August 2, 2017 • 44 mins
From onions hawked by animated ogres, to upbeat soundtracks created explicitly for sharks, there’s a lot of pork in the government’s budget. But just how outraged should we be? Will and Mango try to get an answer for you. Featuring James Ledbetter and the editors of CoinWeek.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Guess what, mango, what's that will? I know you're a
big fan of couzies, so I've got a great story
for you. Just just go with it. It's a good setup.
So you know how we've had so many good business
ideas since starting this show. We had amish dust, we
had remote control condoms. Well, I think we need to
try and apply for some government money to get these
things off the ground. So you really think we'd have
(00:20):
a shot. Well that's where the coozies come in. Just
a couple of years ago, to students at the University
of Washington, we're doing some pretty cool research on how
foam couzies helped keep a can cold in the summer heat.
And you know how much they got from the National
Science Foundation to explore this one point three million dollars
you're making up? I'm not. And it turns out that
(00:41):
there's a little more to the story than just that headline,
and that the study was part of an effort to
learn more about climate change. But it's more fun to
ignore the important science e stuff and just say one
point three million to study cazies. And I'm sure we
could come up with a bigger, more noble cause behind
our ideas, but it does make you wonder what are
the weirdest things our government has invested in? And that's
(01:02):
what we're talking about today, Mr Hei their podcast listeners,
(01:22):
Welcome to Part Time Genius. I'm Will Pearson and as
always I'm joined by my good friend Mangueshot Ticketer and
today we're breaking out our calculators and taking a hard
look at questions on government spending. What exactly does the
US budget pay for? And more importantly, what's the weirdest
stuff our country has ever invested in? And to talk
about that, We've got a few fun guests today. Who's
gonna be joining us today, Mango. Today we'll be joined
(01:44):
by James Ledbetter, author and editor of inc Magazine, and
he's got this great new book, One Nation Under Gold,
where he digs into Operation Goldfinger, this bizarre secret federal
plan from the sixties that tried to sniff out golden
strange places. And we're also going to talk to a
couple of coin collectors. You know a thing or two
about unusual investments. They're going to give us a low
down on some of their best finds and in return,
(02:06):
we'll put them to the test. All right, Well, that
sounds like a fair trade. So to kind of dip
our toes into this topic, I thought we should first
address what most people already know about government spending, which
it turns out isn't a whole lot. Plenty of us
could probably point to healthcare and national defense as big
parts of the US budget, but beyond that, the specifics
actually get a little hazy for most people. Yeah, sad,
(02:28):
but true. The Pure Research Center to the study back
in two thousand fourteen that really helped illustrate just how
little we know about where our money goes. PU pulled
Americans on what they knew about carent events and issues
in the news, and while the average respondent was fairly
knowledgeable about many of the topics, when it came to
how much the government spent on particular programs, most people
were pretty clueless. So when they were pulled out, what
(02:51):
were they asked about? Well, respondents were asked how much
money they thought the government spent on four programs. It
was foreign aid, transportations, social security, and paying down interest
on the national debt. Or rather, they were asked to
put them in order from like largest the smallest, so
at thirty three the majority of people said we spend
the most money on foreign aid, followed by interest on
(03:13):
the national debt. That was at thought. Social Security received
the most money and only four percent. Name transportation is
the top expense, all right, so I'm guessing that's a
little off. So what's the actual breakdown, Well, social Security
nets the most money of the programs on the list
by far. It received ninety four billion dollars in the
(03:33):
fiscal year two thousand and sixteen, and that's roughly seventeen
times the annual spending on foreign aid. It's also nine
point five times the amount spent on transportation and almost
three and a half times the amount spent on interest
for the national debt. So people underestimated how much we
spend on Social Security and they also severely overestimated the
money we devote to foreign aid. Yeah, yeah, I'd say,
(03:53):
well that that's that's very interesting. How do you think
we should reconcile the fact that Social Security always ranks
is one of the most popular government programs among Americans.
So I'll barn aid consistently ranks as the least popular
spending category. I think it really points to how our
preconceived notions and political opinions can color the way we
view the world, including our nation's spending habits. Well, how
(04:14):
is that? Well, we tend to assume the worst about
our government spending, and I think that's because we're aware
in this really broad sense that the country burns through
a lot of money and that the national debt is
this like sky high number that's unimaginable, but it's always
on the rise, even if we don't know the specifics. Yeah,
I mean, it seems like we take the pessimistic approach,
and you know, it's easy to imagine our government that
(04:35):
we must spend the least amount on programs we like
and the most on ones we don't like. And I
guess that's kind of human nature too exactly. But a
closer look shows that the worst case mentality doesn't always
add up. For example, foreign aid, that's the program that
tops the chart in terms of unpopularity, but in reality
it only accounts for roughly one percent of the total
(04:55):
federal budget. Wow, I wouldn't have guessed that. All right,
So let's set the record straight on this and once again,
and it's Pew Research to the rescue here. So they
broke down how the US government spent its three point
nine five trillion dollar budget last year, and according to
their senior writer, Drew to Silver, our country is basically
a giant insurance company that also has a defense gig
on the side. So we spend most of our money
(05:16):
on healthcare in the national defense, oh definitely. About seventy
of the total budget went for different kinds of social insurance,
so that would include Social Security, Medicaid and Medicare, unemployment compensation,
veterans benefits, all of the things kind of like this. Now,
another fifteen percent of total spending went for national defense.
(05:37):
Interest payments on national debt came in and looks like
six percent, and education and related services made up less
than three percent. So I'm just looking at the numbers
on your page here, So seventy fifteen six three that's
only whereas the other six well, that's the crazy thing.
Every other program, whether that's national parks, public broadcasting, foreign A, NASA,
(06:00):
you name it, all of those fit into the remaining
six percent of the federal budget, which is all the
stuff we squabble about. But it's all the fun stuff too.
I know, it's a pretty sweet six percent, And it's
inside that six percent that we're going to be focused
on today. Yeah, but again, the worthiness of those programs
is up for debate depending on who you ask, right,
So we're not going to get into that debate. If
(06:21):
you haven't noticed, we typically avoid big political statements here
on the show, but we do love to dig up
the most interesting fact. So that's what we're gonna stay
focused on. Right. Well, we definitely see federal spending running
into the same problems we face as individuals. You know,
what to buy at the grocery store, or how much
of your incomes should go to entertainment versus savings. Most
people aren't going to agree on this stuff, and the
(06:42):
fact is not everyone wants to spend their money in
the same way, and that causes pretty big headaches when
you're spending from a pot to which every taxpayer contributes. Sure,
and that's why you'll never reach a consensus on certain
line items, like, for example, whether or not it was
a wise move for the government to invest nine dollars
to promote Vidalia nions as part of a promotional campaign
for the fourth Shrek movie. Ninety thousand dollars. I think
(07:05):
we can all agree that sounds like a really bizarre
use of money. Don't tell me that actually happened. It did,
but I'm not so sure the can was a waste.
Like according to the Vidalia Onion Committee, which is a
real committee I was going to call, onion sales were
up thanks to the Shrek promotion, and that's a huge
deal here in Georgia, where agricultural makes up like a
good chunk of the economy. By the way, did you
(07:27):
know even more than that was spent in two thousand
twelve to help Idahope promote their caviar. It's like three
hundred thousand dollars Idaho. Again, it was to help the
local farmers in rural areas. Onions and caviar yummy. All right,
fair enough, But but here's another one for you, unrelated
to food. So in two thousand and ten, the government
gave six hundred and fifteen thousand dollars to the University
(07:50):
of California at Santa Cruz so they could digitize Grateful
Dead memorabilia. How crazy is this? That's over half a
million in federal funds that went a digitally preserving old
Grateful Dead concert tickets, t shirts and posters of dancing
Teddy Bears. I mean, maybe it's just me, but that
seems a little tougher to defend. I feel like we're
(08:11):
gonna get a ton of angry emails from deadheads now.
By the way, I was on Wikipedia the other day
and I found this incredible page of what fans are called,
And so do you know what Barry Manilow's fans are called.
They're called fan alos and cris Pines fans they're called
pine nuts. I'm a huge pine. Maybe I didn't know that,
(08:31):
but I mean, I see your point, right. Like expenses
like the Shrek Onion promotion and a federally funded Grateful
Dead archive, they're tough to justify because they tend to
benefit a much smaller segment of the population than you know,
something like medicare Well, it's definitely an eye of the
beholder kind of thing, and some programs will seem like
good investments to you and others won't. And there's bound
(08:51):
to be a lot of disagreement among people as to
which or which. Absolutely so one of my favorite examples
of that disparity and thinking comes from this weird research
study from two thousand five. Biologists at Yale University received
a federal grant to study the reproductive anatomy of ducks
and namely the mail ducks unique corkscrew shape privates. Right, So, like,
(09:12):
pundits and politicians were all over this, and they counted
the study as like a particularly egregious case of wasteful
government spending, so much so that the lead researcher, and
her name was Patricia Brennan, she actually came forward to
defend her work for the public. What did she say, Yeah,
it's a pretty great statement. Actually, so I'm just gonna
go ahead and read it. Quote, this is basic science.
(09:35):
The headlines reflect outrage that the study was about duck genitals,
as if there's something inherently wrong or perverse with this
line of research. Imagine if medical research through the line
at the belt Genitalia, Dear readers, are where the rubber
meets the road evolutionarily, that's a statement. What a great
quote there. But you know, that kind of dismissive attitude
is it's actually pretty common when dealing with research projects
(09:57):
that can admittedly sound a little nutty when take and
in isolation. In fact, there are a few senators who've
made it a yearly tradition to publish waste books, as
they call them. These detail hundreds of what they deemed
to be the worst cases of wasteful spending for a
given year. I should note that the two thousand sixteen
waste book was titled Pokemon Go. It's pretty great. But
(10:18):
while these reports always make some fair points, they also
tend to ridicule grants for quirky research and present them
without mention of their connections to the broader fields of
legitimate study. Yeah, and I want to make sure we
don't fall prey to that same temptation. But that's a
They're definitely other parts of the federal budget that seemed
wasteful no matter the context. What do you say we
look at some of the strangest cases of clear cut waste,
(10:41):
along with a few more examples that skirt the line
between impractical and outright crazy. All right, well, that sounds
good to me. Why don't we start with Operation gold Finger,
which seems like a prime candidate for the outright crazy category.
Why don't we see if we can get our first
guest on the line to talk through it. Our guest
(11:02):
today is the editor of inc magazine and the author
of a new book titled One Nation Under Gold, How
One Precious medal has dominated the American imagination for four centuries.
It's a terrific book. And with today's episode being focused
on weird government investments, we're going to focus this conversation
on an incredibly bizarre effort known as Operation gold Finger.
James Ledbetter, Welcome to Part time Genius. Thank you so
(11:25):
much for having me. All Right, well, James, can you
help us set the stage for our listeners. So it's
the early nineteen sixties. What is the state of gold
at this point? So, when World War Two was coming
to an end, the major powers of the world gathered
in New Hampshire in Bretton Woods to hammer out a
new monetary system for the globe. Uh and that system
(11:48):
had at its heart the convertibility of the dollar to
gold at the rate of thirty five announced so Bamian theory,
anyone with thirty five dollars could go to the United
States Treasury and get a bounce of gold, and anybody
with announce of gold could go to the High States
Treasury and get thirty five dollars. That every other currency
in the world was then pegged to the dollar, and
(12:10):
the dollar was fully convertible to gold. This system worked
pretty well. It arguably worked too well in the sense
that the growth of Western Europe and Japan starting in
the late forties through the nineteen fifties was so rapid
and extensive that you now have all of these dollars
out in the world and dollar backed securities that if
(12:32):
they were to be redeemed at the same time at
that treasury window, there would be no more gold. And
that was considered to be an absolute disaster that had
to be prevented because it would it would bring the
whole system crumbling down. And that's not because we didn't
have any gold. We had amassed the largest stockpile of
gold known to mankind, but it still wasn't enough to
(12:55):
deal with all of the dollars that were out there.
And so with this problem being very well known by
the country's leaders and the Federal Reserve, there was a
kind of desperation about what to do, and so on
top of that you have pressure coming from the United
States gold mining industry. The the keeping the value of
(13:20):
gold at thirty five an ounce was very depressing to
the US gold industry. That it's a little analogous to
like oil companies when oil is at twenty barrel it's
really not worth their time to drill in certain places
or to go where you need to do fracking. At
a hundred dollars a barrel, it's it makes a lot
(13:42):
more sense. But with the price fixed at thirty most
of the gold that was easily accessible in the United
States had already been tapped out, and and so the
question is where what could be done to get more gold?
And a strange combination of high placed Treasury officials, l
(14:04):
v j's science and technology advisor, and some sympathetic members
of Congress cooked up this scheme in the mid sixties
that because it's the mid sixties, what else are they
going to call it? Operation Golder and the idea, the
idea was to use state of the art technology to
basically find gold where it had never been found before.
(14:28):
So you had this is all completely top secret. There
was no congressional debate, There was no budget line item
for it. You know, there wasn't like people said, oh yeah,
let's let's uh, let's sign off on the on the
on the alchemy quest. Um. It was completely hush hush
because they were afraid, uh they they they believed that
(14:48):
there was so much gold that they could find that
it was essentially you know, double or triple the amount
of gold already mind in the world. That's that's so
one of the things I say is it's not like
discovering a new gold mine. This was like they thought
discovering a new planet, and that they felt that that
if that got out, it might be so disruptive to
(15:10):
the world central banks that you could cause you know,
any number of economic problems. And so what were some
of the weirdest places that they started looking for gold?
It feels like this insane exploratory mission. Yeah, so so
they were There were kind of three parts to Operation
gold Finger. The first part involved using state of the
art technology to see if there is in fact gold
(15:34):
in places where it had traditionally not been looked for. So,
for example, uh, is their gold in the ash that
comes out of cold plants? Is there gold in certain
types of um plants and flowers? Is their golden animal brains?
Is their gold in deer antlers? Is their gold in seawater?
(15:56):
Um Literally dozens and dozens of projects all across the
country and internationally to find out if there's some you know,
kind of hidden source of gold. And this is almost comical.
This is an instant of when science kind of gets
in the way of wisdom because the technology was really great.
(16:19):
The fact is there are traces of gold in lots
of places, but at parts per million or parts per billion,
to get the gold out of the deer antlers would
cost way more than thirty five dollars, So it really
wasn't a solution, even though yeah, it was kind of there. UM.
The second component of Operation gold Finger again goes back
(16:45):
to this idea that we know where the gold is,
but all of the gold that can be easily and
profitably mined in location X has already been mined out.
There's a very good chance that there's more gold underneath there,
but it's not really accessible um at thirty five dollars
(17:06):
announced if you use conventional explosives. But what if what
if we put nuclear explosives in the ground and blast
out the gold and then lead it out with a
with a with a chemical and this this was a
very enticing idea in the in the mid sixties, there
were a lot of government scientists who really believed in
(17:26):
what we're called the peaceful uses of atomic energy. UM.
It was a somewhat naive time in the sense that
people were not paying a lot of attention to radioactivity. Uh,
and that's a bit of a problem. But there were
a number of experiments that were conducted using nuclear weapons
to to move large amounts of earth, and it was
(17:49):
it was kind of in the books to do this
for mining purposes. But by the time the words started
to get out and some of the more um uh
kind of conscious scientists, the program was eventually scrapped before
it actually took the form of of using nuclear weapons
for for gold mining. Um. And then the third component,
(18:13):
which really didn't get too far beyond the conceptual stage. Um.
But let's call it what it is, was to turn
base metals into gold. It was nothing short of a
twentieth century alchemy proposal. And here again the science kind
of outpaced people's understanding of things. You can do this,
(18:35):
It can be done. Glenn Seaborg, who was for many
years the chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission, and there's
there's elements named after him. He's he discovered a number
of elements. Very distinguished scientists actually did this. In you
could you could take very very thin foil of bismuth
and bombard it with proton beam and it displaces electrons,
(18:59):
so that some of this remaining is in fact an
isotope of goals. So you can create gold out of
base metals. But again here's the problem. When Seaboard did this,
he estimated that to produce gold by this method would
cost probably one quadrillion dollars per ounds as a way
of replacing the gold that was propping up the dollar
(19:19):
that was worth thirty five This was not really a
very good proposal. Um. But but you know, it's it's
kind of easy to make fun of these ideas. Now,
it has to be said that at the time these
these were considered viable ways of propping up the global economy,
which was it was a very serious, sober thing to do.
(19:41):
But it shows you how twisted and um and kind
of um uh, what's the word I'm looking for, how
unsustainable the monetary system had become, that that that that
you would have someone seriously thinking of putting nuclear weapons
in the ground, is you know, a better way of
(20:01):
propping up the world's monetary system as opposed to say
changing the rules. It just shows you how the logic
had had really become you know, kind of work. And
I think that's that's part of the theme of my
book One Nation Under Gold, that for whatever reason, sometimes
we're good, sometimes we're not so good. This metal has
kind of warped the American mind over time, and uh,
(20:24):
and we we can't we can't stop. It's it's this utter,
utter fascination with this substance. Well, James, this has been terrific.
I hope everyone will check out One Nation Undergold. James,
thanks so much for joining us. Thank you for having me.
(20:47):
You're listening to part time Genius and we're talking about
the weirdest things our government spends money on. To ango.
Before the break, you mentioned that there were some clear
cut cases of wasteful government spending that are tough to dispute.
So when you said that, what did you have mind?
Oh man, where to begin? I'd say one of the
worst I came across was the staggering ninety million dollars
that federal agencies spent on unnecessary printing charges each year.
(21:10):
Like this includes about twenty eight million dollars just to
print the Congressional Record, and that's a daily transcription of
every word spoken in Congress. So there are over copies
of this record printed every single day. And the worst
part is the whole thing is available online. Yeah, that's
pretty much the definition of wasteful. And I've I've got
another one here. So, according to a two thousand thirteen
(21:32):
report by the Office of the Inspector General, the government
spent big on inside advertising to increase traffic to their
Facebook and Twitter pages. How exciting is that Facebook and
Twitter for government? All told, the State Department told out
six hundred and thirty thousand dollars of the course of
two years, and this was basically to buy more likes
for their social media posts. Man, did they at least
(21:53):
get the traffic they wanted? Well, no, unfortunately. I mean
although the State Department's pages did see an uptick and
visit ters, I think it was less than two percent
of them actually liked or favorite at any post. So
not only was it a big waste of money, but
I'm guessing it was kind of a blow to the
government's pride. You know, I almost feel bad for them.
But what about how much is spent on the annual
(22:14):
upkeep of vacant government buildings? Yeah, I remember you were
looking into this, so I'll buy it on this one.
So how many of our tax dollars go to empty buildings,
way way too many of them. So, according to the
l A. Times, the government spends as much as one
point seven billion dollars each year just to maintain the
more than seven hundred seventy thousand vacant buildings it owns.
And you want to talk about wasteful. Even though the
(22:36):
government already pays for all that unused space, some of
the agencies continue to buy at least new spaces rather
than put the vacant ones. To use seven hundred and
seventy thousand vacant buildings, that is insane. Well, it's it's
especially frustrating in cases like that where a little more
communication could cause multiple problems to cancel each other out.
(22:56):
I mean, in addition to easy workspace for employees, these
buildings could be used as government storage. Take the I
R S. I mean, the I R S alone has
more than twenty thousand pieces of unused office furniture, and
rather than sell it or stored in government buildings, the
agency pays nearly one million dollars each year to rent
storage space. That's so crazy. But you know, as crazy
(23:17):
as these expenses are, if we want to find the
weirdest government investments, we've got to talk about DARPA. Very
good point, all right. So for those who haven't thought
about DARPA lately or or ever, the full name is
the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. Was created back in
ninety eight to help with the US space race and
quickly switched focus to developing technical innovations for defense. This
(23:39):
was once NASA took over the space research. DARPA research
has led to all kinds of breakthroughs, from the first
stealth aircraft, communications, satellites, and drones to the less military
minded inventions like driverless cars and robotic vacuum cleaners. Right,
and if rumas weren't weird enough, DARPA is also responsible
for about sixty years worth of really far robotics projects,
(24:01):
many of which were never put to active use. You know.
One of my favorite examples of this was called EATER.
That's e a t R, also known as the Energy
Autonomous Tactical Robot. I don't know if you saw this, Mango,
but it was back in two thousand twelve. They were
all these online rumors that the government was developing some
kind of monstrous flesh heating robot. It was to be
used in combat. What I mean, I feel like I
(24:23):
definitely remember about that. Well. Thankfully, the rumors turned out
to be exaggerated. Researchers clarified that Eater was strictly vegetarian,
which is comforting seeing as the robot was equipped with
a chainsaw and a powerful gripper arm and this was
help but collect plant based biomass to use for energy,
and the idea was that Eater could support troops in
(24:44):
the battlefield without the need for conventional fuels. I mean,
it's actually kind of cool. So instead it would simply
collect twigs, grass, paper, other plant materials to help power itself.
And I like this statement from the CEO of the
company that was funded by DARPA to help develop the robot.
He said, completely understand the public's concern about futuristic robots
feeding on human population, but that is not our mission.
(25:07):
That's super comforting still for my money. You know, the
scariest thing Dark has worked on has to be their
Total Information Awareness project from way back in two thousand two.
I mean, that does sound way scarier than managing robots.
I know. It was basically this massive counter terrorism database
that was supposed to collect, process, and even analyze mind
data to help prevent terrorist attacks. And as you'd imagine,
(25:29):
there was a lot of pushback against what was essentially
this electronic version of Big Brother. And if you thought
the name was creepy, you've got to see the logo
they came up with. They used the Eye of Providence
symbol that's on the back of the dollar bill, you know,
the pyramid with all seeing eye on top. But then
they managed to make it even more creepy by showing
it projecting a beam of light onto the surface of
(25:49):
the entire planet o God. Yeah, okay, nothing unsettling about that. Now.
Not all their research is terrifying, though. One of the weirdest, coolest,
and most non threatening projects from dark Uh is this
robot that can play jazz music. And we already have
artificial intelligence programs that can produce pseudo original classical music
by analyzing the work of human composers, but DARPA has
(26:12):
its eyes set on robots that actually write and perform
their own jazz songs. All I think about when you
said this is like the creatures from Showbiz Pizza. That's
pretty much what it is. They were so far ahead
of their time that show Biz. But tell me why
jazz and how do musical robots like help with defense. Well,
jazz was chosen because it would require the robots to improvise.
I think it kind of makes sense. So in order
(26:34):
to jam along with human musicians, the robots need to
be able to think and react to the situation in
real time. So the aim is to produce a form
of AI that can make you know the spur of
the moment decisions and response to constantly changing conditions, which
is definitely a skill that would come in handy on
a battlefield just as much as in a jazz club.
So I can't believe you just convinced me that jazz
(26:55):
playing robots are smart investment, or at least that they're
not the worst way to spend our talks about No,
not the worst. But it's, like we were saying earlier,
so many of these seemingly outlandish projects don't sound nearly
as crazy when they're given the proper context. So how
about we try and experiment, mango. Let's take a look
at a couple of the country's most recent strange investments
and see if they're as silly as they sound, if
(27:17):
they're actually worth the money. I'm up for it. But
why don't we take a break for a quiz, first
a mango. Who do we have on the line today,
We've got Charles Morgan and Hubert Walker from the wonderful
publication Coin Week. Welcome to part time genius guys. Hi guys,
he has gone for having. When people are getting into
(27:38):
coin collecting, what are some of the mistakes they tend
to make? So the first one is that people who
really get into a hobby really intensely in the beginning,
I think that there's a race that they need to
buy everything they see because somehow they're all going to
disappear and they're gonna run out of time. And the
fact the matter is like nobody has ever are a
(28:00):
symbol of a a coin collection and that has everything. It's
just it's it's probably not even possible even if you,
you know, even with Esos his money, I don't think
you could do it because you would run out of time,
and then there would also be coins that would be
so rare that maybe there's only one or two known
and you have to convince the person who owns at
the celt Sea. But the second thing is one of
(28:23):
the most profoundly stupid stories that we had covered in
the last few years involved a guy who was an
investor who bought a quarter million dollar gold coin from
a one of those you know called the eight hundred
numbers listened to on radio kind of gold dealers, and
(28:43):
they sold him this this amazing coin, like any collector
who is a real collector would have been just thrilled
to own it. But he found that it had a flaw,
a little bit dingy, so uh, he basically polished the
life out of it, and by the time we saw it,
it looked like costume jewelry, like something that it didn't
(29:06):
even look real anymore. I mean it was it was gold,
so it looked like gold, but it was so shiny,
and it was a coin. It looked like something made
to look like gold. And he still only got like
five six thousand dollars for it on auction. So now
you're used to dealing with much more valuable coins. But
I was curious, what are your thoughts on getting rid
of the penny. I'm personally in favor of a total
(29:27):
coinage reform, which would include getting rid of the penny
at least and maybe the nickel. And if you think
about it, there has never been a success They push
to eliminate a piece of paper currency in favor of
a coin. Uh. In the past, probably a hundred or
so years in this country, we used to actually make
(29:49):
currency notes called fractional currency, which were parts of a dollar.
That was done during the Civil War because they didn't
want to, you know, use silver precious and being hoarded.
So they were making basically stance over money. But uh,
you know, when they tried to introduce the Susan B.
Anthony dollar, it didn't replace the one dollar bill and
(30:10):
the presidential dollar in the second to we it all
are also failed to do that. So from a minting
industry sent point, the elimination of any point from circulation,
it is a slow death spiral for that as an industry.
The second part is the good part. So in the
United States we have essentially had the same coin structure
(30:34):
since seven The coins are different and there are some
different denominations that don't exist, more like a half cent,
half dime, two cent, or three cent piece. But in
eighteen fifty seven the United States meant in a major
pointage reform which eliminated the half cent and the cent
(30:57):
large cent size cent which was oh gosh, maybe in
between the size of a half dollar and a quarter. Essentially,
that's how big the scent used to be, and they
eliminated it in favor of the small size scent that
we used today. Well, the elimination of that meant that
there were scents that were made from three the eighteen
(31:22):
fifty seven, which are like now obsolete, and they were
being redeemed it turned in and destroyed. Well, that's what
started coin collecting in America as sort of a popular hobby.
And so my opinion is if they eliminated the scent
and the nickel, it would actually help coin collecting because
(31:43):
people who grew up using those coins would realize they
were no longer going to be available and people would
start looking for the different dates and mint marks and
things like that. So for coin collectors eliminating stuff like
that it's probably a good thing, But for the mincing
industry it's not. That makes a lot of sense. Well,
you guys are used to dealing with rare coins and
much more valuable coins, but we're gonna put you guys
(32:04):
to the test with something a little more simple. Mango,
what game are we playing today? We're playing the quarter quiz,
and basically we're gonna tell you what's on the back
of the U S quarter and you just have to
tell us the state where it's from. But we're gonna
have you guys face off against one another, and in
order to chime in, we're going to have you make
some animal noises. So Charles you will chime in with
a cow's move, and Hubert you will have the lovely caca. Alright,
(32:28):
so let's get started. Question number one. This stake quarter
has a picture of a common loon on it, though
the phrase Land of ten Thousand Lakes might be the
bigger giveaway. All right, so that's Hubert, what's the answer there?
All right? I think that would be Minnesota, Absolutely nicely done.
Question number two. There are no slot machines or poker
(32:49):
tables on the back of this stake quarter, just a
pair of beautiful mustangs running free. Oh that sounded like
a very realistic cow. Okay, Charles, what do you think
I do? Mind us? Uh? That would be Na Bob, absolutely,
and Nevada is actually home of the nation's wild horses.
Question number three. This state quarter has the phrase Crossroads
(33:10):
of America on it, right under a picture of a
race car. Okay, Hubert, Indiana al right, well done. Question
number four. Unlike North Carolina, which also features the Right
Brothers plane, this state quarter paired. They're playing with a
picture of John Glenn in a space suit. Wow, Huber
(33:30):
just barely beats Charles with a coca alright, what's the answer?
It is Ohio? Alright? Question number five. This state quarter
has a ring necked pheasant in the foreground, though the
pick of Mount Rushmore in the back might be more recognizable.
Um I, why don't we give it to Charles? Yeah?
That would that would be the South Dakota. You got it,
(33:52):
all right? Question number six, This state has a bucking
cowboy on it, and it's accompanied by the phrase the
equality state. It's better known as a home of Dick Cheney.
This is also probably the worst coin design and the
entire STA series, and that would go to Wyoming. Wait,
why why do you think it's the worst state design. Well,
(34:13):
it's not because of the iconic image of the bucking cowboys,
because there's no detail on it. It's just basically a silhouette.
I mean that's kind of boring. Anything that is pretty boring. Okay, Well,
if I'm not mistaken, we are tied at three. So
this is the very last question, the tiebreaker number seven.
This state quarter has a picture of a peregrine falcon
and the phrase may it be forever in Latin. There
(34:35):
are zero potatoes on it, however, alright Hubert for the
wind Idaho, it is Idaho. Alright, Mango. How our contestants
done well? He just barely edged out Charles. But it
was a great competition. And as always are, whinner gets
a note to his mom or boss sing his praises.
And because we don't want Charles to go home h
(34:57):
empty handed, We're gonna send you home with the weirdest
poin press we could find online, a hedgehog coin purse.
I can't wait to use it. Well, congratulations guys, and
thanks so much for joining us on part time genius.
Thanks so much, guys, great, thank you guys. Thanks, We
will thank you. Okay, Well, so it's time to live
(35:27):
out the ultimate taxpayer fantasy. We're basically gonna audit the U. S.
Government and see if any of their two thousand and
sixteen investments past muster. Where do you want to start? Alright?
So here's what I want your opinion on. The researchers
and m I T developed a new program to view
six hundred hours of television shows and four hundred hours
of online videos to see if they could learn about
(35:49):
and anticipate human behavior. So with this, do you think
the government was right to foot the bill for a
couch potato computer. I'm not falling for this. I feel
like I need some more information, So tell me what
it watch. Well, the program was trying to anticipate actions
like hugs, kisses, high fives, and handshakes, so the researchers
had to watch tons of YouTube videos and hours and
(36:10):
hours of Desperate Housewives, The Office, and Scrubs, to name
a few, which isn't a bad plan, but like, what
was the end goal? I mean, is the government really
interested in like saving people from being left on high fives. Well,
the real hope is that, with enough time and enough
binge watching, the program could be used in security cameras.
Is a way to automatically call for help. It identifies
(36:31):
that somebody is about to be injured, or that a
crime is about to be committed. It's it's it's actually
pretty interesting stuff. Yeah that's pretty neat. So, um, why
don't we try another one? Since it's beach season, let's
look at the three million dollars study the National Science
Foundation did on how background music affects viewers perception of sharks.
But before I go into more detail, I'm going to
give you how the Internet frame the studies conclusion. So
(36:52):
here it is the theme music from Jaws caused people
to view sharks in a negative manner. That did. I mean,
I'm not gonna say we got ripped off, but it
does strike me as a fairly obvious conclusion. I mean,
the Jaws theme was composed to feel ominous. It follows
that the song would make viewers wary of whatever's played
alongside it, whether it's sharks or whatever, which is a
(37:14):
totally fair response. Now, let me fill in some of
the gaffs and we'll see if it changes your opinion. So,
as part of the study, researchers determined that the public's
negative perception of sharks is actually hindering conservation efforts, and
we tend to ignore cases where sharks are exploited or abused,
and we donate less money to shark conservation programs than
we do to similar programs for other creatures. I mean,
(37:35):
that's a little sad, But again, is this surprising our culture?
Has a bad habit of blowing shark on human violence
way out of proportion, especially when you look at all
the Jaws and shark nadoes of the world. So what
what is the angle here? Well, according to the NSF
and I'm quoting here, participants rated sharks more negatively and
less positively after viewing a sixty second video of swimming
(37:58):
sharks set to ominous background music, compared to participants who
watched the same video clips set to uplifting background music
or silence. And here's the thing, right, Like, researchers didn't
use footage from Jaws or other horror flicks. They used
a clip from the BBC's Blue Planet Nature series, which
just showed sharks like swimming around and being sharks. So basically,
the study is a warning about making educational content that
(38:19):
borrows too heavily from the Hollywood Shark Playbook. Yeah, pretty
much so, the studies actual non inflammatory conclusion was quote.
Given that nature documentaries are often regarded as objective and
authoritative sources of information, it is critical that documentary filmmakers
and viewers are aware of how the soundtrack can affect
the interpretation of the educational content. All right, I think
(38:41):
I see where you're going with this, and you know,
suddenly a laughable research study doesn't seem quite as ridiculous.
But I mean, three million dollars, was it really worth
that much? Yeah? I mean, I guess that depends on
how the educational community responds to the findings, and of
course whether or not you like sharks. All right, Well,
you know this might sound silly, but auditing the government
is much harder than I thought it would be. There's
(39:02):
just so many angles from what you can analyze these expenses,
and they all make a certain amount of sense. I mean,
our country spent a hundred and twenty five thousand dollars
on a three D printer that can create edible pizzas
for astronauts. On the one hand, that's exorbitant, But on
the other, do we really want to be the kind
of people who would deny astronauts pizza? I don't, I know.
(39:23):
I mean, there are real benefits to even the most
ridiculous sounding investments, but balancing those potential benefits against the
real world costs, I mean, that can all be dizzying.
That's why it's so important to try and keep things
in perspective when looking at these weird government investments. What
do you mean by that, Well, just like with the
thread of sharks or that one percent of funding goes
to foreign aid, we have a way of making these
(39:44):
weird expenses out to be way bigger problems than they
really are. Take those government waste books, for example, they
document billions spent on questionable grants and programs. But even
all nineteen billion dollars of that is only half of
one percent of the three point nine trillion dollar federal budget.
So while it's definitely not something we should ignore, it
doesn't make as much of an impact on the government's
(40:06):
bottom line as you think. That's actually pretty comforting. I mean,
I want people to like sharks and I want astronauts
to eat pizza. So if those things can happen at
no huge cost to the country, I consider that a
win in my boat. We'll hold onto that feeling well,
because it's time for the fact not bring it on mango,
h All right, So I'll kick it off. Every wonder
(40:33):
where all those old Neon signs go when they burn out.
In two thousand ten, one eight million dollars was given
to construct a Neon sign graveyard near Las Vegas, and
I mean, I clearly want to check this place out. Yeah,
I kind of do too. Alright, well, Mago, you and
I both have young sons who are very curious about
video games. Are doing the whole Minecraft thing now, but
it won't be long before they're begging to play games
(40:55):
like World of Warcraft. And it turns out there could
be some good money in this. The creators of one
study received two point nine million dollars to look into
how online virtual worlds such as World of Warcraft and
Second Life can help organizations collaborate and compete more effectively
in the global marketplace. Have you ever been to Denali
National Park? I haven't. Well, when you do, I'm sure
(41:17):
the animals and mountains and stuff will be pretty cool
to look at. But be sure to check out the
toilets because they've got some seriously fancy new ones, or
at least they'd better be fancy. At forty one dollars
perceed with thirty six toilets, that comes out to one
point five million dollars. Wow. All right, Well, I'll try
to swing by right after I visit the home for
the US Ambassador to NATO and Brussels to see the
(41:39):
nine hundred and sixty violets, nine hundred and sixty tulips,
nine hundred and sixty begonias, five four Iva geraniums, and
lots of other plants, totaling seven hundred and four thousand
dollars for this one residence. I feel like he cut
the budget on the ivy geraniums. Yeah, everything was at
nine hundred and sixty until the ivy geranium. So 'st year,
(42:00):
the government allocated like close to a million dollars to
post poems and zoos throughout the country. The poems are
there to quote, increase environmental awareness. Thank goodness, Yeah, thank
goodness for that one. All right. I'm not sure if
you remember this ad back in two thousand and ten,
but the government invested two point five million dollars on
what would later become known as the worst Super Bowl
(42:20):
ad ever. So back in two thousand twelve, then Congressman
Mark Newman noted that he wanted to save taxpayers a
hundred seventy five thousand dollars by cutting the funding for
a study on quote the connection between cocaine and the
risky sex habits of the Japanese quail for risky sex,
I know. And while the study was really intended to
help researchers understand the connection between drug abuse and sex
(42:42):
habits and public health options. I want to see his
study on coked up quails. All right, I'm with you
on this one. That seems like the most necessary use
of government money we've talked about all day. So I'm
gonna get this one to you. Congrats, thank you, and
that's it for today's Part Time Genius. Thank you so
much for listening. Thanks again for listening. Part Time Genius
(43:16):
is a production of how stuff works and wouldn't be
possible without several brilliant people who do the important things
we couldn't even again to understand. CHRISTA McNeil does the
editing thing. Noel Brown made the theme song and does
the mixy mixy sound thing. Jerry Rowland does the exact
producer thing. Gay Bluesier is our lead researcher, with support
from the Research Army including Austin Thompson, Nolan Brown and
Lucas Adams and Eves. Jeff Cook gets the show to
(43:37):
your ears. Good job, Eves. If you like what you heard,
we hope you'll subscribe. And if you really really like
what you've heard, maybe you could leave a good review
for US. Do we do we forget Jason? Jason who
(44:00):
s
Guess what, mango, what's that will? I know you're a
big fan of couzies, so I've got a great story
for you. Just just go with it. It's a good setup.
So you know how we've had so many good business
ideas since starting this show. We had amish dust, we
had remote control condoms. Well, I think we need to
try and apply for some government money to get these
things off the ground. So you really think we'd have
(00:20):
a shot. Well that's where the coozies come in. Just
a couple of years ago, to students at the University
of Washington, we're doing some pretty cool research on how
foam couzies helped keep a can cold in the summer heat.
And you know how much they got from the National
Science Foundation to explore this one point three million dollars
you're making up? I'm not. And it turns out that
(00:41):
there's a little more to the story than just that headline,
and that the study was part of an effort to
learn more about climate change. But it's more fun to
ignore the important science e stuff and just say one
point three million to study cazies. And I'm sure we
could come up with a bigger, more noble cause behind
our ideas, but it does make you wonder what are
the weirdest things our government has invested in? And that's
(01:02):
what we're talking about today, Mr Hei their podcast listeners,
(01:22):
Welcome to Part Time Genius. I'm Will Pearson and as
always I'm joined by my good friend Mangueshot Ticketer and
today we're breaking out our calculators and taking a hard
look at questions on government spending. What exactly does the
US budget pay for? And more importantly, what's the weirdest
stuff our country has ever invested in? And to talk
about that, We've got a few fun guests today. Who's
gonna be joining us today, Mango. Today we'll be joined
(01:44):
by James Ledbetter, author and editor of inc Magazine, and
he's got this great new book, One Nation Under Gold,
where he digs into Operation Goldfinger, this bizarre secret federal
plan from the sixties that tried to sniff out golden
strange places. And we're also going to talk to a
couple of coin collectors. You know a thing or two
about unusual investments. They're going to give us a low
down on some of their best finds and in return,
(02:06):
we'll put them to the test. All right, Well, that
sounds like a fair trade. So to kind of dip
our toes into this topic, I thought we should first
address what most people already know about government spending, which
it turns out isn't a whole lot. Plenty of us
could probably point to healthcare and national defense as big
parts of the US budget, but beyond that, the specifics
actually get a little hazy for most people. Yeah, sad,
(02:28):
but true. The Pure Research Center to the study back
in two thousand fourteen that really helped illustrate just how
little we know about where our money goes. PU pulled
Americans on what they knew about carent events and issues
in the news, and while the average respondent was fairly
knowledgeable about many of the topics, when it came to
how much the government spent on particular programs, most people
were pretty clueless. So when they were pulled out, what
(02:51):
were they asked about? Well, respondents were asked how much
money they thought the government spent on four programs. It
was foreign aid, transportations, social security, and paying down interest
on the national debt. Or rather, they were asked to
put them in order from like largest the smallest, so
at thirty three the majority of people said we spend
the most money on foreign aid, followed by interest on
(03:13):
the national debt. That was at thought. Social Security received
the most money and only four percent. Name transportation is
the top expense, all right, so I'm guessing that's a
little off. So what's the actual breakdown, Well, social Security
nets the most money of the programs on the list
by far. It received ninety four billion dollars in the
(03:33):
fiscal year two thousand and sixteen, and that's roughly seventeen
times the annual spending on foreign aid. It's also nine
point five times the amount spent on transportation and almost
three and a half times the amount spent on interest
for the national debt. So people underestimated how much we
spend on Social Security and they also severely overestimated the
money we devote to foreign aid. Yeah, yeah, I'd say,
(03:53):
well that that's that's very interesting. How do you think
we should reconcile the fact that Social Security always ranks
is one of the most popular government programs among Americans.
So I'll barn aid consistently ranks as the least popular
spending category. I think it really points to how our
preconceived notions and political opinions can color the way we
view the world, including our nation's spending habits. Well, how
(04:14):
is that? Well, we tend to assume the worst about
our government spending, and I think that's because we're aware
in this really broad sense that the country burns through
a lot of money and that the national debt is
this like sky high number that's unimaginable, but it's always
on the rise, even if we don't know the specifics. Yeah,
I mean, it seems like we take the pessimistic approach,
and you know, it's easy to imagine our government that
(04:35):
we must spend the least amount on programs we like
and the most on ones we don't like. And I
guess that's kind of human nature too exactly. But a
closer look shows that the worst case mentality doesn't always
add up. For example, foreign aid, that's the program that
tops the chart in terms of unpopularity, but in reality
it only accounts for roughly one percent of the total
(04:55):
federal budget. Wow, I wouldn't have guessed that. All right,
So let's set the record straight on this and once again,
and it's Pew Research to the rescue here. So they
broke down how the US government spent its three point
nine five trillion dollar budget last year, and according to
their senior writer, Drew to Silver, our country is basically
a giant insurance company that also has a defense gig
on the side. So we spend most of our money
(05:16):
on healthcare in the national defense, oh definitely. About seventy
of the total budget went for different kinds of social insurance,
so that would include Social Security, Medicaid and Medicare, unemployment compensation,
veterans benefits, all of the things kind of like this. Now,
another fifteen percent of total spending went for national defense.
(05:37):
Interest payments on national debt came in and looks like
six percent, and education and related services made up less
than three percent. So I'm just looking at the numbers
on your page here, So seventy fifteen six three that's
only whereas the other six well, that's the crazy thing.
Every other program, whether that's national parks, public broadcasting, foreign A, NASA,
(06:00):
you name it, all of those fit into the remaining
six percent of the federal budget, which is all the
stuff we squabble about. But it's all the fun stuff too.
I know, it's a pretty sweet six percent, And it's
inside that six percent that we're going to be focused
on today. Yeah, but again, the worthiness of those programs
is up for debate depending on who you ask, right,
So we're not going to get into that debate. If
(06:21):
you haven't noticed, we typically avoid big political statements here
on the show, but we do love to dig up
the most interesting fact. So that's what we're gonna stay
focused on. Right. Well, we definitely see federal spending running
into the same problems we face as individuals. You know,
what to buy at the grocery store, or how much
of your incomes should go to entertainment versus savings. Most
people aren't going to agree on this stuff, and the
(06:42):
fact is not everyone wants to spend their money in
the same way, and that causes pretty big headaches when
you're spending from a pot to which every taxpayer contributes. Sure,
and that's why you'll never reach a consensus on certain
line items, like, for example, whether or not it was
a wise move for the government to invest nine dollars
to promote Vidalia nions as part of a promotional campaign
for the fourth Shrek movie. Ninety thousand dollars. I think
(07:05):
we can all agree that sounds like a really bizarre
use of money. Don't tell me that actually happened. It did,
but I'm not so sure the can was a waste.
Like according to the Vidalia Onion Committee, which is a
real committee I was going to call, onion sales were
up thanks to the Shrek promotion, and that's a huge
deal here in Georgia, where agricultural makes up like a
good chunk of the economy. By the way, did you
(07:27):
know even more than that was spent in two thousand
twelve to help Idahope promote their caviar. It's like three
hundred thousand dollars Idaho. Again, it was to help the
local farmers in rural areas. Onions and caviar yummy. All right,
fair enough, But but here's another one for you, unrelated
to food. So in two thousand and ten, the government
gave six hundred and fifteen thousand dollars to the University
(07:50):
of California at Santa Cruz so they could digitize Grateful
Dead memorabilia. How crazy is this? That's over half a
million in federal funds that went a digitally preserving old
Grateful Dead concert tickets, t shirts and posters of dancing
Teddy Bears. I mean, maybe it's just me, but that
seems a little tougher to defend. I feel like we're
(08:11):
gonna get a ton of angry emails from deadheads now.
By the way, I was on Wikipedia the other day
and I found this incredible page of what fans are called,
And so do you know what Barry Manilow's fans are called.
They're called fan alos and cris Pines fans they're called
pine nuts. I'm a huge pine. Maybe I didn't know that,
(08:31):
but I mean, I see your point, right. Like expenses
like the Shrek Onion promotion and a federally funded Grateful
Dead archive, they're tough to justify because they tend to
benefit a much smaller segment of the population than you know,
something like medicare Well, it's definitely an eye of the
beholder kind of thing, and some programs will seem like
good investments to you and others won't. And there's bound
(08:51):
to be a lot of disagreement among people as to
which or which. Absolutely so one of my favorite examples
of that disparity and thinking comes from this weird research
study from two thousand five. Biologists at Yale University received
a federal grant to study the reproductive anatomy of ducks
and namely the mail ducks unique corkscrew shape privates. Right, So, like,
(09:12):
pundits and politicians were all over this, and they counted
the study as like a particularly egregious case of wasteful
government spending, so much so that the lead researcher, and
her name was Patricia Brennan, she actually came forward to
defend her work for the public. What did she say, Yeah,
it's a pretty great statement. Actually, so I'm just gonna
go ahead and read it. Quote, this is basic science.
(09:35):
The headlines reflect outrage that the study was about duck genitals,
as if there's something inherently wrong or perverse with this
line of research. Imagine if medical research through the line
at the belt Genitalia, Dear readers, are where the rubber
meets the road evolutionarily, that's a statement. What a great
quote there. But you know, that kind of dismissive attitude
is it's actually pretty common when dealing with research projects
(09:57):
that can admittedly sound a little nutty when take and
in isolation. In fact, there are a few senators who've
made it a yearly tradition to publish waste books, as
they call them. These detail hundreds of what they deemed
to be the worst cases of wasteful spending for a
given year. I should note that the two thousand sixteen
waste book was titled Pokemon Go. It's pretty great. But
(10:18):
while these reports always make some fair points, they also
tend to ridicule grants for quirky research and present them
without mention of their connections to the broader fields of
legitimate study. Yeah, and I want to make sure we
don't fall prey to that same temptation. But that's a
They're definitely other parts of the federal budget that seemed
wasteful no matter the context. What do you say we
look at some of the strangest cases of clear cut waste,
(10:41):
along with a few more examples that skirt the line
between impractical and outright crazy. All right, well, that sounds
good to me. Why don't we start with Operation gold Finger,
which seems like a prime candidate for the outright crazy category.
Why don't we see if we can get our first
guest on the line to talk through it. Our guest
(11:02):
today is the editor of inc magazine and the author
of a new book titled One Nation Under Gold, How
One Precious medal has dominated the American imagination for four centuries.
It's a terrific book. And with today's episode being focused
on weird government investments, we're going to focus this conversation
on an incredibly bizarre effort known as Operation gold Finger.
James Ledbetter, Welcome to Part time Genius. Thank you so
(11:25):
much for having me. All Right, well, James, can you
help us set the stage for our listeners. So it's
the early nineteen sixties. What is the state of gold
at this point? So, when World War Two was coming
to an end, the major powers of the world gathered
in New Hampshire in Bretton Woods to hammer out a
new monetary system for the globe. Uh and that system
(11:48):
had at its heart the convertibility of the dollar to
gold at the rate of thirty five announced so Bamian theory,
anyone with thirty five dollars could go to the United
States Treasury and get a bounce of gold, and anybody
with announce of gold could go to the High States
Treasury and get thirty five dollars. That every other currency
in the world was then pegged to the dollar, and
(12:10):
the dollar was fully convertible to gold. This system worked
pretty well. It arguably worked too well in the sense
that the growth of Western Europe and Japan starting in
the late forties through the nineteen fifties was so rapid
and extensive that you now have all of these dollars
out in the world and dollar backed securities that if
(12:32):
they were to be redeemed at the same time at
that treasury window, there would be no more gold. And
that was considered to be an absolute disaster that had
to be prevented because it would it would bring the
whole system crumbling down. And that's not because we didn't
have any gold. We had amassed the largest stockpile of
gold known to mankind, but it still wasn't enough to
(12:55):
deal with all of the dollars that were out there.
And so with this problem being very well known by
the country's leaders and the Federal Reserve, there was a
kind of desperation about what to do, and so on
top of that you have pressure coming from the United
States gold mining industry. The the keeping the value of
(13:20):
gold at thirty five an ounce was very depressing to
the US gold industry. That it's a little analogous to
like oil companies when oil is at twenty barrel it's
really not worth their time to drill in certain places
or to go where you need to do fracking. At
a hundred dollars a barrel, it's it makes a lot
(13:42):
more sense. But with the price fixed at thirty most
of the gold that was easily accessible in the United
States had already been tapped out, and and so the
question is where what could be done to get more gold?
And a strange combination of high placed Treasury officials, l
(14:04):
v j's science and technology advisor, and some sympathetic members
of Congress cooked up this scheme in the mid sixties
that because it's the mid sixties, what else are they
going to call it? Operation Golder and the idea, the
idea was to use state of the art technology to
basically find gold where it had never been found before.
(14:28):
So you had this is all completely top secret. There
was no congressional debate, There was no budget line item
for it. You know, there wasn't like people said, oh yeah,
let's let's uh, let's sign off on the on the
on the alchemy quest. Um. It was completely hush hush
because they were afraid, uh they they they believed that
(14:48):
there was so much gold that they could find that
it was essentially you know, double or triple the amount
of gold already mind in the world. That's that's so
one of the things I say is it's not like
discovering a new gold mine. This was like they thought
discovering a new planet, and that they felt that that
if that got out, it might be so disruptive to
(15:10):
the world central banks that you could cause you know,
any number of economic problems. And so what were some
of the weirdest places that they started looking for gold?
It feels like this insane exploratory mission. Yeah, so so
they were There were kind of three parts to Operation
gold Finger. The first part involved using state of the
art technology to see if there is in fact gold
(15:34):
in places where it had traditionally not been looked for. So,
for example, uh, is their gold in the ash that
comes out of cold plants? Is there gold in certain
types of um plants and flowers? Is their golden animal brains?
Is their gold in deer antlers? Is their gold in seawater?
(15:56):
Um Literally dozens and dozens of projects all across the
country and internationally to find out if there's some you know,
kind of hidden source of gold. And this is almost comical.
This is an instant of when science kind of gets
in the way of wisdom because the technology was really great.
(16:19):
The fact is there are traces of gold in lots
of places, but at parts per million or parts per billion,
to get the gold out of the deer antlers would
cost way more than thirty five dollars, So it really
wasn't a solution, even though yeah, it was kind of there. UM.
The second component of Operation gold Finger again goes back
(16:45):
to this idea that we know where the gold is,
but all of the gold that can be easily and
profitably mined in location X has already been mined out.
There's a very good chance that there's more gold underneath there,
but it's not really accessible um at thirty five dollars
(17:06):
announced if you use conventional explosives. But what if what
if we put nuclear explosives in the ground and blast
out the gold and then lead it out with a
with a with a chemical and this this was a
very enticing idea in the in the mid sixties, there
were a lot of government scientists who really believed in
(17:26):
what we're called the peaceful uses of atomic energy. UM.
It was a somewhat naive time in the sense that
people were not paying a lot of attention to radioactivity. Uh,
and that's a bit of a problem. But there were
a number of experiments that were conducted using nuclear weapons
to to move large amounts of earth, and it was
(17:49):
it was kind of in the books to do this
for mining purposes. But by the time the words started
to get out and some of the more um uh
kind of conscious scientists, the program was eventually scrapped before
it actually took the form of of using nuclear weapons
for for gold mining. Um. And then the third component,
(18:13):
which really didn't get too far beyond the conceptual stage. Um.
But let's call it what it is, was to turn
base metals into gold. It was nothing short of a
twentieth century alchemy proposal. And here again the science kind
of outpaced people's understanding of things. You can do this,
(18:35):
It can be done. Glenn Seaborg, who was for many
years the chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission, and there's
there's elements named after him. He's he discovered a number
of elements. Very distinguished scientists actually did this. In you
could you could take very very thin foil of bismuth
and bombard it with proton beam and it displaces electrons,
(18:59):
so that some of this remaining is in fact an
isotope of goals. So you can create gold out of
base metals. But again here's the problem. When Seaboard did this,
he estimated that to produce gold by this method would
cost probably one quadrillion dollars per ounds as a way
of replacing the gold that was propping up the dollar
(19:19):
that was worth thirty five This was not really a
very good proposal. Um. But but you know, it's it's
kind of easy to make fun of these ideas. Now,
it has to be said that at the time these
these were considered viable ways of propping up the global economy,
which was it was a very serious, sober thing to do.
(19:41):
But it shows you how twisted and um and kind
of um uh, what's the word I'm looking for, how
unsustainable the monetary system had become, that that that that
you would have someone seriously thinking of putting nuclear weapons
in the ground, is you know, a better way of
(20:01):
propping up the world's monetary system as opposed to say
changing the rules. It just shows you how the logic
had had really become you know, kind of work. And
I think that's that's part of the theme of my
book One Nation Under Gold, that for whatever reason, sometimes
we're good, sometimes we're not so good. This metal has
kind of warped the American mind over time, and uh,
(20:24):
and we we can't we can't stop. It's it's this utter,
utter fascination with this substance. Well, James, this has been terrific.
I hope everyone will check out One Nation Undergold. James,
thanks so much for joining us. Thank you for having me.
(20:47):
You're listening to part time Genius and we're talking about
the weirdest things our government spends money on. To ango.
Before the break, you mentioned that there were some clear
cut cases of wasteful government spending that are tough to dispute.
So when you said that, what did you have mind?
Oh man, where to begin? I'd say one of the
worst I came across was the staggering ninety million dollars
that federal agencies spent on unnecessary printing charges each year.
(21:10):
Like this includes about twenty eight million dollars just to
print the Congressional Record, and that's a daily transcription of
every word spoken in Congress. So there are over copies
of this record printed every single day. And the worst
part is the whole thing is available online. Yeah, that's
pretty much the definition of wasteful. And I've I've got
another one here. So, according to a two thousand thirteen
(21:32):
report by the Office of the Inspector General, the government
spent big on inside advertising to increase traffic to their
Facebook and Twitter pages. How exciting is that Facebook and
Twitter for government? All told, the State Department told out
six hundred and thirty thousand dollars of the course of
two years, and this was basically to buy more likes
for their social media posts. Man, did they at least
(21:53):
get the traffic they wanted? Well, no, unfortunately. I mean
although the State Department's pages did see an uptick and
visit ters, I think it was less than two percent
of them actually liked or favorite at any post. So
not only was it a big waste of money, but
I'm guessing it was kind of a blow to the
government's pride. You know, I almost feel bad for them.
But what about how much is spent on the annual
(22:14):
upkeep of vacant government buildings? Yeah, I remember you were
looking into this, so I'll buy it on this one.
So how many of our tax dollars go to empty buildings,
way way too many of them. So, according to the
l A. Times, the government spends as much as one
point seven billion dollars each year just to maintain the
more than seven hundred seventy thousand vacant buildings it owns.
And you want to talk about wasteful. Even though the
(22:36):
government already pays for all that unused space, some of
the agencies continue to buy at least new spaces rather
than put the vacant ones. To use seven hundred and
seventy thousand vacant buildings, that is insane. Well, it's it's
especially frustrating in cases like that where a little more
communication could cause multiple problems to cancel each other out.
(22:56):
I mean, in addition to easy workspace for employees, these
buildings could be used as government storage. Take the I
R S. I mean, the I R S alone has
more than twenty thousand pieces of unused office furniture, and
rather than sell it or stored in government buildings, the
agency pays nearly one million dollars each year to rent
storage space. That's so crazy. But you know, as crazy
(23:17):
as these expenses are, if we want to find the
weirdest government investments, we've got to talk about DARPA. Very
good point, all right. So for those who haven't thought
about DARPA lately or or ever, the full name is
the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. Was created back in
ninety eight to help with the US space race and
quickly switched focus to developing technical innovations for defense. This
(23:39):
was once NASA took over the space research. DARPA research
has led to all kinds of breakthroughs, from the first
stealth aircraft, communications, satellites, and drones to the less military
minded inventions like driverless cars and robotic vacuum cleaners. Right,
and if rumas weren't weird enough, DARPA is also responsible
for about sixty years worth of really far robotics projects,
(24:01):
many of which were never put to active use. You know.
One of my favorite examples of this was called EATER.
That's e a t R, also known as the Energy
Autonomous Tactical Robot. I don't know if you saw this, Mango,
but it was back in two thousand twelve. They were
all these online rumors that the government was developing some
kind of monstrous flesh heating robot. It was to be
used in combat. What I mean, I feel like I
(24:23):
definitely remember about that. Well. Thankfully, the rumors turned out
to be exaggerated. Researchers clarified that Eater was strictly vegetarian,
which is comforting seeing as the robot was equipped with
a chainsaw and a powerful gripper arm and this was
help but collect plant based biomass to use for energy,
and the idea was that Eater could support troops in
(24:44):
the battlefield without the need for conventional fuels. I mean,
it's actually kind of cool. So instead it would simply
collect twigs, grass, paper, other plant materials to help power itself.
And I like this statement from the CEO of the
company that was funded by DARPA to help develop the robot.
He said, completely understand the public's concern about futuristic robots
feeding on human population, but that is not our mission.
(25:07):
That's super comforting still for my money. You know, the
scariest thing Dark has worked on has to be their
Total Information Awareness project from way back in two thousand two.
I mean, that does sound way scarier than managing robots.
I know. It was basically this massive counter terrorism database
that was supposed to collect, process, and even analyze mind
data to help prevent terrorist attacks. And as you'd imagine,
(25:29):
there was a lot of pushback against what was essentially
this electronic version of Big Brother. And if you thought
the name was creepy, you've got to see the logo
they came up with. They used the Eye of Providence
symbol that's on the back of the dollar bill, you know,
the pyramid with all seeing eye on top. But then
they managed to make it even more creepy by showing
it projecting a beam of light onto the surface of
(25:49):
the entire planet o God. Yeah, okay, nothing unsettling about that. Now.
Not all their research is terrifying, though. One of the weirdest, coolest,
and most non threatening projects from dark Uh is this
robot that can play jazz music. And we already have
artificial intelligence programs that can produce pseudo original classical music
by analyzing the work of human composers, but DARPA has
(26:12):
its eyes set on robots that actually write and perform
their own jazz songs. All I think about when you
said this is like the creatures from Showbiz Pizza. That's
pretty much what it is. They were so far ahead
of their time that show Biz. But tell me why
jazz and how do musical robots like help with defense. Well,
jazz was chosen because it would require the robots to improvise.
I think it kind of makes sense. So in order
(26:34):
to jam along with human musicians, the robots need to
be able to think and react to the situation in
real time. So the aim is to produce a form
of AI that can make you know the spur of
the moment decisions and response to constantly changing conditions, which
is definitely a skill that would come in handy on
a battlefield just as much as in a jazz club.
So I can't believe you just convinced me that jazz
(26:55):
playing robots are smart investment, or at least that they're
not the worst way to spend our talks about No,
not the worst. But it's, like we were saying earlier,
so many of these seemingly outlandish projects don't sound nearly
as crazy when they're given the proper context. So how
about we try and experiment, mango. Let's take a look
at a couple of the country's most recent strange investments
and see if they're as silly as they sound, if
(27:17):
they're actually worth the money. I'm up for it. But
why don't we take a break for a quiz, first
a mango. Who do we have on the line today,
We've got Charles Morgan and Hubert Walker from the wonderful
publication Coin Week. Welcome to part time genius guys. Hi guys,
he has gone for having. When people are getting into
(27:38):
coin collecting, what are some of the mistakes they tend
to make? So the first one is that people who
really get into a hobby really intensely in the beginning,
I think that there's a race that they need to
buy everything they see because somehow they're all going to
disappear and they're gonna run out of time. And the
fact the matter is like nobody has ever are a
(28:00):
symbol of a a coin collection and that has everything. It's
just it's it's probably not even possible even if you,
you know, even with Esos his money, I don't think
you could do it because you would run out of time,
and then there would also be coins that would be
so rare that maybe there's only one or two known
and you have to convince the person who owns at
the celt Sea. But the second thing is one of
(28:23):
the most profoundly stupid stories that we had covered in
the last few years involved a guy who was an
investor who bought a quarter million dollar gold coin from
a one of those you know called the eight hundred
numbers listened to on radio kind of gold dealers, and
(28:43):
they sold him this this amazing coin, like any collector
who is a real collector would have been just thrilled
to own it. But he found that it had a flaw,
a little bit dingy, so uh, he basically polished the
life out of it, and by the time we saw it,
it looked like costume jewelry, like something that it didn't
(29:06):
even look real anymore. I mean it was it was gold,
so it looked like gold, but it was so shiny,
and it was a coin. It looked like something made
to look like gold. And he still only got like
five six thousand dollars for it on auction. So now
you're used to dealing with much more valuable coins. But
I was curious, what are your thoughts on getting rid
of the penny. I'm personally in favor of a total
(29:27):
coinage reform, which would include getting rid of the penny
at least and maybe the nickel. And if you think
about it, there has never been a success They push
to eliminate a piece of paper currency in favor of
a coin. Uh. In the past, probably a hundred or
so years in this country, we used to actually make
(29:49):
currency notes called fractional currency, which were parts of a dollar.
That was done during the Civil War because they didn't
want to, you know, use silver precious and being hoarded.
So they were making basically stance over money. But uh,
you know, when they tried to introduce the Susan B.
Anthony dollar, it didn't replace the one dollar bill and
(30:10):
the presidential dollar in the second to we it all
are also failed to do that. So from a minting
industry sent point, the elimination of any point from circulation,
it is a slow death spiral for that as an industry.
The second part is the good part. So in the
United States we have essentially had the same coin structure
(30:34):
since seven The coins are different and there are some
different denominations that don't exist, more like a half cent,
half dime, two cent, or three cent piece. But in
eighteen fifty seven the United States meant in a major
pointage reform which eliminated the half cent and the cent
(30:57):
large cent size cent which was oh gosh, maybe in
between the size of a half dollar and a quarter. Essentially,
that's how big the scent used to be, and they
eliminated it in favor of the small size scent that
we used today. Well, the elimination of that meant that
there were scents that were made from three the eighteen
(31:22):
fifty seven, which are like now obsolete, and they were
being redeemed it turned in and destroyed. Well, that's what
started coin collecting in America as sort of a popular hobby.
And so my opinion is if they eliminated the scent
and the nickel, it would actually help coin collecting because
(31:43):
people who grew up using those coins would realize they
were no longer going to be available and people would
start looking for the different dates and mint marks and
things like that. So for coin collectors eliminating stuff like
that it's probably a good thing, But for the mincing
industry it's not. That makes a lot of sense. Well,
you guys are used to dealing with rare coins and
much more valuable coins, but we're gonna put you guys
(32:04):
to the test with something a little more simple. Mango,
what game are we playing today? We're playing the quarter quiz,
and basically we're gonna tell you what's on the back
of the U S quarter and you just have to
tell us the state where it's from. But we're gonna
have you guys face off against one another, and in
order to chime in, we're going to have you make
some animal noises. So Charles you will chime in with
a cow's move, and Hubert you will have the lovely caca. Alright,
(32:28):
so let's get started. Question number one. This stake quarter
has a picture of a common loon on it, though
the phrase Land of ten Thousand Lakes might be the
bigger giveaway. All right, so that's Hubert, what's the answer there?
All right? I think that would be Minnesota, Absolutely nicely done.
Question number two. There are no slot machines or poker
(32:49):
tables on the back of this stake quarter, just a
pair of beautiful mustangs running free. Oh that sounded like
a very realistic cow. Okay, Charles, what do you think
I do? Mind us? Uh? That would be Na Bob, absolutely,
and Nevada is actually home of the nation's wild horses.
Question number three. This state quarter has the phrase Crossroads
(33:10):
of America on it, right under a picture of a
race car. Okay, Hubert, Indiana al right, well done. Question
number four. Unlike North Carolina, which also features the Right
Brothers plane, this state quarter paired. They're playing with a
picture of John Glenn in a space suit. Wow, Huber
(33:30):
just barely beats Charles with a coca alright, what's the answer?
It is Ohio? Alright? Question number five. This state quarter
has a ring necked pheasant in the foreground, though the
pick of Mount Rushmore in the back might be more recognizable.
Um I, why don't we give it to Charles? Yeah?
That would that would be the South Dakota. You got it,
(33:52):
all right? Question number six, This state has a bucking
cowboy on it, and it's accompanied by the phrase the
equality state. It's better known as a home of Dick Cheney.
This is also probably the worst coin design and the
entire STA series, and that would go to Wyoming. Wait,
why why do you think it's the worst state design. Well,
(34:13):
it's not because of the iconic image of the bucking cowboys,
because there's no detail on it. It's just basically a silhouette.
I mean that's kind of boring. Anything that is pretty boring. Okay, Well,
if I'm not mistaken, we are tied at three. So
this is the very last question, the tiebreaker number seven.
This state quarter has a picture of a peregrine falcon
and the phrase may it be forever in Latin. There
(34:35):
are zero potatoes on it, however, alright Hubert for the
wind Idaho, it is Idaho. Alright, Mango. How our contestants
done well? He just barely edged out Charles. But it
was a great competition. And as always are, whinner gets
a note to his mom or boss sing his praises.
And because we don't want Charles to go home h
(34:57):
empty handed, We're gonna send you home with the weirdest
poin press we could find online, a hedgehog coin purse.
I can't wait to use it. Well, congratulations guys, and
thanks so much for joining us on part time genius.
Thanks so much, guys, great, thank you guys. Thanks, We
will thank you. Okay, Well, so it's time to live
(35:27):
out the ultimate taxpayer fantasy. We're basically gonna audit the U. S.
Government and see if any of their two thousand and
sixteen investments past muster. Where do you want to start? Alright?
So here's what I want your opinion on. The researchers
and m I T developed a new program to view
six hundred hours of television shows and four hundred hours
of online videos to see if they could learn about
(35:49):
and anticipate human behavior. So with this, do you think
the government was right to foot the bill for a
couch potato computer. I'm not falling for this. I feel
like I need some more information, So tell me what
it watch. Well, the program was trying to anticipate actions
like hugs, kisses, high fives, and handshakes, so the researchers
had to watch tons of YouTube videos and hours and
(36:10):
hours of Desperate Housewives, The Office, and Scrubs, to name
a few, which isn't a bad plan, but like, what
was the end goal? I mean, is the government really
interested in like saving people from being left on high fives. Well,
the real hope is that, with enough time and enough
binge watching, the program could be used in security cameras.
Is a way to automatically call for help. It identifies
(36:31):
that somebody is about to be injured, or that a
crime is about to be committed. It's it's it's actually
pretty interesting stuff. Yeah that's pretty neat. So, um, why
don't we try another one? Since it's beach season, let's
look at the three million dollars study the National Science
Foundation did on how background music affects viewers perception of sharks.
But before I go into more detail, I'm going to
give you how the Internet frame the studies conclusion. So
(36:52):
here it is the theme music from Jaws caused people
to view sharks in a negative manner. That did. I mean,
I'm not gonna say we got ripped off, but it
does strike me as a fairly obvious conclusion. I mean,
the Jaws theme was composed to feel ominous. It follows
that the song would make viewers wary of whatever's played
alongside it, whether it's sharks or whatever, which is a
(37:14):
totally fair response. Now, let me fill in some of
the gaffs and we'll see if it changes your opinion. So,
as part of the study, researchers determined that the public's
negative perception of sharks is actually hindering conservation efforts, and
we tend to ignore cases where sharks are exploited or abused,
and we donate less money to shark conservation programs than
we do to similar programs for other creatures. I mean,
(37:35):
that's a little sad, But again, is this surprising our culture?
Has a bad habit of blowing shark on human violence
way out of proportion, especially when you look at all
the Jaws and shark nadoes of the world. So what
what is the angle here? Well, according to the NSF
and I'm quoting here, participants rated sharks more negatively and
less positively after viewing a sixty second video of swimming
(37:58):
sharks set to ominous background music, compared to participants who
watched the same video clips set to uplifting background music
or silence. And here's the thing, right, Like, researchers didn't
use footage from Jaws or other horror flicks. They used
a clip from the BBC's Blue Planet Nature series, which
just showed sharks like swimming around and being sharks. So basically,
the study is a warning about making educational content that
(38:19):
borrows too heavily from the Hollywood Shark Playbook. Yeah, pretty
much so, the studies actual non inflammatory conclusion was quote.
Given that nature documentaries are often regarded as objective and
authoritative sources of information, it is critical that documentary filmmakers
and viewers are aware of how the soundtrack can affect
the interpretation of the educational content. All right, I think
(38:41):
I see where you're going with this, and you know,
suddenly a laughable research study doesn't seem quite as ridiculous.
But I mean, three million dollars, was it really worth
that much? Yeah? I mean, I guess that depends on
how the educational community responds to the findings, and of
course whether or not you like sharks. All right, Well,
you know this might sound silly, but auditing the government
is much harder than I thought it would be. There's
(39:02):
just so many angles from what you can analyze these expenses,
and they all make a certain amount of sense. I mean,
our country spent a hundred and twenty five thousand dollars
on a three D printer that can create edible pizzas
for astronauts. On the one hand, that's exorbitant, But on
the other, do we really want to be the kind
of people who would deny astronauts pizza? I don't, I know.
(39:23):
I mean, there are real benefits to even the most
ridiculous sounding investments, but balancing those potential benefits against the
real world costs, I mean, that can all be dizzying.
That's why it's so important to try and keep things
in perspective when looking at these weird government investments. What
do you mean by that, Well, just like with the
thread of sharks or that one percent of funding goes
to foreign aid, we have a way of making these
(39:44):
weird expenses out to be way bigger problems than they
really are. Take those government waste books, for example, they
document billions spent on questionable grants and programs. But even
all nineteen billion dollars of that is only half of
one percent of the three point nine trillion dollar federal budget.
So while it's definitely not something we should ignore, it
doesn't make as much of an impact on the government's
(40:06):
bottom line as you think. That's actually pretty comforting. I mean,
I want people to like sharks and I want astronauts
to eat pizza. So if those things can happen at
no huge cost to the country, I consider that a
win in my boat. We'll hold onto that feeling well,
because it's time for the fact not bring it on mango,
h All right, So I'll kick it off. Every wonder
(40:33):
where all those old Neon signs go when they burn out.
In two thousand ten, one eight million dollars was given
to construct a Neon sign graveyard near Las Vegas, and
I mean, I clearly want to check this place out. Yeah,
I kind of do too. Alright, well, Mago, you and
I both have young sons who are very curious about
video games. Are doing the whole Minecraft thing now, but
it won't be long before they're begging to play games
(40:55):
like World of Warcraft. And it turns out there could
be some good money in this. The creators of one
study received two point nine million dollars to look into
how online virtual worlds such as World of Warcraft and
Second Life can help organizations collaborate and compete more effectively
in the global marketplace. Have you ever been to Denali
National Park? I haven't. Well, when you do, I'm sure
(41:17):
the animals and mountains and stuff will be pretty cool
to look at. But be sure to check out the
toilets because they've got some seriously fancy new ones, or
at least they'd better be fancy. At forty one dollars
perceed with thirty six toilets, that comes out to one
point five million dollars. Wow. All right, Well, I'll try
to swing by right after I visit the home for
the US Ambassador to NATO and Brussels to see the
(41:39):
nine hundred and sixty violets, nine hundred and sixty tulips,
nine hundred and sixty begonias, five four Iva geraniums, and
lots of other plants, totaling seven hundred and four thousand
dollars for this one residence. I feel like he cut
the budget on the ivy geraniums. Yeah, everything was at
nine hundred and sixty until the ivy geranium. So 'st year,
(42:00):
the government allocated like close to a million dollars to
post poems and zoos throughout the country. The poems are
there to quote, increase environmental awareness. Thank goodness, Yeah, thank
goodness for that one. All right. I'm not sure if
you remember this ad back in two thousand and ten,
but the government invested two point five million dollars on
what would later become known as the worst Super Bowl
(42:20):
ad ever. So back in two thousand twelve, then Congressman
Mark Newman noted that he wanted to save taxpayers a
hundred seventy five thousand dollars by cutting the funding for
a study on quote the connection between cocaine and the
risky sex habits of the Japanese quail for risky sex,
I know. And while the study was really intended to
help researchers understand the connection between drug abuse and sex
(42:42):
habits and public health options. I want to see his
study on coked up quails. All right, I'm with you
on this one. That seems like the most necessary use
of government money we've talked about all day. So I'm
gonna get this one to you. Congrats, thank you, and
that's it for today's Part Time Genius. Thank you so
much for listening. Thanks again for listening. Part Time Genius
(43:16):
is a production of how stuff works and wouldn't be
possible without several brilliant people who do the important things
we couldn't even again to understand. CHRISTA McNeil does the
editing thing. Noel Brown made the theme song and does
the mixy mixy sound thing. Jerry Rowland does the exact
producer thing. Gay Bluesier is our lead researcher, with support
from the Research Army including Austin Thompson, Nolan Brown and
Lucas Adams and Eves. Jeff Cook gets the show to
(43:37):
your ears. Good job, Eves. If you like what you heard,
we hope you'll subscribe. And if you really really like
what you've heard, maybe you could leave a good review
for US. Do we do we forget Jason? Jason who
(44:00):
s
Part-Time Genius News
Hosts And Creators
Will Pearson
Mangesh Hattikudur
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