Scott Galloway's TED Talk: Insights on Society and Young People

Scott's TED talk sparked a civil dialogue, revealing a strong desire for change among young people regarding societal issues.

### Scott Galloway's TED Talk: Provocative Insights and Civil Dialogue on Societal Issues
* 🎤  Scott Galloway's TED talk has garnered over **five million views**, receiving predominantly positive feedback, with many billionaires reaching out for collaboration on **philanthropy and political ambitions**.
* 💬  Galloway acknowledges receiving pushback on certain topics, such as Social Security and body image, emphasizing that **provocative statements should invite civil discourse**.
* 🎓  He highlights a growing movement to reform higher education, advocating for **expanded freshman classes and investment in vocational programs** to make education **more accessible**.
* 💰  Galloway discusses the necessity for tax reform, including **eliminating capital gains tax** and revising income tax structures to **better support young people financially**.
* 📉  He raises concerns about the financial burdens of Social Security on future generations, suggesting **means-testing and adjusting the age of eligibility** to reflect **longer life expectancies**.
* 📈  Galloway proposes a federally mandated minimum wage of **$25 per hour**, arguing that it could stimulate the economy by **increasing the purchasing power of low- and middle-income individuals**.
* 💔  He emphasizes the **urgent need to address the mental health crisis among young men**, who face **higher rates of suicide and addiction**, advocating for a **shift in societal narratives around masculinity**.
* 🗣️  Galloway concludes by calling for **political engagement and community involvement** to create a supportive environment for young people, urging a **collective effort to address pressing societal issues**.

Scott, an amazing talk, honestly. I want to ask you a bit about just your style of speaking because I think it's remarkable. I'm going to start here. This thing’s been seen by five-plus million people around the world already and growing. It's the biggest single hit coming out of the last TED. I'm curious what feedback you've had from it. I mean, you laid out some pretty savage criticisms of a lot of people there. Have some of them come back hard at you? Have you mainly been amplified and cheered on? Give us a sense of the feedback on this. SG: First off, thanks for having me, Chris, and thanks for creating such a powerful platform to let people like me have this type of opportunity. 97, 98-plus percent has been exceptionally positive. Not yesterday, but the day before yesterday, I was on a Zoom call where I spoke after Speaker Pelosi

and before Senators Blumenthal and Blackburn, and talking specifically about my recommendations around Big Tech. I don't know if I'll be invited back because I did not hold back. But it's been, you know, let me talk about, it's been overwhelmingly positive. It's been everything from ... Billionaires reaching out and saying, I have a philanthropy, and I'd like your help allocating some of our resources, to someone sent me a screenshot of an account with 10 million dollars in it and said, It's yours if you run for president in 2028. To which I responded, I have no interest in that, but I'd really enjoy spending the weekend in Vegas with you. It's been really positive. So the points of pushback that I think are interesting, and I want to be clear, I get it wrong all the time. You know, I'd like to think that some or even most of this is directionally correct.

But what I know for certain is some of it is wrong. I got pushback around Social Security from Representatives, from seniors, that this is the most successful social program in the world, and that I shouldn't be demonizing old people for taking out something they've already contributed to. I’ve got pushback for fat shaming. So I've gotten, you know, points of pushback. But I think that's important. I think that if you're going to make provocative statements, you need to be subject to pushback. And I would say that my goal is not to be right. It’s to catalyze a conversation such that we can craft better solutions. And the thing that's been really rewarding about this dialogue is that when people send me very long emails, including from Congress and the Senate and people who run companies and nonprofits, the dialogue’s been very civil. And I would say that the thing that I really enjoy, you know,

I recognize about the TED community. I'm in a variety of different communities, whether it's TikTok or whether it's different conferences where I say these things. And the dialogue this has inspired has been remarkably more civil. It's been more, you know, I liked this, I didn't like this, but I really appreciate that the medium is the message. You know, people are more civil on LinkedIn than they are on Twitter. And I have found so far people are much more civil on TED than other platforms. CA: Well, that's nice to hear. We definitely, though, don't want people to hold back. And I know that in the comments there are some people who've pushed back on specific aspects of the talk. But which of the various proposals and things that we could actually do about this problem, do you think have the most chance of actually moving forward? Because it's so wide-ranging. You know, it's like, it's very hard for young people to get to college now.

hard to get a house. And then, you know, all the way up to Social Security and so forth. Where do you think there's most traction, Scott? Something that might actually shift. SG: I think there's already a movement underway to expand freshman class at elite colleges, to invest more in vocational programs, to reverse this vibe or gestalt of higher ed as a luxury brand and return it to being a public servant. I think that movement was already underway, and it feels like there's a lot of momentum there, and some of the stats have really freaked people out. There's 10 to one MIT employees for every person who teaches. So I've heard from the president of ASU saying, and the presidents of Purdue saying, Come here, and they've been circulating my talk and raising money around the fact that they have not embraced this strategy. I think we're seeing -- I've heard from quite a few people in the budget office.

and Congresspeople talking about things, including eliminating capital gains tax or just having one income tax, similar to what we had under Reagan, instead of favoring the income that capital earns or wealthier people versus current income. I have heard a decent amount around the idea of just general, generally speaking, tax reform. How do we put more money in young people's pockets? And then from what I'll call the retail media, whether it's Morning Joe or The View, which I've been on since this talk, it's we need to change the narrative and stop criticizing young people and saying that their depression, their anxiety, their obesity as a function of their entitlement and not a function of public policy that people of my age have implemented. That, OK, maybe there is some truth to some of their disappointment. CA: So let me, before we go into the other details on it, let me pick up that specific point, because there is, I'm sure that some people watching this,

probably older people would say, Are you sure it's really this intentional thing as opposed to a consequence of just cultural cycles? So there’s this quote that you all know by Michael Hopf that, you know, Hard times create strong men, strong men create good times, good times create weak men, weak men create hard times. That there's an argument that we've been through so much prosperity that, you know, baby boomers raised, you know, a generation of kids who just grew up too comfortable and that that is where part of the problem is. You are halfly arguing a different case. Is there any truth to that argument? SG: I think in almost every generation before ours, I’ll call it Gen X and baby boomers, there was a concerted effort to elect people who would think long-term and make forward-leaning investments. If you think about Apple, Google, Nvidia, all of these companies, Moderna,

that have added trillions of dollars in market cap. It’s really, they build a thick layer of innovation on top of investments that have been made by the most successful venture capitalists in history, and that's the US government with its limited partners, its investors, the middle class. And that there’s a lack of that forward-leaning investment. Basically, the only thing that passes for bipartisan cooperation now is reckless spending. Republicans want more military spending and lower taxes. Democrats want more social spending and, you know, higher taxes. And they agree on lower taxes and more spending. So I just feel like we are being irresponsible, even reckless. The way I loosely describe it is seven trillion dollars in government spending which juices the economy, five trillion in receipts. I'm in the club partying with champagne and cocaine, and the closest the young people get to the club is they can throw their credit card at me from downstairs.

and I'll rack up more debt on their backs so I can continue this prosperity. Even the markets right now, we don't want to talk about this. The markets are being supported right now by an additional two trillion dollars in stimulus every year, in the form of government spending that’s beyond our revenues. In past generations, unless it was wartime, never would have engaged or supported that type of government spending. So I do think there's something different here. I think the financialization of everything, Chris, where, as they said in Jerry Maguire, more money used to be a bigger seat in business class, now it’s a better life. And the fact that we haven't faced really any external threats to rally us together to create more comity of man or more patriotism, there just seems to be not the same sense of selflessness or investment mindset there's been with past generations. CA: One of the most powerful aspects of the talk,

and there were so many powerful aspects, was your juxtaposition of different stats. So Harvard, this explosive growth in the endowment and, you know, no more students being admitted. I mean, you immediately know, when you just put those numbers together that there's something very, very wrong with that picture. So powerful. I thought your line about just showing, you know, minimum wage has just not remotely caught up with the way at which capital is growing. And I wonder whether one, you know, there's almost like some political ideas that we could push out there that said things like that. A society is not operating justly if the rate, its minimum wage rate, is growing slower than the rate at which capital is appreciating. It shouldn’t be linked to inflation or even wages. It should be linked to the rate at which capital is appreciating you know, in that society. Otherwise, inequality is absolutely bound to increase.

And I'm curious which others of those have landed, like with Social Security, for example. I understand why people have pushed back. Do you see any workable, kind of, middle ground here where you could say, look, Social Security is important, we’re not going to take the whole thing away. But we have to make it more just, we can't have it sucking more and more of the next generation's time. Like, what is the right metric to think about how much Social Security could be trimmed to be fair to the generation coming through that? Feels like one of the biggest numbers. SG: So I've had a bunch of calls with people, different people in Congress and different PACs about Social Security. So means-testing and moving the age back, right? I mean, the majority of people, just even 100 years ago, didn't participate in Social Security because they were dead by that time. Now they're living 20 and 30 years beyond that.

People will say, Well, I invested in it, I want it back. I'd say first it's called a tax, not a pension fund, meaning that it might be distributed to other people. Two, people who will live to be 85 take out two to three times more than they put in. I'm not saying we should do away with it. I'm just saying it should be means-tested, the age should be pushed back to reflect that people are working much longer. Also just basics. The person who put together the slides, Mia, makes 160,000 dollars a year, I'm allowed to say that with her permission. She's 26, a very talented young woman. She pays 9,000 dollars a year, or six percent, in Social Security. This year, I’ll make 100 times that, and I’ll pay, wait for it, 9,000 dollars in Social Security income tax. It's capped for anyone making over 160,000 dollars.

So if this generation is the wealthiest generation in history, why have we decided to cap Social Security for rich people? So I don't have a problem with stimulus. I don't have a problem with social programs. But Social Security is another example yet again, of we are really taxing -- six percent is a real number for young people their whole life, but it's been de minimis for me because I'm old and wealthy. So it’s another example of how this transfer under the cover of dark, that wealthy people are in there saying, We'll position this tax as onerous, but we're going to cap it like it's a good thing at six percent. Why is Jeff Bezos not paying six percent of his income into Social Security? It’s an off-balance-sheet item, it doesn't impact the deficit, it's funded every year. But right now, 40 percent of all government spending is allocated for programs that go to seniors.

It's about to be 50 percent in ten years at this rate, which means that crowds out investments and forward-leaning investments such as education and technology. And we also just need to acknowledge, and this sounds ageist, and it is, old people are less productive and more expensive. And so unless we figure out a way to acknowledge that they spend a longer period of their lives being expensive and unproductive, our economy is basically just going to be an engine to kind of support the most expensive nursing home in the world. This is happening in Japan, it's happening in Italy, and it takes an economy into decline, because you can't make forward-leaning investments that encourage wealth or inspire wealth for young people, and they don’t have kids. In terms of minimum wage, this is an easy one. I've been positioned as anti-union. I'm not; there should be one union. It should be in DC, and it should be federally-mandated minimum wage, 25 bucks an hour.

except in certain areas where there’s an exceptionally low cost of living. And the incumbents and corporations will start this bullshit narrative of it'll kill the economy. No, it won't. In Washington state and California, where they raised minimum wage, the economy actually grew because the wonderful thing about low- and middle-income people is they spend all of their money, meaning the multiplier effect is greater. If it had just kept pace with productivity and inflation, it'd be 23 bucks. That's an easy one. Mandatory, federally-mandated, 25 bucks an hour. Would McDonald's and Walmart stock take a huge hit? Sure. Would a bunch of small businesses go out of business? Yes. And it'd be worth it. CA: So, as you say, you don't hold back. And there were definitely a few things in the talk that provoked comment. So Kyra Gaunt, I see in the chat, found your comment about diabetes a bit smug.

She says there are epigenetics to consider. It's complicated for members of marginalized groups. And you say you've heard from other people on that. Do you want to clarify your view on that at all? SG: It's a fair feedback. As someone who was born to parents who were both tall and thin, so easy for you to say, Scott. What I have said in the past and you know, if I sound offensive, I apologize, is I believe that we need bottom line to put more money in the pockets of lower-income people such that they can eat better. I think we need to tax the food industrial complex relative to its externalities. Obesity, morbid obesity has gone from five to nine percent in the last 30 years. Obesity has gone from, I believe it's gone from 30 to 45 percent. The only thing that Americans really share is it's 70 percent of us are overweight or obese.

And if you look at McDonald's, Kraft, General Foods, PepsiCo, Coca-Cola, they're not companies as much as they are obesity indices. And their stocks have gone up 10 to 12x as obesity has gone up. And if you give those two, their stocks and obesity rates, to a statistician, they will tell you they are highly correlated. So as a result, because there's money in the diabetes industrial complex, we have Unilever celebrating obese women. We have people saying you're finding your truth. And this is from the same company that sells Ben and Jerry's and Axe, which basically encourages young men to fuck anything. So the notion that they are concerned about, are trying to liberate people or all of these apparel companies saying that you’re finding your truth -- I want to go back to the '60s, where Kennedy said it was American and patriotic to be in great shape. I used to train every year for the Presidential Fitness Awards,

and that was seen as fat shaming, so they did away with it. I don't think there's anything wrong with celebrating fitness, but also at the same time recognizing some people are dealt a difficult hand genetically and providing them with money and resources so they can get out of food deserts. I also believe GLP-1 drugs are the most impressive technology of the last year, not AI, and we should be pushing them into low-income communities. I think they're an absolute game changer right now. Here's a crazy stat: the region of America that has the greatest penetration of GLP-1 prescriptions is also the thinnest. It’s the Upper East Side. Because right now, GLP-1 drugs are being used for ladies of lunch who want to lose that last 10 pounds. I hope that more and more of it is imported illegally across the border, where it’s 100 bucks a month versus 1,000.

and it gets to the people who really need it, which is low-income people who don’t have the money for diabetes. Because the industrial food complex wants you to be obese so they can hand you over to the medical industrial complex of hip replacements, kidney dialysis, knee replacements, heart stents. That's an enormous industry. I want to put Coca-Cola, Kraft, McDonald's, and some of these hospital systems absolutely out of business. There's too much incentive to convince you that being obese is some sort of personal liberation. It's not. CA: So this is so interesting. Like, somehow, and I feel this for TED as well, we have to figure out how to have conversations about difficult topics that are respectful of people. And, you know, everyone, as you say, has been dealt a different hand, but that don’t ignore the basic facts of health or of science. And that is what is so hard to do in the current environment right now.

We've all got frightened, I think, of saying the kind of thing that you just said. And there probably are still, I don't know Kyra, how you felt about what he replied there, but I feel like we need to do both, you know, we need to be provocative and also respectful. And I heard that in you. So I think that's cool. And then again, actually not to pick on Kyra, but I noticed that she pushed back on your point about social media, that, you know, one of the fixes is to get our younger kids off of social media. Points out, and I’ve felt this reading Jon Haidt’s work myself, that those communities that people connect with on social media sometimes are incredibly beneficial. So you think of the kid who's queer or is struggling with something and doesn't find anyone in their community who they can connect with, finds a community online.

I mean, there's presumably some benefit in that. Is there any way of making recommendations where there aren't swings and roundabouts? There aren't, you know, sort of downsides to what we recommend? SG: Look, one in five LGBTQ high schoolers is going to try and kill themselves. So I'm involved with the Jed Foundation that works with high schools to try and identify or distinguish between kind of what is normal abnormal teen behavior and suicidal ideation. Because we really have an epidemic of self-harm at a teen level, and there's just no getting around it. Some trans and gay kids and other kids from special interest groups find other people like them on social media. I guess the question would be if banning social media under the age of 16 or age-gating it on the whole were demonstrated to be an absolute huge net positive -- because I think a lot of those communities are actually the subjects of incredible bullying and shaming online,

and are more prone to go down a rabbit hole of depression and end up in self-harm -- are there other programs that could replace that incredible community some of them have found? But look, when you make huge government decisions, there is no decision where there's not going to be losers. I mean, the special-interest-group kid who finds people online at 14, when social media is age-gated, yeah, that person suffers. I guess the argument I would make is that if you were to look at any study about the general impact it's having on people under the age of 16, the benefits dramatically outweigh the soft tissue here. So the question is, could we do it? But at the same time recognize we still have an enormous self-harm problem among kids, especially in the LGBTQ community, and move in with other programs or other analog means of helping them find other people. But I want to acknowledge, there's just nothing I recommend

that doesn't have a downside. CA: Some people are asking about practical things we can do. So Adrian Neubauer said, As an elementary school teacher, what's your advice for helping Gen Alpha students? I don't want my students to grow up having such apathy towards learning and being successful. I definitely don't want my students' highest aspirations to be TikTok influencers. How do I help them? SG: Well, the first thing is, I think this is an easy one, I don't think there's any reason for anyone under the age of 16 to be on social media. I think we need a massive investment. I think we need to tax every person in a private school and use that capital to invest in after-school programs and third places. I went to public schools all the way through graduate school. I went back to my high school, university high school, and 93 percent are kids of color. It's got the unfortunate designation

of having the greatest proportion of kids who are classified as homeless in LAUSD, and they just cut their drill team. They just cut their band, their drumline, because they don’t have money. I just think so much of this, Chris, unfortunately, it’s like households with a lot of anxiety. It sounds very crass, but I think a lot of it, a lot of problems are solved with money. Show me divorce and I'm usually going to show you some sort of economic stress or poor alignment around economics. And when you can add a quarter of a trillion dollars in five minutes post the earnings call of Nvidia, and at the same time, you see corporations are paying their lowest taxes since 1939 and the top 25 wealthiest Americans are paying a tax rate of six percent, and five companies have added the value of the entire global auto industry in the last six weeks. We have the resources. So I think a lot of this comes down to funding.

giving kids more third places such that they’re not staring at their phones. And also demanding that parents and demanding that entire school systems go phone-free and that there's no social media. And on a more tactical level, I absolutely think we need to ban or divest TikTok. I think it makes absolutely no sense to be raising a generation of civic, military, and nonprofit leaders who hate America, and it's all wrapped in cute dances. I just think it's insane that we would be this stupid. One of the wonderful things about America is our optimism. But one of the downsides of that is we're much easier to fool than convince we've been fooled. I think every day we're being fooled by TikTok. I think this is the most unbelievable propaganda tool in history. Unfortunately, it's not ours. CA: You mentioned Nvidia there, which has exploded in value in the last couple of years,

last year really. Isn't that to some extent a counterargument to your earlier comment about you had this unique opportunity to buy these cheap stocks like Netflix and Amazon at low prices. I mean, there are always ... Is the market fundamentally changed, there aren't that kind of opportunity for smart people to identify trends and get the same kind of wealth? Was it just a timing thing? SG: No, what we've decided is we want capitalism on the way up. We want low taxes, and the pioneer, the individual who earned the money and should pay a low tax rate because he or she is the most productive citizen. And then on the way down when there’s a virus or some exogenous event, which happen a lot, whether it's war, famine, revolution or a virus, the CEO of Delta says, “We’re all in this together,” and wants a massive bailout, despite the fact that 80 percent of the free cash flow of airlines

the 10 years before were either used on dividend or stock buybacks or CEO compensation that juice their compensation. So look, capitalism on the way up and socialism on the way down is cronyism. And we've gone full cronyist in the United States. And I understand the rationale for pumping the economy full of stimulus, because they said we needed to overdo it versus underdo it, but then no one suggested a special tax for the unbelievable champagne and cocaine disco party we've had in the markets. Markets are touching all-time highs right now. And the myth that my generation is fomented across the economy, the young people take hook, line and sinker is the following. There are two phases of everyone's life. There's investing, and then there's the harvesting phase. Investing is when you do your best to make more than you spend, and save some money, so you can deploy an army of capital

that grows in your sleep, such that you can have some security and some balance as you get older, and you begin harvesting. I'm entering the harvesting stage of my life where I'm no longer making as much as I spend. During the investment part of your life, in your younger years, you want markets to crash. You want real estate that's inexpensive. You want to dollar-cost-averaging at the low price. The reason I get to roll with you in London and I get to go to the south of France tomorrow, Chris, is because we let the markets crash in '08, and I got to buy Netflix at 12 bucks, which is at 650 now. What we've decided now purposefully, is that we aren't going to let the markets have a natural cycle of disruption, that anytime the markets are threatened, we're going to weigh in with the credit card of our young friends, of our daughters and our sons,

and we're going to artificially inflate and support the markets. That is nothing but a transfer of wealth. You need disruption. You need churn. These are purposeful decisions to protect old on the credit card of the young. I don't have a problem with stimulus, but for God's sakes, those of us who have benefited from it should pay it back. CA: So there's a great question here from Brett McCall. During this talk, there are an overwhelming number of points that are all delivered in an easy-to-understand way. That's true, by the way. I don't know of a talk where there's been such density of points, of facts that connect, really remarkable. Anyway, he says, It leaves me charged with the desire to join, 'the movement' and make change. It's almost like a full semester-worth of issues that could be movements, but there isn't an explicit community or movement to join.

Scott, where would you suggest a starting place for someone who becomes inspired by your talk? SG: It's hard to do this without being political, but try and find Congresspeople or get involved in campaigns of people who are, one, talking about the deficit, talking about the war on young people, having difficult conversations. I mean, there's some very basics. And the speaker before me, Andrew Yang, final five and ranked choice voting. People who are going to be moderates, who are going to think long-term about society. I think we need absolutely more young people in Congress. So I would say political action, just being engaged. And then on a ground level, getting involved with local schools, getting involved in charities and efforts to help young people in special interest groups find third places, find places to find each other. I think all of this is somewhat couched in young people, in an epidemic of loneliness. So anything you can do to create resources and opportunities

for young people to get out of the house. I think it's up to parents to get their kids off -- I mean, I think it's not what to do, it's what not to do. In terms of a political movement, I'm still waiting for a leader to come forward and say, I'm going to piss off everybody. Old people, you're going to hate me. Unions, you're going to hate me. Rich people, you're going to hate me. You know what we need? We need the biggest class traitor in history. Someone who shows up and says, “Are we going to decrease government spending, or are we going to raise taxes? And the answer is yes. It's time to start acting like adults and paying it back to some of the incredible Americans who have made sacrifices such that we can enjoy this prosperity. I haven't seen that person yet. CA: Politicians assume that that's an unelectable slate.

And maybe they're underestimating the intelligence of their citizens. SG: I think people are ready. Do you know one of the top three issues among young people is right now? People think it's the Middle East, it's not. That's like number 17 because of the zombie apocalypse of useful idiots on campuses that has been highlighted in media and in TikTok to give you the sense that every student is protesting. 2,300 arrests, 40 weren’t students. I'm at NYU, 99.9 percent of the kids are just getting their shit done. The new undergraduate president of Columbia is an Israeli girl. You know, we need ... anyways, one of the top, top issues for young people, one of the top three? The deficit. So I just think we need a pragmatist who says, I am not going to ever insult anyone on the other side of the aisle personally to get on TikTok and raise money.

I'm going to talk about really boring shit: tax policy, the deficit, teen depression, obesity. And I'm going to make big sweeping changes. And guess what? All of you are going to suffer, all of you. Because there's just no getting around it. We need to make a fraction of the sacrifices that a lot of Americans made 80 years ago. I don't know about you, I was very moved by the D-Day commemorations. But every generation up until this one has made real sacrifice for forward generations, except this one. So we need to catch up. I think people are ready for that. CA: Scott, you've spent a lot of time giving advice, especially for young men. Do you think that the problem has been especially bad for them for some reason or that a disproportionate share of the solution will be found by fixing the problems that young men are facing right now? SG: Well, all of these things are especially acute.

So with young men -- and this is really the thing, this is my passion project -- four times as likely to kill themselves, three times as likely to be addicted, 12 times as likely to be incarcerated. There has been no group globally that's ascended faster than women. More women globally are pursuing tertiary education, which is remarkable when you think about -- many nations don't allow women to pursue tertiary education, and twice as many women have been elected to parliament over the last 30 years around the world. Now domestically in the US, there has never been a cohort that has fallen further faster than young men. More women, single women own homes now than single men, which is fantastic. In urban areas, women are out-earning men. These things are wonderful. We don't have a homeless crisis. We have a male homeless crisis. We don't have an opioid addiction crisis. We have a male opioid addiction crisis. And unfortunately, something that gets in the way of programs, Chris,

is that because of the benefit, the massive benefit, privilege, and advantage that you and I received, we hold these young men accountable. We use words like accountability or pull yourself up by your bootstraps. If any special interest group is killing themselves at four times the rate of the control group, we'd move in with programs. And I think there just generally needs to be a change in the narrative and the dialogue. And we need to recognize that empathy isn't a zero-sum game. Gay marriage didn't hurt heteronormative marriage; civil rights didn't hurt white people. And recognizing the problems that young men especially are facing -- one in three men under the age of 30 hasn't had sex in the last year. Three million working-age men have given up looking for work. Fifty percent of millennial men are no longer even trying to date. And so you have this cohort that is doing so poorly,

and if we don't have a vibrant middle class full of successful, economically and emotionally viable men, the nation is going to collapse. Because here's the thing about women, we don't want to have an open and honest conversation about mating. And this is the following. Women mate, socioeconomically, horizontally and up; men, horizontally and down. And when the pool of men available horizontally and up keeps shrinking, we're going to have a lack of household formation. Sixty percent of people aged 30 to 34, 40 years ago, had at least one child. Now it's 27 percent. The whole shooting match, the whole shooting match, why we engage in all this shit, is so we can find someone we love and raise kids together. That is the most rewarding thing. Everything else is a means. That's the ends. And when a nation is failing to do that and just creating a generation of anxious, obese and depressed kids who don't like themselves,

much less have the opportunity to like other people and get together and start having sex and fall in love and have kids and have economic prosperity, then what the fuck is any of this for? So I think this is a call for all hands on deck. If young people, and especially young men, aren't doing well, then we are not going to have a functioning nation or economy, full stop. And it's time to put the politically correct agenda away and say, Well, you're being sexist. Yeah, I'm sexist. I believe the genders are different. If you don't believe me, put a three-year-old girl and a three-year-old boy in a room with cars and dolls and see what happens. That doesn't mean we reduce empathy for either gender, but we can't even have an honest conversation about this stuff because someone sees an opportunity to virtue signal and get a Guardians of Gotcha pin rather than actually addressing the fucking problem.

That was a rant. CA: Well, I will say that you rant better than anyone I know. I mean, I really, just as someone who’s hosted a lot of TED Talks, I was stunned by how this one went. Like many, many speaker coaches looking at you would say, Oh, he’s very monotone. It's very, you know, where's the -- it just unwraps in a very, sort of flat voice initially. But every word is so carefully chosen and follows so consequentially to what's just gone before, that you tap into a different part of people’s brains than most talks do. People go, Yes, you know, that makes sense, that makes sense. And then it builds, and then your anger and frustration starts to come out and get dialed up. It's absolutely remarkable rhetoric. I don't know how you learned it or where you got it from, but it's really unique out there, I would say.

And I think it's a super powerful weapon. And I mean, I don't know if people listening agree with this. This is really unusual... It's not like everyone will agree with every single word, Scott, that you said, but it's a really unusual and powerful piece of rhetoric about something that really matters. And for that, I feel, I think we all feel huge gratitude to you and wish you well on this continued journey. I mean, there just isn't a more important issue. So bravo to you. Thank you. SG: Chris, I appreciate the generous words. And what I told my wife is that after 30 years of working my ass off, I'm an overnight success because of Chris Anderson and TED. So thank you. CA: You had visibility everywhere, and you do. It's amazing how much your voice is out there. If people don't know it, Scott has his own --

Well, just talk about the two or three podcasts you'd most like people to do, because I think that's the best way to get closer to you. SG: Yeah, to resist is futile, I'm like AOL in the '90s. If you stick your hand in a cereal box, you're going to find something from Scott Galloway. I have “Pivot,” I have “Prof G,” I have my newsletter, No Mercy, No Malice, and a slew of books. So to resist is futile. [Want to support TED?] [Become a TED Member!] [Learn more at ted.com/membership]

Part 2: Scott Galloway’s Viral TED Talk on How the Old Are Stealing from the Young

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Scott's Impactful TED Talk and Its Aftermath

Scott's TED talk has garnered over five million views, receiving mostly positive feedback, including offers for philanthropy and even a $10 million proposition for a presidential run.

He acknowledges pushback on certain topics, such as Social Security and fat shaming, but values the civil dialogue it has sparked.

Scott believes there is momentum for expanding freshman classes at elite colleges and investing in vocational programs as potential solutions to the wider issues he addressed.

Tax Reform and the Struggles of Young People

There is a growing discussion about tax reform to put more money in young people's pockets, with suggestions to eliminate the capital gains tax and favor a single income tax.

The narrative around young people's struggles, such as depression and anxiety, is being challenged, with a call to recognize the impact of public policy rather than blaming entitlement.

The speaker argues that past generations have failed to make long-term investments, leading to a cycle of reckless government spending and increasing inequality.

Reforming Social Security and Minimum Wage

Social Security should be means-tested and the retirement age pushed back to reflect longer life spans, as the current system disproportionately benefits those who live longer.

The cap on Social Security contributions for high earners is questioned, as it perpetuates wealth inequality.

A federally-mandated minimum wage of $25 an hour is proposed, arguing that it would stimulate the economy by increasing spending power for low- and middle-income individuals.

The speaker emphasizes the need for more financial support for lower-income individuals to access better food and the importance of taxing the food industry for its negative impact on health.

They highlight the correlation between the rise of obesity and the profits of major food companies, calling for a shift in the distribution of resources and the use of GLP-1 drugs to aid those in need.

The conversation also touches on the challenge of discussing difficult topics related to health and social media's role in providing support for marginalized individuals.

One in five LGBTQ high schoolers are at risk of suicide, leading to efforts by the Jed Foundation to address the issue.

Social media plays a complex role in providing community for marginalized youth, but age-gating it may have negative consequences.

The speaker advocates for investing in after-school programs and creating phone-free environments to support vulnerable kids, while also calling for the banning of TikTok to prevent its negative influence.

The Flaws of Capitalism and the Need for Change

The speaker critiques the current economic system, highlighting the contradiction of capitalism on the way up and socialism on the way down as a form of cronyism.

They emphasize the importance of market disruption and the need for a natural cycle of change, arguing that the current approach is a transfer of wealth from the young to the old.

The speaker encourages political engagement and local involvement to create resources and opportunities for young people, addressing the epidemic of loneliness and the need for community.

Young people are struggling to leave home, and there is a call for a leader to address government spending and taxes.

The deficit is a top concern for young people, contrary to popular belief.

Young men are facing acute challenges, including higher rates of suicide, addiction, and incarceration, while women are making significant educational and economic gains.

A strong middle class of successful men is crucial for a nation's stability and household formation.

The shrinking pool of men available for women is leading to a decline in family formation and a generation of struggling young people.

Honest conversations about gender differences and the challenges faced by young men are essential for addressing these societal issues.