Charlie Rose

Vincent Evangelisti  08/27/2007 08:04 PM Report

Dear Charlie Rose, Ten years ago when you had "economist Larry Summers" on the broadcast I dropped you a note to complain that he is a politician, not an economist, and I asked that you invite authentic economists in more often. This year Summers showed himself to be an economist and through your questions you showed yourself to have been an astute student of economics during the past ten years. Particularly you showed how much you have grown when you probed the mysteries of whether a fiscal account deficit or a trade account deficit is more ominous. Thank you. There are many friendly Nobel laureates in economics out there and I am sure you would do an excellent job of it if you invited onto the broadcast some of them or others of similar stature, to discuss the recent advances during the past twenty years in this very fascinating science.

ED Zee  08/25/2007 05:21 AM Report

Thanks Roger and Mike for pointing out the flaws in Summer's statements.

If he thinks every worker in an emerging econnomy is better off working 60-80 weeks and then geting no pay, evidently he missed the CNN series on this problem in China.

Or he may have missed the CNN series on Russian girls promised jobs abroad, only to find out that they ended up sex slaves in brothels; beaten if they tried to escape.

I was amazed that an intelligent person would categorically say that all people in emerging economies are better off in these wonderful new jobs; and that Charlie would not point out the errors in the claim. Too many interuptions by Charlie also.

Alvin J.Thompson  08/24/2007 04:30 PM Report

The 8/22/2007 interview with Lawrence Summers was superb. It helped me resolve the dilemma of enhancing business, while improving the lot of the average citizen. I heard it on TV, but I'd like a copy to send to my daughter to share with her business students. Thank you.

Alvin J. Thompson

kfza  08/24/2007 01:18 PM Report

Thanks Roger and Mike you point out well. The economy has always been about finding cheap labor mostly in the form of slave and then screw the environment to make widgets for profit. This goes ever since man crawled out of slime!!

Mike as Gordon Gekko (michael douglas) said in the famous wall street movie Greeeeeeeed Is Gooooooooood today is the embodiment of that theory!!

Roger  08/24/2007 06:04 AM Report

Charlie is right to interrupt when a speaker who speaks in short phrases and goes on and on.... That aside, Rose misses the opportunity to challenge Summers on FREE trade vs. FAIR trade. It isn't until 41:26 that Rose even gets to this distinction. And when he does Summers merely states that if you have tens of thousands of people wanting the same job, it's okay to pay them little or nothing and it's okay to house them in shanty towns and it's okay for the employer to destroy the environment. Hey, that's globalization, baby. And after one minute, the TWO MOST CRITICAL QUESTIONS (fair wages and the environment) regarding globalization are dismissed in the 42nd minute of a discussion ABOUT GLOBALIZATION, mind you, and Rose nods and goes on. No one is asking that the factory worker in China or Mexico or India be paid the same money as a factory worker in Ohio. But the U.S. has to make sure the factory worker in Ohio isn't competing against a worker making pennies to the dollar of a U.S. worker. Similarly, the U.S. employer who must be concerned about the environment cannot be competing against companies that are allowed to pollute abroad without restrictions. ...Talk about a foreign policy that is going to create future instability. Summers poo-hoos any restraint on globalization, insisting that allowing for free and open markets is too beneficial to concern ourselves with any restraints - which he immediately associates with "trade barriers." This will be great to know when the people of other nations get tired of slave wages and living in sewage for the sake of the U.S. consumer.

Dwayne Kincade  08/23/2007 11:58 AM Report

Jon,

Please accept my apologies. I thought your comments were with respect to my proof reading and grammar.

Seriously, I come from a different perspective than you do about global trading. Ten years ago, I once went to China to teach basically a technology transfer seminar on PWB manufacturing. Since that time I have seen the bulk of PWB manufacturing offshored. I can't help but think that I was a part of that technology exchange that helped facilitate the manufacturing ease that China has taken advantage of with the help of currency exchange rates, lax environmental standards, and subservient labor wages.

Jon Mansell  08/23/2007 11:57 AM Report

And I will be the first to point of that for someone out to teach the english language abroad, I might want to clean up my proof reading skills before submitting comments on the internet. : )

Dwayne Kincade  08/23/2007 11:57 AM Report

Jon,

I don't really care about my grammar at nearly 2:00am in the morning. The subject was presented, and not specifically to you. Are you some Chinese dude intent on propoganda?

Jon Mansell  08/23/2007 11:57 AM Report

Dwayne, I was refering to my own grammer. And just as a side note, I'm not, "some Chinese dude intent on propaganda" whatever that means, I'm a white guy born and raise in the US of A, as if it matters. Do you have any legitamate response to what I said though? And please try to keep it from getting personal, I have too much respect for the Charlie Rose program to get involved in ugly online banter.

Peter Hopkins  08/23/2007 11:42 AM Report

Larry Summers is a complete jerk.

Mike  08/23/2007 01:25 AM Report

The widening gap between the rich and poor in this country and elsewhere is because of greed. Any other explanation is fiction pure and simple. I have to admit that I stopped watching the interview after Lawrence Summers brought up that tired old myth about capital flocking to talent as the reason for the widening gap. Corporations have bought our government and freed themselves from regulation and used the congress to write laws that protect their wealth and power. Under the circumstances it is easy to see why the richest among us grow ever richer as they are unbound by conscience or compassion and they pull the strings of the leadership in this country.

Shaft  08/23/2007 01:13 AM Report

What a great interview. I hope the next president comes fast so our next president will be advised by people like Summers. Today, our middle class is under intense pressure, thanks to Bush policy designers they helped the top 1% by forcing the middle class to carry the burden of America. Middle class is taxed heavy on top of it is subsidizing the luxury of the top 1% and paying the welfare of the low class.

IRAN  08/23/2007 12:18 AM Report

Thanks professor for a great educational session. Thanks again.

mark rogers  08/22/2007 11:44 PM Report

I really enjoyed the Summers interview;Wish it were on video. I think all of this Global Economy stuff is beginning to turn on us. US companies hiring all their employees from developing countries without regard for their health or ours, all done by US Corporations on the one hand, and then our "representatives" talking about taking action against China, when it is the US Corporations that are the ones to blame, not "China" per se', seems to sum up the dilemma we are in now. I think that the only way to maintain our standard of living to lower our population growth, not import more workers here which only lowers wage levels by having surplus labor, and places even more pressure on resources for domestic as well as global consumption....

jones  08/22/2007 11:05 PM Report

I wonder if he was high or drunk? he acted very strangley last night!

K Woulfe  08/22/2007 08:40 PM Report

Congratulations to Lawrence Summons for not allowing Charlie Rose to interrupt him. I am a big fan of Charlie Rose, however, he is always butting in. A guest will be making an interesting point and Charlie will interrupt. To see an example, Charlie needs to review his interview of John McCain.

Don Wrinkles  08/22/2007 06:25 PM Report

Does anybody here agree with me? We have to overthrow the education system. I have a few ideas on how to do this. I'm keeping them quiet for the time being, until I figure out the best way to present them. I first would like to know everybody's attitude about school in general. Post what you think in a comment. I want to see your ideas, and if I like them, maybe I'd like to talk to you, and we can share our thoughts. How do we plan a revolution? Leave that to me. What do you say?

Don Wrinkles  08/22/2007 06:13 PM Report

The structure of education will be a hot issue pretty soon. We Americans are superior to the Indians and the Chinese because we have the insolence to question the government and this all encompassing agreement factory that is compulsory education. When you ask your teacher why you need school, they say, "To get a better job." As if the actual content of the class is only filler to test for obedience. You suffer from an onslaught of information, and you have to force yourself to memorize it, for the test, and then you can forget it. I can't emphasize this enough: You will probably never use 99% of what you learn in school. And the part you do retain probably can't be controlled by state standards. It's not until you get to graduate school that you're allowed to master any specific discipline. Up until then, you're being pulled in five or six different directions, and it's absolutely ridiculous to think that anybody can be anything but superficially trained in all those areas. And most of it you won't use anyway! Teachers tell you, "You might use it. You never know." That's about as vague an answer as you can possibly give. Or they'll say, "Just the act of learning alone will benefit you later in life." You might as well learn something that is of authentic importance to you, instead of what's required. There's an intellectual ceiling! If you know too much, too bad! You're in class! Do your work!

Don Wrinkles  08/22/2007 05:57 PM Report

Amy: "While those with superior educations, ideas, and capital have thrived..." Be careful what you mean when you say superior education. Much of K-12 is arbitray and superfluous. The universities don't make a distinction between intellectual and vocation education. As a result, the path to getting a job is very slow and tedious and inefficient. Imagine if in order to get a job, all you needed was to know how to do the job! No comparative literature, no calculus, nothing that you'll probably forget within a couple of months. Nothing that you'll never use again. Figure out what you want to do first, then figure out how to do it. What you call "superior education" is backwards. It says try everything first, then pick something. Most of what you learn invariably goes to waste, or the context of the classroom is so far removed from any useful situation that it's just crap.

Ben Andrews  08/22/2007 05:53 PM Report

MR SUMMERS asserts that we need to do something about the growing income gap.

MR FRIEDMAN recently reiterated the need to encourage our children to improve their skills because 'the Chinese (and the Indians, etc)are coming' in massive numbers and with better skills.

RETRAINING INSURANCE -- That's what we need. We need to legally require that all employers who pay less than $10 an hour to contribute the difference (or $2 an hour whichever is the lesser) to a trust account in the employee's name.

THE EMPLOYEE would be restricted from withdrawing any of the accumulated funds except for college or other trade school tuition and the expenses of at least 1/2 time attendance.

ALL of these thresholds would be inflation indexed as any and all monetary thresholds should be in almost any legislation.

(TO FAIL to index is gross malpractice by Congress, regulatory agency, and any legislature.)

THERE are other provisions that would be necessary for this program to work well but you get the idea.

THIS program would de facto raise the minimum wage but it would be a forced savings plan similar to an IRA.

IT WOULD encourage planning for the future.

ANY job that pays less than $10 is most likely a dead-end job.

WE NEED to help people get out of those jobs and into trades and/or professional careers.

Amy  08/22/2007 05:23 AM Report

While I agree with much of what Lawrence Summers said, especially his ideas about supporting the American middle class and raising taxes on the top 1%, I am uneasy about the number of skilled jobs that are being lost overseas.

Initially, free trade seemed to have very little in the way of a down side, but then again, 15 years ago it was difficult to conceive of the vast number of every day consumer products that would be made off shore.

It's fantastic that countries like China and India are doing so well, but the result is that we have lost our role as one of the great manufacturing nations of the world. While those with superior educations, ideas and access to capital have thrived, the high paying manufacturing jobs, that provided a good life for many, are evaporating.

We are becoming more and more dependent on producers in foreign countries to provide us with everything from clothing, to dog food, to the computers and cell phones that are so important to modern living. Yet we no longer have control over wages and working conditions, pollution and unsafe manufacturing practices, or even the content of the products we buy.

And while in theory, there is nothing wrong with buying imports, it's become clear that with an ever increasing roster of products, there is a good deal more risk involved than we imagined.

While closing our markets is not the answer, tinkering with the current system would seem to be of vital importance, if we are to continue to provide jobs that provide a good living and products that are safe and effective.

AAguilar  08/22/2007 02:39 AM Report

Very provocative interview. I'm not sure I agree with everything, but that may be because Mr. Summers is not articulating his viewpoint in a manner to bring me with him. He makes assertions but doesn't persuade us why globalization is good for everyone, domestic and foreign.

(Perhaps we need to define what globalization *is*)

Whether we like it or not, people are fearful of the change globalization brings. No one seems to be explaining what the implications of globalization are and how we will absorb the change. "New" is not always a good thing if people are going to be left behind for the little reason that they don't "get it".

The unfortunate but brutal truth is that fundamental movements are aflame in the world because of this fear of change. Just saying globalization and openness is a good thing, is not persuasive, especially if we remain culturally insensitive and ignorant to those groups that are reactive and defensive to change.

I am for intelligent change, but I also understand I cannot force others to adopt change if they treasure their cultural traditions and fear they will lose what they value.

What I am interested in understanding is how American culture will change from globalization. There was a great deal of xenophobia in our country at the beginning of the 20th century when there was an influx of immigrants. It seems that there is a similar phenomenon occuring today.

Those visionaries who see globalization as "the way" need to persuade, not coerce; cooperate, not bully; explain, not condescend.

I do not mean to say Mr. Summers is condescending, but rather he needs to work harder and make up for the other globalization-free-traders believers who are.

Terry Cunningham  08/22/2007 02:39 AM Report

Always amazing to have various distinguished free traders spend the hour and forget to simply note what drives Asia's downhill stampede of discount goods to America and Europe:

1. Asia has hundreds of millions of very low- wage production workers, easy to exploit migrants who are desperate, obedient and required to work twelve hours seven days a week.

2. The long-standing disparities in currency values of Europe and America against those of poor countries.

3. Western materialism,esp. a consumerism that considers paying the world's lowest possible price an economic (family)duty.

4. Credit card debt and abuse in America.

Jon Mansell  08/22/2007 01:55 AM Report

Mr. Kincade, please understand I am not confined to the parameters of economic theory as I will be returning to China as an American citizen teaching western culture and our english language in no less than a week.

I understand that many in the middle class are losing jobs to those working for lower wages in countries like China and India, but would you suggest they do not do so?

If our American corporations are not allowed to move abroad then we allow a comparative European competitor to move to these low wage countries instead.

They these European business competitors will then gain an essential competitive advantage and with it will eventually gain the price advantage that will put their products in major distribution channels.

This new distribution will force those Americans who's jobs were salvaged [in the short term\ to buy a European product instead of an America one because it is that much cheaper.

They need to feed their families, lower prices are what this market economy is based on.

If that American corporation can't compete then it goes out of business. Then all that business goes out of the hand of American and instead in the hands of a European country.

Do you see that people like Lou Dobbs mention their propensity for closing off our borders because they are television sensationalists bent on ratings and [unlike Lawrence Summers or Charlie Rose\ will [whether consciously or not\ pray on the insecurities of middle americans and their friends and family who have been affected by the loss of jobs.

What we really need is less interviews with people like Lou Dobbs, and more interviews with the vary people who are attracting our money and corporations so that we may learn something useful from them so that we can improve our circumstances.

Dwayne Kincade  08/22/2007 01:31 AM Report

Mr. Rose;

Please invite Lou Dobbs to your program to counter the free trade arguments presented by Lawrence Summers.

There is no benefit to the middle class of the USA when corporations transfer technology to China and India simply because the labor costs are lower in those countries. In my opinion, this has been a huge blunder by our political leaders, starting with the Clinton administration.

I could not agree with any argument that Lawrence Summers presented. The Free Trader Economists are in favor of no restrictions on intellectual techonology transfer. Do these same economists have any patriotic inclinations such as containing the intellectual property developed within the USA?

Let me say that when the average citizen cannot improve the situation they find themselves in, then there will be political turmoil. The free traders don't seem to understand this. Turmoil will happen if our political leaders do nothing to protect the living standards of the middle class, the intellectual property rights of ideas born within the R&D labs of the USA, and the labor class that will not concede to competing with the slave labor wages of China, etc. The free traders are immersed with the 1930's Hawley-Smoot tariff act as reason to have no restrictions on trade. What about approaching a trillion dollars in trade deficit? They do not seem to understand because they live within the confines of economic theory.

Thank you. Please ask Lou Dobbs to come to your program.

Sincerely,

Dwayne Kincade

Dwayne Kincade  08/22/2007 01:04 AM Report

Mr. Rose;

Please invite Lou Dobbs to your program to counter the free trade arguments presented by Lawrence Summers.

There is no benefit to the middle class of the USA when corporations transfer technology to China and India simply because the labor costs are lower in those countries. In my opinion, this has been a huge blunder by our political leaders, starting with the Clinton administration.

I could not agree with any argument that Lawrence Summers presented. The Free Trader Economists are in favor of no restrictions on intellectual techonology transfer. Do these same economists have any patriotic inclinations such as containing the intellectual property developed within the USA?

Let me say that when the average citizen cannot improve the situation they find themselves in, then there will be political turmoil. The free traders don't seem to understand this. Turmoil will happen if our political leaders do nothing to protect the living standards of the middle class, the intellectual property rights of ideas born within the R&D labs of the USA, and the labor class that will not concede to competing with the slave labor wages of China, etc. The free traders are immersed with the 1930's Hawley-Smoot tariff act as reason to have no restrictions on trade. What about approaching a trillion dollars in trade deficit? They do not seem to understand because they live within the confines of economic theory.

Thank you. Please ask Lou Dobbs to come to your program.

Sincerely,

Dwayne Kincade

annefrank  08/22/2007 12:19 AM Report

Great interview! Summers reflects many of John Edwards' positions - and concerns for the middle class - essential to our democracy and shrinking like during the Great Depression!

Our entire family is voting for Edwards - even the Republicans.

Jon Mansell  08/22/2007 12:18 AM Report

I just want to thank Lawrence Summers for giving me a solid boost of intellectual support before I leave for China to teach western culture and the english language as well as to study the Chinese language. I have encountered some harsh criticism from Americans my age who have said to me,"why don't you just move to North Korea", and, "I am one of the millions who take offense at your pathetic attempts to argue for the bloody Chinese government." Lawrence Summer has helped re-affirms my beliefs in keeping an open mind in my study of the world and my attempts to be open to other cultures as I build my career in the business world. I hope his type of global awareness can become infections in the minds of Americans as our world moves forward through a volatile new era.