Adam Ruins Everything (2015–…): Season 1, Episode 11 - Adam Ruins Nutrition - full transcript
Adam explores nutrition. Included: truths about vitamin supplements; a look at balanced breakfasts; the lack of science in "nutritional science."
Ah, you worry too much about me, sis.
No, I'm sure I'll find work
as soon as the economy
gets back to normal.
No, no, I appreciate the invitation,
but I'm gonna stay
right here in town. Yeah.
Factory's gonna be open, you'll see.
Yeah.
Yeah, well, look, I gotta
get back to my taxes,
much as I hate 'em.
Yeah. All right, love you too.
Yeah, bye.
W-w-welcome to HulkoTax.
A-a-are you salaried or self-employed?
Well, I was working at
the toaster factory 'til March,
but since the layoffs, I've been
driving for Uber, so...
Enter all W-2s and 1099s.
Oh, okay. Well, which do I, uh...
Now enter all double-2-Us
and 9-10dy-10s.
Well, does, does the bank
send you that or...?
Do you have any commercial
fishing income?
I wish.
You have done every part
of this incorrectly.
Now entering m-m-manual mode.
Hope you like math-math-math-math...
- Oh, come on!
- ...math...
Why do taxes have to be so hard?
Actually, taxes
don't have to be hard at all.
Did I kill a man?
Nope. You summoned a TV host.
Hi, I'm Adam Conover
and this is "Adam Ruins Everything."
Oh! Ugh.
Corrected & Synced by Bakugan
Hey, you scared the fudge out of me.
Oh, that's nothin'.
One time I made my friend
Emily give birth.
I don't know what
that means, but I hate it.
Almost as much as I hate
doing my taxes.
Now, what's that you were saying
about how taxes could be easy?
Well, think about it.
Taxes are a bill
the government charges you,
so why do you have to do all the math?
Imagine if we did that
with any other bill.
How much do I owe you?
You tell me.
Divide number of toppings
by cheese consumption?
$12?
Wrong! Now you're goin' to jail!
Bogus.
Instead of making you fill out
a complicated return,
why doesn't the government
just tell you how much you owe?
Well, 'cause they
need to know my income,
my interest on my savings...
all the numbers
that are on those forms.
News flash! They already do.
Employers, banks, and
other financial institutions
already send
detailed records to the IRS.
Okay, we just got Hank's W2s and 1099s.
I could calculate
his tax bill myself...
Nah, I'll just wait quietly
while he sends me the
exact same information.
D'oh!
The government could quite literally
do your taxes for you.
It's an idea called return-free filing.
Instead of the government
checking your work,
you'd check theirs,
and it would make taxes more like this.
Ooh, honey, our taxes came.
Oh...
Just need to deduct that work
trip to Toledo and we're done!
Hey, think we have time for
some wild, bedpost-rattling sex?
Why not? Our April's wide open.
Return-free filing is already used
by countries around the world
and could allow millions
of Americans like you
to do your taxes for free
in just five minutes.
Yeah, well, those bozos in Washington
would never go for an idea
that makes that much sense.
Actually, return-free filing bills
are introduced in Congress
all the time,
and both Barack Obama
and Ronald Reagan pushed for it.
Yes, we can.
Tear down this wall...
of paperwork.
Wow... that must be the only
thing those guys would agree on.
Okay. I'm sold.
- Give me return-free filing.
- Sorry.
The makers of tax software
like TurboTax and H&R Block
spend a butt-load of money
to make sure it never happens.
T-t-tax software industry.
You p-p-pay us
to make your taxes easier,
so we pay lobbyists to make sure
they stay c-c-complicated.
Citizens, we feel your pain!
Filing your taxes
is just too... darn...
fun! Everything's great.
We're changing nothing.
Ooh...
These calculating
companies have lobbied
to kill multiple
return-free filing bills
over the past decade.
And they're using my money to do it?
Well, that's shameless.
And it gets worse.
This is Jessica Huseman,
a reporter at ProPublica
who's covered this story.
The tax prep industry actually
created a front group
called the Free File Alliance
that lets you file your taxes for free.
It's supposed to be available
to two-thirds of the taxpaying public,
but almost no one uses it.
That's because the system is confusing,
the IRS doesn't market it,
the tax companies have no incentive
to push it themselves,
and a sneaky opt-in option
allows them to push
their paid products.
Don't use the f-f-free option.
It's too hard.
Pay me instead.
But I want return-free filing,
like you were talking about.
Well, here's the worst part.
The tax industry
negotiated an exclusive deal
that prevents the federal government
from offering return-free filing
or any free system of tax filing
so long as
the Free File Alliance exists.
So you're saying the government
could be doing my taxes for me,
for free, but TurboTax and H&R Block
are working like crazy
to stop that from happening?
Exactly.
Instead, you're stuck
doing your taxes yourself
with this guy.
Get ready to spend
all your Aprils with m-m-me.
Gah!
See, this is the problem
with the economy.
The government and the CEOs get rich
and the rest of us
get screwed by something
that takes three degrees to understand.
Yeah, you pretty much nailed it.
See, that's why I like this guy.
Bad news comin' in from Wall Street!
The Dow is down 500 points,
which means we're headed into
the icy depths of poverty!
Joe "Cray-Cray" Krasowitz.
He makes the economy so simple.
Yeah, he does, and that's
what makes him so wrong.
I'll show you.
Hey, don't come into a man's house
and teleport him against his will.
Welcome back to "Demented Dollars,"
America's loudest and therefore best
financial advice show!
The Dow Jones Industrial Average
is down in the dumps,
just like me after every date!
I think we should see other people.
And that means the economy is ruined,
so it's time to panic!
Actually, no, it isn't.
The American economy
is an incredibly complicated system
that even experts spend a lifetime
trying to understand,
so when the news media
dumbs it all down
into how a single number
changed that day, it tells you
a lot less than you think.
Okay. Who the heck are you?
Hi. Name's Hank, big, famous Krasowitz.
Can I call you Cray-Cray?
And can you tell him
that he's full of it?
The Dow tells us how the
whole stock market is doing.
Nope. It tells you how a tiny part
of the stock market is doing,
and its methodology is deeply flawed.
The US stock market
is an enormous system
with over 3,000
publicly traded companies
in the US alone,
but the Dow includes just 30 of them
and it's basically designed
to go up over time.
If a stock does too poorly,
it gets dropped and replaced.
What? You mean
the whole thing's rigged?
Yep. And it's not
adjusted for inflation.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, right.
Well, if that were true, then how come
all of us in the media
report on it constantly?
Maybe because that's
what you've been doing
for a century.
See, the Dow became popular
during the economic panics
and depressions of
the early 20th century,
when people were desperate for any sign
of how the economy was doing.
Are we ruined or ain't we?
I just need some kind of sign.
There's the Dow
and it's just gone bust.
Thanks. Guess it's curtains for me.
Now, back when our economy was simpler,
the performance of 30 big companies
was actually pretty useful information,
but as our economy grew
and became more complex,
the Dow started to
tell us less and less,
and today, financial insiders
don't even pay attention to it.
Dude, don't jump.
The Dow's, like, sick.
It's, like, up 1,000 points.
Who cares about that
meaningless number?
My wife cheated on me
with a pottery instructor.
Hey, please don't
make light of suicide.
It's insensitive. Sorry.
Today, despite the fact
that the Dow tells us
less than ever,
reporters like Cray-Cray
keep using it out of sheer habit.
Yeah, well, I have another habit!
Doing my show! You two done?
'Cause it's time for the Jobs Report!
I know I was just screaming
that the economy is through,
but it's actually great
because the unemployment rate
is down to 4.5%.
So, 96% of folks are making a living?
That's great!
Ac-ac-actually...
The number you hear reported
as the unemployment rate is...
The female hymen.
Wrong button. Old episode.
The unemployment rate
is a flawed number
that excludes tons of people
who you and I would
consider unemployed.
Well, I find that hard to believe.
You're either working or you're not.
Well, let's play America's
least-favorite game show,
"Who Counts As Unemployed?"-
Up first, we have Trista.
I'm 24, I got laid off
a few months ago,
and I've been so depressed
that I haven't looked for work.
She's unemployed.
Not according to the government.
Hi, I'm Charles, I'm 52,
and this week, I mowed
my neighbor's lawn for $25.
That's all the work I've had in months.
Well, he must count as unemployed.
No, again.
And finally, we have Hank.
Me? Well, I drive Uber some nights
since the factory closed,
but I'm barely making by.
I'm unemployed.
Wrong again. You don't count either.
Thanks for playing,
and remember to spell and
grammar check your resume.
Wait. Why don't I count as unemployed?
Well, the number we
always hear reported
as the unemployment rate
only counts people
who are actively looking for work
and excludes anyone who's earned
more than $20 in the past week.
Now, that doesn't make it
totally useless,
but if you hear that number and think
that's how many people are out of work,
you're wrong. Many more are struggling.
Yeah. Like me.
That's enough for bloated
Anderson Cooper here.
Time to whip out the big guns!
Let's talk G... D... P!
Yes! GDP. The bigger it gets,
the better economy it is,
right, Cray-Cray?
Absolutely! Let's take a look
- at the latest figu...
- Sorry!
Even though politicians and the media
act like GDP or Gross Domestic Product
is a measure of our overall
economic well-being, it ain't.
GDP really only tells us
how much we make
and how much we consume.
In other words, it goes up
when spending does.
I got a raise. I'm
gonna buy a catamaran.
That's good for me, Mr. GDP.
But the problem is,
spending isn't always a good thing.
GDP could also go up
because something bad happened
and we had to spend money to fix it.
My house was destroyed in a hurricane
so I need to buy a tent to sleep in.
Here's all my savings.
All spending is good spending
for Mr. GDP.
Yeah, but she lost
her house and her savings.
That can't be good for the economy.
No, but she spent money,
so GDP goes up.
I thought when GDP rose,
that meant things
were getting better for everybody.
Sadly, a strong GDP doesn't guarantee
the average person feels any benefit.
In the last two decades,
GDP has steadily risen,
but the average
American's earnings haven't.
It's actually possible
to have the highest GDP
and the most poverty at the same time.
Terrible.
Useless number.
Well, it has its uses.
You just can't expect one
number to tell you the truth
about our gargantuan global economy.
Despite what the media says,
it's just not that simple.
I can't believe you, Cray.
I listened to you, trusted you,
sat through all those
erectile dysfunction
commercials for you!
Just wait one second.
Well, I don't need simple.
I learned how to use
a backward extrusion press.
I can learn a little economics.
Maybe it'll even help me figure out
when my old factory job is coming back.
Uh, about that...
Hey, Mr. Magic Man,
why don't you let me show you
why they call me Cray-Cray?
You know what?
I'll tell you in a second.
For now, I'm gonna run.
You ruined my show!
My fellow Americans, For now, I'm
gonna run. I know you're hurting.
You're in your den right now, thinking,
where did my high-paying
manufacturing job
that doesn't require
a college degree go?
Yeah. That's, like, eerily accurate.
Well, I'm here to tell you
we only lost those jobs
because of bozo politicians.
Once you elect me,
I will bring the Golden Age
of American Manufacturing back again.
Paid for by Americans Against Bozos.
Now, that's what I'm
talking about. Right, Max?
Sorry, Hank, but as tempting as it is
to blame bozos, they're not
why America lost those jobs.
It was the result of
massive historical forces.
Well, now, hold on a second.
My dad came to this town
looking for opportunity,
and he and everybody here
worked their entire lives
at the toaster factory.
They're in a middle-class income,
they bought houses,
and they retired on a pension,
and I'm gonna do the same
just as soon as this country
gets back to normal.
Actually, that wasn't normal at all.
It was a historical anomaly.
Here, I'll show you.
The Story of American Manufacturing.
Between 1945 and 1973,
American manufacturing
gave us the greatest
period of economic growth
in human history.
Economic historians
call it the Golden Age,
but it wouldn't have been possible
without the help of World War II.
During the war, every other
industrialized nation involved
was devastated.
That meant that when the war ended,
the US had a huge temporary advantage.
From the end of the war
through the 1960s,
America made 50% of the world's stuff
and it made great things for Americans.
By the '70s, we more than doubled
the standard of living for
the average American family.
Next up, a third baby.
Not unless it's coming out of you.
Ah! Now, that's the life!
The problem was,
this monopoly couldn't last forever.
As time marched on,
other nations rebuilt,
their economies recovered,
and they started bolstering
their own manufacturing.
The real reason
America's Golden Age ended
is because of history.
But you're ignoring the fact
that American companies are choosing
to make stuff overseas.
Like, why is the iPhone made in China?
We could make all that stuff
they build over there over here.
Oh, actually,
we couldn't, because of...
Unique Chinese advantages
that America cannot recreate.
Well, it's not quite as simple
as "China beat America,"
but China does excel at certain
kinds of manufacturing.
This is Dr. Penelope Prime, economist,
professor at the Institute
of International Business,
and director of
the China Research Center.
First of all, China has a vast,
relatively inexpensive workforce.
They have about 80 million
manufacturing workers alone.
That's double the
population of California
and the Chinese factories
that assemble the iPhone
are massive.
Just one can employ
up to 350,000 people
and produce 1/2 million iPhones a day.
And historically, China's workers
have been willing to accept
relatively low wages.
Before 1978, China had
zero trade with the US
and was closed to most
foreign investment.
When they finally opened their doors
after years of economic isolation,
they were an ideal location
for low-cost manufacturing.
Well, we have workers too.
But our government today
does not invest heavily
in infrastructure and
education like China does.
The Chinese government
even helps recruit
and train workers for jobs like this.
Apple estimated it would
take up to nine months
to find enough engineers
to oversee a factory in the US,
but in China, they found
them in just 15 days.
Come on, people!
I'm offering free Frisbees!
Well, what if we did
train enough people?
Could we build the iPhone then?
No. China sits at the center
of a global supply chain, which means
they're physically closer
to most of the parts
needed to make the iPhone.
That means, even if we did build
a giant iPhone assembly plant in the US
and somehow staffed it with
cheap, well-trained labor,
it would still be faster and cheaper
to build iPhones in China
than ship all the parts
and assemble them here.
The fact is, when it comes to
certain types of manufacturing,
China has unique advantages
that we just don't.
So, what? We're just screwed?
No matter what we do,
we're falling behind?
Actually, it's a misconception
that the US is falling
behind in manufacturing.
There are a lot fewer people
working in those jobs,
but we produce more than ever,
thanks in large part to...
Automation!
Oh, no! Robots!
These are monsters!
They'll kill us all!
Hyah!
Well, that's an exaggeration,
but it's true that automation
has transformed our economy.
Heavy industry jobs
like car manufacturing
were lost almost entirely
to advances in technology.
For example, General Motors
still makes tons of cars
in America, but today, they only need
a quarter of the workers it took to do
the same amount of work in the '50s,
and it's not just manufacturing jobs.
Bank tellers have been
replaced by ATMs and apps,
video store employees have been
replaced by streaming sites,
and even lawyers and accountants
have been replaced by software.
I'm ba-ba-ba-back.
Get out of here!
That is why these jobs disappeared...
the last half-century
of technological progress.
And the story is much bigger
than just the US and China.
The value of manufacturing itself
is actually falling across the globe.
Today, goods are worth
less than services.
The part of the iPhone
that's a manufactured good
is actually worth very little,
but the services that go into it...
the software, the design, the marketing
are much more valuable
and we do all those things in the US.
Even though there are
fewer manufacturing jobs
than there used to be,
new services jobs are being
created here all the time,
especially in fields
like software development,
healthcare services,
and education services.
So instead of making
impossible promises
to reverse history
and bring the old jobs back,
our politicians should
have been taking action
to help us adapt to these changes,
like by lowering the cost
of higher education
so more people would have
access to these new jobs.
But I'm looking for
a job in manufacturing.
That's all I know.
I know it's hard, but the truth is,
economies change.
That's just what they do.
Even if we wanted to,
we can't turn back the clock
to the economy we had
half a century ago,
and anyone who tells you
otherwise is wrong.
Now, there are things
that you can do to...
Aw, forget it.
I guess there's no place
in a shiny new economy
for a guy like me.
Hank, no!
This goes
in the recycling! A guy like me.
Sorry, Max, can't find work.
Gonna lose the house.
I guess I'm gonna
have to shack up with you.
Okay, that's a tad dramatic.
What am I supposed to do?
The economy is so complicated.
We've got no control over it.
It changes right under your feet
and it puts good people out of work.
It just makes me feel so powerless.
Well, you're right.
The economy is insanely complex
and it's always changing,
but that doesn't mean
there's nothing you can do.
What do you mean?
Well, you could take steps
to adapt along with it.
Yeah. My sister's been telling me
there's more jobs down by where she is
and she knows a good night school
if I want to try something new.
I guess I could think about doing that.
But, come on, not everybody
can afford to move.
That's true. Adapting
to all these changes
is a huge, daunting, expensive
investment for workers,
and our government could help
people more with that investment
with things like relocation vouchers
and especially higher education
and skills training,
like how in Georgia, where I live,
there's state-subsidized
skills training
that's coordinated
with new factory openings
to encourage companies to set up there.
We can't control whether
or not the economy changes,
but we have a responsibility
to help ourselves
and each other adjust to those changes.
Uh-huh. Well, thanks, Dr. Prime.
No problem.
Uh-oh. I forgot I was two-dimensional.
Hank, you may not win
the golden toaster,
but you can go after new opportunities
just like your dad did.
Thanks, Adam.
You know, I'm gonna
give my sister a call.
It might be a big change, but I think,
with her help, I can swing it.
And don't you worry.
I know one day,
you're gonna find a job too.
I have a TV show!
You've been on it for 20 minutes!
Hello, everyone. I am using
the power of the Internet
to talk to Jessica Huseman
from ProPublica's office in New York.
Jessica, thank you so much
for being here.
Thanks for having me.
Can you tell a little bit more
about the Free File Alliance
and the role that they play
in changing how all of us do our taxes?
Sure. So, the Free File Alliance
is a group of 13 tax filing
and preparation companies,
and you've probably heard
of a lot of them.
They're places like
Intuit and H&R Block.
This Free File Alliance
spends thousands
and thousands of dollars every year
to lobby individual
members of Congress,
many of whom then write bills
to insure that the government
doesn't offer its own system
of free filing for taxes.
It's just so crazy, the idea
that they're taking the money
that we pay them
to make our taxes easier
and they're using it to lobby Congress
to make our taxes more difficult
or to keep them difficult.
Yeah. This is not a Republican issue.
This is not a Democratic issue.
That money tastes good to both parties
and they both take it.
The system that we have set up,
as confusing as it is,
as much help as you need
to file your taxes,
that is entirely within
the Free File Alliance's
best interest, right?
In every single one
of their corporate reports
that they give...
their quarterly reports
that they give to investors...
they list the risk
that the government could
come up with a free system
as an inherent risk to their business.
You can see that every quarterly report
that Intuit files,
they list that specifically,
so they're very concerned
about something like this happening,
and they're paying thousands of dollars
so that it won't.
Yeah. They want the problem
to stay in place
so they can keep
selling us the solution.
They don't want the problem
to be fixed.
Right. Exactly. And,
you know, they've done
a lot of tricky things
to make you think
that they're on your side,
so the Free File Alliance
a couple of years ago got
a bunch of community members
to write... like, they handed them
prewritten letters to the editor
that they would send in
to all of these newspapers
across the country.
So, like, rabbis did this,
city councilmen did this,
because they'd get a call
from the Free File lines
with this great pitch being like,
"We provide free tax services
for the lowest two-thirds
of Americans."
They leave out that
they're making your taxes
more complicated, and the
only reason the government
doesn't provide it to everyone
for free is because of them.
Well, going back to return-free filing,
I'm sure that, you know,
a lot of people in America
would be suspicious of that at first.
Like, wait a second. If the government
is the one doing my taxes,
how am I gonna know
that they're doing it right, etcetera.
I mean, what's the response to that?
Right. So, this, in system,
would be entirely voluntary.
So, the government already knows
quite a lot of information about you,
which I don't think that most people
who pay taxes realize.
You might as well use
that to your advantage.
And I say, use that to your advantage
because there are a lot of situations
in which the government
might not actually be aware
that you have some income,
and so if they say,
"Here's what we know about you,"
you could probably choose
whether or not
to volunteer that you had
this extra income
that they don't know about
that you might or might not
want to pay taxes on.
So this is actually
quite a powerful thing
for the American taxpayer
to know about themselves,
because as it stands,
right, I have no idea
what the IRS already knows about me.
I have no idea what
the federal government
is aware that I make every year,
even though they probably know
just about everything.
That's a good point,
because, yeah, we don't actually know
the information that
they've been given.
It's like this weird test
that we don't have to take.
Just tell me what you want
and then we'll use that
as a starting point.
Yeah. For sure, for sure.
Well, Jessica, thank you so much
for your work uncovering this story,
and thank you so much
for coming onto the show
to talk to us about it.
Thanks so much. I enjoyed it.
No, I'm sure I'll find work
as soon as the economy
gets back to normal.
No, no, I appreciate the invitation,
but I'm gonna stay
right here in town. Yeah.
Factory's gonna be open, you'll see.
Yeah.
Yeah, well, look, I gotta
get back to my taxes,
much as I hate 'em.
Yeah. All right, love you too.
Yeah, bye.
W-w-welcome to HulkoTax.
A-a-are you salaried or self-employed?
Well, I was working at
the toaster factory 'til March,
but since the layoffs, I've been
driving for Uber, so...
Enter all W-2s and 1099s.
Oh, okay. Well, which do I, uh...
Now enter all double-2-Us
and 9-10dy-10s.
Well, does, does the bank
send you that or...?
Do you have any commercial
fishing income?
I wish.
You have done every part
of this incorrectly.
Now entering m-m-manual mode.
Hope you like math-math-math-math...
- Oh, come on!
- ...math...
Why do taxes have to be so hard?
Actually, taxes
don't have to be hard at all.
Did I kill a man?
Nope. You summoned a TV host.
Hi, I'm Adam Conover
and this is "Adam Ruins Everything."
Oh! Ugh.
Corrected & Synced by Bakugan
Hey, you scared the fudge out of me.
Oh, that's nothin'.
One time I made my friend
Emily give birth.
I don't know what
that means, but I hate it.
Almost as much as I hate
doing my taxes.
Now, what's that you were saying
about how taxes could be easy?
Well, think about it.
Taxes are a bill
the government charges you,
so why do you have to do all the math?
Imagine if we did that
with any other bill.
How much do I owe you?
You tell me.
Divide number of toppings
by cheese consumption?
$12?
Wrong! Now you're goin' to jail!
Bogus.
Instead of making you fill out
a complicated return,
why doesn't the government
just tell you how much you owe?
Well, 'cause they
need to know my income,
my interest on my savings...
all the numbers
that are on those forms.
News flash! They already do.
Employers, banks, and
other financial institutions
already send
detailed records to the IRS.
Okay, we just got Hank's W2s and 1099s.
I could calculate
his tax bill myself...
Nah, I'll just wait quietly
while he sends me the
exact same information.
D'oh!
The government could quite literally
do your taxes for you.
It's an idea called return-free filing.
Instead of the government
checking your work,
you'd check theirs,
and it would make taxes more like this.
Ooh, honey, our taxes came.
Oh...
Just need to deduct that work
trip to Toledo and we're done!
Hey, think we have time for
some wild, bedpost-rattling sex?
Why not? Our April's wide open.
Return-free filing is already used
by countries around the world
and could allow millions
of Americans like you
to do your taxes for free
in just five minutes.
Yeah, well, those bozos in Washington
would never go for an idea
that makes that much sense.
Actually, return-free filing bills
are introduced in Congress
all the time,
and both Barack Obama
and Ronald Reagan pushed for it.
Yes, we can.
Tear down this wall...
of paperwork.
Wow... that must be the only
thing those guys would agree on.
Okay. I'm sold.
- Give me return-free filing.
- Sorry.
The makers of tax software
like TurboTax and H&R Block
spend a butt-load of money
to make sure it never happens.
T-t-tax software industry.
You p-p-pay us
to make your taxes easier,
so we pay lobbyists to make sure
they stay c-c-complicated.
Citizens, we feel your pain!
Filing your taxes
is just too... darn...
fun! Everything's great.
We're changing nothing.
Ooh...
These calculating
companies have lobbied
to kill multiple
return-free filing bills
over the past decade.
And they're using my money to do it?
Well, that's shameless.
And it gets worse.
This is Jessica Huseman,
a reporter at ProPublica
who's covered this story.
The tax prep industry actually
created a front group
called the Free File Alliance
that lets you file your taxes for free.
It's supposed to be available
to two-thirds of the taxpaying public,
but almost no one uses it.
That's because the system is confusing,
the IRS doesn't market it,
the tax companies have no incentive
to push it themselves,
and a sneaky opt-in option
allows them to push
their paid products.
Don't use the f-f-free option.
It's too hard.
Pay me instead.
But I want return-free filing,
like you were talking about.
Well, here's the worst part.
The tax industry
negotiated an exclusive deal
that prevents the federal government
from offering return-free filing
or any free system of tax filing
so long as
the Free File Alliance exists.
So you're saying the government
could be doing my taxes for me,
for free, but TurboTax and H&R Block
are working like crazy
to stop that from happening?
Exactly.
Instead, you're stuck
doing your taxes yourself
with this guy.
Get ready to spend
all your Aprils with m-m-me.
Gah!
See, this is the problem
with the economy.
The government and the CEOs get rich
and the rest of us
get screwed by something
that takes three degrees to understand.
Yeah, you pretty much nailed it.
See, that's why I like this guy.
Bad news comin' in from Wall Street!
The Dow is down 500 points,
which means we're headed into
the icy depths of poverty!
Joe "Cray-Cray" Krasowitz.
He makes the economy so simple.
Yeah, he does, and that's
what makes him so wrong.
I'll show you.
Hey, don't come into a man's house
and teleport him against his will.
Welcome back to "Demented Dollars,"
America's loudest and therefore best
financial advice show!
The Dow Jones Industrial Average
is down in the dumps,
just like me after every date!
I think we should see other people.
And that means the economy is ruined,
so it's time to panic!
Actually, no, it isn't.
The American economy
is an incredibly complicated system
that even experts spend a lifetime
trying to understand,
so when the news media
dumbs it all down
into how a single number
changed that day, it tells you
a lot less than you think.
Okay. Who the heck are you?
Hi. Name's Hank, big, famous Krasowitz.
Can I call you Cray-Cray?
And can you tell him
that he's full of it?
The Dow tells us how the
whole stock market is doing.
Nope. It tells you how a tiny part
of the stock market is doing,
and its methodology is deeply flawed.
The US stock market
is an enormous system
with over 3,000
publicly traded companies
in the US alone,
but the Dow includes just 30 of them
and it's basically designed
to go up over time.
If a stock does too poorly,
it gets dropped and replaced.
What? You mean
the whole thing's rigged?
Yep. And it's not
adjusted for inflation.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, right.
Well, if that were true, then how come
all of us in the media
report on it constantly?
Maybe because that's
what you've been doing
for a century.
See, the Dow became popular
during the economic panics
and depressions of
the early 20th century,
when people were desperate for any sign
of how the economy was doing.
Are we ruined or ain't we?
I just need some kind of sign.
There's the Dow
and it's just gone bust.
Thanks. Guess it's curtains for me.
Now, back when our economy was simpler,
the performance of 30 big companies
was actually pretty useful information,
but as our economy grew
and became more complex,
the Dow started to
tell us less and less,
and today, financial insiders
don't even pay attention to it.
Dude, don't jump.
The Dow's, like, sick.
It's, like, up 1,000 points.
Who cares about that
meaningless number?
My wife cheated on me
with a pottery instructor.
Hey, please don't
make light of suicide.
It's insensitive. Sorry.
Today, despite the fact
that the Dow tells us
less than ever,
reporters like Cray-Cray
keep using it out of sheer habit.
Yeah, well, I have another habit!
Doing my show! You two done?
'Cause it's time for the Jobs Report!
I know I was just screaming
that the economy is through,
but it's actually great
because the unemployment rate
is down to 4.5%.
So, 96% of folks are making a living?
That's great!
Ac-ac-actually...
The number you hear reported
as the unemployment rate is...
The female hymen.
Wrong button. Old episode.
The unemployment rate
is a flawed number
that excludes tons of people
who you and I would
consider unemployed.
Well, I find that hard to believe.
You're either working or you're not.
Well, let's play America's
least-favorite game show,
"Who Counts As Unemployed?"-
Up first, we have Trista.
I'm 24, I got laid off
a few months ago,
and I've been so depressed
that I haven't looked for work.
She's unemployed.
Not according to the government.
Hi, I'm Charles, I'm 52,
and this week, I mowed
my neighbor's lawn for $25.
That's all the work I've had in months.
Well, he must count as unemployed.
No, again.
And finally, we have Hank.
Me? Well, I drive Uber some nights
since the factory closed,
but I'm barely making by.
I'm unemployed.
Wrong again. You don't count either.
Thanks for playing,
and remember to spell and
grammar check your resume.
Wait. Why don't I count as unemployed?
Well, the number we
always hear reported
as the unemployment rate
only counts people
who are actively looking for work
and excludes anyone who's earned
more than $20 in the past week.
Now, that doesn't make it
totally useless,
but if you hear that number and think
that's how many people are out of work,
you're wrong. Many more are struggling.
Yeah. Like me.
That's enough for bloated
Anderson Cooper here.
Time to whip out the big guns!
Let's talk G... D... P!
Yes! GDP. The bigger it gets,
the better economy it is,
right, Cray-Cray?
Absolutely! Let's take a look
- at the latest figu...
- Sorry!
Even though politicians and the media
act like GDP or Gross Domestic Product
is a measure of our overall
economic well-being, it ain't.
GDP really only tells us
how much we make
and how much we consume.
In other words, it goes up
when spending does.
I got a raise. I'm
gonna buy a catamaran.
That's good for me, Mr. GDP.
But the problem is,
spending isn't always a good thing.
GDP could also go up
because something bad happened
and we had to spend money to fix it.
My house was destroyed in a hurricane
so I need to buy a tent to sleep in.
Here's all my savings.
All spending is good spending
for Mr. GDP.
Yeah, but she lost
her house and her savings.
That can't be good for the economy.
No, but she spent money,
so GDP goes up.
I thought when GDP rose,
that meant things
were getting better for everybody.
Sadly, a strong GDP doesn't guarantee
the average person feels any benefit.
In the last two decades,
GDP has steadily risen,
but the average
American's earnings haven't.
It's actually possible
to have the highest GDP
and the most poverty at the same time.
Terrible.
Useless number.
Well, it has its uses.
You just can't expect one
number to tell you the truth
about our gargantuan global economy.
Despite what the media says,
it's just not that simple.
I can't believe you, Cray.
I listened to you, trusted you,
sat through all those
erectile dysfunction
commercials for you!
Just wait one second.
Well, I don't need simple.
I learned how to use
a backward extrusion press.
I can learn a little economics.
Maybe it'll even help me figure out
when my old factory job is coming back.
Uh, about that...
Hey, Mr. Magic Man,
why don't you let me show you
why they call me Cray-Cray?
You know what?
I'll tell you in a second.
For now, I'm gonna run.
You ruined my show!
My fellow Americans, For now, I'm
gonna run. I know you're hurting.
You're in your den right now, thinking,
where did my high-paying
manufacturing job
that doesn't require
a college degree go?
Yeah. That's, like, eerily accurate.
Well, I'm here to tell you
we only lost those jobs
because of bozo politicians.
Once you elect me,
I will bring the Golden Age
of American Manufacturing back again.
Paid for by Americans Against Bozos.
Now, that's what I'm
talking about. Right, Max?
Sorry, Hank, but as tempting as it is
to blame bozos, they're not
why America lost those jobs.
It was the result of
massive historical forces.
Well, now, hold on a second.
My dad came to this town
looking for opportunity,
and he and everybody here
worked their entire lives
at the toaster factory.
They're in a middle-class income,
they bought houses,
and they retired on a pension,
and I'm gonna do the same
just as soon as this country
gets back to normal.
Actually, that wasn't normal at all.
It was a historical anomaly.
Here, I'll show you.
The Story of American Manufacturing.
Between 1945 and 1973,
American manufacturing
gave us the greatest
period of economic growth
in human history.
Economic historians
call it the Golden Age,
but it wouldn't have been possible
without the help of World War II.
During the war, every other
industrialized nation involved
was devastated.
That meant that when the war ended,
the US had a huge temporary advantage.
From the end of the war
through the 1960s,
America made 50% of the world's stuff
and it made great things for Americans.
By the '70s, we more than doubled
the standard of living for
the average American family.
Next up, a third baby.
Not unless it's coming out of you.
Ah! Now, that's the life!
The problem was,
this monopoly couldn't last forever.
As time marched on,
other nations rebuilt,
their economies recovered,
and they started bolstering
their own manufacturing.
The real reason
America's Golden Age ended
is because of history.
But you're ignoring the fact
that American companies are choosing
to make stuff overseas.
Like, why is the iPhone made in China?
We could make all that stuff
they build over there over here.
Oh, actually,
we couldn't, because of...
Unique Chinese advantages
that America cannot recreate.
Well, it's not quite as simple
as "China beat America,"
but China does excel at certain
kinds of manufacturing.
This is Dr. Penelope Prime, economist,
professor at the Institute
of International Business,
and director of
the China Research Center.
First of all, China has a vast,
relatively inexpensive workforce.
They have about 80 million
manufacturing workers alone.
That's double the
population of California
and the Chinese factories
that assemble the iPhone
are massive.
Just one can employ
up to 350,000 people
and produce 1/2 million iPhones a day.
And historically, China's workers
have been willing to accept
relatively low wages.
Before 1978, China had
zero trade with the US
and was closed to most
foreign investment.
When they finally opened their doors
after years of economic isolation,
they were an ideal location
for low-cost manufacturing.
Well, we have workers too.
But our government today
does not invest heavily
in infrastructure and
education like China does.
The Chinese government
even helps recruit
and train workers for jobs like this.
Apple estimated it would
take up to nine months
to find enough engineers
to oversee a factory in the US,
but in China, they found
them in just 15 days.
Come on, people!
I'm offering free Frisbees!
Well, what if we did
train enough people?
Could we build the iPhone then?
No. China sits at the center
of a global supply chain, which means
they're physically closer
to most of the parts
needed to make the iPhone.
That means, even if we did build
a giant iPhone assembly plant in the US
and somehow staffed it with
cheap, well-trained labor,
it would still be faster and cheaper
to build iPhones in China
than ship all the parts
and assemble them here.
The fact is, when it comes to
certain types of manufacturing,
China has unique advantages
that we just don't.
So, what? We're just screwed?
No matter what we do,
we're falling behind?
Actually, it's a misconception
that the US is falling
behind in manufacturing.
There are a lot fewer people
working in those jobs,
but we produce more than ever,
thanks in large part to...
Automation!
Oh, no! Robots!
These are monsters!
They'll kill us all!
Hyah!
Well, that's an exaggeration,
but it's true that automation
has transformed our economy.
Heavy industry jobs
like car manufacturing
were lost almost entirely
to advances in technology.
For example, General Motors
still makes tons of cars
in America, but today, they only need
a quarter of the workers it took to do
the same amount of work in the '50s,
and it's not just manufacturing jobs.
Bank tellers have been
replaced by ATMs and apps,
video store employees have been
replaced by streaming sites,
and even lawyers and accountants
have been replaced by software.
I'm ba-ba-ba-back.
Get out of here!
That is why these jobs disappeared...
the last half-century
of technological progress.
And the story is much bigger
than just the US and China.
The value of manufacturing itself
is actually falling across the globe.
Today, goods are worth
less than services.
The part of the iPhone
that's a manufactured good
is actually worth very little,
but the services that go into it...
the software, the design, the marketing
are much more valuable
and we do all those things in the US.
Even though there are
fewer manufacturing jobs
than there used to be,
new services jobs are being
created here all the time,
especially in fields
like software development,
healthcare services,
and education services.
So instead of making
impossible promises
to reverse history
and bring the old jobs back,
our politicians should
have been taking action
to help us adapt to these changes,
like by lowering the cost
of higher education
so more people would have
access to these new jobs.
But I'm looking for
a job in manufacturing.
That's all I know.
I know it's hard, but the truth is,
economies change.
That's just what they do.
Even if we wanted to,
we can't turn back the clock
to the economy we had
half a century ago,
and anyone who tells you
otherwise is wrong.
Now, there are things
that you can do to...
Aw, forget it.
I guess there's no place
in a shiny new economy
for a guy like me.
Hank, no!
This goes
in the recycling! A guy like me.
Sorry, Max, can't find work.
Gonna lose the house.
I guess I'm gonna
have to shack up with you.
Okay, that's a tad dramatic.
What am I supposed to do?
The economy is so complicated.
We've got no control over it.
It changes right under your feet
and it puts good people out of work.
It just makes me feel so powerless.
Well, you're right.
The economy is insanely complex
and it's always changing,
but that doesn't mean
there's nothing you can do.
What do you mean?
Well, you could take steps
to adapt along with it.
Yeah. My sister's been telling me
there's more jobs down by where she is
and she knows a good night school
if I want to try something new.
I guess I could think about doing that.
But, come on, not everybody
can afford to move.
That's true. Adapting
to all these changes
is a huge, daunting, expensive
investment for workers,
and our government could help
people more with that investment
with things like relocation vouchers
and especially higher education
and skills training,
like how in Georgia, where I live,
there's state-subsidized
skills training
that's coordinated
with new factory openings
to encourage companies to set up there.
We can't control whether
or not the economy changes,
but we have a responsibility
to help ourselves
and each other adjust to those changes.
Uh-huh. Well, thanks, Dr. Prime.
No problem.
Uh-oh. I forgot I was two-dimensional.
Hank, you may not win
the golden toaster,
but you can go after new opportunities
just like your dad did.
Thanks, Adam.
You know, I'm gonna
give my sister a call.
It might be a big change, but I think,
with her help, I can swing it.
And don't you worry.
I know one day,
you're gonna find a job too.
I have a TV show!
You've been on it for 20 minutes!
Hello, everyone. I am using
the power of the Internet
to talk to Jessica Huseman
from ProPublica's office in New York.
Jessica, thank you so much
for being here.
Thanks for having me.
Can you tell a little bit more
about the Free File Alliance
and the role that they play
in changing how all of us do our taxes?
Sure. So, the Free File Alliance
is a group of 13 tax filing
and preparation companies,
and you've probably heard
of a lot of them.
They're places like
Intuit and H&R Block.
This Free File Alliance
spends thousands
and thousands of dollars every year
to lobby individual
members of Congress,
many of whom then write bills
to insure that the government
doesn't offer its own system
of free filing for taxes.
It's just so crazy, the idea
that they're taking the money
that we pay them
to make our taxes easier
and they're using it to lobby Congress
to make our taxes more difficult
or to keep them difficult.
Yeah. This is not a Republican issue.
This is not a Democratic issue.
That money tastes good to both parties
and they both take it.
The system that we have set up,
as confusing as it is,
as much help as you need
to file your taxes,
that is entirely within
the Free File Alliance's
best interest, right?
In every single one
of their corporate reports
that they give...
their quarterly reports
that they give to investors...
they list the risk
that the government could
come up with a free system
as an inherent risk to their business.
You can see that every quarterly report
that Intuit files,
they list that specifically,
so they're very concerned
about something like this happening,
and they're paying thousands of dollars
so that it won't.
Yeah. They want the problem
to stay in place
so they can keep
selling us the solution.
They don't want the problem
to be fixed.
Right. Exactly. And,
you know, they've done
a lot of tricky things
to make you think
that they're on your side,
so the Free File Alliance
a couple of years ago got
a bunch of community members
to write... like, they handed them
prewritten letters to the editor
that they would send in
to all of these newspapers
across the country.
So, like, rabbis did this,
city councilmen did this,
because they'd get a call
from the Free File lines
with this great pitch being like,
"We provide free tax services
for the lowest two-thirds
of Americans."
They leave out that
they're making your taxes
more complicated, and the
only reason the government
doesn't provide it to everyone
for free is because of them.
Well, going back to return-free filing,
I'm sure that, you know,
a lot of people in America
would be suspicious of that at first.
Like, wait a second. If the government
is the one doing my taxes,
how am I gonna know
that they're doing it right, etcetera.
I mean, what's the response to that?
Right. So, this, in system,
would be entirely voluntary.
So, the government already knows
quite a lot of information about you,
which I don't think that most people
who pay taxes realize.
You might as well use
that to your advantage.
And I say, use that to your advantage
because there are a lot of situations
in which the government
might not actually be aware
that you have some income,
and so if they say,
"Here's what we know about you,"
you could probably choose
whether or not
to volunteer that you had
this extra income
that they don't know about
that you might or might not
want to pay taxes on.
So this is actually
quite a powerful thing
for the American taxpayer
to know about themselves,
because as it stands,
right, I have no idea
what the IRS already knows about me.
I have no idea what
the federal government
is aware that I make every year,
even though they probably know
just about everything.
That's a good point,
because, yeah, we don't actually know
the information that
they've been given.
It's like this weird test
that we don't have to take.
Just tell me what you want
and then we'll use that
as a starting point.
Yeah. For sure, for sure.
Well, Jessica, thank you so much
for your work uncovering this story,
and thank you so much
for coming onto the show
to talk to us about it.
Thanks so much. I enjoyed it.