Who Actually Runs the US Government? - Bernie Sanders - #1010

**Chris Williamson** (0:00)
I read something recently that I want to get your thoughts on. The left's greatest enemy is not the right, but the hard left. The right's greatest enemy is not the left, but the hard right. The lunatics of your own side make you look much sillier than the opposition ever could.

**Bernie Sanders** (0:15)
Maybe, but what I am most interested in right now is not left or right. What I am focusing on right now is that in an unprecedented way in American history, we have more income and wealth inequality, more concentration of ownership, more billionaire control over the media and our political system than we've ever had in the history of the United States. And you add all that together, that's what's called oligarchy. And that's the fight that I am engaging in right now. We should not be living in a nation where so few have so much wealth and power, while at the same time, Chris, you got in the richest country on earth, 60% of our people, got it? 60% are living paycheck to paycheck. They're struggling to pay for health care, for child care, for education. Housing is off the charts. Very few young people can afford to buy their own homes. And parents having a hard time even affording to buy decent quality food for their kids. That's the reality I'm focusing on right now.

**Chris Williamson** (1:17)
What's the story of how we got here?

**Bernie Sanders** (1:19)
Good question.
Let me throw out a statistic and we can go from there. In the last 52 years, you got it? Go back to 1973

**Chris Williamson** (1:32)
You'd have been in 31

**Bernie Sanders** (1:33)
All right. I would have been it. Right. There has been an explosion in technology, correct? Explosion in worker productivity. So how is the average worker doing with all of that increase in worker productivity and technology? They're doing really much better now than they did back in the early 70s.
In fact, real inflation accounted for weekly wages for the average American worker is lower today than it was back then. That's an extraordinary statistic. And at the same time, according to the Rand Corporation, we are seeing a $75 trillion transfer of wealth. Okay, you with me? From the bottom 90% to the top 1%. So what you have seen throughout that period is the very wealthiest people becoming much wealthier. All of the gains of worker productivity, increased worker productivity, et cetera, going to the people on top. And today, tens of millions of working class families are struggling to put food on the table for their kids.

**Chris Williamson** (2:41)
I want to show you a chart in a second. So this tracks the price of consumer goods and services over the last 25 years. Broadly speaking, prices have increased by about 74% since 2000, but the actual numbers vary wildly, depending on what type of good or service it is. So consumer goods, toys, TVs have gotten...

**Bernie Sanders** (2:59)
Got housing in there?

**Chris Williamson** (3:01)
Consumer goods like toys and TVs have gotten over 50% cheaper. TVs are nearly 100% cheaper.
But critical categories like health care, education have skyrocketed by 200%. Housing is in there, too. One potential interpretation is that the less legislation that you apply to an industry, the more the free market is allowed to take over, the cheaper the things become. Even new cars haven't got that much more expensive. So this is price changes. And you can see, as you basically get to the top, there's more legislation put in and down to the bottom. What do you make of that?

**Bernie Sanders** (3:30)
I don't. Yeah, look, to me, when I look at the economy, I look at what does a family need to do well? Okay, let's just go through. What are the basic needs of life? All right, everybody, right? Rich, poor, young, old needs health care, correct? In America, by the way, we probably spend three times more per person on health care than you do in the UK. Okay.

**Chris Williamson** (3:55)
What are the outcomes like?

**Bernie Sanders** (3:57)
UK has its problems, but it depends. I think, again, I'm talking off the top of my head, I don't think there's all that much difference. In terms of international outcomes, I don't know just the UK, the United States does not do particularly well. We spend twice as much per capita as the average OECD country. We live three or four years shorter lives. We have 85 million Americans who are uninsured or underinsured. We don't have enough doctors, even if you have decent insurance, sometimes it's hard to find a doctor, not enough dentists, not enough nurses.