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Inequality of the Economy: Interviewing Secretary Yellen | The Problem With Jon Stewart | Apple TV+ - YouTube
Channel: The Problem With Jon Stewart
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I think the 2008 crisis is a great example.
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Instead of a big firehose of money
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being turned on those mortgages that
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went underwater and brought them back to sea level,
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they chose to pour money into those bundles
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and a lot of people lost their houses.
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People had every reason to feel unhappy about what happened.
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The purpose of intervening so that big financial institutions
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and markets didn't completely fail
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was to avoid a drying up of credit in the economy.
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If those financial institutions had been allowed to fail,
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the toll on ordinary families would
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have been not only bad, which it was, but unspeakably
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horrendous.
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We would have been looking at something like the Great
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Depression.
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I think for people, they would view it as, well,
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if I'm going to lose my house, that's a crisis.
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And I don't have a backstop.
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That's an important reason why when the pandemic struck,
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President Biden and his administration
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have been focused on using fiscal policy, not the Fed,
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to get help to all those who really need it.
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But corporate America gets all the benefits
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of American stability and fiscal policy,
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but bears none of the responsibility.
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I'll give you an example--
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Walmart, they make billions in profits.
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Their workers are one of the largest corporate users
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of social service programs.
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Why don't Walmart workers share in the profits of Walmart?
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In a capitalist system, companies
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have a right to distribute profits to their shareholders.
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They're not forced to, there's nothing in the law that force--
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Aren't we subsidizing it?
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This is the insidious part, I think,
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of when we talk about that we have a free market
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system, because what it makes it seem
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like is that the natural order of things
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is that Walmart makes billions in profits
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and can distribute it to its shareholders,
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and that's just how it goes.
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But we know that we the taxpayers
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are subsidizing their workforce with food stamps.
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They're getting the benefit of our tax dollars,
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so it's not free market.
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The government, in many cases, should be running programs.
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It's not necessarily the case that Walmart
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should do that directly.
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You don't feel they are responsible because they
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benefit from fiscal policy.
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They benefit from the American infrastructure.
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They do benefit from fiscal policy,
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but I think an important way of making them pay
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is by taxing them and making sure
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that their profits provide the resources to provide
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that infrastructure.
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You would rather they still make their billions in profit,
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but as long as they pay us taxes so that we have enough
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to give their workers food stamps, that's OK.
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We also need to invest in their workers
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so that they can have jobs that will produce
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better pay that they'll have the skills to be able to compete.
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But it feels like the system doesn't
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have accountability for those at the corporate level.
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How do we build that into the system?
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I think there's a lot of truth in what you're saying,
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and we are very focused on trying
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to make sure that companies are responsible and do
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pay their fair share.
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But we slashed the IRS budget-- we make
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accountability very difficult.
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We're trying to reverse that.
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We're proposing a substantial increase
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in resources for the IRS so they can go after tax evasion.
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I want to tell you about another thing that's important here.
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All over the world, countries have
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been competing with one another to attract these companies
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by cutting corporate tax rates.
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Every country faces this--
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of companies having power and saying to governments,
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cut our tax rates or we're going to go someplace else.
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Is the problem here that corporations
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feel like they have this country over a barrel?
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We have a system where political contributions are important
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and where wealthy corporations and individuals use
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the power of--
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Access.
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Access to skew the playing field.
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But the Biden administration has a different view,
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and we want to make sure that companies behave fairly,
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that they pay their fair share, and we make the investments
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in people and in communities--
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Who fights you on this?
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Necessary to reverse this.
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When you guys bring this up or when you try and change
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fiscal policy in that way, where is the fight from?
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What are the headwinds?
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Why is it difficult to push through?
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Well, the headwinds--
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And I'd like some names.
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Let me get a pen.
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People don't like to have their taxes increased.
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And we need to raise more tax revenue in order
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to finance the investments that our economy needs
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to be productive and for families to do well.
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