The Story Behind Raging Moderates + Why Jeff Bezos Is Wrong About Taxes

Scott Galloway explains why Jeff Bezos' proposal to cut taxes for lower earners is a deflection from the real issue, shares the origin story behind Raging Moderates and how he met Jessica Tarlov, and breaks down how to tell the difference between a toxic workplace and one that just isn't the right fit. Want to be featured in a future episode? Send a voice recording to [email protected], or drop your question in the r/ScottGalloway subreddit. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

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• 1:36Scott Galloway?

  Welcome to Office Hours of 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 officehoursofprofgmedia.com. Again, that's officehoursofprofgmedia.com or post your question on the Scott Galloway subreddit, and we just might feature it in our next episode. Question number one. Our first question comes from KGL on Substack. They ask, "What do you think about Bezos' statement on taxes?"

• 2:04Scott Galloway?

  Okay, well, let's listen to what he said.

• 2:06Speaker 05

  So people talk about making the tax system more progressive. How about we start by having the nurse in Queens not pay taxes? Why is somebody... At all. Why is a nurse in Queens who makes $75,000 a year paying more than $1,000 a month in taxes? That's a thousand dollars a month that could help with rent or groceries or anything. And so, and by the way, do you know what that all adds up to? The bottom half of income earners in this country pay only 3% of the taxes. It's only 3%. We can find 3%. So, we don't have, it's a small amount of money for the government, you know, that.

• 2:50Speaker 05

  And really, it's, and the more I thought about it, to me, it's kind of absurd that we're doing this. You know, we shouldn't be asking this nurse in Queens to send money to Washington. They should be sending her an apology.

• 3:04Scott Galloway?

  Yeah, so, I'm friends with Andrew Yang, and I thought that he, I think UBI was, I don't think UBI is a good, I hate the universal and basic income. And, well, let me back up. I think Bezos talking about cutting taxes for people under the income of 75,000 is a bit of a deflection, and ultimately, I think what Amazon would probably do is lower their wages such that they ended up with the same take-home pay, because I think Amazon is optimized for the supply-demand of labor, not for what is social consciousness, as in many of their drivers have to, you know, pee in bottles because they don't want to take bathroom breaks to try and meet their productivity quota.

• 3:47Scott Galloway?

  So, I'm a little bit, I think it's a little bit cynical for a guy who pieced out to Florida to spend more time with his father about the time he was about to sell his Amazons. In other words, in sum, Mr. Bezos, sit the fuck down. I think you talking about cutting the taxes of people making less than 75,000 dollars, like, how do I figure out an Amazon-sized eye roll? And the fact that this guy is also saying, in the same breath with the same interview at CNBC... That there's no way that raising his taxes would help that same Nurse and Queens. No, actually it would, would. Even if we don't create additional programs, it would at least reduce the deficit. There's just no getting around it.

• 4:29Scott Galloway?

  State taxes exemption, capital gains,

• 4:35Scott Galloway?

  lower tax rates, being able to piece out from the state of Washington to Florida about the time you decide to sell your stock, despite the fact that you aggregated $120 billion in wealth using the great infrastructure and ecosystem of Washington. You know, you just shouldn't lecture us. I, I think this is quite frankly, a deflection and a misdirect. And I don't think he's genuine about, about his own view on taxation. Having said that, I do think that if Andrew wanted to be successful in framing this, I think the way you frame trying to get money to people to level them up is not by saying universal basic income. That sounds socialist.

• 5:16Scott Galloway?

  I would have framed it as a, as a negative income tax. And that way you'd get Republicans on board. Republicans like the idea of cutting taxes. So say we're going to cut taxes and make a negative income tax. And so for example, and by the way, you would, there'd be a big argument over whether it's universal childcare or services. Cause the problem when you give people services and just not straight cash is you create a government bureaucracy that never goes away. And there's a lot of NGOs in Europe that give a lot of money to, you know, needy people in Africa. But what they found is they're better off just giving the money to people in Africa as opposed to creating these large infrastructures of people, of administrators who get paid, who are overeducated to, you know, think big thoughts and

• 5:56Scott Galloway?

  host lunches and talk about famine in Africa. You're better off just giving money to people in Africa and say, go buy, buy your own food and figure out what to do. And they'd also, and this is sexist, but I'll say it, give money to the women because you give money to the dudes and the, the prostitutes in the bars thrive. You give money to the women and the kids get taller and fatter. Anyways, I don't, I think that negative income tax is a really good idea. Whether you give it to people in the form of services, universal childcare. You know, healthcare subsidies, I don't know, I'd want to see studies on that. But yeah, I, you know, I, I agree, we need to figure out a way to put more money in the pockets

• 6:39Scott Galloway?

  or help lower and middle-class people keep more of their money. I'm down with that, but we gotta pay for it, Mr. Bezos. And the fact that you've aggregated $120 billion in wealth. You know, people say, people demonize billionaires like Bezos, and I don't agree with the far-left either, that he didn't earn his money. He was born to a single mother when she was 17. He's a genius. He deserves to have earned $120 billion in wealth. What is wrong is that we have failed to elect people who maintain a progressive tax structure, similar to the tax structure we had in the 60s, 70s and 80s, where people who made $120 billion, the equivalent of that, were taxed at 60, 70 or 80%.

• 7:20Scott Galloway?

  You might think, huh, you know, that's, that's going to discourage innovation and innovators, and they're more productive with capital than the rest of us. Well, there's a kernel of truth in that. Except the downside of letting people aggregate so much power is they weaponize government and they decide who gets elected. And generally speaking, we don't look back on history and say, wow, I wish the most powerful people had had more power. So taxation, to a certain extent, is what protects us from the aggregation of power. And so I believe we need a progressive tax structure. Now, what do you want? You want taxes that are the least taxing. What do I mean by that? If you were to tax people for every time, 100% tax for every dollar they spent on food

• 8:03Scott Galloway?

  or healthcare or education, you would decrease the amount of education, health, right? And, and longevity. That's a bad tax. A good tax is one where you create revenue for the system, whether it's paying down deficit, the Navy, our parks, that doesn't really hurt people's emotional or physical well-being.

• 8:26Scott Galloway?

  I believe getting rid of the estate tax exemption, if the Bezos heirs inherit 20 billion instead of 30, I don't think they're going to be any less happy. I think if you had an alternative minimum tax of, say, 50% on people making more than $1 million, or, and by the way, some people already pay 50%, but the owners don't, the people who buy and sell stocks or businesses. I don't think that anything above $1 million or $2 million bucks a year makes you any happier. And there's research, and basically what I say on Daniel Kahneman's research, that there is a correlation between money and happiness, but it tops out. So above a certain amount, if you get no incremental happiness, but people under a certain amount of money get a lot of happiness.

• 9:11Scott Galloway?

  In other words, if someone pays $1 billion more in taxes because they made $10 billion in a year selling shares in the upcoming space ex-IPO, and there's going to be a lot of people who make at least $10 billion, they're no less happy. But if you take a million houses and give them each $10,000 in cash or services that, say, have an income of less than $60,000, you create a great deal of happiness. Or more specifically, you relieve anxiety. The happiest countries in the world are the ones in Northern Europe. And it's not because they have more stuff. It's because they have an absence of fear of things being taken away from them. They have an absence of fear about having their dignity robbed because they might be one of the 40% of US households that have medical or dental debt.

• 9:55Scott Galloway?

  So nearly half of American households have medical or dental debt because they just couldn't afford to pay for their daughter's root canal. So in sum, you know, I think it's nice to saying that. I think it's a misdirect from the fact that he should be paying more taxes. I do believe we should at some point have something resembling a negative income tax and make sure that people at least have enough money for housing and healthcare. But yeah, Bezos, again, sit down.

• 10:24Scott Galloway?

  Question number two comes from Gooseneck07 on Reddit. They say, "I would love the Jessica Tarlov Prop G origin story. Why did you decide to bring her on and start a separate podcast with her? Did you have to do any persuading since she is a mom and has a current full-time job on TV? Love the Raging Moderates podcast. Thanks." I love this question. So during COVID, I heard from this lovely woman named Susan Bennett and said, "Would I be interested in going on Bill Maher?" And I just freaked out because I get more nervous going on Bill Maher than anything I do. And the reason why is because my dad, when he was alive, only watched two things on TV. He watched Maple Leafs hockey, Go Leafs, or Bill Maher. And so when I'm on Bill Maher, I feel like my dad is watching me and I desperately want

• 11:08Scott Galloway?

  to impress my dad. I get very nervous on Bill Maher. Also, I have a lot of respect for him. I think he's fearless and a moderate. I just think the, I think the world of him and his producers are, are these incredibly impressive people, Dean and Sheila. Anyways, so I went on Bill Maher. Notice how he turned this back to me. And there was this woman on named Jess Tarlov, who I guess hosted a show called The Five. And I do well, or I have done well on Bill Maher. And I'm a narcissist and an egomaniac. And so immediately after the show goes, I go to the YouTube comments and I love hearing like, "Oh, Scott's so good." You know, I like that. I'm like anybody else, I like affirmation.

• 11:51Scott Galloway?

  And when I went on, when I was on with Jess, every comment was, "She's a genius. More Jess Tarlov." And my first reaction was one of jealousy. And then I thought, I should reach out to her and see if she's interested in starting a podcast about politics. Because I wanted to try and take the politics out of Pivot and out of Prop G stuff and put it in its own area. Because people get upset listening to business takes and takes on this show that are political because that's not why they came here. And I thought she would be a great co-host. I reached out to her and said, "Would you be interested in starting a podcast?" She said, "Yes." And simply put, she is a lovely person and is a joy to work with.

• 12:33Scott Galloway?

  I would say of all the external people we work with, and we work with a lot of talented, good people, the team here is an enormous, is, you know, a fan of Jess Tarlov. She's shows up, she's a professional, she's nice, very good at what she does, and she's just a great team player. But anyways, I found Jess and she found me on Bill Maher, and it's been a great relationship. I think we're going on our second or third year with Jess, and she just brings a really nice dynamic to the show. Anyways, thanks for the question.

• 13:08Scott Galloway?

  We'll be right back after a quick break.

• 13:17Scott Galloway?

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• 16:24Scott Galloway?

  That's spelled V.A.N.T.A.com/profg for $1,000 off. Welcome back. Question number three comes from RToThehelm on Instagram. Have you ever had to navigate a toxic work environment? If so, any tips on how to do so well? So, I may have worked in a lot of toxic work environments, but they've been my toxicity, simply because since the age of 25, every company I've worked at, I've been the CEO of, so I kind of set the tone. The most toxic work environment I worked at, and I learned a lot from it, was I worked at Morgan Stanley, right out of UCLA, and it was...

• 17:09Scott Galloway?

  You know, I don't abusive, probably. I had a chair thrown at me once and it was sort of like a fraternity hazing, but even more. I was in a fraternity, but the hazing there was somewhat good natured. This was not good natured hazing. It was, oh, he's, it was sort of the Steve Jobs mentality before Steve Jobs. And that is if you were a managing director at Morgan Stanley and you would yell at people, it meant you were a genius. Where if you were just a nice, pleasant person, it meant you were talented. So you got a reputation in a positive way for occasionally yelling at people or being just a total dick. And it just wasn't very healthy. And there was a, so when I was at Morgan Stanley, you weren't allowed, you had to be

• 17:52Scott Galloway?

  there before anyone senior to you and you couldn't leave until everyone senior to you had already left. So I worked and I didn't mind that. I'd needed a swift kick in the ass. I was 22, I'd been sleepwalking through life. Yeah. So some of that discipline, it almost felt a little bit kind of military-ish, if you will, was good for me. And I actually look back on my experience as being positive, but it was pretty toxic. And also I was, it was more, it was easier for me because I was a straight white male and it was all straight white dudes, or at least, you know, we thought they were straight. So I think it was especially hard for women, for non-whites. And I think things have gotten a lot better. It's no longer as abusive, but I gotta be honest, I look back on it and I think some

• 18:36Scott Galloway?

  of that was probably good for me. Do we need that kind of abusive behavior in the workplace? Absolutely not. I learned a lot from it. I learned about what I didn't want to do in terms of how to treat employees, but I also have some of that still in me. One of my favorite quotes is from Don Draper of Mad Men. When people complain, I say, well, that's what the money's for. You know, it's just, so, okay, how do you, how do you navigate a toxic work environment? I think you have to decide if the environment is, one, what is your role in that? You know, are you, you know, are you facilitating that? Well, that's probably unfair. Shit, I don't know. A couple of things. One,

• 19:21Scott Galloway?

  is it a work environment or is it your little pod? Do you just need to get out and away from this, these people you're working with and for whatever reason, it's just a stew that creates toxicity? Or is it an environment and a culture of toxicity? What I have found oftentimes is people conflate toxicity with a culture that doesn't match theirs. What do I mean by that? So a place like Goldman Sachs or McKinsey, or even I would say tech firms in the early days, and some of my firms, quite frankly, the agreement is the following. We own your ass. You're gonna have no life. Your relationships, your health, your mental wellbeing are all gonna suffer. And in exchange for owning your ass and you basically devoting your entire life to this organization, we will,

• 20:05Scott Galloway?

  by the time you're 30, give you more opportunity and more economic security and more income than your parents had at 50. And guess what? Millions of young people raise their hand and say, I will absolutely sign up for that. And oftentimes, people decide, I don't want that environment. And so they call it toxic, when no, it's not, it's not necessarily toxic. It's just not the right culture for you. And the most successful organizations in the world usually have that compact with their employees. You're gonna work your ass off. It's not gonna be fun. You're not gonna have a lot of balance and you're gonna make an extraordinary amount of money. And a

• 20:46Scott Galloway?

  lot of people willingly embrace that. So one, is it toxicity? Or is it just a culture that doesn't foot with what you want in terms of the work-life balance or the culture you want? I worked at Levi Strauss and Company. Well, I didn't work there. They were my biggest client. And it was a very maternal organization. What do I mean by that? Fridays off, very politically correct, sensitivity training.

• 21:12Scott Galloway?

  I found that toxic. I found that so fucking obnoxious and that it fostered such a culture of mediocrity that it was difficult to get anything done and very frustrating. Now, that's a politically correct form of toxicity. What I would suggest is the following. If you're being abused, go to your HR manager and ask to be switched out, or say, you know, find a boss or someone who you can confide in and say, this is what's going on. What's my role in this? How do I improve? What do you think? Two, decide if it's real toxicity or if it's just you need a change in culture. And also, three, it's a free market. If you

• 21:55Scott Galloway?

  really believe you're in a toxic work environment, maybe you don't even need to examine what the problems are. Just try and find another job and find something that is more suitable. I find the word toxic is overused and a lot of time, people use it to wallpaper over their own disappointment that they aren't doing better in that culture. Anyways, I would need to know more to make more of an accurate assessment. Appreciate the question. That's all for this episode. If you'd like to submit a question, please email a voice recording to [email protected]. Again, that's [email protected]. Or if you'd prefer to ask on Reddit, just post your question on the Scott Galloway subreddit,

• 22:36Scott Galloway?

  and we might feature it in an upcoming episode. This episode was produced by Jennifer Sanchez and Laura Janer. Kami Rika is our social producer. Brad Williams is our editor. And Drew Burrows is our technical director. Thank you for listening to the Prop G Pod from Prop G Media.

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