Latest / The Matt Walsh Show / The Subscription Economy Is Killing the American Dream

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The Subscription Economy Is Killing the American Dream · The Matt Walsh Show

0:00
Speaker 1: We're all aware of the WEF's now infamous threat, you'll
0:03
Speaker 1: own nothing and be happy. Globalists have been using that
0:06
Speaker 1: phrase for a decade. Now, understandably, it's led to a
0:09
Speaker 1: lot of backlash. If you manage to survey 100 normal,
0:13
Speaker 1: non-schizophrenic people on the street, all 100 of them would
0:17
Speaker 1: tell you that owning property is preferable to borrowing everything.
0:21
Speaker 1: Just from a PR perspective, it's remarkable that they even
0:24
Speaker 1: attempted to push this messaging.
0:25
Speaker 2: It's obviously appalling.
0:27
Speaker 1: But as it turns out, You don't really need any
0:29
Speaker 1: buy-in from the public in order to force this plan
0:32
Speaker 1: down their throats. You can tell customers that they're buying
0:36
Speaker 1: something and you can clarify explicitly that they're purchasing it
0:40
Speaker 1: and not renting it. And then one day you can
0:43
Speaker 1: simply remove the product from their homes and you don't
0:46
Speaker 1: even have to offer them a refund or anything. This
0:49
Speaker 1: is one of the more important stories that isn't getting
0:51
Speaker 1: a lot of mainstream attention, but it's a very important
0:53
Speaker 1: sign of where things are going. Tens of thousands of
0:56
Speaker 1: people in the UK and Europe who purchased digital content
1:00
Speaker 1: on Sony's PlayStation Store, which sells games, movies, and television shows,
1:05
Speaker 1: recently received the following notification in their inbox. And here
1:09
Speaker 1: it is, quote, from September 1st, 2026, due to our
1:13
Speaker 1: content licensing agreements, you will no longer be able to
1:16
Speaker 1: access your previously purchased content from Studio Canal, and it
1:19
Speaker 1: will be removed from your video library.
1:22
Speaker 2: Thank you, PlayStation Store. That's it.
1:25
Speaker 1: They don't even get a refund. Not an apology. They're
1:29
Speaker 1: simply informed that although they thought they were purchasing this content,
1:33
Speaker 1: it was actually an extended rental and now it's gone.
1:37
Speaker 1: To be clear, customers navigated to the store page for
1:41
Speaker 1: various movies and television shows and they had an option.
1:44
Speaker 1: They could rent a movie, which they'd have to view
1:47
Speaker 1: within a month, or they could spend more money and, quote,
1:50
Speaker 1: purchase it. What's being deleted from their accounts are the purchases,
1:54
Speaker 1: including films like Apocalypse Now, Evil Dead, Highlander, Hot Fuzz, Paddington,
2:00
Speaker 1: Rambo First Blood, as well as First Blood Part 2, Robocop, Sharknado,
2:05
Speaker 1: Terminator 2 Judgment Day. Several television shows will also be removed,
2:08
Speaker 1: including American God Season 1 and Below the Surface Season 1.
2:13
Speaker 1: A couple of years ago, a similar purge nearly took place.
2:16
Speaker 1: This is from Business Insider back in 2023. Quote, Sony
2:21
Speaker 1: is removing hundreds of discovery titles from users' video libraries
2:25
Speaker 1: that they already purchased. Users who bought any of the
2:28
Speaker 1: hundreds of listed programs will no longer be able to
2:31
Speaker 1: access the content as of December 31st, according to a
2:34
Speaker 1: legal notice posted.
2:35
Speaker 2: By the company.
2:36
Speaker 1: Due to our content licensing arrangements with content providers, you
2:40
Speaker 1: will no longer be able to watch any of your
2:42
Speaker 1: previously purchased discovery content, and the content will be removed
2:45
Speaker 1: from your video library, according to the note. Now, in
2:49
Speaker 1: that case, Sony eventually signed new license arrangements that restored
2:53
Speaker 1: access to this content. But the point was made, you know,
2:56
Speaker 1: even when you purchase something online, you don't actually own it.
3:00
Speaker 1: You're at the mercy of whatever license you're agreeing to,
3:04
Speaker 1: which is 5,000 pages long and which no one will
3:07
Speaker 1: ever read. And indeed, just a few years later, Sony
3:10
Speaker 1: has said that it will begin removing digital purchases from
3:13
Speaker 1: everybody's account. Now, for now, these purges are unique to Sony,
3:17
Speaker 1: but every single online service that sells movies and television
3:20
Speaker 1: shows works the exact same way. I looked up the
3:24
Speaker 1: terms of service on Amazon Prime Video, for example. This
3:27
Speaker 1: is another service that says you can buy movies instead
3:30
Speaker 1: of just renting them. But when you read the fine
3:33
Speaker 1: print on the website, here's what you find. Quote, availability
3:38
Speaker 1: of purchased digital content. Purchased digital content will generally continue
3:42
Speaker 1: to be available to you for download or streaming from
3:44
Speaker 1: the service. as applicable, but may become unavailable due to
3:48
Speaker 1: potential content provider licensing restrictions or for other reasons, and
3:52
Speaker 1: Amazon will not be liable to you if purchased digital
3:55
Speaker 1: content becomes unavailable for further download or streaming. This should
4:00
Speaker 1: obviously be disclosed to everybody on the actual store page.
4:03
Speaker 2: Instead, it's buried in the fine print.
4:06
Speaker 1: So they're lying about what they're selling you. They're lying
4:09
Speaker 1: about what you actually own. In response, maybe you're thinking, well,
4:13
Speaker 1: it's just movies and television shows. They're not that important,
4:17
Speaker 1: which is true. But this general philosophy, the idea that
4:20
Speaker 1: you don't own something even after you've paid for it,
4:25
Speaker 1: obviously is not restricted to entertainment. This is just a
4:28
Speaker 1: symptom of a larger problem. As you've probably noticed, it's
4:33
Speaker 1: infecting pretty much every industry. For example, even if you
4:36
Speaker 1: generally tune out stories about corporate greed and the rising
4:41
Speaker 1: cost of living, This was a pretty unbelievable development that
4:44
Speaker 1: you probably remember. The automaker BMW announced a few years
4:48
Speaker 1: ago that it would begin charging customers a monthly subscription
4:52
Speaker 1: fee to use the heated seats that were already installed
4:55
Speaker 1: in their cars. The idea was that BMW's production lines
5:00
Speaker 1: would be simplified rather than having to make one batch
5:03
Speaker 1: of cars with heated seats and another without for every
5:06
Speaker 1: available paint color. And while you can make the argument
5:09
Speaker 1: this arrangement was more economical for BMW, the problem is
5:12
Speaker 1: that customers never saw any cost savings as a result
5:15
Speaker 1: of the change. BMW didn't lower the prices on all
5:18
Speaker 1: of their new cars by $ 1, 000 or something because of
5:21
Speaker 1: their new streamlined production lines. And therefore, the subscription fee
5:25
Speaker 1: went over about as well as you'd expect. There were
5:27
Speaker 1: endless news reports about it, like this one, which led
5:32
Speaker 1: to a lot of outrage.
5:33
Speaker 2: Watch.
5:34
Speaker 3: If you buy a car that has heated seats, you'd
5:36
Speaker 3: expect to be able to use them on a cold morning, right? Well,
5:39
Speaker 3: some BMW owners now have to pay more for that option.
5:44
Speaker 3: BMW recently rolled out subscription plans to overseas that require
5:50
Speaker 3: owners to pay a monthly fee for heated front seats.
5:54
Speaker 3: The seats are already installed in the cars, yet owners
5:57
Speaker 3: still have to pay $ 18 a month to use them.
6:00
Speaker 3: Or they can shell out $ 450 for a lifetime subscription.
6:05
Speaker 1: Now, it might seem easy to understand why people rebelled
6:07
Speaker 1: against this, but if you think about it, there's some
6:10
Speaker 1: nuance to the reaction. There's a very popular commentator in
6:15
Speaker 1: the do-it-yourself community named Lewis Rossman, who did a good
6:18
Speaker 1: job summarizing the reason for the outrage here. Rossman's point was,
6:23
Speaker 1: you know, it's one thing if the subscription fee unlocks
6:25
Speaker 1: some kind of advanced technology like self-driving or auto parking
6:30
Speaker 1: that the customers couldn't realistically implement on their own. People
6:33
Speaker 1: can tolerate that. And people do tolerate it all the time.
6:38
Speaker 1: Tesla is the prime example. But BMW is doing something
6:41
Speaker 1: very different and much more rudimentary. They were charging customers
6:46
Speaker 1: to send voltage to a transistor, which is the most
6:49
Speaker 1: basic thing imaginable. It's something that a customer could hardwire
6:53
Speaker 1: on their own in about 10 minutes, assuming the car
6:55
Speaker 1: didn't use software to lock them out, which it probably would.
6:59
Speaker 1: And that's why BMW's decision really infuriated people. With cable
7:04
Speaker 1: or Netflix, your subscription fee at least unlocks content that
7:07
Speaker 1: you couldn't easily create on your own. But BMW's subscription
7:11
Speaker 1: for heated seats didn't feel any different from, say, a
7:14
Speaker 1: subscription to lower your car windows or a subscription to
7:18
Speaker 1: spin your wheels really fast. So very quickly, the outrage
7:22
Speaker 1: forced BMW to backtrack. They announced that they would stop
7:25
Speaker 1: charging a fee for heated seats. But executives at BMW
7:29
Speaker 1: made it clear that They didn't fully understand the reason
7:32
Speaker 1: that they had angered so many people.
7:34
Speaker 2: This is from Edmonds.
7:35
Speaker 1: Quote, BMW board members, board member for sales and marketing,
7:39
Speaker 1: Peter Noda said, what we won't do anymore is offer
7:44
Speaker 1: seat heating by a monthly subscription. The heated seat subscription
7:48
Speaker 1: was reportedly going to cost buyers $ 18 a month. But
7:51
Speaker 1: Noda said BMW buyers feel that they pay double for
7:54
Speaker 1: the feature before insisting that isn't true. However, he acknowledged
7:57
Speaker 1: that perception is reality. While heated seats are out, other
8:00
Speaker 1: aspects of the brand's relatively new subscription.
8:03
Speaker 2: Model are not.
8:04
Speaker 1: Well, it's just about the worst possible response BMW could
8:08
Speaker 1: have given. He's accusing customers of being stupid because they
8:11
Speaker 1: thought they were paying double. And then he says that, well,
8:15
Speaker 1: even though they're stupid, they're still our customers and, you know,
8:18
Speaker 1: we got to make them happy. Therefore, we're going to
8:20
Speaker 1: keep charging them subscriptions for basic built-in features of their cars,
8:24
Speaker 1: just not the.
8:25
Speaker 2: Heated seats anymore. And indeed, he wasn't kidding.
8:29
Speaker 1: This is a quote from a BMW spokesperson from the
8:31
Speaker 1: outlet Motor One several years after the drama over the
8:35
Speaker 1: heated seats. Quote, adaptive suspension is available through the connected
8:39
Speaker 1: drive store in the U.S., but a subscription isn't required.
8:43
Speaker 1: Still available as a factory option, but through the store,
8:46
Speaker 1: it can be added to certain cars that.
8:48
Speaker 2: Weren't optioned that way originally.
8:50
Speaker 1: Customers can try it out for a month at no charge.
8:53
Speaker 1: And if they like it, they can opt for a
8:55
Speaker 1: monthly or yearly subscription. if they wish, or simply buy
8:59
Speaker 1: it outright for a one-time $ 500 charge. To be clear,
9:02
Speaker 1: a monthly subscription isn't required to use the feature. So
9:07
Speaker 1: you're going to be charged $ 27 a month or a
9:10
Speaker 1: $ 500 one-time fee if you want to use your adaptive suspension.
9:14
Speaker 1: But whatever you do, don't call it a subscription. They
9:18
Speaker 1: say it's not a subscription because you can pay a
9:21
Speaker 1: bunch of money up front to own the feature indefinitely.
9:27
Speaker 1: First of all, this is Exactly what they were doing
9:29
Speaker 1: with the heated seats. It's the exact same policy, complete
9:31
Speaker 1: with the buyout option. Only this time they're being more
9:35
Speaker 1: careful to avoid bad PR by saying again and again
9:38
Speaker 1: that no subscription is required. But more importantly, no, you
9:41
Speaker 1: don't actually own that feature at all in any meaningful sense,
9:44
Speaker 1: even once you complete the purchase. If your car is totaled,
9:49
Speaker 1: the feature won't transfer to a new BMW and your
9:52
Speaker 1: insurance company isn't going to pay you $ 500 for it
9:53
Speaker 1: in all likelihood. For centuries, John Milton's Paradise Lost has
9:58
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10:01
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10:05
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10:09
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10:11
Speaker 1: serve in heaven. It's a line that cuts to the
10:13
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10:16
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10:18
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10:22
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10:25
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10:29
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10:30
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10:34
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10:37
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10:41
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10:44
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10:48
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10:50
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10:54
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11:11
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11:15
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12:11
Speaker 1: What Sony and BMW are doing or attempting to do
12:15
Speaker 1: is not unique. They're just a couple of prominent examples
12:18
Speaker 1: of a phenomenon that we're all familiar with at this point.
12:22
Speaker 1: We're living in an era where increasingly we don't own
12:26
Speaker 1: anything and we have no real legal rights to products
12:29
Speaker 1: that we're paying for. You can buy a $ 2, 500 bike
12:33
Speaker 1: from Peloton, but it's basically useless unless you pay for
12:35
Speaker 1: an all-access membership, which costs $ 50 a month. You don't
12:39
Speaker 1: get your live classes or your workout library or your
12:42
Speaker 1: fitness progress or any of the interactive features that supposedly
12:45
Speaker 1: make the bike worthwhile. You can buy a $ 200 digital
12:49
Speaker 1: wall calendar off Amazon, complete with smartphone integration so that
12:53
Speaker 1: all of your family's events are prominently displayed in real
12:55
Speaker 1: time on the refrigerator. But for the privilege of updating
12:58
Speaker 1: this calendar, you can expect to pay an annual fee
13:00
Speaker 1: of around $ 95 a year. Yes, calendars now cost $ 200
13:02
Speaker 1: plus $ 100 a year. And people are buying this. You
13:11
Speaker 1: can get a Whoop fitness tracker to track your sleep
13:14
Speaker 1: if you're a crazy person. But some people think it's worthwhile.
13:18
Speaker 1: And regardless, it's the kind of thing that obviously shouldn't
13:21
Speaker 1: require a monthly fee. But if you want to use
13:23
Speaker 1: the device, then you need to shell out at least
13:26
Speaker 1: $ 25 a month or realistically closer to $ 40 a month
13:28
Speaker 1: for all the features. Otherwise, your device is nothing more
13:32
Speaker 1: than a paperweight. You can pay $ 100 for a Ring
13:35
Speaker 1: doorbell camera, but if you don't pay the subscription fee,
13:38
Speaker 1: which runs from $ 50 to $ 100 per year, then you'll
13:42
Speaker 1: probably end up like Savannah Guthrie's mom. Your Ring won't
13:45
Speaker 1: save any footage at all, so if somebody comes to
13:48
Speaker 1: your house in the middle of the night and drags
13:49
Speaker 1: you away, well, good luck. Nobody will ever hear from
13:52
Speaker 1: you again. You can buy a Volkswagen, but if you
13:55
Speaker 1: want to use the full horsepower the car is capable of,
13:58
Speaker 1: you'll need to pony up some more cash.
14:00
Speaker 2: Watch.
14:01
Speaker 4: Volkswagen just did something that should make every car owner furious.
14:04
Speaker 4: They're selling their electric ID3 with its full horsepower, locked
14:08
Speaker 4: behind a paid subscription. The car comes from the factory
14:10
Speaker 4: with 228 horsepower, but if you don't pay a monthly fee,
14:13
Speaker 4: it's software limited to just 201. For about $ 22 a month,
14:16
Speaker 4: they'll flip a digital switch and unlock the power that
14:18
Speaker 4: was already inside the car that you paid for.
14:21
Speaker 1: You can buy an iPhone, but without a $ 5 a
14:23
Speaker 1: month iCloud subscription, you'll run out of space for your
14:27
Speaker 1: photos and movies. Of course, you need to pay for
14:30
Speaker 1: the cell phone service monthly as well. You can buy
14:33
Speaker 1: a smart home device, but without paying for Alexa, none
14:36
Speaker 1: of your devices will communicate with each other. You can
14:39
Speaker 1: buy food on Uber Eats or DoorDash, but if you
14:43
Speaker 1: don't pay for an annual membership, you'll pay extra fees
14:46
Speaker 1: on every order.
14:48
Speaker 2: You'll also get worse drivers.
14:49
Speaker 1: You can buy an Xbox or PlayStation, but if you
14:51
Speaker 1: want to play online with your friends, you'll need to
14:53
Speaker 1: pay something like $ 50 to $ 100 a year for the
14:56
Speaker 1: privilege of doing that. You used to be able to
14:58
Speaker 1: go to the store and buy Microsoft Word. You know,
15:02
Speaker 1: old people will remember this. It came with a big
15:04
Speaker 1: box and everything. Well, now Microsoft pressures you to sign
15:07
Speaker 1: up for an Office 365 monthly subscription. And meanwhile, Ford
15:12
Speaker 1: locks down basic features like built-in navigation with live traffic
15:16
Speaker 1: as well as in-dash streaming apps behind a paywall.
15:19
Speaker 2: You can pay $ 15 a month, $ 150 a year, or
15:20
Speaker 2: a $ 750 one-time fee.
15:25
Speaker 1: And there's an even more egregious Ford security package, which
15:29
Speaker 1: is available on new F-150s, Mustangs, and Expeditions. For the
15:32
Speaker 1: low price of $ 8 a month or $ 80 a year,
15:36
Speaker 1: you'll get push notifications on your phone if somebody tries
15:39
Speaker 1: to force your door open or if the car's GPS
15:42
Speaker 1: location changes when the engine is off, meaning your truck
15:44
Speaker 1: is getting towed or maybe dismantled on the side of
15:47
Speaker 1: the road. But one of the most important features in
15:51
Speaker 1: this monthly subscription plan is called Start Inhibit. So this
15:55
Speaker 1: is a feature that, according to Ford, quote, lets you
15:57
Speaker 1: respond quickly by remotely locking down your vehicle from being started,
16:01
Speaker 1: even if an authorized key is detected nearby. And the
16:07
Speaker 1: point of this feature is to prevent so-called relay attacks
16:11
Speaker 1: like the one that you're seeing on your screen right now.
16:15
Speaker 1: And in a relay attack, a thief walks up to
16:17
Speaker 1: your front door or the side of your house with
16:20
Speaker 1: a large signal booster. And normally, your key fob only
16:24
Speaker 1: unlocks your car if you're within a couple of feet
16:26
Speaker 1: of the vehicle. But the signal booster tricks your car
16:29
Speaker 1: into thinking that the key fob is right next to
16:31
Speaker 1: the door. The thieves then unlock the car, start the
16:34
Speaker 1: push-button ignition, and they drive off before you realize what's happened. Now,
16:39
Speaker 1: with the Ford security plan, the start inhibit will stop
16:43
Speaker 1: this kind of attack. It will prevent anyone from starting
16:46
Speaker 1: the car with the fob unless the start inhibit option
16:50
Speaker 1: is disabled immediately.
16:52
Speaker 2: In your Ford app.
16:53
Speaker 1: So in other words, Ford wants to charge you a
16:56
Speaker 1: monthly fee in order to correct a security vulnerability that
17:00
Speaker 1: they have built into every single one of their vehicles.
17:04
Speaker 1: So instead of allowing you to say, require a pin
17:07
Speaker 1: to be entered before your truck will start, Ford demands
17:10
Speaker 1: that you pay them $ 80 a year to enable this
17:12
Speaker 1: feature within the app. Oh, you have to select start
17:16
Speaker 1: inhibit every time you park the car, which is obviously
17:20
Speaker 1: very convenient as well. Now, the upshot is that when
17:23
Speaker 1: you buy a new Ford, you're given a major incentive
17:27
Speaker 1: to subscribe to at least two different monthly plans in
17:30
Speaker 1: order to make the car function as it should. And
17:35
Speaker 1: that's not to pick on Ford necessarily. Again, this is
17:37
Speaker 1: an epidemic. Everyone's doing it. You could buy a $ 200
17:40
Speaker 1: printer from HP only to discover that your ink cartridges
17:43
Speaker 1: have been remotely disabled because you canceled your HP instant
17:47
Speaker 1: ink subscription. That's something that actually happens to people for
17:51
Speaker 1: the record. And HP is proud of this program.
17:54
Speaker 2: Watch.
17:56
Speaker 5: HP Instant Ink is a smart print subscription service that
17:59
Speaker 5: delivers ink the moment you need it. You get ink
18:01
Speaker 5: or toner, plus hassle-free deliveries.
18:03
Speaker 1: How does it work?
18:04
Speaker 5: Step one, pick a plan based on the number of
18:06
Speaker 5: pages you print in a month. Step two, print whatever
18:09
Speaker 5: you want. Every page costs the same, no matter how
18:11
Speaker 5: much ink you use. Step three, when you run low,
18:14
Speaker 5: your smart printer lets us know, and we ship your
18:16
Speaker 5: ink or toner at no extra cost. Print more or less.
18:19
Speaker 5: Unused pages roll over, and extra pages cost just pennies. Plus,
18:23
Speaker 5: you can change plans or cancel any time.
18:26
Speaker 1: They say you can cancel any time, but they don't
18:28
Speaker 1: tell you that if you cancel, they'll remotely disable the
18:31
Speaker 1: ink in your printer. Nor do they warn you about
18:33
Speaker 1: any of the other problems that customers are experiencing. And
18:38
Speaker 1: there are quite a few of them. Here's one quote.
18:41
Speaker 1: I set my printer up and ran the alignment and
18:44
Speaker 1: cleaning functions. They were some pretty bad streaky prints, but
18:47
Speaker 1: it was working. The black cartridge only printed exactly 50 pages.
18:50
Speaker 1: That coincidentally was the same as the plan I signed
18:53
Speaker 1: up for. And then it stopped printing black altogether, which
18:56
Speaker 1: I found odd. It didn't fade. It was like the
18:58
Speaker 1: ink was getting low. The black ink just stopped. I
19:01
Speaker 1: assume this instant ink plan was where they would send
19:04
Speaker 1: you more ink when you needed it. They shut off
19:07
Speaker 1: ink cartridges that still have ink. That's some wasteful and
19:10
Speaker 1: fishy tactics, HP. On top of that, I learned there's
19:12
Speaker 1: an overage fee if I somehow print more from a
19:15
Speaker 1: shut off ink cartridge. This is going back into the
19:18
Speaker 1: box and will be sent back. Here's another glowing review, quote,
19:23
Speaker 1: the worst program ever. I lost a credit card and
19:25
Speaker 1: the monthly subscription failed the process. So HP turned off
19:28
Speaker 1: my printer. I had to resubscribe to continue printing. then
19:32
Speaker 1: cancel the service. Shortly after that, my printer stopped printing
19:35
Speaker 1: again with the error code, you must subscribe to HP
19:37
Speaker 1: Instant Ink. So now my printer will not print. In
19:41
Speaker 1: response to these complaints, you might say, well, these people
19:44
Speaker 1: need to read the fine print. It's not HP's fault
19:46
Speaker 1: if the customers don't understand the license terms.
19:49
Speaker 2: They agree to. And in a court of law, maybe
19:51
Speaker 2: you'd have a point.
19:52
Speaker 1: Now, I have no doubt that HP's lawyers would successfully
19:55
Speaker 1: defeat any class action lawsuit over this subscription plan. Actually,
19:59
Speaker 1: when I looked this up, I discovered that indeed HP
20:01
Speaker 1: has been sued several times over this practice. Lawsuits allege
20:04
Speaker 1: that HP didn't deliver ink on time. The ink was
20:07
Speaker 1: prone to errors, etc., And they avoided any significant consequences
20:10
Speaker 1: because the terms of service basically prevent large-scale nationwide class actions.
20:15
Speaker 1: But the legal maneuvering isn't the point. Neither is the
20:18
Speaker 1: abstract theoretical economic argument, the idea that somehow all of
20:21
Speaker 1: these subscriptions are saving the consumer money or providing more
20:26
Speaker 1: consumer choice or whatever. The issue is that the sum
20:30
Speaker 1: total of all these different subscriptions, which are extremely frustrating
20:34
Speaker 1: and confusing for millions of people, has a clear effect
20:38
Speaker 1: on the mindset of the typical consumer, if not.
20:41
Speaker 2: Their political views. It gives people a very real reason
20:45
Speaker 2: to hate capitalism.
20:48
Speaker 1: I mean, for one thing, just at a practical level,
20:49
Speaker 1: all these subscriptions make things more expensive. There are hidden
20:53
Speaker 1: costs that stack up over time, particularly if you forget
20:55
Speaker 1: you have an active subscription. All these monthly payments also
20:59
Speaker 1: mean that consumers have much less control than they used to.
21:03
Speaker 1: One of my producers just bought a Jeep Grand Cherokee,
21:05
Speaker 1: which apparently comes with a complicated U-connect system that caused
21:09
Speaker 1: some kind of glitch, which prevented the ignition from.
21:11
Speaker 2: Turning on when the button was pressed.
21:13
Speaker 1: This bug kept coming back, and ultimately the dealership wanted
21:16
Speaker 1: $ 200 just to diagnose the problem. Not even to solve it,
21:19
Speaker 1: just to diagnose it. 30 years ago, our parents would
21:22
Speaker 1: have just swapped carburetors in the driveway. People were comfortable
21:26
Speaker 1: with the products they owned. They were easier and less
21:29
Speaker 1: expensive to fix. All that's gone now. We have less
21:33
Speaker 1: control than ever before. On top of that, you're giving
21:36
Speaker 1: away a lot of personal data, which you probably don't
21:39
Speaker 1: even know about every single time you sign one of
21:41
Speaker 1: these license agreements. The odds are very good that when
21:44
Speaker 1: you log into Ford Security Service or Jeep's Uconnect, they're
21:48
Speaker 1: sharing your driving habits with their advertising partners. In fact,
21:51
Speaker 1: it's written into Ford's privacy agreement. In other words, apps
21:55
Speaker 1: that claim to make you safer are, in fact, Trojan
21:59
Speaker 1: horses for advertisers. That's what they're actually designed to do.
22:03
Speaker 1: The other problem here, of course, is that the prices
22:05
Speaker 1: of these services keeps increasing. That makes the cost of
22:09
Speaker 1: living much more unpredictable. For Ring cameras, the subscription fee
22:12
Speaker 1: to save your videos went from $ 30 a year in
22:15
Speaker 1: 2022 to 50 in 24. That's an increase of 60%
22:19
Speaker 1: in two years for the same exact functionality. But Amazon
22:23
Speaker 1: and Ring got away with it because once you have
22:25
Speaker 1: the Ring camera on your front door, you're much more
22:28
Speaker 1: likely to accept the increase.
22:30
Speaker 2: In your monthly fee.
22:31
Speaker 1: After all, you have a major sunk cost in terms
22:33
Speaker 1: of your finances and in terms of convenience. And these
22:37
Speaker 1: corporations are constantly taking advantage of that. In the meantime,
22:41
Speaker 1: the corporations are completely blind to the risks of what
22:45
Speaker 1: they're doing, or they don't care. I mean, when you're
22:48
Speaker 1: constantly billing your customers for products that they used to
22:51
Speaker 1: own outright, then sure, your bottom line might go up
22:55
Speaker 1: in the short term. And sure, some customers may not
22:58
Speaker 1: mind the additional fees, but the fact remains, People want
23:01
Speaker 1: to own the place they live, the car they drive,
23:04
Speaker 1: the movies they watch, the doorbell on their front porch.
23:09
Speaker 1: Ownership is one of the most fundamental components of living
23:12
Speaker 1: a fruitful, real human life. I mean, it's the literal
23:15
Speaker 1: American dream. The house with the white picket fence and
23:19
Speaker 1: all that. And the assumption is that you would own
23:21
Speaker 1: the house and the fence. The trade-off used to be
23:24
Speaker 1: that you would have less stuff. but the stuff you
23:29
Speaker 1: did have would be yours. And now we have the
23:32
Speaker 1: inverse of that, where we have a ton of stuff,
23:35
Speaker 1: but we don't own any of it. But the thing is,
23:38
Speaker 1: all this stuff is owned by someone, specifically the corporations
23:42
Speaker 1: that rent it out. So we own less, they own everything.
23:49
Speaker 1: It's anti-human, it's bad for our wallets, and it's bad
23:51
Speaker 1: for our souls. And it makes us much easier for
23:53
Speaker 1: the powers that be to surveil and monitor every single
23:58
Speaker 1: one of us, which they are. The moment a political
24:01
Speaker 1: candidate comes along and promises to wage war on the
24:04
Speaker 1: corporations that are depriving Americans of the ability to own anything,
24:09
Speaker 1: that candidate will win in a landslide.
24:11
Speaker 2: And if that candidate is AOC, let's say, then.
24:14
Speaker 1: We have much bigger problems. I mean, certainly every major
24:17
Speaker 1: corporation will be targeted for destruction. As a result, as
24:20
Speaker 1: a country, we'll probably experience an economic crisis on par
24:23
Speaker 1: with the Great Depression. So it's very important to understand
24:26
Speaker 1: what's going on here and how it happened. The root
24:29
Speaker 1: of the problem is that Wall Street and private equity
24:32
Speaker 1: have become enamored with a concept known as SAAS, or
24:36
Speaker 1: software as a service. You maybe heard this term before.
24:40
Speaker 1: What you may not have heard about is that a
24:42
Speaker 1: little over a decade ago, lenders developed something called annual
24:45
Speaker 1: recurring revenue loans, or ARR loans. These are loans in
24:49
Speaker 1: which lenders would hand out money equal to multiples of
24:54
Speaker 1: top-line revenue as opposed to profits. Private equity firms could
24:57
Speaker 1: use these loans to acquire very unprofitable companies as long
25:00
Speaker 1: as these companies had a subscription-based model that provided a
25:04
Speaker 1: lot of top-line revenue. The private equity companies then have
25:07
Speaker 1: about three years to make the company profitable by traditional metrics.
25:12
Speaker 1: So for example, imagine you run a widget company that
25:15
Speaker 1: has operating expenses of $ 18 million, but you collect $ 15
25:19
Speaker 1: million in subscription fees a year. So you're losing millions
25:23
Speaker 1: of dollars every year. You have a negative cash flow. Now,
25:26
Speaker 1: in the normal scenario, the bank wouldn't give the private
25:28
Speaker 1: equity company any money to acquire your business because you're
25:31
Speaker 1: too risky. But with an ARR, the bank might loan
25:35
Speaker 1: the private equity company some multiple of your annual recurring revenue. So,
25:39
Speaker 1: for example, they might give the private equity firm $ 40 million,
25:43
Speaker 1: which is roughly three times your annual subscription revenue. And
25:46
Speaker 1: now the private equity firm can purchase your widget company,
25:49
Speaker 1: fire half of the employees, increase margins, and sell it
25:53
Speaker 1: off in three years. The ARR only became popular in
25:57
Speaker 1: the United States within the last 20 years, and it's
26:00
Speaker 1: completely changed how the entire economy works. Every company now
26:05
Speaker 1: wants recurring revenue in order to allow private equity companies
26:08
Speaker 1: or anyone else to have an easier time acquiring them,
26:11
Speaker 1: which obviously means a big payday for the owners of
26:14
Speaker 1: the company. Now, to be clear, this isn't some nefarious
26:17
Speaker 1: conspiracy to fix the markets.
26:20
Speaker 2: Or anything like that.
26:21
Speaker 1: The reason ARR loans have become popular is that they
26:23
Speaker 1: tend to make everybody involved much wealthier. It's the same
26:26
Speaker 1: reason why every major restaurant is reheating food from the
26:29
Speaker 1: back of a Cisco truck. If people are willing to
26:32
Speaker 1: pay more money for inferior products, if people are willing
26:35
Speaker 1: to pay increasingly insane subscription fees for the rest of
26:38
Speaker 1: their lives, then major corporations and private equity firms will
26:42
Speaker 1: happily oblige.
26:43
Speaker 5: In our world.
26:45
Speaker 1: Today, people have been trained to believe there's always a catch.
26:48
Speaker 1: If something costs less, it must be worse. If customer
26:51
Speaker 1: service is good, you'll sacrifice coverage. If coverage is great,
26:53
Speaker 1: you'll pay twice as much. Seems there always has to
26:56
Speaker 1: be some kind of trade-off like that, but not with
26:58
Speaker 1: Pure Talk. Consumer Reports just did a massive survey of
27:00
Speaker 1: wireless providers across the country, and Pure Talk was the
27:03
Speaker 1: only one to earn five out of five stars in
27:06
Speaker 1: every category, including coverage, support, value, and data. So you're
27:09
Speaker 1: getting better service without paying inflated prices. That's how it
27:12
Speaker 1: should work, and Pure Talk is doing more than offering
27:14
Speaker 1: a better wireless plan. Right now, they're matching donations dollar
27:18
Speaker 1: for dollar until they hit $ 250, 000 for America's Warrior Partnership,
27:22
Speaker 1: an organization that's helping support veterans.
27:25
Speaker 2: Where it matters most.
27:26
Speaker 1: Go to puretalk.com slash walls to switch to the only
27:29
Speaker 1: wireless company awarded five stars in every category by Consumer Reports.
27:33
Speaker 1: No service contract, no cancellation fee, just phenomenal U.S. customer
27:37
Speaker 1: service on the 5G network that powers America. Again, it's puretalk.com
27:41
Speaker 1: slash walls to make the switch to Pure Talk, a
27:43
Speaker 1: wireless company that actually lives up to your expectations. For
27:47
Speaker 1: two and a half centuries, we've talked about the ideals
27:49
Speaker 1: this country was founded on. Among them, one of the
27:51
Speaker 1: most important is the idea that every person is endowed
27:53
Speaker 1: by their creator with unalienable rights of life, liberty, and
27:57
Speaker 1: the pursuit of happiness. Everything else depends on that first right,
28:00
Speaker 1: the right to life. And yet every day, unborn children
28:02
Speaker 1: are denied it. That's why the work of pre-born really matters.
28:06
Speaker 1: At pre-born network clinics, mothers facing unexpected pregnancies are met
28:10
Speaker 1: with compassion, practical support, and a free ultrasound. The ultrasound
28:13
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28:16
Speaker 1: that tiny heartbeat for the first time her baby is
28:19
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28:21
Speaker 2: These babies aren't statistics.
28:22
Speaker 1: They're future mothers and fathers, teachers, church members, entrepreneurs, first responders,
28:27
Speaker 1: the people who will shape the next generation of this country.
28:30
Speaker 2: Consider helping.
28:31
Speaker 1: Just $ 28 provides one life-saving ultrasound. And in honor of
28:35
Speaker 1: America's 250th birthday, we're asking friends to prayerfully consider a
28:39
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28:43
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28:52
Speaker 2: That's preborn.com slash Walsh. Every gift is tax deductible.
28:56
Speaker 1: The only way out of this downward spiral, short of
28:58
Speaker 1: electing president AOC and destroying the entire country, making all
29:03
Speaker 1: these problems much worse, is to reward businesses that sell
29:07
Speaker 1: finished products, not just subscriptions. There's a massive market opportunity here,
29:13
Speaker 1: and already some companies are capitalizing on it. Vinyl records
29:16
Speaker 1: are having a comeback for exactly this reason. Go to
29:20
Speaker 1: the top floor of your local Barnes & Noble, and
29:22
Speaker 1: it's like going back in time. They have vinyls all
29:24
Speaker 1: over the place. They're selling record players. Even in the 1990s,
29:29
Speaker 1: that would have been retro, but people are paying a
29:32
Speaker 1: lot of money for vinyls because they're tired of borrowing
29:35
Speaker 1: everything and owning nothing. Look at the popularity of steelbooks
29:39
Speaker 1: as another example. If you're not familiar, various studios are
29:43
Speaker 1: releasing films on Blu-rays and 4K discs, and they're packaging
29:47
Speaker 1: them in steel cases. And the cost for these steelbooks
29:50
Speaker 1: usually ranges from $ 30.
29:51
Speaker 2: To $ 50.
29:52
Speaker 1: The profit margins are substantial. That's very expensive for one film, obviously,
29:57
Speaker 1: but here's the thing. Spending on steelbooks has been growing
30:01
Speaker 1: dramatically over the past few years, even as sales of
30:04
Speaker 1: other forms of physical media have declined. Steelbooks routinely sell
30:08
Speaker 1: out within minutes of going online. There are entire online
30:10
Speaker 1: communities dedicated to hunting down the steelbooks. So it's not
30:16
Speaker 1: hard to see what's going on here. People are tired
30:18
Speaker 1: of a status quo where they don't own anything, where
30:21
Speaker 1: everything they license can be deleted from the internet at
30:25
Speaker 1: a moment's notice. And in response, people are shelling out
30:29
Speaker 1: more money in order to lock down something tangible, something
30:33
Speaker 1: physical they can hold in their hands, even if it's
30:35
Speaker 1: just a Blu-ray movie or a vinyl record. This is
30:39
Speaker 1: a signal, albeit a small one, that's easy to miss. Now,
30:44
Speaker 1: put simply, it's not possible for people to be happy
30:47
Speaker 1: without owning anything. The more we borrow everything we use
30:52
Speaker 1: in our lives, the more we careen towards the same
30:55
Speaker 1: fate as every other civilization that didn't respect the right
30:58
Speaker 1: of private property. And that fate ultimately is total collapse.
31:04
Speaker 1: That's what the WEF wants. It's what AOC wants. And
31:08
Speaker 1: unless we recognize what's happening and reward the few businesses
31:11
Speaker 1: that still allow us to purchase actual products instead of licenses,
31:17
Speaker 1: we will give the WEF and AOC and every demented
31:20
Speaker 1: politician like her exactly what they want. Once upon a time,
31:31
Speaker 1: there was a country.
31:34
Speaker 2: Not just a country, but a big one, an empire.
31:37
Speaker 1: And in that empire, there was an upper middle class
31:39
Speaker 1: family where two boys were raised by their mother, loved books,
31:44
Speaker 1: Uncle Tom's cabin, and the Bible. Their father admired the
31:47
Speaker 1: country's leaders, were patriotic and happy.
31:50
Speaker 2: Both sons went to universities where they were radicalized.
31:54
Speaker 1: One of the brothers read a book and convinced him
31:56
Speaker 1: to try to shoot the country's leader.
31:58
Speaker 2: He was hanged.
31:59
Speaker 1: The other brother In the same books, they decided to
32:02
Speaker 1: lead a movement. First they came from the universities, and
32:06
Speaker 1: no one seemed to care. Then they took over the unions,
32:08
Speaker 1: and again, no one seemed to care. Then they created
32:10
Speaker 1: their own media organizations and took over the cities.
32:13
Speaker 2: And again, most people just ignored it. Change, after all,
32:16
Speaker 2: was something they could believe in. Until it was too late.
32:20
Speaker 2: Sound familiar?
32:21
Speaker 1: This is the real history of communism, the Russian Revolution.