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Brian Deese · The David Rubenstein Show

• 0:03
  Speaker 1: One of the President's most senior economic advisors is Brian D's,
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: who heads the National Economic Council at the White House.
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: I recently had a chance to sit down with Brian
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: to talk about interest rates, inflation, and the general state
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: of the economy in the United States and around the world.
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: So let me ask you the first and most important question,
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: Are we going to go into a recession anytime in
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: their foreseeable future? Well, thank you for having me, And
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: you know, I thought we were going to start on
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: the uh rosie. Nope, but I should have expected nothing less.
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: I'll join this. I thank you, thank you for having me,
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: and thank you for putting this together. Um, we are,
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: no doubt in uncertain times. But I think that if
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: you look at the US economy my perspective, the most
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: striking feature of the US economy right now is resilience.
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: The resilience of households and consumer balance sheets, resilience of
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: business and business investment, and globe the resilience of the
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: US economy in in certain global environment. So, UM, we're
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  Speaker 1: certainly in a complicated and in many ways unprecedented transition,
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: but I think that there's every reason to have a
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  Speaker 1: lot of confidence in the US position in the context
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  Speaker 1: of a globally uncertain environment. I'll take that as maybe
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: you don't know. Well, let me ask you easier question. Please,
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: all right, I'll take any how you want to get
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: think England is and you think the UK is in
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  Speaker 1: a in a recession, well, uh, I think the situation
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  Speaker 1: in Europe in the UK is very very difficult right now.
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  Speaker 1: They face a very difficult situation. Uh. And they are
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  Speaker 1: um as I was saying, in terms of the US position,
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: they're significantly more exposed to the energy price volatility UM.
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: And they don't have some of the incumbent strengths that
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: we have here economically. So I think it is it
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: is and is going to be a tough puer it
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: for the UK and for the European Union. Normally in
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: the United States, when you cut taxes, uh, it's design
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: to stimulate the economy, and that's what happened in Britain.
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: They now cutting taxes to stimulate the economy. But it's
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: had a seems a unfortunate impact on the British economy.
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: Stock markets going down, and people are are very upset
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: about it, or you're surprised about that. I wasn't surprised
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: with the market reaction. You know, I think that if we, uh,
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: you have to any economic policy has to be in
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  Speaker 1: the context of the situation that we are in and
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: in a monetary tightening cycle like this. Uh. The challenge
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  Speaker 1: with you know that that that policy aperture is it
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  Speaker 1: just puts the uh, it puts the monetary authority in
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: a position of potentially having to move even tighter. I
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: think that that's what you saw in the reaction. And also,
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: you know, I would say it is important, particularly important
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  Speaker 1: to maintain a focus on fiscal prudence, fiscal discipline. It
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: is certainly something that we have been focused on here
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  Speaker 1: and uh, you know, the markets take notice. So let's
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: talk about another easy subject. Inflation. Inflation is as high
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: as it's been since I was in government. I managed
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: to get a higher rate than you've gotten so far.
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: But um, I wanted to know, in your view, is
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: inflation now coming down a bit as a result of
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: the FEDS hiking and do you expect the Fed continue
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: to hike U in the November and December fo MC meetings. Well,
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  Speaker 1: the goodness is the second part of your question is
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  Speaker 1: the easy one, as you know, because part of respecting
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  Speaker 1: the independence of the FED is leaving to this if
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  Speaker 1: you expect, look, the market expects that, and and okay,
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  Speaker 1: have any wisdom beyond that? I think, Uh. But but
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  Speaker 1: if you look at most of the data points over
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: the course the last couple of months, we've certainly seen
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  Speaker 1: headline inflation on a month over month basis slow dramatically. Basically,
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: it's been flat for the last couple of months. That's
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: a function of the fact that we've seen energy prices
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  Speaker 1: come down gas prices, uh, and that's offset price increases elsewhere.
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: But I think if you look broadly across the economy,
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: you are seeing a number of places where you're seeing
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  Speaker 1: the shift. And this transition happened in in real time.
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  Speaker 1: Commodity prices have have come off. You've seen that in
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  Speaker 1: a number of the of durable goods segments. And at
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  Speaker 1: the same time, as you know that this this process
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  Speaker 1: operates with some lags. And so that's why even as
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: you look over the course of the last couple of months,
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  Speaker 1: you've got to really, even at a moment of heightened
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  Speaker 1: uncertainty that we are in right now, have to do
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  Speaker 1: whatever we can to lift up from individual monthly data
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  Speaker 1: points Now, when I went to college many years ago,
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  Speaker 1: the standard textbook said that inflation was on average three
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: or four percent a year. That was relatively normal. For
• 4:45
  Speaker 1: the last twenty five years, we've had two percent inflation,
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  Speaker 1: So we've gotten used to two percent inflation. My children
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: have never seen higher inflation. But the FED now says
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  Speaker 1: they want to get inflation back to two percent, which
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  Speaker 1: is what it was. But why why not three or
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: four percent? Is why does two percent have to be
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  Speaker 1: a goal? And how hard is it going to be
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: to get down the two percent without putting unemployment up
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  Speaker 1: the six percent or high higher. You know, A big
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  Speaker 1: part of inflation is expectations. UH. And the risk with
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  Speaker 1: inflation is not only the immediate impact on you know,
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  Speaker 1: purchasing power, but also the risk that expectations get on
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  Speaker 1: more get un anchored, and then it gets much more
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  Speaker 1: difficult to bring inflation down. So when you ask the
• 5:28
  Speaker 1: question about bringing down to a level, I think one
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: of the most important questions is is the is the
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: is the shape of policy focused on making sure that
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  Speaker 1: we don't lose control of those expectations. That's obviously something
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  Speaker 1: that the FED keeps a close eye on. UH. And
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: so you know to your your question of of the process, Look,
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  Speaker 1: I am fundamentally optimistic about the American economy, and I'm
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  Speaker 1: optimistic that we can navigate through this transition in a
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  Speaker 1: way where we come out of this as a country
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  Speaker 1: and as an economy in a stronger position than when
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: the pandemic hit. So so yeah, at core, I do
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  Speaker 1: believe that that's that's There's there's no no certainty in
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  Speaker 1: any way or no no way inevitable that we are
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  Speaker 1: you know, we're going into a down turn for people
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  Speaker 1: live in Washington. Politicians, is it more difficult when unemployment
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: is going up or when inflation is going up? Inflation
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  Speaker 1: affects everybody. Unemployment doesn't affect everybody, So how do you
• 6:24
  Speaker 1: weigh the political trade off between unemployment going up and
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: inflation going up? Which is more difficult for politicians or
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  Speaker 1: for let's say, the administration. There's no question that inflation
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  Speaker 1: affects everybody, and it affects the if it affects the psyche.
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  Speaker 1: And I think that when it it affects a sense,
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  Speaker 1: I think also of people's sentiment and a sense in
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  Speaker 1: which things are you know, um uh in or out
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  Speaker 1: of out of control? And and we see that in
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  Speaker 1: consumer sentiment data. At the same time, we also, as
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: you asked the question about on the political side, as
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  Speaker 1: economic policymakers, need to recognize that the way that economists
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: think about inflation and the way that Americans think about
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  Speaker 1: inflation often differs. That we have this idea of headline
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: inflation versus core, and economists say, really should pay less
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  Speaker 1: attention to headline because it has food and gas. You
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: asked to typical people what inflation is, it's food and gas,
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  Speaker 1: and so you know, understanding the you know, the interplay
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  Speaker 1: between the economics and the politics of inflation is is
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  Speaker 1: something that we haven't been as used to. So let
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: me go back to the n a C. And NFC
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  Speaker 1: was started under UM President Clinton and Bob Rubin was
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  Speaker 1: the first person to hold that job. Can you explain
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  Speaker 1: to people what it actually does and what the NBC
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  Speaker 1: does stay to day when, for example, who's in the NBC,
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  Speaker 1: who's only the n AC What is your job actually
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  Speaker 1: to do? So? UM, the National Economic Council are the job,
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  Speaker 1: the mandate, the mission of the organization is to coordinate
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  Speaker 1: economic policy across the executive branch and across the cabinet
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  Speaker 1: to make sure that the President is getting the benefit
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  Speaker 1: of UH making decisions of his entire economic cabinet, and
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: also that the econic cabinet is getting clear direction from
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: the President as well, so that that two ways. So
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  Speaker 1: it's a coordination function UH. On the NBC itself are
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  Speaker 1: all of the relevant cabinet members, the sort of core
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  Speaker 1: Economic team o MB Council, Economic Advisor's, Treasury, but also
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  Speaker 1: Secretary of Labor, Secretary of Commerce, my team. The NBC
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  Speaker 1: team is a small team within the White House. That
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  Speaker 1: is our job is to do that coordination across the
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  Speaker 1: range of economic policiation. Now, you were the deputy in
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  Speaker 1: the Obama administration of the ANEC, and now you're the director.
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  Speaker 1: Which NBC worked better the Obama administration one or the
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: Biden one? Well, on the issues that I worked on
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  Speaker 1: in the Obama administration, it worked very very well. And
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  Speaker 1: the current UH ANYC works very well as well. So
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: it's the subset of the ones I didn't work on. Okay,
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  Speaker 1: let's talk about your own background for a moment. I
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: mentioned before you grew up in Boston area, UM, and
• 8:57
  Speaker 1: what did your family do? Were they in business, academics, politics,
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  Speaker 1: important things like private equity that they do that. Uh.
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  Speaker 1: My father is an educator, he teaches, uh. And my
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  Speaker 1: mother is a civil engineer by training and worked as
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: an environmental engineer. Okay, So you went to Middlebury and
• 9:18
  Speaker 1: what did you study there? I studied political science and economics, uh,
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  Speaker 1: internet within the international focus. Okay. And after you graduated,
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  Speaker 1: what did you do? Then? I came here to d
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  Speaker 1: C on a fellowship to the Carnegian down Itt for
• 9:30
  Speaker 1: International Peace, and I was doing uh, international economics, international
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  Speaker 1: economic development. I had spent the better part of a
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: year in Argentina right before the collapse there. Became fascinated
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: with trade and development issues, and so I spent Uh.
• 9:47
  Speaker 1: I came here to d C and the Argentine and
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  Speaker 1: economy collapse while you were there, No, right after I left, okay,
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: right after Okay, you got correlation and causation, all right.
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: So then you came back to Washington to do what? So?
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: So I I stayed here? I uh, Um, I worked.
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  Speaker 1: I sort of shifted from from international policy, economic policy,
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: domestic policy. Then I went to law school, left e C,
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: and I came back here. We went to law school
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: to be a lawyer or not. I went to law
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: school to UH to know not to be a lawyer,
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: but because because I was fascinated. As I was working
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: on the economic war economic elements, it became clear that
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: most of policy is actually understanding law um in different ways.
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: And so I went. I went to I went with
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: the idea that I would continue to work in policy.
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: But then so you didn't want to practice law ever,
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: wasn't my objective? Okay, So how did you get involved
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: with the Obama administration? Did you volunteer in the campaign
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: or how did you get involved in the campaign or
• 10:46
  Speaker 1: the administration? So I started working on the two thousand
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: seven two thousand new campaign, actually worked for UH I
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: had I had the most important experience. I campaigned again
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: camp candidate Obama for about nine months, working for Senator
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: Clinton Secretary Clinton UH and then after they lost, I
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: was fortunate enough to then join the Obama campaign in
• 11:11
  Speaker 1: campaign from what did then Senator Omama say about that?
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: The good news was I was junior enough in the
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: campaign and the Senator I don't think particularly aware of
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: that of my transition to his. So he got elected,
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: and then you got this position as a special assistant
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: the President of Economic policy. And what was the biggest
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: thing that you accomplished during the Obama administration in your view,
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: My first project upon coming into government was to work
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: as part of the team that did the restructuring of
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: General Motives and Chrysler as well as the finance companies
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: UM as well. And so that was basically from you
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  Speaker 1: will all many of you will recall November December of
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: two thousand eight right through to the summer of two
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: thousand nine. That was that was my over overriding. So
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: after the Obama administration, you join the dark side of
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: money management and you work for black Rock, but in
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: charge of global sustainability. So what does that really mean?
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: What were you doing at black Rock? So two things.
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: One was trying to uh actually do uh financial research
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: to understand what are drivers of long term economic performance
• 12:23
  Speaker 1: that are uh that are financially relevant but that may
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: not be on the mind of traditional investors to you know,
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: give you a concrete example. One of the most uh,
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: you know, persistent measures of financial performance uncorrelated is the
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: rate of change at which a company brings down its
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: carbon emissions, not just the level of carbon emissions, but
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: the rate of change of doing stuff. And you know,
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: we did a lot of research around that to to
• 12:50
  Speaker 1: find that that's that is in part because it is
• 12:54
  Speaker 1: an uncorrelated UH measure of operational performance. Better management team
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: is actually better manage against that, and so that becomes
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: the kind of thing that you can invest invest against.
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: But it also expands the universe of what investors are
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: thinking about. So when President Biden was starting to run
• 13:12
  Speaker 1: for president, you knew him when he was vice president.
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: You're in the bomb administration. Did you support him? Where
• 13:16
  Speaker 1: you work in the campaign for UM then Vice President Biden?
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: Or did you work for somebody else? I was for
• 13:25
  Speaker 1: for for for us of that time, I was I
• 13:27
  Speaker 1: was busy. I had a job at a family I
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: would any time that, any time anyone called, I would offer.
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: So when did you actually get involved with the Biden people?
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: Wasn't after you won the election? Then they asked you
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: to help with the transition. So I did some work
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: in volunteering during to help on the developing some elements
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: of the platform during that came together in sort of
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: his his his general election economic policy. White House staff
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: jobs are notoriously long houred and you have two little children, So, um,
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: how do you manage your time? And how come you
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: have no gray hair as a result of working these
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: long hours in two administrations. If you if the camera
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: gets close enough, you'll see some uh I Uh, it's
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: it's a it's a it's a it's a constant challenge,
• 14:16
  Speaker 1: and it's it's I don't have I don't have uh
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: particular wisdom or inside into how to answer it other
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: than you know, needing to be extremely efficient with the
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: time that you have, higher great staff and build a
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: great team. Uh. There's I've got an extraordinary uh an
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: ec team and core team inside the White House, without
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: which I wouldn't be able to do this. And also
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: but it also takes a um an understanding family because
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: no matter how good you are at prioritization, time management,
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: and productivity with your own time, there was always, uh,
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: there was always something that happens and always something that
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: comes up. Your children are young. Um, so you go
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: to PTA meetings and people give you economic advice PTA meetings,
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: so they kind of say, I have an idea for
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: you when and fighting inflation? Has that ever happened? People
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: are extraordinarily generous with their advice. I suppose uh, you know,
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: somebody wants to write a book about you and so
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: here's what what would you say that you feel you've
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: accomplished or what would you like to have as your legacy.
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: I'm just I'm reflecting on your question and how boring
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: a book it would be. Uh. I guess I would
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: say two things. One is, I think that we are
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: in a position where we could actually demonstrate that for
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: the United States, doing dedicated public investment over the long
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: term in areas of high productivity research, semiconductors, infrastructure, clean
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: energy manufacturing. Showing that we can actually do that in
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: a way that changes the trajectory of the economy is
• 15:49
  Speaker 1: something that I would love to be part of demonstrating
• 15:52
  Speaker 1: and part of associating. The second thing for me is
• 15:55
  Speaker 1: I think that one thing that I have tried to
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: do and that I think we have tried to do,
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: is to say that gonna have an economic policy where
• 16:02
  Speaker 1: accelerating the clean energy transition is at the core of
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: our economic policy. It's not that we have an economic
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: strategy and then we think about climate change and clean
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: energy policy. It's actually at the core. I think we
• 16:12
  Speaker 1: are doing that effectively doing that, and that's certainly something
• 16:15
  Speaker 1: that I hope sustains across time. What is your career
• 16:18
  Speaker 1: advice about how best to prepare for this kind of job.
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: I would say a couple of things. One is, um,
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: I can't encourage strongly enough people anybody who has any
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: inkling towards public service to run toward it and u
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: and engage in it. It's incredibly important at this point
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: in our country right now too, for more people to serve.
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: I think the second is, particularly if if you're interested
• 16:41
  Speaker 1: in getting into policies, then probably elements of that that
• 16:44
  Speaker 1: that that are also true in the private sector, to
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: which is you know, be humble, be willing to work
• 16:49
  Speaker 1: a lot, and be willing to both not have any
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: expectation or sense of entitlement, but also uh have a
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: lot of aspiration and willing to step to the table.
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: So recently we had the an act pass called the
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: Inflation Reduction Act. I mean, who came up with that name?
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: Really it's a great name, um I guess so, But
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: but you really think it's going to reduce inflation? It
• 17:12
  Speaker 1: seemed like it was spending a lot of money, and
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: how is the inflation going to be reduced by that?
• 17:16
  Speaker 1: See it's because of the Inflation Reduction Act. Uh So
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: joking aside, I actually think that it's UH. It's it
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: is an appropriate name and UH it goes to the
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: it goes to the structure of of UH. If if
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: I could say that in a in a walkie way,
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: the role of fiscal policy in a period of of
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: monetary tightening. What you want to do is you want
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: to pro you want to take measures that will lower
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: costs for individuals and do it in a way that
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: lowers the federal deficit. Because if you're lowering the federal
• 17:46
  Speaker 1: deficit at the same time that you're lowing costs for individuals,
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: then you're actually operating in the same direction. Now that's
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: complicated to do from a policy perspective, but that is
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: exactly what the Inflation Reduction Act accomplish, but doesn't really
• 17:58
  Speaker 1: lower federal debt and and title deficit because I thought
• 18:01
  Speaker 1: it was just lowering it but the lower ware it
• 18:03
  Speaker 1: would otherwise have been, But it's not actually producing a
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: net reduced reduction in the title of debt isn't so
• 18:10
  Speaker 1: we're producing it below where the policy people said it
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: would have otherwise been right. So the appropriate way to
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: judge any piece of legislation is is it going to
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: reduce or increase the deficit compared to the baseline at
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: the time, and the Inflation Reduction Act will reduce the
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: deficit compared to the baseline by you know, about two
• 18:27
  Speaker 1: hundred and sixty billion dollars depending in the first decade,
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: probably more than a trillion dollars in the second decade.
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: And importantly, it does it in ways like you know,
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: probably the simplest way to understand is the provision that
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: allows Medicare to for the first time, negotiate for better
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: prices for prescription drugs. That will mean that Medicare is
• 18:44
  Speaker 1: spending less money on drugs. That will lower federal spending,
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: but it will also lower the cost of drugs to
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: Medicare recipients and also to recipients in the private market,
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: since Medicare is such a large purchaser. Okay um. In
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: the Inflation Reduction Act, a lot of the taxing increases
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: that the President had previously proposed the Build Back Better
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: Act did not get in. There are those tax increases
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: off the table for the remainder of the Biden term,
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: or you're not precluded from uh those are those uh,
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: those are policies the present thing thought made sense was
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: would have supported if they were in the legislation and
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: continues to support going forward. And I will say, even
• 19:22
  Speaker 1: for all the things that weren't in there, one of
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: the reasons, to go back to your previous question why
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: that bill reduces the deficit and actually helps in reducing
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: inflation across time, is that what is in there, for example,
• 19:35
  Speaker 1: is a new minimum tax book minimum tax um for
• 19:40
  Speaker 1: the largest corporations, those with over a billion dollars and earnings.
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: I think that that's the kind of reasonable, common sense
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: tax reform that makes sense. It does mean that some
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: people will pay more in taxes, but certainly that kind
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: of base broadening reform, there's a lot of there's a
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: lot of important sensibility to it. On the day that
• 19:58
  Speaker 1: the Inflation Reduction Act as signed, record high inflation numbers
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: came out. So did you ever consider maybe adjusting the
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: schedule of the signing ceremony or was it something you
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: you said that who told the president the numbers were
• 20:11
  Speaker 1: gonna be that high that morning and and maybe you
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: should change the signing ceremony. I think that that number
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: and others go to how people are experiencing inflation today
• 20:21
  Speaker 1: because one of the principal reasons why that headline number
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: was basically flat. Was because in the month prior gas
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: prices had calmed down by a very significant amount, and
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: that is really important for typical Americans UH monthly balance sheets.
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: But it also is important because it's it's one of
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: the most visible price signals in our economy. Now you're
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: two in years into almost two years into this administration, UM,
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: and you expect to stay for another two years I think,
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: which it's a long UM two years, so you're not
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: worn out and you could see doing this for another
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: two years at least, if not more. I've got no
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: plans to leave, and I've got my head down and
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: certainly fully fully absorbed in the work we're doing. So
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: in the next two years, let's suppose you control Congress.
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: What is you what you'd like to do most in
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: economic policy in the next two years. What would be
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: your highest goal other than getting inflation down and unemployment
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: keeping a reasonable level? Is there another type of Chips
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: Act or some other major piece of legislation that you
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: want to get through? Look, I think there's UM. There's
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: a number of priorities that that UH I would love
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: to see us make more progress on. UM. I'll answer
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: your question. But as a decide, the first and most
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: important thing that that we're gripped by and focused on
• 21:36
  Speaker 1: now is effectively implementing this historic set of legislation that
• 21:40
  Speaker 1: we have accomplished. The implementation of this to your point
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: about chips and otherwise, the effective implementation across the board
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: is going to make a difference, a big difference in
• 21:48
  Speaker 1: terms of uh, the broader economic impact. But look, I
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: think we need to make more progress on tax reform.
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: We made some steps here, but it's uh. Showing that
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: we can as a country effectively fund our prior orities
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: and also bill fairness into the tax code is important.
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: It's important for trust, it's important for strengthening our democratic institutions.
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: We need to make more progress on underscoring that issues
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: that often get referenced as care or the care economy
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: are not social issues, their core economic issues. They're a
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: core to our labor force, uh, their core to our
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: productivity as a country. And there's other issues that are
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: now you know, coming to floor, like housing and housing costs.
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: The fact that we have persistent under supply of affordable
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: housing in this country is a policy choice decades in
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: the making. We could do something about that, and now
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: is a really important time to do that given the
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: period in the monetary policy cycle. There's a number of
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: places where we can make progress, places where there is
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: a lot of actual bipartisan support. So UM and I would,
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: I could, I could go through a much longer list
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: if you think time. So what's the greatest pleasure of
• 22:51
  Speaker 1: your job and what's the worst part of your job
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: other than interviewing like this, But what's the greatest pleasure
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: and what's the greatest um less pleasurable part? So, you know,
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: having gone out and being in comp administrations, by far,
• 23:04
  Speaker 1: the greatest pleasure is the people you spend so much
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: time with them, but also the quality of people that
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: can come. You know, a white house is it's a
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: in a sense, it's a terrible place to work. It's
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: very hard and all the like, but it's also a
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: place where you know, the the the you know, the
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: reservation price or a wage that you would pay is
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: negative because you know, everybody wants to come and and
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: and and have an opportunity. So you can attract great people,
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: diverse people with diverse backgrounds and extraordinary things to bear.
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: So you make um friendships, uh and and bonds with
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: people and so that's at core the best. What's the
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: worst part, the best part, I think the most challenging
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: part is that your time is never your own. That's
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: something kind of is something you you have to be
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: prepared that something always can happen, and usually something does happen.
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: Thanks for listening to hear more of my interviews. You
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: can subscribe and download my podcast on Spotify, Apple or
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: wherever you listen and s