Latest / We Can Do Better / The Arms Industry: Robbing the Working Class of a Better Life
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- Fran Quigley: Hello and welcome to We Can Do Better, a podcast about ending poverty in our time. I am your host, Freyan Quigley. I'm a law professor who goes with my students every week to eviction court, where we represent some of the millions of people in the United States who are facing the loss of their homes. Many of the people we represent and folks across the country are also forced to skip filling prescriptions, go without health care, and even go hungry, despite living in the richest nation in the world. We can do better. Other nations already do far better, and the United States has done better in the past as well. So this podcast lifts up the many people and organizations who are working to make housing, healthcare, and decent a decent life enforceable human rights for all. This week we are excited to host Steven Semmler. Stephen is a ⁓ co-founder of the Security Policy Reform Institute. It's a think tank that works to align US foreign policy with working class interests. He also writes Polygraph, a data journalism newsletter, which I am proud to say I'm a paid subscriber and ⁓ grateful that I am. We'll we'll give links in the show notes, et cetera. But it is Stephen Semler.com, is the way you get connected. And as Steven describes himself in the ⁓ newsletter introduction, he's a producer of charts and policy analysis for the working class. I love that phrase. And Stephen has previously worked in the International Human Humanitarian Response to Syria, worked with US federal budget authorizations and appropriations, and done a lot of policy analysis and advocacy and gonna ask more about your path soon. But Steven, welcome to the show. Stephen Semler: My pleasure to be here. Thanks for having me, friend. Fran Quigley: Yeah. Well I I do wanna talk more about your your own path to getting to to this and and why data journalism is a is important. But I don't want to bury the lead for for our folks. This is a a a podcast about ending US poverty and that makes a lot of us most interested, separate from the fact that war instituted by the United States is killing people, it's maiming people, it's destroying communities and families. But it's also leading to huge lost opportunities here. And you've done some terrific reporting most recently, I think in April in your newsletter, about ⁓ the one point five trillion dollars that we're spending ⁓ for the Pentagon what it could fund instead. So, you know, can you walk us through a little bit about what what research was and and how you conducted that research and and what you found about the lost opportunities here? Stephen Semler: Well, it's really the there's a an antiquated debate, I think, about big versus small government. And in practice that debate is basically over. It's not big versus small government or limited versus expansive government. It's really who government works for. And that's what this trade off discussion is all about. When you talk about a one point five trillion dollar military budget, which compared it's not just I mean The point of comparison isn't largest, you know, versus Vietnam War or or post Cold War high. We're talking a military budget that's higher than World War Two adjusted for inflation in real dollars. Not just a little bit more, but twenty percent more than World War Two's peak. So Trump wants to spend two hundred billion more in twenty twenty seven on the military than the US spent in nineteen forty five. Which is shocking. It really is. So I went through I charts are kind of my MO, so ⁓ n now I kind of I've chosen a theme and now I'm stuck with it. So ⁓ for one it actually worked out really well 'cause I it was kind of how I pictured it in my head, ⁓ is you have ⁓ one showing a one point five trillion dollar budget and on the other you have all the stuff that could it could fund instead. And I thought it would be Fran Quigley: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Stephen Semler: You know, friend, th the thing is when I when I talk about military spend it's a grim subject. It really is. I mean, thinking about what it does and all that stuff. But when you talk about trade off that that's when it's that's when it's fun. Because you can imagine what the what the government can do its side instead. You can think about all the ⁓ Does the wholesale rejection basically of free market logics when it comes to military spending? I mean, it's a socialized system. It's government-directed spending, picking winners and losers, to use the old, you know, phrase. it has socialized medicine through the VA. if wanted to. ⁓ It could institute a fifteen or twenty or twenty-five or thirty dollar minimum wage just by saying we're not gonna contract you. The government's not gonna contract you unless you pay your workers a f a fair amount. And we're not gonna pay you we're not gonna contract with you unless your workers are allowed to unionize. You think about like what this what the government could do for housing and infrastructure in the climate crisis ⁓ it If it borrowed its logics for the military-industrial complex and applied it to something useful, that's when it gets fun. And for this, it was fun. Because I mean, I'll just walk you through the list real fast. I mean, all the stuff I was able to accomplish with 1.5 trillion, end world hunger, end global extreme poverty, end US homelessness. Provide Medicaid for every single uninsured person in the United States, institute universal pre-K for three and four year olds, send six hundred dollar checks to two hundred and thirty-five million Americans. That's the number who got the six hundred dollar checks in January 2021. And then the last one, at this point we're only halfway there, ⁓ less than halfway there. ⁓ Fran Quigley: Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. Right, and I I I think it's worth noting 'cause it took me a a a minute to just wrap my brain around it. This is not one of these. These are all of these can be accomplished with the one point five Yeah. Yeah. Stephen Semler: Yes, they're stacked on top of each other, dude. I mean it's it's it's so shocking. And then I mean, I kind of had a moment of panic because at this point like I I did all this research and I'm, you know, I feel like a god, like solving extreme poverty and ending world hunger, and I'm like, ⁓ crap, I'm only ha I'm not not even halfway there to using up all this money. I I did some research on what it would take to ⁓ power Fran Quigley: Mm-hmm. Stephen Semler: Half of US ho of US households was solar. So I calculated the energy demand of US households and then ⁓ energy the Department of Energy has this tool where you it provides ⁓ data on what it would take to build solar infrastructure and then also all the stuff like b ⁓ not just building the panels itself, but building the energy storage capacity and delivering it so you could actually power US households, the transmission lines and that's and that. So that would be a one-time payment of five hundred and ninety-six billion. So I've done all this stuff and I still have seventy seven billion dollars left over. And it's it's it's it's shocking because the Washington Post reported and others have reported as well that Fran Quigley: Goodness. ⁓ my goodness. Stephen Semler: The one point five trillion request was actually delayed a bit because the Trump officials, like I did, to figure out ways to spend it all. So Trump it wants to provide the Pentagon with an amount of money they don't even know what to do with. I mean, it was it was always, you know, how quickly we went from a trillion dollar budget from kind of a reference point like hyperbole. Fran Quigley: Mm-hmm. Stephen Semler: to reality to know sixty percent of what Trump wants to spend next year it we went like that. And at the same t Fran Quigley: Right. Right. No, I remember I remember the rhetoric that ⁓ we're heading towards a trillion dollar military budget. Well that you know that we got there awful fast. Stephen Semler: Yeah, and depending on how you count it, like if you if you want to count like ⁓ post war costs, like veterans care and that sort of thing, we've been at one trillion for a while now. But now it it's gradually taken less and less math to get there and now it's just yeah, that's the that's the Pentagon budget itself. So here we are. Fran Quigley: Yeah. And and you also just to ⁓ to let listeners know that I wanna say it's a couple of months ago that you did you know, you dug further as to just further back in the timeline, why does this happen? ⁓ And the enormous amount of ⁓ of ⁓ Bribes, campaign contributions made by military contractors and how that's influenced ⁓ you know, folks in Congress and obviously the the presidential administrations as well. I think that was you could probably remember, I think it was in December you talked about how, you know, the the public doesn't want this. The public to the extent that we understand this, very and across all kinds of ideologies, does not want this, but it happens. And the reason it happens is money, right? Stephen Semler: Right. So in the intro you said I worked in federal government relations. that I'm former arms industry lobbyist. ⁓ I my career out that way. and kind ended there several times. I started as an intern in college, ⁓ couldn't find a after college, was hired as a legislative fellow at the same lobbying group. Fran Quigley: Okay. Stephen Semler: And then after grad school, couldn't find a job there either, and then ended up as director of defense legislation, which didn't last long because morally I had figured out who I was at that point. I the good news is I was trained by the best ⁓ far as government go and now I'm carrying that work into advocacy. I will say though, relevant to your question, it's a hell of a lot easier getting meetings with congressional offices ⁓ Fran Quigley: Yeah. Stephen Semler: when your office and the companies you represented donate millions of dollars each year. So campaign cash, does it matter? I would say Absolutely matters. for every military ⁓ budget vote since 2018, I've compared the amount of money that members of Congress have taken from military contractors before they voted on the military spending legislation. In every single year, the results show what you'd expect in the show. The more money the members who vote yes approving military spending increases take several times more ⁓ average than those who vote against such increases. I'm not talking about one or two years out of the twenty eighteen to twenty twenty five range. I'm talking every single year. There's a military spending increase, there's that ratio observed in both the House and Senate. And that's with if you control for ⁓ election cycle, or if you look at lifetime or ⁓ f lifetime, I guess, acceptance ⁓ military contractor cash, you observe the same thing. And I so The donations for military contractors is one thing that unites, you know, I guess my world to people who are, you know, doing antitrust stuff or ⁓ focused on any large company that donates a ton of money to members of Congress. I'm not saying ⁓ that the focus on military contractors is special in any way, but it is unique in the sense that they're so dependent ⁓ Fran Quigley: Mm-hmm. Stephen Semler: ⁓ government contracts that the cycle from public funds to private capital to private capital spent to manipulate the flow of public funds is very tight knit. So for example, Lockheed Martin, over 70% of its annual revenue comes from US government contracts. And then another twenty or twenty-five percent comes from government approved. Fran Quigley: Mm-hmm. Well. Stephen Semler: or government brokered foreign military sales, which are contracted through the same contracting mechanism as regular Pentagon contracts are. So at the end of the day, you have a company who's 95 to 97% dependent on Pentagon contracts, s recycling a lot of that public r recycling a lot of that revenue from contracts back into the political system to drive up the overall Fran Quigley: Right. Stephen Semler: pot of resources that are available to them every year. Fran Quigley: Well we ⁓ we have ⁓ we we we dig up the old Dr. King quote that the United States has socialism for the rich and rugged individualism for the poor. I think maybe we should be more specific about it, socialism for military contractors, right? And I did not know you were a a traitor to your class, right? You you got ⁓ schools on how to do it from ⁓ you know, your your work doing that lobbying early in your career. But I for what it's worth, there's a real analogy in our in our law world. A lot of people, you know, get trained in big law and and represent some horrible interests, but but gain some skills and insights and then go, you know, turn to public interest. And so ⁓ you you have some sisters and brothers in the law who've done that done the same thing. So glad you're you're doing that now. yeah, I just that list again, it's worth folks going through. End world hunger, end global extreme poverty, end US homelessness, Medicaid for the uninsured, universal US pre K six hundred dollar checks to th two hundred thirty five do ⁓ million Americans, which I do want to circle back to because you you wrote about how the Biden administration in Congress went back on that and we saw that, you know, you see that every day when you're working with poor people in the United States in an eviction court with that ⁓ in twenty twenty one people were not getting evicted. People had options, people had tax credits, they had stimulus they had ⁓ you know, ⁓ full food stamps, etcetera. ⁓ power half of the United States households with solar with money left over, right? The money could be like a little bit of a weaning off maybe for Lockheed Martin, et cetera, and some re employment for for those folks in that industry, right? ⁓ Stephen Semler: ⁓ yeah, yeah. The just transition thing is like if you so a common justification for all this quote unquote national security spending is jobs. And that's that's sort of the argument they resort to because they realize the actual national security justification is non existent or incredibly weak, so they default to, you know, a bread and butter issue like jobs. But even if you the terms of that debate and you look at okay, so how many jobs does this actually produce? Like yes, military ⁓ you on an econometric level does produce ⁓ a amount of jobs per million dollars invested. I think it's like six per million dollars. But if you look at literally any other way to invest those funds and get jobs back, investing in literally any other sector is a more efficient producer of jobs. I mean, for education it's something crazy. It's like ⁓ or it's like two or ⁓ and a half or three times more per dollar invested. ⁓ for, you know, climate programs, infrastructure, construction, stuff like that, it's it's ⁓ Fran Quigley: Sure. Stephen Semler: Like fifty percent more or in some cases a hundred percent more per dollars invested. I forget where the question was. Sorry, I I couldn't sent out ⁓ Fran Quigley: No, no, I th that that that kind of leads to well ⁓ the question was just that that idea of j of just transition and and the fact that they're you know, they they'll they'll lean back on jobs, like you say, which is ⁓ is a fraction compared to what green energy and infrastructure improvement and you know, a return to something like the New Deal, right? Works Progress Administration or you know, just it's so much ⁓ I live in a red state in Indiana, you know, the the infrastructure needs are enormous because we've underfunded the the public sector so much. There's so many things that we could do with that money. Stephen Semler: ⁓ yeah yeah. Fran Quigley: And which I think kinda leads to what I wanted to ask about you you you wrote, ⁓ again, I think it was in December that one in ten voters want a bigger military budget. Literally ninety percent do not, but eight in ten senators voted for it and that that that circles back to the to the campaign money. I once heard an advocate for campaign finance reform saying that ⁓ that that doesn't necessarily need to be your your most important ⁓ important issue. No, your doesn't need to be campaign finance reform doesn't need to be your top issue, but it needs to be your first issue because anything else we want to accomplish is going to be blocked by the f the money that that's in politics now. But but the public doesn't like that to the point that they that the the administration has lied, lied in in in huge numbers. And and you wrote about this and and that got a lot of play. I see I saw it a lot of different places where you crunch the numbers and found that the the real cost of their Iran war was was many times more ⁓ than what the the Trump administration was claiming. Like, you know, how did you you know how how did you how did you uncover that? What do you you know, you see the number that they give and and I obviously I think we probably most of us distrust that number, but you're the one who could figure out why that's wrong. How did you do that? Stephen Semler: Yeah, I I I've crunched war costs before and I've tracked military and and that sort of thing. I've written a couple of papers for Brown University's Cost of War project. Linda who wrote with Joe Stiglitz a best selling book, in the early two thousands, the three trillion dollar war, which is on the costs of the Iraq War. I've read that several times through it's it's somewhere behind me. but ⁓ you you kinda just ⁓ learn from people who are extraordinarily good at that sort of thing and there's very few of them. Linda Billmas is a professor at Harvard and ⁓ best selling author at this point on for that book and just ⁓ extremely cool person. and of sub Fran Quigley: And Stiglitz has us ⁓ Nobel Prize in economics, right? That little that little thing, right? Yeah. Yeah, that's great. Stephen Semler: Yeah, yeah, but Linda's cooler. Just cause I know. Just cause just 'cause I know or not. I really like Linda. But you know, you learn from people who are extremely good at this stuff, and then you read papers in other sectors and you kind of combine methodologies and you just figure out what's ⁓ you know, basically what's going on. And I wouldn't have done the analysis had the figure that Pentagon chief Pete Heggseth and acting comptroller Jules Hurth Hearst gave Congress was so ridiculously low. And they said it was 25 billion to start, and then a couple weeks later it was 29 billion. way, it's it's impossibly low. Through 60 days, I I counted 72 billion. I think it was 71.8 billion. ⁓ and that's for operations, that's for expended ammunitions, that's for military to ⁓ other countries relevant to the conflict, namely Israel. and also ⁓ damage and destroyed military assets, infrastructure, equipment, that sort of thing. You run all this cost together and conservatively, I estimated seventy two billion. And, you know, a certain extent you can maybe go into Pentagon math and and figure out a way to say it's lower. But I don't see even even being fully invested in the earn internal logics of Pentagon bookkeeping, can you produce a figure that's twenty five or twenty nine billion? You're still looking at over sixty billion. So they're lying to Congress about the cost of the war is what I'm trying to say. And doing it very, very patently. And one piece I have working out is supposed to be out yesterday, but it I'm just Fran Quigley: Yeah. Yeah. Stephen Semler: writing incredibly slowly as of late, but I looked at all the public opinion data for every US war where there's public opinion data for. So every war since World War Two. And time, just as a sneak preview, over time wars get more unpopular. Even the popular ones like World War II that ended that ha started with like 95% net approval and ended around 60 net approval, which is support minus opposition. So that's still wildly popular. Fran Quigley: Mm-hmm. Stephen Semler: Every war starts with with positive public opinion, meaning there's more people who support it than oppose. and then some wars, recent ones typically, ⁓ in Vietnam, start with public s net support and then end with negative. They end up under underwater. The Iran war is the only one that has never had public support. It's been underwater the whole time. ⁓ started out at negative thirteen net support, and now it's at negative thirty. Fran Quigley: Not even day one. Wow. Stephen Semler: And this is really the only amusing part is that you have an administration who are bona fide fascists. Like Pete Hagsath is is fascism to like easy almost a caricature in that respect. media question or or thing of accountability, it's ⁓ that wasn't a very patriotic question. I think he's literally said that. So just doesn't believe in accountability at all. And they're to th it's they Fran Quigley: Yeah, yeah. Stephen Semler: They are a serious threat. I don't wanna downplay it, but these are incompetent fascists. Th these are bumbling idiots. So they're trying to ⁓ they're trying to cultivate this image of a of a winning war, a productive war, a good war, and the public just isn't buying it. It just isn't buying it. And I think that's that feeds into why they lied about the cost of war, because it's it's a performative war. The peace through strength thing, which is the justification, it's it's n it's based on performance really, not necessarily theatrical, but it it requires it demands just a violent expression of force because without it, it's meaningless because, you know, it's it's peace through strength, but w strength being, you know, projection of military force and war. But without that projection of military strength and war, there's peace. So they're just they're just trying to cultivate this image and th they're just radically overestimating their ability to manipulate public opinion. But again, they're really when they Fran Quigley: Right, right. Stephen Semler: lie about these costs, they're really lying to Congress and then us by proxy. They're just provide I I think in part, they're lying just to provide Congress an out, basically, an excuse to provide funds. and from what I'm hearing on the Hill, the I mean Republicans are on board with the one point five trillion dollar budget. w part of most of that's come through the regular budget and then Trump wants another three hundred and fifty billion through reconciliation, which is Reconciliation is the process, ⁓ his big beautiful bill was passed last year. and then there's the Iran War supplemental, which if you think my estimate is a little high, the latest report is that the Pentagon is gonna ask for eighty to a hundred billion. So maybe my estimate is a bit low. Fran Quigley: Mm-hmm. Wow. Wow. And and you mentioned, you know, congress will will will almost certainly go along and ⁓ you know, Democrats certainly aren't in control of Congress but have a important role, have staff. w i is it ⁓ for me to be concerned that I am seeing these real costs coming from you ⁓ not seeing a lot of pushback from the loyal opposition saying that these are are crazy, there's, you know, all this lost opportunity, the numbers are lies, et cetera. I mean, I just don't see it clearly and vociferously coming from most or Democrats in ⁓ in Congress. Or or or am I just missing it and and and they're doing this work too. Stephen Semler: You'll see it from ⁓ Democratic voters. You'll see it on Twitter or or social media or whatever. from Republican voters as well. You'll see it from damn near everybody except for Congress. Democratic politicians will here's the state of play, and I'll I'll generalize here in understanding there's exceptions. The establishment Democrats at this point in Congress realize that there is a benefit politically to being anti-war. ⁓ and they will go as so far as introducing legal authorizations like war powers resolutions and stuff like that. They will bring up how Trump is prioritizing war over everyday needs, over affordability, which is true. But I mean, I'm trained in military spending legislation, and that's how I interpret the world in some ways is that I follow the money. and I don't you know, I I think those legal authorizations are important and those legal constraints to ⁓ Trump's destruction ⁓ the military is it those are really important. But when we're talking about actually enabling what Trump is doing And you're talking about the most exalted purpose of Congress, talking about money. Congress has the power of the purse, ⁓ when it comes to military spending, Democrats just aren't willing to use it. The closest they got recently was after forget which after which ICE murder it was, Democrats introduced a democratic leadership, I should say. Fran Quigley: Mm. Right. Right. Stephen Semler: Schumer and Jeffries introduced what I can only describe as a milkedose set of reforms that ICE could have just rejected out of hand in exchange for ⁓ regular budget. so they ⁓ Democrats agree to ⁓ pass funding or ⁓ broader of Homeland Security funding without accepting those reforms. And Fran Quigley: Mm-hmm. Stephen Semler: th f for whatever reason they just didn't Republicans just didn't accept those reforms, which I don't think Democratic leadership was them to, which resulted in that huge drawn out shutdown that only ended recently. so ⁓ What I'm saying is that Democrats, ⁓ regardless of whether you're talking about the military or or the you know, internal policing repression, are willing to fund it just as long as it looks okay on the surface. But as far so as an example, the big beautiful bill last year, which they which they now call something else because it's polling so poorly. Now it's called like the Working Families Tax Cut Act, I think or something. Yeah, they rebranded. Fran Quigley: Yeah. Yeah. ⁓ I didn't know that. Yeah. I hate that name, so yeah. Stephen Semler: Which is funny because people always like ⁓ people were complaining about the title Big Beautiful Bill. Be but the public is, I think, smarter than people think. Like and they really s it's almost more insulting to call it that to them. ripping their s yeah. ⁓ that bill liquefied social programs in order to pay for tax cuts and also Fran Quigley: Well, especially when their when their Medicaid's getting cut off or their food stamps getting cut off, right? Yeah. Stephen Semler: in order to pay for increase in ICE spending, increase in military spending as well. from what I hear from my Sources on the Hill, which is a phrase I don't get to say much, so I'm gonna revel in it, my sources on the Hill ⁓ ⁓ that ⁓ Fran Quigley: There you go. Stephen Semler: Democratic leadership in the House, i.e. Hakeem Jeffries, word from that office was to the rank and file Democrats in Congress was to not protest the military spending in the bill. You can make they said you could, you know, complain about, you know you know, in speech or introduced amendments that would maybe cut surface level or make conditional cuts to the hundred and fifty billion and extra military spending that Bill had. don't try to cut the whole thing. Don't make a scene about it. You can complain about anything else, but don't complain about the military spending. And that's ⁓ word is now that Democrats are just leadership wise are just gonna go along with the $1.5 trillion dollar budget. They aren't gonna try to cut it in any serious way. They might vote against the bill, whatever, you know, they might vote against the standard military budget. They might vote against the reconcili I mean, they'll definitely vote against the reconciliation bill, most likely. and they might vote against the Iran supplemental bill. but I affect I expect a few detractors and I expect them ⁓ not do everything that they can to ⁓ prevent funding from being enacted. It's just not a priority for them, even though they realize being anti-war is on the surface is, but they're just not willing to actually make the substantive changes necessary that reflect the public's will. Fran Quigley: Right. And and and I will say again, your research shows why. That we don't have to wonder this is not a philosophical choice, this is not a a a pro support our troops or or or job creation or any of that bullshit. It it it is about how these lawmakers have been funded. And and your your research and I think I'm gonna s I'm gonna point back again, I think it was December twenty twenty five, your post about showing exactly what you said earlier, is it that that ⁓ and ⁓ ⁓ Congresspeople are are voting with ⁓ the side that's funding their campaigns, that that's ⁓ pr providing them the know, the the the job security that that they want and ⁓ way, way, way in contradiction to what their ⁓ what their voters want. So Stephen Semler: Right. And that money just really just it's about creating an ecosystem. the campaign contributions, the f the hiring of lobbyists, the of think tanks, ⁓ that's underrated one. If you look at the think tanks ⁓ who who provide experts ⁓ to in on in front of Congress on military spending and foreign affairs matters, the th the experts overwhelmingly Fran Quigley: Mm. Mm-hmm. Stephen Semler: and in some years entirely come from think tanks funded by military contractors. So it's really about the money i sometimes it functions in a quid pro quo like stand like backroom corruption sort of way, but it's it's really about keeping a certain attitude in Congress and building walls between Congress and the people it represents. Fran Quigley: And and speaking of those walls, I wanna also make sure we we spend a little bit of time. You ⁓ again, your your background is on on this military spending in the military industrial complex to what that's citing Eisenhower, right? We go back to to that. But you've also you know it and again th they're not unrelated, but you've spent a a fair amount of time ⁓ and analysis ⁓ on what how people are struggling economically here in the United States. And so you have a a recent article about U US credit card debt. ⁓ that we are it's again folks can probably either they know themselves or they know some of my loved one who is is seriously, seriously underwater with credit card debt. but you you ⁓ exactly what we're talking about at at a national level. So do you want to ⁓ talk a little bit about about that and again how that is obviously tied to ⁓ know the now Gas prices going up, food prices going up, et cetera. and and we don't and we do know people who are using credit cards to to to buy groceries, to to pay for health care, et cetera. So ⁓ I think this was a May sixteenth article by you that I want folks to to go back. I think the title is US credit card debt is historically high. So ⁓ what did you find when you researched this? Stephen Semler: that US credit card debt is historically high. I just I in fact I just I just wrote I got an editor from Market Watch, which is this ⁓ is I guess like affiliated with like Wall Street Journal. ⁓ i I wro I just wrote an opinion piece that's based on that analysis. And I Market Watch is not a website of Fran Quigley: Okay. Good headline. Okay. Stephen Semler: I would normally read or I don't think I've ever read it, in fact, 'cause it's ver it's very it's very it's it's very like investor based. But it said something that the editor reached out and wanted me to write something about it. So it's kind of good news that this is gaining currency. I did use I mean, th the word consumer will probably be like used in the op ed and I'd never use like the word consumer. But but you know, like that sort of thing. But it's cool. It's cool that it Fran Quigley: Same same. Yeah, I'm not sure. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Stephen Semler: The thing about you know the thing that worries me about the credit card debt thing is just how prolific it is and just more people have it, the total is higher and the debt is more expensive to carry. So APRs went from fifteen or sixteen percents you around twenty fifteen to twenty nineteen to now it's twenty-two or twenty-three percent. I think most recently it's at twenty-one point five percent, which is insane. So if you Fran Quigley: Yeah. Yeah. Stephen Semler: And I think like all this market research for firms like I studied like a Bain and company study for it. And they're like, ⁓ yeah, this is really bad. This is like this is very, very strong indicator that consumer health is a term they use, is very poor. I would agree in my own terms. ⁓ the the met the so I guess I'm I'm concerned ⁓ not I guess, I mean Fran Quigley: Yes, yeah. Stephen Semler: I'm concerned with matters of of security. And I'm trained, you know, in school of matters of national security, but ⁓ perspective of how I interpret the ⁓ is through a lens of a concept I'm developing or has maybe it's has been developed in the past that I'm trying to refine is working class security. So instead of evaluating security conditions in the United States through the lens of the state, what's good for the nation, what's bad for the nation, you look at ⁓ How is the working class doing? Which is good because those are the people mostly who are living in the country. So you're not asking about how the country's doing, you're asking about how the people are doing who are living in it. another good thing about that, you know, lens is that it immediately binds you to the working class abroad too. So ⁓ you're able to see past states and you're able to interpret, you know, the conditions that are that tie you yourself, Guy in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where I am, or or Bloomington, Indiana, abroad. So I interpret the world in that respect. So that that ties in the military spending portion and wars and that sort of thing, but also it ties me into your world as well, because you're talking about the everyday conditions that people live in. What are the most urgent threats that are facing them? And public health research over the last two hundred years have shown, you know, if housing isn't an order, everything else apart really. I mean it's it's really the most important part. And as know, the it's ⁓ amusing some respects that if you look at a chart on credit card debt, or if you look at a chart on poverty, or any chart on economic insecurity, which ⁓ the ability to make Fran Quigley: Absolutely. Absolutely. Stephen Semler: one's to reliably make one's ends meet. all show the same thing, which is if starting in 2019, it shows a dip in 2020 ⁓ or or or a decrease in in security so an improvement in twenty twenty then a major improvement in twenty twenty one A worsening in 2022, worsening in 2023, and a continued worsening and s after that. And that aligns perfectly with the creation and dissolution of the pandemic welfare state. The eviction moratorium you r ⁓ you mentioned earlier. There was additional funding for security provided through I think the American Rescue Plan and I think maybe even the CARES Act as well. But but but yeah, but basically Fran Quigley: Right, right both. Yeah. Yeah. Stephen Semler: What I was talking about, that difference between national security and working class security, or human security, I guess will be the more popular term, is that in twenty twenty one, the US government changed its perspective from being just intensely focused in prioritizing national security to focusing on human security. And the results were obvious. I mean, historic reduction in poverty and child poverty. And then Fran Quigley: During a pandemic, for goodness sakes, right? When people were Yeah, yeah. Stephen Semler: Which is wild. Imagine if we did that one economic condition macroeconomic conditions, I should say. We're good. It would be it would be sublime. But instead what happened was a nightmare unfolded. We saw this historic reduction in in poverty and child poverty and again, every single chart looks the same way. So I made one that at the bottom you it shows the poverty rate, supplemental poverty rate, so it shows it from ⁓ tw ⁓ twenty nineteen eleven point eight to twelve point nine for standard and then twelve point six to thirteen point four. and for to twenty twenty to twenty twenty four it was ⁓ nine point to thirteen point four and then nine point two to twelve point nine percent. So you saw this huge increase from twenty nineteen to twenty twenty four or twenty twenty to twenty four. and in between a huge reduction in twenty twenty one. again, if you that that same shape of graph follows from level of economic insecurity you look at. So if you say poverty is is like the baseline most severe level of economic insecurity. And then above that you have the number of the percentage of people who paid overdraft or NSF fees at their bank. And then above that you say you have the data on the people who said they have diff difficulty paying household bills at some point in the last week or month or year. And then above that you say the broader measure of that ⁓ the Federal Reserve does of living comfortably, the percentage of people who are living comfortably or not Fran Quigley: Mm-hmm. Stephen Semler: at every level it just makes the same exact shape. So whichever level of economic security you care about, you're indirectly caring about the other ones as well, or you should at least, because it it I don't know w whether you call poverty a leading indicator at that point. But what I'm saying is is that they all follow the same shape and they all follow the creation and destruction of the pandemic welfare state. And that destruction of the pend that pandemic welfare state happened at the exact worst time, which was during a historic bout of inflation. Fran Quigley: Right. Right. And ⁓ and again, anyone doing frontline work with with poor folks was seeing it. We s you know, see folks who are sleeping in their cars a res as a result of that, right? People are literally sleeping on the street as a result of that, going without health care. and I I wanna point out that you know, we we talk about Biden twenty twenty one and ⁓ American Plan, but I said it's the CARES Act, you this was twenty twenty, this is Trump administration. So, you know, the there was there was enough ⁓ Stephen Semler: Yeah. Fran Quigley: mo political momentum that we really made this huge change. And I I wanna make sure that listeners know that when we're talking numbers, mostly Steven's talking numbers 'cause he's much better at that than I but his his charts are amazing and the charts are incredibly understandable for a non data person like me and and for others as well. So that's again Steven Stemmler Steven Stemmler dot com, where I am happy to be a paid subscriber and you should be too. It's doesn't ⁓ Can't remember what it costs. It doesn't cost much. It was it was a it was a it was a bargain. And and I do want to you ⁓ c affirm to folks that this is y you are connecting if we're concerned when probably a lot of these listeners are concerned with with the US poverty that we're seeing in our communities, maybe in our work and our in our on our on our streets in our neighborhoods, it's very, very much tied to the the the spending ⁓ the the crazy militarism that that we are ⁓ focused on at the national level and Steven always makes that point and and connects it to it. ⁓ so before we we s sign off, I wanna be respectful of your time here, but I I want to talk a little bit about your hearing a little bit about your path. You you've mentioned a l a a little about that that you you had a period of time where you were ⁓ working on the what did you say? You didn't say defense contractor. What did you say it's war spending, I think you were ⁓ what did ⁓ what was the term you Stephen Semler: ⁓ I said ⁓ yeah, yeah, I I worked in government relations as a a for military contractors. Yeah. Fran Quigley: Military contractors. Okay. ⁓ but ⁓ we know you said national security and quotes. I like your rephrasing a few times of of that this is not about national security. It's about financial security for billionaires and ⁓ ⁓ and their contractors. ⁓ so wha you know, how can you talk a little bit about your your path to in fact you did do humanitarian work, you know, how how did you get to doing data journalism? Stephen Semler: Yeah, yeah. Yeah, ⁓ you know, in between my career as an arms industry lobbyist, I was able to do a little bit of soul searching. Ended up in the humanitarian sector working for this giant NGO. ⁓ I was based in Beirut. I think it was called the ⁓ Syria Access Team. This is about providing intelligence and ⁓ ⁓ logistics and just providing you know the ground research ⁓ needs barriers to entry to ⁓ people delivering the humanitarian assistance on the ground. If the office was called the Syria Humanitarian Access Team, but I think they changed the name ⁓ after pointed out the that that acronym ⁓ spelled out SHAT. So I think called something else now. Like I think it's like ⁓ Fran Quigley: No, you earned your salary just doing that. Stephen Semler: Yeah, yeah. I I I thought it was funny. I think they were horrified. But so ⁓ I think I th ⁓ is when I really started to pay attention to those on the ground indicators. Because in the humanitarian sector you look at, you know, human security indicators all the time. But when it comes to the US, like the data's available, But people don't pay attention to it and then other times the data's just not available. There's this great the Census Bureau had this thing called the Household Pulse Survey during the pandemic, which rocked. was ⁓ asked about housing, how they you know, not just current conditions, but past conditions and and their expectations for the future. So ⁓ your world, which is which is so cool by the way. I didn't know you took your students to eviction court. That rocks, dude. Fran Quigley: Yeah, that's ⁓ yeah, you know, and and we we referenced the household poll survey about the ⁓ number of people behind on rent and behind on their mortgage that are just on the verge, right? And you can imagine the stress and of course many times people get pushed off that edge. ⁓ yeah, that's amazing. They don't do is that not ⁓ is it is was that just a pandemic ⁓ level of detail or they still do that? Stephen Semler: Yeah. Yeah. So they're d so they resurrected it but it's it's much slower now. ⁓ and there actually is I'll send it to you. I looked at the data. I think they still have housing data. I'll send you the numbers. I haven't published it anywhere, I'll just send you the spreadsheet I was able to crunch. But it it like c it comes as like a public use file, which I had to like figure out how to to decode by myself instead of like ⁓ ⁓ one reason the household post serv pulse server was great is because it like this interactive dashboard you could track in real time. Fran Quigley: Okay. No, thanks. Stephen Semler: And if you again if you look at any one of those indicators on security, economic insecurity, food insecurity, they all follow it's any plotted out by year, they all improve radically in twenty twenty one. It's actually kind of nice to look at as someone who has a bit of an obsessive thing going on. It's just like they all follow the same shape. It's beautiful. so that's where my interest started was in the humanitarian sector, ⁓ focusing those everyday lived conditions. because I I mean ⁓ Fran Quigley: Yeah. Stephen Semler: I studied foreign affairs and l political science in undergrad and grad school. but and I s I remain deeply interested in that sort of thing. but at same time I I realized like yeah, there's there's a connection there between, you know, security and human security and I thought the latter was Fran Quigley: Mm-hmm. Stephen Semler: Wildly underrated. Because you look at national security, that that what is national security? The national interest is is is determined by the people in charge, and the people in charge are routinely and structurally put private interests over the public interest. So I wanted to, you know, kind of balance those worlds. As far as the graph thing and the data journalism part, like i initially my newsletter started as as ⁓ as an advisory service to candidates challenging incumbents ⁓ on congressional level. So I was advising congressional candidates informally and sometimes ⁓ formally through that channel. and then I never I Fran Quigley: Mm. Stephen Semler: I didn't bother putting any like paywall or anything up. So kind of word got out and other people started paying attention to it. So it kind of spiraled from there. The chart thing I don't I I can't I honestly can't remember. I think I I just I I had a post it that did really well. and I realized that I was a good writer, maybe even good, but not brilliant. And I was also getting annoyed by people who I think use bad word efficiency and really made readers work to find the point of the article. So I kind of overreacted in a way and said, Okay, so how can I make channel those complaints and that feedback into a source where people can Fran Quigley: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Stephen Semler: read the text of the email they want they want or read the newsletter if they want, but they can quickly scroll and see the main takeaway right away. And at least like if they disagree with my perspective, they at least have some concrete data that they can interpret however they like. so now I've I've chosen that theme and now it's it's about every every newsletter has a chart and I force it to be that way, even if it's not conducive. so ⁓ which good 'cause that constraint breeds creativity. So a and it forces me to actually do a lot of empirical research that I wouldn't have done otherwise. Fran Quigley: ⁓ that's Right, right. You can't a a chart can't lie, right? You c it is not ⁓ it's not a subjective piece of information. I gotta say, ⁓ somebody who is a big fan of your stuff, that's the first thing I look at. I before I re you know, I'm a text person, I'm I'm a I'm a words person, but I will look at the chart. The the visual the power of that is is ⁓ is is worth your effort. So thank you for making the effort and like you say, even if it's ⁓ hard to shoot. Yeah. No, it's it's it's and I I've gotta say I've Stephen Semler: ⁓ that means so much to me, Fran. ⁓ coming from you dude, I mean that that really means a lot. ⁓ so so I'm happy you appreciate it. Fran Quigley: I'm trying to think if I have, if I haven't, I will. You know, ⁓ as a teacher, you're, you know, putting things up on a screen a lot and and and no, you know, and again, we'd like to think the students are reading everything you assign, ⁓ but ⁓ but a chart is something everybody's gonna understand and you can talk about it in the class. It's like, ⁓ my God, what about this? and and ⁓ yeah, that's it's worth the I don't know how much time you put into it, but it's it's w the end result is definitely worth it. Stephen Semler: ⁓ they take they take f they take forever. They you know, they come out and and I think people just assume that it it's kind of an automated process. No, no. If there's an automated process, like I don't think I've ever used one and a lot of times it doesn't exist or would provide accurate data even if there was. But no, I I very much collect the data by hand. It's a ⁓ data collection, if you will. ⁓ i you know, and one thing I I was ⁓ Fran Quigley: Mm. Right. There you go. That's right. Stephen Semler: I I've heard that my charts get shown in in high school social studies classes and other classes in high school level, which was super flattering. ⁓ that and them being shown and referenced on podcasts are like two of the and then also being used to like, you know, call people idiots indirectly on social media is another another method, another use that I find very amusing. But yeah, that's one reason I I try to keep the language PG 'cause, you know Fran Quigley: Absolutely, yeah. Stephen Semler: That's shown in high school classrooms though. Sometimes when you talk about this stuff it's it's hard. Fran Quigley: Right, right. No, the ripple effects of that, right? That a fifteen year old that's coming into political consciousness is seeing that and and talking about it with their with their peers or online or or showing their parents the error of their ways. ⁓ that's great. That's great. You don't even know what impact that's having. Stephen Semler: Yeah, yeah. In the footnotes I let myself become unglued a little bit and I make a lot of sarcastic remarks, along with, you know, rigorous rigorous citations and ⁓ off cue remarks you'll find in the footnotes, but otherwise ⁓ friend, I mean, I'm so flattered that you support my work and read my newsletter and ⁓ I I f follow your newsletter as well. I mean I follow your podcast. ⁓ so it's great to finally talk to you in person, dude. Fran Quigley: Ha. ⁓ Yeah, well I appreciate it, Stephen. And again I just wanna reference ⁓ Stevensler dot com. That's where you can find ⁓ the not just the the newsletter but also and then ⁓ I'll put the links in the show no show notes of ⁓ how to follow you on ⁓ on social. ⁓ 'cause this is important stuff. It's gonna continue to be important stuff and and again a lot of Stephen's stuff is that we we're living in a hellscape of a Trump administration and a in a Republican controlled Congress. But Democrats didn't, you know, haven't taken the opportunities that they have had in the past. They need to do that if they get the opportunities in the future. And it's going to take, you know, this kind of information ⁓ from us who are going to advocate for that. So Steven, thank you for being on the show. Really appreciate it. And ⁓ thanks for your continued work. And if you don't mind, I'm almost certainly going to circle back on, you know, who knows what the what the next developments are going to be that you're going to be writing about. So ⁓ we'd love to have you on the show again sometime. Stephen Semler: That sounds great to me, man. Reach out anytime. Fran Quigley: Okay, thanks. And thanks everyone for listening. And remember, until we meet again next week, we can do better. And we've just heard a lot about how we can find the money to do better. So thanks to Steven Semler. Thanks you all for listening. And we will see you next time.