks. And we could get wellness bucks showing up

[A]

who's paying us the wellness bucks.

[B]

So what we need to do, in my opinion, is build a multivariate human centered economy around multiple pursuits. And then if you have this Wellness Bucks as an example, the wellness bucks would be monetized by the federal government. If I was in charge, I'd be like, look, there's an exchange rate whole thing. You can take wellness bucks and turn them into stuff. You can go to Chipotle, get a burrito. You can live great on the wellness bucks. You can live well on the education and nurturing bucks. And the example I used on the trail is that we have an autistic son. My wife spent years at home with him. The market economy value is that at zero. We all know that's perverse and that's immensely valuable. And so she could be getting like these nurturing bucks. I mean, we'd have a better name. They'd all be called Yang Bucks. Honestly. No, no. And then arts and creativity. If someone paints a mural or goes and performs live, which I love, like the, you know, the cafe or whatnot, instead of counting on the charity of strangers, which, like, you know, it's very. I always, by the way, give money to any musician, I pass because I have a reputation to uphold. And I'm like

[C]

of.

[B]

It could be a camera, but the government would say, look, this new currency is real. Everyone would doubt it at first. They'd be like, oh, it's bullshit. But then after you have a bunch of people taking action on it and then realizing that they can carry a balance and do these things and even trade it with each other and do it, you could stimulate billions and billions of dollars worth of activity in each of these dimensions that could occupy millions of Americans very happily. And do it at a fraction of what it would cost if you were paying people in USD.

[A]

Okay, this is like a sort of a utopia that's sort of on the other side of the transition. Right. Like say we could get this, well,

[B]

oh, by the way, we have to get there as soon as fucking possible.

[A]

Well, that's what I'm saying.

[B]

Because this chasm in the middle is going to consist of us all freaking out, our kids coming home, getting depressed and dysfunctional, feeling they don't have a place in the world, and eventually we start killing each other. Well, that's not already there.

[A]

No, that's what I was getting at is that like the, the transition, regardless of what's on the other side of the transition, is the most precarious part here because of politics, right?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And you know, 80% of Americans want more regulation. You've got politicians from like Bernie Sanders to Ron DeSantis attacking data centers. I was thinking about something my old boss, Barack Obama said to the New Yorker a couple months ago. He said he's like working on a. He's been working on helping like lawmakers could come up with like, AI agenda that's not simply a knee jerk, screw the billionaires in tech thing because the genie's out of the bottle. And he said he worries that without a proactive agenda, some of the populist impulses could go in bad directions that don't actually help people or reinforce some of the anti Democratic trends we've seen. As usual with him, he's sort of understating the issue here. But it does seem like this could supercharge all of the political trends we have seen over the last decade in ways that are quite destructive. And I wonder how you think about sort of navigating that challenge.

[B]

Yeah, the path of least resistance is disintegration, conflict, strife, hatred, like the whole nine. And I am Asian. And so one of the things I joke about with my community is like, look, guys, we all know that, that when the wheel of hate turns, it will land on us relatively early on the list. And so we have to try and keep the country strong and whole and together and keep us from turning on each other. I think it's a noble ambition that Brock is laying out. But, but right now let's take wealth inequality as something I think we can all agree is driving nastiness and polarization, anger and frustration. AI is going to supercharge it all. I mean anyone sane can see that. And so what you'd have in the best of worlds would be government acting as a counterweight, bringing the folks to the table and saying, look guys, pitchforks are going to come. Let's try and figure this out. We don't all want to be using Chinese AI. And by the way, I have an AI joke I'm going to share. It's fun. How far behind the US is China and AI how far? 12 hours. Because they wake up and see whatever we did. All right, So we need to have a grand bargain type approach. And even the folks I know at the AI companies, the argument is like, look guys, this is just enlightened self interest because even though you're sitting on stacks of money, bulletproof cars and private security and the bunker and the rest of it, it sucks. It's terrible. So how about you give some back and stay above ground? That's really the argument. And some of them are like, yeah, yeah, I'm down with that. Others have just said like no, it's all going to shit and I'm just going to monetize. But you have to try and take advantage of the first group group as quickly as you can.

[A]

Well, let's talk about politics. You were a Democrat for most of your adult life. You ran for President as one. You left the party in October of 2021. What in your view is so wrong or broken with the Democratic Party that you didn't think it was worth changing it from the inside?

[B]

It was the math. Genuinely I looked at it was like, hey, you have have maybe 30 of the 50 states where the Democratic brand is quite underwater. Negative. And by the way, it's gotten a lot worse since 21. And so if you want some kind of genuinely dynamic solutions oriented environment, you need someone like Dan Osborne to become senator out of Nebraska. By the way, union guy, like military veteran, pro choice, very reasonable, think would be a fine US senator and got 47% in Nebraska as an independent, forced the Republicans to spend $10 million in a deep red state. So I'm sure they enjoyed it. I'm sure they enjoyed propping up Deb Fisher. So I looked at the math and the map and I said the two party system is going to get worse, not better. It's going to become more polarized and dysfunctional and not somehow right itself. And so the only way out would be to try to have a positive independent political movement that can compete in ways that, you know, a traditional partisan couldn't. And I experienced versions of this, John. So I'm walking around Iowa and say, hey, I'm running for president. And the waitress at the diner says, very, very intrigued, like, oh, really? Like, what party? And I said, Democrat. And then she recoiled and was like, oh, it's like I just sprouted horns. And I was like, wait a minute. Like, aren't I, like, aren't I for you? I mean, at least that's the way I was brought. Brought up. So Dan Osborne's running again. You have Seth Bodnar running in Montana, who was advised by John Tester, the last Democratic senator from Montana, who's like, hey, I think his direct quote was, the Democratic brand is poison in Montana. So run as an independent. And now Seth is raised seven figures and poised to be potentially competitive.

[A]

But then the Democrat is still in the race. Yeah. Screwing the whole thing up.

[B]

Right, Right. Well, and that is one of the points here, is that that like a lot of folks listening to this podcast think Democrat and then any third party is a spoiler. But then if you look at a place like Montana, it really could be the reverse where you, Seth Bodnar, one on one with the Republican, who, by the way, in this case is like, not exactly a strong Republican, just like some weird last minute replacement job.

[A]

Yeah. Not beloved.

[B]

Yeah, you can compete there, but if you throw a D next to the candidate's name, you probably can't compete because, you know, and you can feel how you want to feel about that, but it's just math. It's practical. And so the question is, how can you make more of these environments genuinely dynamic and competitive? And I saw that in 2021 when I was just doing the research. And I'd urge anyone to take a look at some of the numbers. Electoral map, gerrymandering, number of competitive districts, Senate races, et cetera. And it's very hard for me to imagine a world where, where the Democratic Party, as it currently stands, gets a durable governing majority, solves all the problem, turns all the red states blue. It's actually trending the other direction because a lot of the biggest blue states are losing population. And so congressional seats are then drifting the other direction. More and more rural areas are. I mean, I can stop there, but people kind of get it.

[A]

You are right about the brand and the math. The challenge I see is Like, I love that Dan Osborne can run in Nebraska instead of the Democrat. And then a bunch of people will think, oh, cause there's not the D attached to his name, that maybe I'll give him a shot. Even though all of his positions, he could fit comfortably within the Democratic Party.

[B]

Yeah, a whole lot of them.

[A]

Most of them. Right. And even all of them, he would still be, he wouldn't be kicked out. Right.

[B]

Well, by the way, his biggest big break from the party in terms of like the voters of Nebraska is he was like, look, I'm a pipe fitter, I'm a mechanic, I have tattoos on my arms, I don't even own a business suit. And like, I think that politicians should wear NASCAR jackets with the names of all their corporate sponsors on them because that's what's going on in Washington. I was like, yeah, so like that's, you know, that happens to be genuine in Dan's case. But I agree with you on his policy position positions.

[A]

But the challenge is at some point Republicans are going to get smart to this and figure out that if someone's not running with the D next to their name, but they have a lot of the D positions, that they're just a Democrat trying to fool you by shedding the party's brand. And like it's. Do you see the Forward party as a party that people join and support because they see their political beliefs reflected in the party or like some third parties, Is it just a home for people who hate the other two parties, the two major parties?

[B]

We are political infrastructure for positive, principled independence.

[A]

But what does that mean? What positions, what beliefs? Because everyone has like, and you know this, right? Like it's a Seth Bodnar and a. Dan Osborne has a different platform than a Bloomberg. There's like the socially liberal, fiscally conservative independent. There's the culturally conservative economically populous independent. Do they both have a home in the Forward party? Is it just everyone who's not completely ideologically left and ideologically right?

[B]

Well, we have principles around being data driven, solutions oriented, rule of law, listen to vote totals. Here are the Constitution, some of the big basics, but it's also collaborate with people from either party or any party. Don't demonize, don't villainize. And I think those three figures you named, obviously Dan Osborne and Seth Bottom are sure. But we'd be perfectly happy with a Mike Bloomberg as well, even though he might differ very significantly from Dan Osborne in various economic issues. The point we would make is that right now our current system is not going to deliver what the majority of Americans want. And so how do we get ourselves to a place where it will. And in my view, that starts with having. Dynamic U.S. senate that in this case might have two or three principled independents from South Dakota, Montana and Nebraska, instead of it being like run by, in this case, the Republican Party. And I think that's more achievable than most Americans realize that if you had one or two of these independent Senate candidates break through, it would be a very, very big deal for our national politics. By the way, to your point, I just wanted to say, you know what the Republicans spent that 10 million on in Nebraska saying Dan Osborne's a Democrat. So to your point, that's like the attack line. It's like he says he's an independent, he's lying to you, he's just a Democrat. And then, you know, anyway.

[A]

But it also, it works in Nebraska because the Democrats are bowed out or is bowing out, right? Like, we're not going to have this, we're not going to have a situation we had in Montana, right? The situation in Montana is because Republicans are all, you know, enthralled to Trump and it's a Trump Party and everyone's, and they're all cohesive and so they're, at least for now, they're one party. And in Montana, the Republican's gonna win because the Democrat won't drop out and Seth's in the race. And so then they split the vote. The Republican wins and then it's like, whose fault is that? Is it, is it the independent candidate, the Democratic candidate, both, everyone for not being able to figure it out. Like, I'm just wondering if both the, the Democratic Party and the forward party are put at a disadvantage because the Republican Party has unity and can take that, that partisan Republican voters. But other voters who might be sick of the Democratic Party brand, interested in being more independent will split the vote and then it will end up to benefit Republicans.

[B]

So Dan Osborne being one on one with Deb Fisher is not a one time thing in 2022, just two years before Evan McMullen got a one on one with Mike Lee, right? Because the Democratic candidate in Utah was like, hey, look, I'm going to give it to Evan. I got her shot, right? And that Democrat, like, you know, I think new Evan, like it was kind of coalitional. It was like a good energy and a good vibe. In South Dakota, Brian Bangs, who ran for U.S. senate as a Democrat in the last cycle and now is running as an independent, said, hey, I will agree with the Democratic candidate that whichever one of us is polling weaker gets out and supports the other and you know, like. Right, so. So the other thing I'm going to just say from the starting gate is no one thinks Montana is going to be competitive in the absence of an independent candidate. Same with South Dakota. I mean, these are just red blotches on the map to the vast majority of folks. But if you get to those states, you realize that it's not like everyone loves the Republicans there, and it's not like everyone loves their electeds in dc. I mean, a lot of them hate them. So yeah, it's like if you decide you just want to play the current game, then you're just giving the Republicans uncontested wins in various places. And so at least if Seth runs and he can work it out with the Dem, at least you have a chance. We're introducing possibilities where there would be none otherwise.

[A]

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[B]

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[A]

Com offline. So this is all sub presidential love level. What do you think about sort of 28 and the field that the Democrats might have in 28? What's your, what's your, your scouting report on the bench.

[B]

Oh, so fun. Are you a sports guy, John?

[A]

Are we going to hit like too much? I have too much politics in my head so I don't have enough space for all the sports stuff that I used to.

[B]

I, I do like sports, but I get asked a lot about the candidates states and I know most of them. I'd say in the Democratic field, I think it's going to be governor who's not part of the Biden administration is my feeling. And so that gives you Gavin Newsom, Josh Shapiro, Wes Moore, J.B. pritzker, Gretchen Whitmer. If she decides to run. I think there might. Was there news on her? Not. I don't know. I mean I thought she kind of

[A]

ruled it out and then sort of walked it back, but it seems like she's not coming.

[B]

Yeah. So I think Americans are eager to move on from the Biden years. Oh, I shouldn't laugh, by the way. I want everyone to rewind the tape a little bit. And I think you were in on this, which I appreciate about you because you have something called a brain.

[A]

For now.

[B]

All right. So if people keep up with me, I've not been a Trump fan from the get like, I decided to run for president because Trump won in 2016. I was like, oh my God, things are gonna get more fucked up. It's time for me to get off my couch and do something about this. Fast forward to 2024. Joe Biden's running. And I was like, this is a catastrophe. And so I get behind my guy, Dean Phillips, go up to New Hampshire being like, hey, it's primary time, let's go. Dean. The new Dean screen. And watching the knives come out for Dean really, really saddens me to this day where this dude tried to save the party from itself, really. It's like, come on. Watching all the Democrats A, fall over themselves to get out of Joe's way and B, shiv Dean in the way that they did. It was just such a calamity and missed opportunity for the country. A lot of these governors I just listed would have been great candidates in 2024 if they, like, you had a primary. And I think that's where the Democratic Party failed all of us. I'm angry about it every day to this day, you know, and, and, and Dean lost his seat in Minnesota. And this is a guy who like, you know, three term member of Congress from a competitive district lost his, you know, like, like, I mean, I was, I'm going to say, like lost his reputation. I mean, I'm not sure that's true because his reputation kind of got vindicated. But there was like a parade of and his colleagues being like, oh, like this guy terrible. It's like, what are you talking about? This guy did what we wish everyone did, which is like, put his career on the line for the country.

[A]

Well, I will say so. I was very much on the, like, I don't know about, this is not a great idea for Biden to run. And I was way more vocal debate. We had Dean on and gave Dean a hard time, but not because it wasn't like other people in the party was like, how dare you run against him? Because my frame to Dean was like, yeah, this is pretty, this is pretty scary that we're doing this. And it's like, nice that someone's actually challenging him. But like, what are you off? Like, what's the choice? And I feel like it's indicative of a larger issue we have, which is we're all very good at talking about what's bad or what we don't like, but you can't beat something with nothing.

[B]

So mean. Tom, what are we talking about, Aaron?

[A]

But I'm like, you know, I do, I think that in the Democrat. I say this for the whole party. Right. And I worry as much as, like, I think that. And I know you have thoughts on Kamala Harris as well, but, like, you know, she only had 104 days and all that. But it was very, okay, what do I have to, like, I want to win. I want to help the party. There's so much pressure on me, which, like, I totally get. But it was like, okay, what do I need to say? And although the governors you talked about, too, I saw sort of blame all of them, too, because they could have run. They could have run before the debate. They could have not endorsed her and forced a primary afterwards. There was no time, so they didn't. I understand why, but, like, it's really a collective problem here where at the end of the day, you need to. If you're going to run for president, and we need someone who runs for president who's, like, going to be for something and you understand immediately why they're running for president.

[B]

I'm with you. And I do remember you being one of the more lucid voices on, like, the yo guys. Is this really the best approach? You know? So what about you?

[A]

You're going to run?

[B]

I am.

[A]

I know you're. You see? So you sound like you're leaning towards it when I. When I've heard you.

[B]

Well, it's good, I guess. I mean, shoot. Leaning forward. Andrew Yang. I. I did not run in 2024 because I did not think I would be constructive or helpful or generative. What I did do in 24 is go to New Hampshire and South Carolina and try and help Dean Phillips force a Democratic primary. I thought that was my highest use. And it made me sad when you did something above average just by having Dean on. I mean, we were on.

[A]

Oh, you must not come on. Because you've done something horrible.

[B]

Yeah. No, I mean, he was like, you know, freaking again. Third term member of Congress, vice chair of the Democratic Caucus. Real dude.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So. So I thought that was my highest use. And the question now for me is, like, what is my highest use? You know, I try and ask myself that's like a. You know, like, I have two missions. Like, you know, how can I do the most good? And two, how do I stay married? Those, like, the two main things that motivate me at any given day goes through my head. Yeah.

[A]

Make sure my kids still like, like me.

[B]

Yes. So really the major question for me is how do I see things playing out and how can I be helpful?

[A]

If you did run Would you run as a Democrat?

[B]

I have a lot of respect for a lot of the candidates who are currently in the field. But I can't say to you what I said earlier and then spend the last number of years trying to build a political alternative and saying, I think the answer is actually it's the Democratic Party again.

[A]

Well, I guess you're. I mean, the thing that would worry me is I think, I mean, you know the history of third party candidates on a presidential level, like the system just makes it impossible for them to win. Ross Perot got what, 18% of the vote, 90% of the vote, still got zero electoral votes. The only one who's ever gotten electoral votes is George Wallace because he was a factional candidate in one geographic area.

[B]

So though if you do rewind the tape, I think Abraham Lincoln technically was a third party candidate. That is also part of our history. But what you're asking right now, John, is the sort of thing that someone like me weighs. It's like, you know, because like I consider myself a do gooder, like I want to do positive things. And so you have to figure out, hey, is this going to have a positive impact? One of the reasons I ran for President in 2020 is that I thought I'd have a positive impact, win or lose. It's like, look, I'm going to let people know about the fourth Industrial revolution and AI, mainstream universal basic income as something we need hopefully accelerate the end of poverty in our time. Because poverty, poverty, we can alleviate it if we just decide to do so. I mean, it's fucking madness that we haven't. We are the richest, most advanced society in the history of the world. And AI is going to give us an unprecedented in human history chance to flip from scarcity to abundance. That's like the only big opportunity in this time. Like, is it going to make us crazy? Is it going to decimate our jobs? Like, yes, but it could also flip us to abundance. And so that is the, the project of this time. And I thought I could help us in 2020 move in that direction, win or lose. And when I was on programs like this, if someone was like, come on, Yang, like, do you really think you're going to win? Then I have to be like, of course. Because if you say no, then you're a joke and people blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. So what I said to. And I don't know if this is you specifically, but what I'd say to people is like, there are multiple versions of victory. If I thought that there were multiple versions of victory. I'd be much more enthused about running happening because the reality is I'm unlikely to actually be president. And I'm also not someone who's terribly motivated by that, though, in part because, you know, I'm like, Asian, like, son of immigrants, not like, I'm going to be president someday. That's not a thing that was happening in the Yang household. It's. It's more, you know, it's like, I love this country. Can I help it?

[A]

Are there any Democrats and the potential candidates now that you think think come close to getting the AI story and the crisis and solutions? Like, is anyone talking about it in ways that you find compelling?

[B]

I think a lot of them get it. The question is, what are we going to do about it in what time frame? And that's something I'm more dubious of, truly, because one of the great diseases of this time, John, is that the political incentives and what happens to most people are now, like, more unrelated than they've been in our lifetimes. You know what I mean?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And so my concern is that someone's going to win and then have various pressures coming in and then do some of the things maybe. And this is all assuming, by the way, that we have fair elections, the institutions hold up, and like, a lot of things you have to hope hold. But I'm someone who thinks that we should be distributing money to human beings right now. Like, I was sincere in 2020, it's like, look, at a minimum, we should be adopting a negative income tax and a revved up child tax credit so that more money is flowing to the needy among us, and the numbers show it pays for itself. And I'm not sure that's going to happen with even some of my favorite people in this field winning. I do like some of them, though.

[A]

Yeah. I want to end on one question. That's just because it's the most offline topic of all. You now run a phone company, Noble Mobile, whose entire pitch is that it pays you to use your phone less.

[B]

It is very offline.

[A]

Explain the model and the idea behind it. And you even have offline parties, which you referenced earlier.

[B]

Yes, offline parties where we put your phone in a bag and then you have to make eye contact with people. We actually had someone get someone's phone number on a napkin. They, like, walked out with, like, a napkin. It's like the 90s, man. You and I remember. I know. College parties.

[A]

That's why this generation's gonna solve it. Cause we've seen both We've experienced now.

[B]

Yeah, like, you're a Gen Xer like

[A]

me, then I'm millennial.

[B]

Oh, you're another millennial.

[A]

Like, I'm 1981.

[B]

So, like, my wife was born in 81.

[A]

Okay. Yeah.

[B]

So, yeah, yeah. All right. So check it out, Check it out. I'm the magical Asian man who's trying to give everyone money. And then. And Americans are more frustrated than ever about our finances. So I saw what Mark Cuban did with Cost Plus Drugs. Have you had Mark on?

[A]

Actually, yes, we did. Pfeiffer talks one.

[B]

Yeah. Good, good, good. So Mark starts Cost Plus Drugs, which gets Americans a better deal on generic drugs. And I was like, mark, that's freaking genius. And so I thought, can we get Americans a better deal on something else that we all pay for? So I listed the expense structure of the average American family and household, and it goes, you know, you know, this. Housing, healthcare, education, food, fuel, transportation, media, and then wireless. We spend $83 a month on our wireless service. I was spending 140, $150 a month on Verizon just for myself. I'm a chump. I'm going to put you on the spot. I don't know if this has ever come up in the history of offline. Which provider do you use and how much do you spend? Do you know?

[A]

Verizon? And it's definitely up to, like, one between. I want to say between 150 and 180.

[B]

Me, too. You and I. Same, same, same.

[A]

It's a lot.

[B]

All right, all right.

[A]

Because I get the. Because I have the automatic pain. I get the, like, the thing from the text message from Verizon. It's like, you've paid the bill this month. And I'm always like, yeah, yes.

[B]

Every month I got it, it was like 154.74 was the number they kept texting me. All right, the average American spending 83amonth on their wireless. The average European is spending $35 a month on their wireless. Same stuff that $48 a month. Delta comes to an extra hundred billion dollars a year that Americans are spending on data that's really a commodity at this point. One of the secrets in this industry is that you and I chose Verizon because it was the best network. And we are a very special and important people, so we deserve the best. It was more expensive. Over the intervening 20 some odd years or so, all of the three major carriers have now built very robust, robust networks so that there's almost no difference between them. So you and I are spending $150 a month on Verizon for a brand that might have been true at some point. Now less true. I went to the carriers and was like, guys, who's going to give me Andrew Yang and Scott Galloway and some other people the best value possible to distribute to the American people, like the Robin Hoods of mobile. Yeah. And T Mobile said, we will. So T Mobile is our backbone, where you sit on their. To sit on their tower, but we use their towers. And the average Noble Mobile user is spending $42 a month as opposed to $83 a month on unlimited wireless. I'm on it right now. I switched from Verizon. And here's the kicker, that any data you don't use, we give you half the money back at the end of the month. So that's the.

[A]

So you're using your phone less.

[B]

That's the gimmick of if you use your phone less, we will pay you. And the average Noble Mobile user is using 17% less screen time than they did previously, which I'm going to say is probably realistic for a lot of people because I like you, I'm a heavy phone user, but 15% less, it's like, yeah, I can do that. And by the way, the entire thing is psychological because when you're doom scrolling and looking at stuff that's probably making you sad now, you're like, wait a minute, I'm actually costing myself money doing this. And you're like, oh, let me stop

[A]

making me miserable and poor.

[B]

So those are the two things we try and solve for with Noble is save more money and we pay five and a half percent interest on any of the savings you get. And like, Yang thinks that psychologically, if you have a growing balance, like it'll make you happier.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And then also doom, scroll less, look up more, touch grass more, and that will make you happier. So Noble Mobile, you know, millions in revenue, like thousands of very, very happy customers. And anyone listening to this, if you go to noblemobile.com Yang, you get three months for free, which will save you 250 bucks on average. So I'm still the magical Asian man from the future trying to give everyone money. And I don't even need to be president to do it. Look at that. Yes. So, you know, and this brand tie in with offline is, I gotta say, perfect. We'll probably.

[A]

I know, I can't believe I didn't know about this before, but we love any kind of gimmick, any kind of strategy to get people off their phones or at least use their phones less. So I'm glad we could end the conversation with that. Thanks for coming by.

[B]

Thanks for having me, John. I really appreciate it.

[A]

Of course.

[B]

It. This episode sponsored by Apollo still moving deals forward from your desk? With Apollo, you can go to market on the go, find leads, research accounts, and launch outreach right Inside Claude and ChatGPT. You can even make calls or research leads from Gmail, your CRM, or company websites. So whether you're at the airport or on a coffee run, Apollo works where you work. No more switching tabs or devices. Grow boldly with Apollo, the revenue engine trusted by over 3 million teams. Visit Apollo IO anywhere and start free today. That's Apollo IO anywhere.

[C]

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