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Podcast Host
Does the winter weather have you feeling tired, antisocial, sad? You may want to take a cue from our friends in Norway, Really.
Esther Perel
They tend to orient towards the things that they like about the season instead of just sort of seeing it as a time of year to endure.
Podcast Host
How to embrace the winter. That's on the next. Explain it to me. New episodes every Sunday, wherever you get your podcasts.
Beth Bella Freud
Hi, this is Beth Bella Freud. I'm the host of Fashion Neurosis. This week on the show, Esther Perel is on my couch.
Esther Perel
Erotic recovery is part of trauma healing.
Beth Bella Freud
God, that's interesting.
Esther Perel
It's not the reward at the end.
Beth Bella Freud
Yeah.
Esther Perel
That's the difference. And I think we both come together around that construct.
Beth Bella Freud
Yeah. Find fashion neurosis on YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts.
Interviewer
Coming up on Today Explained. I talked to one of the top stars of the Democratic Party and one of the most divisive about her run for Senate in Texas. I wonder, like, is there times in which the rhetoric goes too far? Are there times in which you should say, you know, maybe I messed that one up?
Esther Perel
No, not in this environment. I don't. I think that, you know, we are really in unchartered territory.
Interviewer
Representative Jasmine Crockett this week on Today Explained. Listen, wherever you get your podcast.
Scott Galloway
Welcome to Office Hours with Prof. G. This is the part of the show where we answer your questions about business, big tech, entrepreneurship, and whatever else is on your mind. If you'd like to submit a question for next time, you can send a voice recording to officehoursofgymedia.com Again, that's officehoursofgmedia.com or post your question on the Scott Galloway subreddit it and we just might feature it in our next episode. Our first question comes from Diane Brooks. One On Instagram, they say, why do you think Trump is so focused on belittling Canada? The honest answer is, I don't know. Because they're close or because it's like that movie on Wall street where Charlie Sheen asks Michael Douglas, why did you have to break this company? And he goes, because it was breakable. So Canada is our largest trading partner. So I could see how he might zero in. And all right, he asked for a list of our biggest trading partners. It's not China, Mexico and Canada are actually tied. What was interesting is a colleague of mine at Stern, a guy named Pankajemawat, he's an expert on trade. And his big insight, which I found fascinating, is that if you look all over the world, trade is a function of Proximity, and that is 80, 90% of the nations in the world, their biggest trading partner, they share a border with. It makes sense. Logistically, it's just easier. You share cultures. Oftentimes there's crossover in terms of language, and the same is true of us. Our two biggest trading partners are Mexico and Canada. He's also sort of zeroed in, I think incorrectly, on the notion that past trade deals have disadvantaged the US And Canada was central to his push to replace NAFTA with the usmca. He tends to highlight bilateral trade imbalances and sector by sector outcomes. And he frequently points to specific industries, especially things like he likes the kind of tangible stuff, dairy, autos, lumber, steel and aluminum, where he says Canadian policies or experts hurt US Producers. And these industries are typically more important with kind of what he perceives as the real America. And people he feels are advantageous to him politically and tend to side with them, whether it's farmers or the manufacturing states in the industrial Midwest. So also, I wonder if he just sees it as a real estate play that, oh, it's our neighbor, let's buy their house. The problem is it's around all of this is it's just really fucking stupid. And that is we let's look at oil, they transfer to us oil and energy and shale in its Ross form, and we add value to it and we get a discount on it because of proximity and we sell it at much higher margin. They have manufacturing plants where they produce cars, parts go back and forth. They send them here, they send in timber, they send in timber, they send in oil, manufactured products which tend to have operating margins of 10 to 20 points and be produced by companies that trade at a PE of say 8 to 15. And then in exchange we sell into them. IPhones, chips, digital services, banking, things that have exceptionally high margins, sometimes 40 to 50 points of operating margins and are housed within companies that trade at a PE of 20 to 50. So in sum, if there's been any asymmetry in trade, it's been towards us. And that is for every dollar of trade we do with Canada, we import in a dollar worth of goods from Canada, right? So dollar into Canada of our shit, our iPhones, our chips, they put in a dollar of cars, timber, oil into the American market. The dollar we sell into them is literally worth three to ten times more to American shareholders or to the American company than the dollar than the shareholder value they get from the dollar they sell into the US if there's a trade imbalance or an asymmetry, it benefits US full stop. But because it was such a mutually beneficial relationship and because there's been a level of trust that's been built up there by virtue of the fact that Canadians went into World War II before we did. They followed us into Iraq, they followed us into Afghanistan. We have fought shoulder to shoulder. Here's a fun fact. Canada, the Canadian US border is the largest undefended border in the world. It's forest in most places. Just walk across it. Why? Because we trust each other. We haven't had to militarize it. So Canada fucked up. It trusted us, and 75% of its exports come into the U.S. and I think that essentially Trump said, oh, we have leverage. Maybe they're our friends, but we have real power and I can bully them and push them around, and they kind of have to take whatever tariffs we send to them. And Prime Minister Carney has pushed back and said, look, this might be bad for us in the short term, but Canada's not going to be bullied anyways. His views on trade are just batshit crazy. I think he did get China right. He did highlight in his first administration that there was asymmetry with China, that they basically steal our ip, rip it off, and then sell us back the finished good for less gutting our industry. I think there was real validity there. By the way, since COVID Chinese Exports are up 40%, but its imports are at 1% in some. China's basically decided, you can buy our shit, but we're not going to buy yours. And that means trade representatives all over the world need to unify to push back on China. But when the biggest consumer economy is sclerotic and declaring war on all these foreign nations, we can't pull together. And China's been effectively able to atomize us vis a vis Trump's stupid policies. According to Justin Trudeau, Trump's obsession may be due to Canada's significant supply of critical minerals. And then Paul Krugman's theory is that Trump hates Canada because it's a fundamentally decent place. It's an interesting theory. Trump, who nobody would describe as a decent person, dislikes and maybe even fears people who are, says Krugman. Hmm, that's some armchair psychology there, but it makes no sense. They will be hurt very badly. We will be hurt badly. The greatest unlock economically in terms of prosperity. Over the last 80 years, it's been NATO and the Marshall Plan and turning enemies into allies and help build up incredible trading partners that rest on rule of law and democracy. Japan and Germany, where US laws and trading constructs became the operating system for 70% of the world's GDP. And we've decided that we can take on the world with, you know, 27% of the world's GDP, which makes absolutely no sense. And it's essentially fraying the operating system and the world order. That was the kind of the, the biggest innovation. The next was the middle class. And what's fueled the middle class and unlocked unbelievable economic growth really since kind of the 90s in Clinton, it's been an embrace of global trade. And that is, it is hard on certain losers, certain industries that aren't competitive with global suppliers. But at the end of the day, if you can buy bananas for less money and then reinvest that additional consumer spending in other products that we're better at, what's happened over time is that we have traded or swapped out low wage, non competitive industries for higher wage, higher gross margin, higher shareholder value industries. So Dave Chappelle summarized it perfectly. We don't want to make Nikes, we want to wear them. The people assembling iPhones in China and it's 2,000 parts make about 500 bucks a month, $6,000 a year, the average wage. Even Apple employing Cupertino, who was figuring out retail strategy, distribution, marketing, supply chain lobbying, regulations, communications, investor relations, they average about I think 220,000 a year. So again, the notion somehow that manufacturing is going to come back, which I think was one of the primary objectives of these stupid trade wars, it's not happening. Also folks, in terms of manufacturing, long winded answer here. Americans have a fetish with it. And 80% of Americans think that we need more manufacturing in America. But get this, only 20% want to work in manufacturing. You can't bring your dog to the factory floor. And it has not. These tariffs have not in any way inspired a renaissance in manufacturing. What they have done is hurt some of our tourism that employs 12 million people in the tourism sector. So in sum, if these tariffs and a war on Canada make no sense economically or morally, trust your instincts. Question number two comes from mxml on Instagram. They say how does your call to action to unsubscribe from Big Tech impact your investment plans? Yeah, this is a tough one. So I've already unsubscribed from Uber, Amazon prime and last night I spent about two hours trying to unsubscribe from Paramount plus and I still can't figure out I got a Smiley or a Sad mountain saying I'd unsubscribe, but unsubscribe From Uber and Amazon Prime. The really shocking thing was when I unsubscribed or I canceled my Uber account, it gives you this graphic that says, this is how many times you've ordered from Uber Eats. I've ordered from Uber eats, I think, 34 times. And then it said, this is how many rides you've taken. I think I've been a member of uber for about 10 years. Let me say I love Uber. I think it's amazing. I love the little graphic of how my Cadillac Escalade. Oh, it's around the corner. I hope he parks in the right spot. Oh, he's going to be here, too. I just absolutely love it. I think it's an amazing service. I haven't owned a car in four years, and it's something I've really enjoyed not owning a car. All right, how many Uber Drive rides have I taken the last 10 years? 3746. Okay, see above. Love Uber. I take Uber Lux. I like to think I'm a, you know, a big deal. I have some money, and I always take Uber Lux. I did some analysis. That's approximately 370 rides a year. If you divide it evenly across the 10 years. Most of my rides to Midtown to do a meeting, to the West Village to go drinking, or to an airport to go somewhere else. So my rides are expensive. The average Uber Lux ride when I joined in 2015 was 40 to 60 bucks. And this is the big tech playbook. They underprice, they consolidate the market with an incredible offering, and then once they've consolidated the market, they raise prices faster than inflation, which is what Uber has done. It has raised prices 7 to 10% a year despite inflation going up about 3 to 3 and a half percent a year. The result is, in 2025, the average price of an Uber Lux for yours truly is somewhere between 80 and $120. So let's call it 100 bucks. So do the math. I have been spending, no joke, $35,000 a year on Uber. And before you say, yeah, privileged. Yeah, guilty. And my point is, is that you don't realize how much money you're spending on these things because they raise their prices. You get used to them, and they make it frictionless, such that it is so easy to. To spend money. Back to your question. I own stock in Apple and Amazon, and Amazon is my big tech stock pick of 2026. I have owned these stocks since 2009. So to sell them would incur an extraordinary capital gain. But at the same time, If I'm going to walk the walk, do I really want to finance these companies? Do I want to send a signal? So I am contemplating selling down or selling my positions in these companies. I've not done it yet because, and this is a good problem, these companies are up 10, 20x, meaning that basically the entire sale amount is gonna be taxable. The last time I sold a lot of my Shares was in 2016 when Trump got inaugurated. I had an emotional reaction and said, this guy's a fucking idiot. He's gonna crash the economy. And I sold most of my stocks and all that did was incur a tax liability. I bought back in six months later. Cause the markets like deficit spending and irresponsible economic policies that rob money from the young and give it to the rich and corporations. And that emotional decision probably cost me 20, 25% of my net worth. So I try to be very careful about having an emotional reaction at the same time. I need to walk the walk. Today. I think I'm going to unsubscribe from Amazon. I found out when I unsubscribed from Amazon prime, it made the mistake of showing me all the shit I'm subscribed to there. I'm a member of amazon1. It's health thing. During COVID I got Covid and I needed paxlovid and someone suggested joining Amazon One. The health thing. I haven't used it since to get packs of it, by the way. I thought it was a good service. So I'm going to unsubscribe from that today. And I've been doing commentary, but I'm going to unsubscribe or cancel something every day. I think it's amazing how many things you have that you didn't know you had. I found out I have three different ChatGPT accounts. I'm not even talking about canceling all of them. But, you know, I had a family meeting. Family meeting. I love those. That's my. Basically my boys rolling their eyes and me lecturing at them and saying, someday you'll respect me anyways. And I said, we're going. We're going to cancel our streaming media. I told them about what I was doing and they're like, yeah, yeah, we're not. And they're like, no, we're not canceling Australian media. I'm like, okay, I'll let you keep one. And of course the argument broke out from going, we have six streaming media platforms, we're going to one. I'm not suggesting you give up Everything. But if you're a subscriber to Anthropic or chatgpt, pick one. Could you do without Amazon prime for a month? Could you take more cabs? Or could you eat local and not use Amazon Grocery? I mean, there's just a ton of different subscription services you could do away with. And one I think you're going to find, you're going to save money. I think it hits these firms really, really hard. My next thing, that'll be pretty easy, just unsubscribe from Apple TV. By the way, these companies have increased their prices 20 to 40% just over the last two or three years. And the soft tissue of corporate America, or the soft tissue of Trump is that he responds to the markets. The only time he has pulled back is not because of protests or the courts. The only time or quote, unquote, a co equal branch of government. The only time he has pulled back is, is when interest rate spikes. When interest rates spike or the S and P goes down, what is our best shot at the S and P going down? Simple. Go after the subscription services of the Companies that represent 40% of the S and P. And that is if you cancel ChatGPT at 20 bucks a month, their pro offering, that's $240, right? Okay, it's not a lot of money, but say you decided not to buy groceries. Kroger's trades at 0.3 times revenues. OpenAI trades at 40 times revenues. What does that mean? That means that every dollar that goes to ChatGPT results in about $130 in market value. Or put another way, put another way, you could buy $30,000 less groceries. The average home spends $6,000 on groceries, meaning five homes. American homes could take all of their grocery spending down to zero and I guess plant gardens and figure out a way to survive. And it would have the same impact on the markets as one person canceling their ChatGPT subscription. So I'm suggesting we focus on pulling the string that might have a real impact on the markets, which is the only thing that Trump listens to. But back to your original question. I am going to do something involving my stocks and my capital to try and send a signal to these companies and these financial institutions that they need to speak up before it is too late. And if you're interested in joining us, Please go to resistandunsubscribe.com Again, that's resistantunsubscribe.com We've tried to make it really easy with links for you to investigate which big tech subscriptions you can easily cancel without much impact on your day to day life. We'll be right back after a quick break.
Sponsor Announcer
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Esther Perel
Their tank tops are a staple in my closet even in the winter. I love their sheets. I have a few sweaters from them. I haven't upgraded to the Mongolian cashmere yet, but I think I'll have to after all these ads so that'll be my next purchase. But I love Quinn's High quality Fair prices. Can't recommend them enough.
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Indeed Representative
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Scott Galloway
It uses AI to figure out what.
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Scott Galloway
J-O-I-N a m p.com. Welcome back. Question number three hi Scott, I consider.
Listener/Caller
Myself a super fan of yours. I buy all of your books. I was a member of Section for a couple of years and I listen to your pod every week. My question is about the value of focusing on one project and how elastic one's focus should be. Due to my ambition in fomo, I spend most of my life managing or building multiple projects at the same time. A full time career, a couple small businesses, investing, thought leadership, et cetera. I've had an epiphany that maybe my outcomes have been worse than if I had just focused on doing one of those things really well. I see you as someone who has many pots cooking at the same time, but it seems like they all use the same ingredients. For example, the content you create for Prof. Key Media becomes a book, newsletter and a section course. What are your thoughts on focus, how liberal one's focus should be, and if finding synergies between projects is essential to making them all work. Or maybe you think people should just have one successful project before expanding into others. I appreciate your thoughts and thank you.
Scott Galloway
Yeah, thanks very much for the question. So a secret weapon that most people don't take advantage of is focus. And that is. I'll give you an example. I hate side hustles. There was a trend around side hustles. Everybody needs. All young people need a side hustle to make some extra money. If you're spending a lot of time on side hustles, it means you need to find a different main hustle. And if you look at the people who get promoted. If you get promoted every three years instead of every four years, you'll be making millions of dollars more or have millions of dollars more. By the time you're 50 or 55, you'll be. That's the difference between being a CEO and being a junior VP by the time you're 55. And the difference between getting promoted every three years versus every four years is in the last 10%. And I love that saying, success is in the last 10%. And that's the person who works a little bit harder, is a little bit better, but also a little bit more focused. And I think your job in your 20s is not to find your passion, but to find something you're really good at and then double down on it and focus on it and try and become one of the top 10% in that profession with an objective of within 10 years being in the top 1%. And essentially, academia is an example of this. There are people who make millions of dollars, sell tons of books, have huge consulting agreements, have tenure, get to work six hours a day, and have really wonderful lives. Because they have so narrowly focused on pharmaceutical companies in Portugal, like, they're the top guy or gal studying breakthroughs in a rare Gap one Accounting. They know everything about Gap one Accounting, or they know everything about trade in Southeast Asia. They're the top person in trade in Southeast Asia. And that focus, you know, the specific crowds out the general. So I think it's okay to workshop stuff.
Sponsor Announcer
If you don't love your main gig.
Scott Galloway
You gotta make some money. You want to investigate some other things, you want to dip your toes in water. But as soon as you find something where you think I could be in the top 10% in three years and the top 1% in 10 years, I think you go all in on it. Now, what I've done is I've basically gone all in on one function and leverage to superpower. Now, what is that function? I've gone all in on storytelling, and that is I create a lot of content where I try and find data, couch it in an entertaining, humorous, provocative, irreverent way. That is what I do. That's my superpower. That's my focus. The majority of my day is around creating content that is entertaining and educational. Now, my superpower is finding really talented people that scale that focus. And that is people constantly say to me, oh, it's amazing how much content you produce. And I love your drawings. I'm like, I don't draw anything. We have a graphics team we have a video team. I was just talking to our the woman who runs our company, Katherine Dillon, who I've been working with for 15 years. And she's saying we need more people on the video team. And I'm like, go ahead and make another full time hire. We have probably 25 full time people and another half a dozen contractors working at Prof. Giving to try and scale my focus. And each of them has their own focus. Catherine's a great manager, she's very good with people, but she also is very good on the creative side. Billy runs our video group. Drew is our tech guy. These people have very specific foci focuses on what they do. So what I would suggest is find someone close to you who understands business and say, this is all I'm doing. Should I pair a couple of these things? And pairing is really important. So for example, I don't go on boards for longer than four years and I'm now much more disciplined around, okay, this sounds interesting, but what am I going to get from it? How is it going to advance? I try and set corporate objectives, financial objectives every year, objectives around my relationships, mostly around my boys. And then I run almost every decision or allocation of time. And I used to say yes to goddamn everything. After I hit four years on a board, I get off. I, you know, the sexist word in the English language is no. So the problem most people have is not what they say yes to, but what they say no to. And what I would suggest is you just do an audit and have some friends help you and say, what am I really good at? What would pay the most dividends if it got into the top 10 or 1% now, quite frankly, try to outsource or clear everything else off those decks. Now, if you haven't figured that out, dancing in different parties might make sense to see which one gets traction. But at some point you should be totally focused on one thing. And then success is a series of small acts of discipline every day. If you're doing financial content on TikTok, you need to put out one, two, three pieces of content every day. It's like investing small acts of discipline every day. A few bucks every day adds up to millions by the time you're my age. So what are we going to do? We're going to build a kitchen cabinet of people. You're going to describe very honestly and openly all the things you're doing, what's working, what isn't. Ask them where you should be focusing or if you should be focusing. And then you're going to be very disciplined about doubling down and putting all of your human capital into that one thing, such that you can be in the top 10 or the top 1%, and then you're going to get really good at saying no, such that you free up more human capital to provide the artillery and the ammunition to be exceptionally focused. Thanks for the question. That's all for this episode. If you'd like to submit a question, please email a voice recording to officehoursoproptummedia.com Again, that's office hours@prhetmedia.com or if you prefer to ask on Reddit, just post your question on the Scott Galloway subreddit and we just might feature it in an upcoming episode. This episode was produced by Jennifer Sanchez and Laura Genair. Cammie Reek is our social producer, Brad Williams is our video editor, and Drew Burrows is our Technical Director. Thank you for listening to the Prop G pod from propg Media.
In this Office Hours episode, Scott Galloway addresses listener questions on three major topics: Donald Trump’s focus on Canada and trade deals, the paradox of advocating for “Resist and Unsubscribe” while holding Big Tech investments, and the career power of focused attention over multitasking. Galloway mixes sharp business analysis with his signature candid, irreverent style, providing practical advice and broader commentary on U.S. politics, economics, and personal development.
[01:43–17:51]
Reasoning Behind Trump’s Canada Critique:
Canada–U.S. Trade Dynamics:
Trust and Leverage:
Canadian Perspective:
Broader Trade Philosophy:
[17:52–21:09]
Scott’s Unsubscribing Campaign:
Investment Dilemma:
Market Impact of Canceling Subscriptions:
Call to Action:
[21:10–End]
Question from Listener:
On Side Hustles:
Career Advice:
Academic Example:
Scott’s Own Focus:
Advice on Saying “No”:
Actionable Steps:
On Trade & Trump’s Views:
On Investment and Activism:
On the Power of Focus:
This Office Hours episode is a cross-section of Scott Galloway’s worldview: pragmatic, sometimes profane, deeply analytical, and always urging listeners to be more intentional—whether it’s in their politics, wallet, investment portfolio, or personal ambitions. He brings nuance to the trade war narrative, unpacks the moral tension of profiting from companies one is actively protesting, and delivers actionable career advice on how true success comes from focus and saying “no.” Suitable for listeners seeking both a business roadmap and a philosophical nudge.