I like TED talks as much as your average techie / nerd-culture geek. But I don’t let that cloud the fact that if someone yelled “Who is John Galt” at a TED conference, the rumbling you’d hear would be a thousand masters of the universe suppressing their desire to shout “Me!”. That explains why TED won’t be showing the video of a talk by a billionaire who dared to say that taxing the rich is the right way to support the middle class, and that ordinary middle-class consumers are better job creators than billionaires. (via)
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middlewest
There’s always one asshole who’s gotta ruin the circle-jerk for everyone, I tell ya.
Zifnab
Now now. Don’t go speaking ill of TED Talks. These are highly respected informational videos in the tote-bagger community. :-p
Brachiator
I saw a bit about this story earlier. Thanks for the info and the links.
I had previously seen a background piece at geekwire.
BGinCHI
This guy can’t be right. Just look at how many jobs the Facebook founders have created. Soon Facebook factories in the US and Singapore will employ thousands of people at high wages to….
Jesus, you can’t even make this shit up it’s so absurd.
This is a scam. Rich people game the system to keep more of their money. It’s not complicated.
Steve in DC
Considering TED talks tend to attract self important millionaires and other types who think they are on top of the world I’m not surprised. TED is just as much an elitist 1% gathering as any Wall Street or Silicon Valley fundraiser could ever dream of being.
Self important fuck wits thinking they will change the world don’t like being told the little people do it. TED has never been anything more than a masturbatory circle jerk for these types that happens to spooge out some interesting information in the process.
Eric U.
I cringe whenever I hear people say that rich people create jobs. Very few actually do that. This guy is right, the real job creators are middle class people. I think the main thing we could do to create jobs in this country is to go to a solid single-payer medical system reducing the risk of startups.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
@Zifnab:
__
Mankind will never be free until the last pundit is strangled with the strap handles of the last totebag.
BGinCHI
@ThatLeftTurnInABQ: Can you work a wetsuit in there?
Violet
Interesting. Seems like the plutocrats are a wee bit nervous. Perhaps they fear a gathering of the pitchforks?
Mark S.
Climate change, contraception, and income inequality. While those might be extremely controversial topics at Liberty University, I think most educated people could probably listen to talks on these subjects without their heads exploding.
MosesZD
I’ve said that for years. The most important part of society is the middle class followed by the poor with the rich in third place.
As our country expanded and became more wealthy it was because of the expansion of the middle class. This came through Unions and Government policies (GI Bill, etc) that protected and cultivated the middle class. Much of which was destroyed by Reagan and the follow-up GOP stooges. Lots of which is enabled by many Democrats at this point.
Now we’re 30+ years into the war on the middle class (and poor) by the rich who are, literally, in the pursuit of their own wealth turning the US into the same kind of economy you saw/see in many second-world and third-world countries. Sure, they’re going to ‘do fine’ for some time. But they’ve sewn the seeds of their own destruction and it’s obvious within the stagnation of the American economy.
Except the Clinton years, even when times are ‘good’ they still suck compared to the 1950’s through 1970’s. Even the Carter years ranked better at GDP growth than any Republican post-WWII president. And Carter was only 4th among the Democrats (Johnson, Kennedy, Clinton)…
Anyway, it’s nice to see one of the Lords of Capitalism admit this… But I think it’s too late for our country. It’s been taken over by a defacto aristocracy.
RossInDetroit
I was invited to the TEDxDetroit session a year or so ago. At least from that session I didn’t get the impression you’re giving. And I met Craig(slist) Newmark, who is about as far from a Billionaire MOTU as you can get. I mean, the guy turned operations of his company over to other people because he wanted to work the phones in the call center himself.
rreay
@RossInDetroit:
TEDx is so not the same as TED
RossInDetroit
@rreay:
Obviously, but it’s sponsored by the same organization.
No One of Consequence
@ #5 Steve in DC:
Don’t candy-coat it for us — Let us know how you really feel.
Anecdotal Observation for your Consideration:
I had a roommate in college who spoke quite frequently in terms of absolutes and superfluous language. Most any thing or occurrence that anyone else would describe or relate, this individual would inform them of how this person did more, was cooler, and a lot of other descriptors that ended in -est. i.e. This guy believed that he was the bestest at everything, and no one had seen or done cooler stuff.
What I had noticed as an annoyance of personality manifested in him leaving college, in contact with no one, so lonely as to this day he is some tea-bagging self-deluded Republican.
Praythee, do not let this happen to you. When you paint derision and bile with such a broad brush, you are likely to spill some on yourself.
TED is not entirely worthless, and many of those who deliver talks are not rich, they are geeks. Total alphanerds about whatever their subject matter might be.
Peace, and open-mindedness please,
– NOoC
Nylund
Back in 2008, I attended an event hosted by a financial management company in Silicon Valley where the guests exclusively mega-rich Silicon Valley types. The firm’s main message was “Don’t vote for Obama unless you want to pay higher taxes,” (their second message being, “but if he wins, we can get you out of paying those taxes.”)
The crowd’s very spirited response was that they’d much rather pay taxes than vote for the party that started two wars, authorized torture, attempted to privatize social security, push the culture war, etc.
I don’t know the TED crowd very well, but I did leave that meeting in 2008 feeling a bit better…that maybe some of these rich folk did value some things more than than their own pocketbooks.
goblue
@RossInDetroit: I’ve met him too. He’s a bit of an outlier amongst the lords of tech. Craig Newmark is a nerd’s nerd.
Villago Delenda Est
@Brachiator:
Do you know how I know that the John Galt types have never read Adam Smith?
Because Smith says pretty much this same thing in The Wealth of Nations.
If you raise wages for workers, you’re going to create a feedback loop (Smith of course didn’t call it that, but he described it) that creates greater wealth for everyone.
Smith was not a zero sum guy, and he didn’t have much patience for the zero sum mentality.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
@BGinCHI:
__
In a macro-economic sense it isn’t even their money. Rich people don’t create currency, governments do that, through their proxies in the banking system. Money plays two roles in our lives, as a store of value for personal property, and as a lubricant for reducing the friction of economic transactions to the point where we can actually have a modern economy. These two roles come into conflict when one of them dominates too much over the other. Money which is hoarded as a store of value isn’t circulating, and too much of that means the economy grinds to a halt like an car engine running without any oil.
__
We ought to start calling the 1% what they really are: Hoarders.
Brachiator
@Steve in DC:
That’s odd. A number of people who have spoken at TED have in fact changed the world.
And some speakers, such as biologist Frans de Waal, is neither rich nor particularly self important.
jibeaux
I didn’t know there was hostility to TED talks out there. I mean, some of them are better than others, but they’ve had on champion whistlers, scientists explaining how babies learn language, all kinds of random things I’ve found interesting. I’m not surprised they called it political, but I also agree that the kind of people who listen to TED talks could probably handle the topic without their heads exploding.
grass
No, the reason the speech wasn’t taken well was because it’s just polemical and lacking in facts, and now TEDs insistence on standards is being used to wack it by the misguided and mislead.
Villago Delenda Est
Point of information for those of you who may not be aware, cut and pasted directly from Wikipedia:
I’m now a bit more knowledgeable, I hope some of you are too!
Daulnay
To put a couple more teeth in Hanauer’s point:
The wealthiest have placed their much of spendable wealth into big banks like Morgan Stanley, because they can’t find good investments for it. Morgan Stanley can’t find good investments for it, either (their justification for what the London Whale was doing).
We are in a slump because too much of the wealth has gone to the wealthy, who will not spend it. They cannot find good investments because we are in a slump.
In monetarist terms, the velocity of money has dropped. In Keynsian terms, there is insufficient demand. In either case, we are screwed as long as most of the increase in wealth goes to the wealthy.
redshirt
I want to open a wine bar named “TED @ Davos”
mistermix
@RossInDetroit: Yes, but the national org decides what goes on their video, not the locals.
Villago Delenda Est
@Daulnay:
This is one of those stagflation type dilemmas that conventional “I’ve got mine, fuck you!” economics cannot deal with. So ignoring it is better, since, after all, they’ve got theirs.
The problem of course is that this sort of thing leaves the realm of pure economics and migrates to the world of politics, where suddenly, demand starts being created for tumbrels and sharp metal blades.
jibeaux
Do we like “wacked by the misguided and mislead” as a tag, or are there enough already? I don’t want anyone to think we endorse that sort of spelling though…
karen marie
While I agree that TED is being overly cautious in not putting up video of Nick Hanauer’s presentation, I think criticism by “The Other 98%” and others is a bit over the top.
I can think of a lot of things that are national embarrassments, and I know of a lot of groups that are “making plutocracy the default in our national conversation” (oh, say, like the fucking media) but TED and its (non) action here is a mere fart in its general direction.
What I also find annoying is that the change.org petition gives literally no information about who, what, where. People are signing a petition when they have not the first clue why except that a bunch of people are screaming “FIRE!”
Chris
@Daulnay:
This.
Just tax the shit out of the guys who aren’t spending money, and pass it along to people who ARE going to spend it. That’s how you get the economy moving again. It’s not fucking rocket science.
Another Halocene Human
@rreay: No kidding. TEDx hosted a talk by Jack “Leptin Quilt” Kruse, who used his time to spin a tall tale about how he had injected himself with MRSA and immerses himself in ice baths for periods of time which would kill a mere mortal, all to prove how superhuman his “primal” lifestyle has made him.
This guy has single-handedly laid waste to the online “paleo” diet community, which, in the service of the LULZ certainly deserves some sort of medal.
He’s also been sanctioned by his medical society and I do hope he is ejected by his state medical board soon.
RossInDetroit
@mistermix:
Understood. But I don’t think that necessarily supports your assertion that a TED audience would include ‘a thousand John Galts’.
kindness
Who is the Galtian in the comments there, Adam someone-or-other? Jesus he’s swilling the KoolAid.
Zifnab
@Daulnay: Which is truly bizarre in a sense, because why collect all this wealth if you never plan to spend it? What’s the point?
“Hurray! I’ve got a high score! Now what…”
At least when the Egyptian Pharoahs hit their nadar of wealth, they had the good sense to start building fabulous pyramids. The billionaires of the modern era do what, exactly, with their fortunes?
Jamey
TED is a wankfest designed to stroke the egos of underinformed businesspersons.
Jon O.
@grass: Seriously? There’s one glancing reference to the two parties’ position on taxes at the beginning. Beyond that, the whole point of it is pretty common-sense to me – efficient business owners hire as little as possible to maximize profits. Investment in the middle class does much more to reinforce healthy employment. How often do you hear that on the talking head shows?
And where does this lack facts? If anything, this speech seems a little uncontroversial to me. Unfortunately, that’s not the world we live in…
Another Halocene Human
@Chris:
INCOME REDISTRIBUTION!!! SOCSHULIZM!!!!1111
NobodySpecial
@redshirt: Name it Davos Ted, put a bouncer on the door, and ask for credit limits to get past him. Then start turning away the rich ones who dare try and get in, but don’t tell them why. Reactions would be humorous, to say the least.
Rob in CT
@Daulnay:
Yup. Well-off/rich people with functioning frontal lobes see the problem. It frustrates me to no end that so many do not. It’s very narrow, zero-sum thinking. Far too many of these guys think THEY are the golden goose, when in fact they’re in the process of strangling the golden goose.
middlewest
@grass:
Which is why they’ve renounced all their Deepak Chopra talks… right, fanboy?
Another Halocene Human
@Rob in CT:
QFT
amk
@Nylund: That gives me some hope.
jlow
@grass: Here is the text of the speech. I suppose he doesn’t have cites in there, but it’s basically Krugman territory. Nothing too radical unless you are a delusional republican.
MosesZD
@Villago Delenda Est:
Ah yes. Inconvienent things Adam Smith said… Smith also said: ‘You can hardly have two tradesmen meet without them starting a conspiracy in restraint of trade.’
It’s the same today as then. Big business uses the law and ‘self-policing trade associations’ to throttle small businesses. Take the National Restaurant Association or the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants.
I can’t help but notice that as restaurant owner who came from over twenty years of being a CPA that most the more onerous requirements, licensing, record-keeping, CPE, and self-governing ‘trade/professional’ policies, procedures, etc., stem from big companies/firms (a) fouling up in a major way and (b) enacting (somewhat to completely pointless) ‘feel-good/confidence’ requirements that disproportionally impact on the time and resources of small companies making it far more difficult for them to compete.
grass
@Jon O.: I agree with the thrust of the talk – tax the rich! But it doesn’t back anything up other than some well worn statements on tax and income inequality, it’s not innovative or interesting, it’s just political advocacy. If TED accepts weak sauce like this then we’ll have to endure speakers telling us things that yes! Tax cuts do work, here’s x, y and z examples!
And I’m a little surprised at all the hate for TED on here. Good god, you’d think a scientific/innovation seminar for rich people could get a little support around here.
Chris
@Another Halocene Human:
I like to think of it as “trickle down economics” :D
The Tragically Flip
Well once again, the old trick of not-publishing something “controversial” has ensured it got a wider distribution than it would by simply quietly posting it to the TED site.
Good job, TED curator Chris Anderson!
superking
I fucking hate TED. It’s all so smug. The fact is that we don’t need new ideas on how to fix social problems. We have all the ideas we need. What we lack is implementation. Rather than sitting around wanking about ideas, we’d be better off if both the audience and the speakers would go out and work to see the ideas become reality. But work is hard. Sitting in a nice room with other people who confirm your status and intelligence is easy, and much more satisfying.
middlewest
@jibeaux:
Next, you’ll be shocked by the backlash against Avengers.
Villago Delenda Est
@Chris:
It seems to be rocket surgery, though, because the Austerions just don’t fucking get it. Too busy fretting over poor people with cell phones.
Mino
Interesting development. Berkshire-Hathaway has just purchased a slew of newspapers in the South from Media General.
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/media-general-announces-agreements-berkshire-120000630.html
Anyone familiar with any of the papers now being published by BH media group?
slag
@jlow: And this:
Hanauer has been making the very same point for many many moons now. Why even invite him if you don’t want him to say what you know he’s going to say?
That said, here’s an exceptional TED Talk about problems with economic inequality: http://www.ted.com/talks/richard_wilkinson.html. So, it’s not as if TED has never touched the subject before. Maybe you can talk about the problem of inequality as long as you don’t propose any solutions to it?
Chris
@Villago Delenda Est:
This, too.
These guys are as much “capitalists” as the Soviet and Chinese governments were “socialists.” In both cases, it’s simply a return to feudalism, under the shield of a shiny, hip new name.
The Tragically Flip
I don’t agree with the sentiment that TED is outright bad or useless. Certainly there’s some great talks in there that have nothing wrong with them. TED attendees are certainly the 1% but they’re a somewhat better version of the 1% than the ones currently running most of everything, they’re generally at least socially liberal, and at least the sort to admit global warming is a problem, even if they’re too prone to think some magic technology will be invented at the last minute to fix it.
But censoring this talk does put a big dent in my modest esteem for them. I’ve certainly encountered some talks that veered into glibertarian nonsense and neoliberal triumphantilism (man do they love the microcredit movement for example), so I don’t see why a talk promoting upper class taxation is beyond the pale.
slag
@superking:
Over the top and illustrates that you have no idea what TED actually does. I’ve seen first-hand that TED prizes do make some amount of difference.
James Gary
@superking:
I fucking hate TED. It’s all so smug. The fact is that we don’t need new ideas on how to fix social problems. We have all the ideas we need. What we lack is implementation. Rather than sitting around wanking about ideas, we’d be better off if both the audience and the speakers would go out and work to see the ideas become reality. But work is hard. Sitting in a nice room with other people who confirm your status and intelligence is easy, and much more satisfying.
This, a thousand times.
Another Halocene Human
@MosesZD:
Adam Smith thumping was popular when I came of age. You never hear his name now. I finally read Smith and was shocked at what a commie he was. Advocating for syndicalism, bemoaning cartels and their access to state power, reframing “idleness” as the expected fruits of a successful economy that provides good-paying jobs.
Another Halocene Human
Burke and Plato are still popular, however, as they fellate elites and comfort the vicious.
MaximusNYC
“In a capitalist economy, the true job creators are consumers, the middle class. And taxing the rich to make investments that grow the middle class, is the single smartest thing we can do for the middle class, the poor and the rich.”
Nick Hanauer’s TED talk is a brilliantly concise explanation of how the economy really works. It’s about 20 times more clear and to the point than anything I have heard from a Democratic politician — including the POTUS — in years.
Obama would do well to just swipe this verbatim as his campaign stump speech.
Another Halocene Human
@superking:
I dunno, some of the talks certainly come off this way (especially the slacktivism and fauxlanthropy, or any talk that puts credit for government programs on the sainted coders they recruited to implement, not on the resources from taxes that were thunked on the table), but others are about stuff nobody is talking about or working on because either big money or big religion throws tear gas in the public square any time the subject comes up.
Where else but Geek Heaven would I find a talk about using edible mushrooms to recycle your corpse after you die?
Another Halocene Human
@Mino:
Not sure… does that include the Charleston paper? For an SC paper, it’s pretty liberal.
I guess ol’ Warren having gotten his trainset fantasy fulfilled now wants to be Hearst? I mean, I know newspapers are cheap, but it’s not because they’re undervalued. What’s the long game, I wonder?
Another Halocene Human
@MosesZD:
That’s what it’s all about, and captive executive regulatory agencies and congress are in on the game.
The zinger is when they convince small business owners that voting Republican will fix this. Hahahahhahahaha.
pseudonymous in nc
I don’t think the TED people quite realised what Ridley Scott was saying about them when he made that trailer for Prometheus.
pseudonymous in nc
@Another Halocene Human:
Brad DeLong always tries to teach Smith as a moral philosopher first, by getting his students to read The Theory of Moral Sentiments before The Wealth of Nations, and emphasising that Smith was writing at the very beginning of the Industrial Revolution, when the major private economic actors were the colonial joint-stock companies.
chopper
@superking:
TED always struck me as similar to a mensa meeting. bunch of self-important people who lay down money to demonstrate what big fucking geniuses they think they are, with a smattering of actual smart people doing actual fascinating work.
it’s supposed to be about big ideas to change the world, and that attitude is based on this friedmanesque american ideal that ‘we’ll just innovate our way out of our problems’.
Sly
@Villago Delenda Est:
In fairness to the John Galt types, no one really reads the Wealth of Nations. It is perhaps second only to the Bible for the most cited yet least read book in human history.
They all love to quote that one paragraph about the invisible hand, yet wouldn’t even recognize the entire chapters dedicated to the necessity of banking regulation or how, if left unchecked, the division of labor could end up destroying civilization.
fledermaus
“That explains why TED won’t be showing the video of a talk by a billionaire who dared to say that taxing the rich is the right way to support the middle class”
BZZZZT Mr. Hanauer, incorrect answer. The answer we were looking for is decertifiying teachers unions, standardized testing, charter shools and massive student loans available to all. But do stop by the award table and pick up your consolation prize a blu-ray copy of “Waiting for Superman” and a copy of the as-yet-unpublished collaboration of Thomas Freidman and David Brooks “Rich People are Our Future”
Brachiator
@Villago Delenda Est:
Good point; however, I don’t know many people of any political or economic leaning who have read Smith. Even though everybody likes to quote him.
James E Powell
Doesn’t’ TED believe in the marketplace of ideas? If what this guys said is wrong, someone will say so.
Corbin Dallas Multipass
I’m just a jerk but I would prefer if the “via” went to the specific SLOG article than the general blog:
http://slog.thestranger.com/slog/archives/2012/05/17/ted-censors-talk-thats-too-political
Jennifer
In the sense that what Hannauer was saying isn’t innovative, TED was right not to post the video.
I mean, it’s not like we haven’t known since the days of Adam Smith that demand drives employment. No business owner is going to hire people sit around and do nothing (ok, but I wouldn’t call NRO a business). Hiring workers you don’t need is the same as setting money on fire. Actually, it can cost more than just burning money – if your business makes widgets and a recession hits, and you have an inventory backlog of 6 months, you’ve got money tied up in raw materials, the labor required to produce the inventory, and the cost of warehousing the inventory. Hiring more people before demand comes back will just add even more to your carrying costs for raw materials and warehousing – you can get back your “sunk costs” on the labor when the inventory sells, but you’ll never get back the cost of storing it or any interest you may have paid on carrying the cost of the raw materials.
This is pretty simple-minded stuff which anyone who has ever run a business of any size knows. The sad thing is that these days, common sense itself is politically divisive.
Walker
@pseudonymous in nc:
Exactly. That was not a particularly flattering send up that was intended to set up one of the primary villains of the franchise.
Gromit
@superking:
I’m sorry, but this is so much bullshit. The people at these conferences don’t give and receive talks for a living (well, most of them don’t, at least — I see Tony Robins did one). I’ve been watching a lot of these talks on Hulu while doing household chores, and most of the people giving the talks are working artists, designers, and researchers, and some of them are doing really incredible things, like figuring out how to allow amputees to control artificial limbs with unprecedented dexterity, or designing cheap water filtration bottles that can screen pathogens out of some of the filthiest water imaginable. Some of this is very real work that has the potential to improve the lives of millions of people. If you think listening to talks is “wanking”, then what would you call reading and commenting on blogs? It’s a fallacy that “talk” is meaningless and unproductive. Lets see you go out there and change the world without exchanging ideas of any kind with anyone by any means.
Jamey
@Gromit:
Also wanking. But it doesn’t prevent us from actually doing stuff. Ditto with TED. But the whole brand seems like a cool-kids Super Adventure Club where plutocrats can impress their pals by sitting in a room with geniuses who make awesome micro-filtration artificial limbs.
Superking +1
Another Halocene Human
@chopper:
This sounds like sour grapes to me. Yeah, some of the talks have that indelible odor (or ordeur) of smugness. I have the app on my smartphone to keep me company during boring periods at work. The short time on the talks and the “curated” nature work well for that. No ppl shouting at each other or the one conservative troll brought in to shout down the reality-based guests, like on npr.
You can always pick and choose which talks you listen to, or hit back if the talk turns out to be crap. I do.
Those few truly smart clever people often tend to be more than worth the price of admission. Which is, oh, zero, as the price of my phone is a sunk cost (purchased for entirely different reasons).
I don’t think you really mean to say that we can’t innovate our way out of problems. The grand theft carried out by vultures is, of course, a political problem that we must solve, but environmental, energy, medical problems we can innovate our way out of.
I recently saw a figure that investments in education yield a 10 time return in the economy, greater than building highways or railroads!
Investing in minds and research works.
(ETA second part when I realized I hit the button too soon.)
Steve in Iowa
@Villago Delenda Est:
Brad Delong has expressed the same point like this: “Markets are solved political problems.”
Another Halocene Human
@Sly:
What also strikes me when I read Smith is that English businesses were far, far more highly regulated than any industry in the US today. Not even NYC or Philly had a hair on the Crown. Regulation (a lot of it tax regulation) out the wazoo.
Job cremators today are whiny-ass titty babies.
flukebucket
Nothing increases demand like a little more discretionary income. What good is demand when you cannot afford to buy? There is no need to make stuff if people cannot afford to buy it. As Charles Pierce says, “people ain’t got no jobs and people ain’t got no money!”
Zifnab
@James E Powell: According to the admins on the site, the speech was “too partisan”, whatever the hell that means.
http://tedchris.posterous.com/131417405
nwithers
Found the talk! (to be fair Digby found it)
Here it is
Gromit
@Jamey:
So this is really all about your impression of who is in the room, and not about the content and who it is ultimately reaching? And what exactly is wrong with micro-filtration or artificial limbs? Or nanotube films that can turn any window into a solar panels. Or, for that matter, plutocrats sitting in a room and learning about things like the problems getting clean water to much of the world, or about the relationship between income inequality and so many measures of quality of life? Who is the “cool kid” here, if not you guys sneering at people for their idealism?
Nickws
Gromit, your ‘micro-filtration’ and ‘artifical limbs’ (mechanical arms, indeed!) are obviously nothing more than Rearden-Metal-style McGuffins invented by glibertarian fabulists who are trying to oppress those of us in the Reality Based Community./kidding.