Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Well then I got to hit a button here on
(00:01):
my ZOOMI thing. All right, there we go, We got
that going. That should be good. All right, Shannon, you
can put the zoom audio up now. I am very
pleased to welcome back to the show my good friend Rabbit,
Georgia Bulldogs fan, and a man wearing a very unusual
shirt right now. And that is my friend Dan Mitchell,
(00:22):
who is co founder of the Center for Freedom and
Prosperity and a longtime economist at the Cato Institute and
also an economist on Capitol Hill, so he understands how
politicians really work. He has a fabulous blog that you
can subscribe to and get pretty much daily emails called
International Liberty. Dan.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
It's good to see you.
Speaker 1 (00:44):
And what the heck is that shirt?
Speaker 2 (00:47):
It's a Georgia Bulldog shirt, of course.
Speaker 1 (00:50):
Okay, all right, he's leading. It looks like an oil
rig or something on it there, all right, a Georgia
Bulldogs shirt. Not surprising, not surprising.
Speaker 2 (00:59):
All right.
Speaker 1 (01:00):
You, more than any other person I know, or certainly
any other American I know, have been paying very close
attention to Argentina, to hobbyer Malay, and to the mid
term elections they had yesterday. So I'm just going to
open this up with a broad question for you to
kind of edumicate me and my listeners as do not
(01:22):
just what happened yesterday, but what's going on bigger picture
in Argentina, and then even one step above that, why
should Americans care?
Speaker 3 (01:35):
There's a lot to answer there, ross, But what happened
yesterday in Argentina was great news.
Speaker 2 (01:41):
Hobbier Malay is.
Speaker 3 (01:42):
The libertarian president of Argentina, a country that for seventy
years was basically governed by socialists, by interventionists, the Parotus,
who increased the burden of government and posed protectionism, regulated
everything they had, sort of this corp fascist socialist model
of government being everywhere controlling everything. The economy went so
(02:07):
far down that Argentinian voters did something really radical two
years ago and elected a libertarian hobby Or Malay.
Speaker 2 (02:14):
I mean, this guy is as rabbit as I've ever
wanted to be.
Speaker 3 (02:20):
I mean, and just imagine electing Ron Paul as governor
of California or something like that. That will give you
an idea of how completely unexpected that was. And then
Malay gets into office, he does all these great free
market reforms. At least, what he was able to do
with a hospital legislature reduced the burden of government spending
(02:41):
by six percentage points a GDP, a world record for
spending cuts in peace time. But everyone was worried, well,
the midterm elections are coming up, will there be a
backlash against this so called austerity?
Speaker 2 (02:55):
And I was worried yesterday.
Speaker 3 (02:57):
I'm messaging back and forth with all the people that
have gotten to know and Argentina because of my trips
down there over the last couple of years, and we
were all very concerned, Well, maybe the pronus would win
the popular vote, and more important, they might strengthen themselves
in the legislature. But what we got was a landslide
for the Libertarians. And the reason this matters for Americans,
(03:18):
And probably getting around to your last question, Jabier Malay
is a role model. When I talk to Republicans on
Capitol Hill, many of them know we need to reform
a toitaments, we need to push back against Trump's protectionism.
We give many of them know what good policy is,
but they've been scared of voters. And Hobbier Malay is
(03:40):
showing not only American Republicans, but the Conservative Party in
the UK, the Christian Democrats in Germany. He is showing
supposed right of center parties all over the world that
you can do the right thing and as long as
you explain it to voters, they're going to reward you.
Speaker 1 (03:59):
So one of the other things that I've found very
interesting in this conversation is that the United States has
gotten involved here with what looks like two separate twenty
billion dollar deals. One maybe and I don't really understand them.
Maybe you can explain, but do it in plain English
if you do, but something that strengthened the currency, and
then another maybe larger loan. Don't you can explain. But
(04:24):
what that seems to have done is shown the voters
of Argentina that Trump supports Malay and Malay's policies. And
you know, a lot of the chatter online is that
is that maybe Argentinian voters were moved towards Malay because
(04:47):
of Trump. Do you think there's anything to that.
Speaker 2 (04:51):
Here's some important background for your listeners.
Speaker 3 (04:56):
Two months ago, less than two months ago, actually, I
think it was September fifth, there was an important regional
election in Buenos Aires Province, which is the most populous
province in Argentina, and the Coronas the left won that election.
Not only did they win it, but they won it
by a very strong margin. Overnight, that made everybody very
(05:16):
pessimistic about what was going to happen in the midterm elections. Oh,
voters don't like austerity, that they want to go back
to the free spending Santa Claus government of the Pronus.
And what happened is immediately financial markets weekend, the currency drop,
the stock market drop, and Trump, even though I'm not
a big Trump fan, I gave him credit that they
(05:39):
did this currency swap, which all you really need to
know is that the US government, with the Treasury Secretary
and Trump's blessing, sort of stepped in to say, no,
we're not going to allow financial markers to deteriorate because
Coronas won an important election. Now, how much did that
affect what happened? And yet yesterday's libertarian landslide, I don't
(06:03):
know a lot of libertarians in the country were worried
that being too closely linked to Trump might hurt Malay
and obviously that wasn't the case. So I don't know
what the net effect of Trump was, but I know
that Trump wanted to help Malay. That they don't exactly
see eye to eye on economic issues because Malays a
(06:23):
free trader. Malay wants to cut government, and Trump's sort
of okay with big government.
Speaker 2 (06:27):
But they are definitely allies in the.
Speaker 3 (06:30):
Cultural and sort of global war against the left, you know,
the woke left, the Marxist left. They definitely see themselves
as allies in that fight, and that paid off for Argentina.
Speaker 1 (06:43):
So some of the stuff you mentioned that Malay has
done with cutting government spending and cutting regulation and so on,
you know, to econ nerds like you and me, like,
we get that and we kind of understand how important
that is. To a lot of folks, that stuff seems
a little bit ethereal So I wonder if you could
please explain the impact of Malay on inflation, which is
(07:05):
something that everybody in Argentina would not just understand but
would feel every day.
Speaker 3 (07:12):
Let me give you some background information. First, economic policy matters.
If you go back to the end of World War two,
Argentina was one of the ten richest countries in the world.
They were on par with the other advanced democracies, only
a little bit behind the United States. But because of pronisms.
Sort of this seventy plus years of just gradual statism,
(07:37):
bigger government, more intervention, Argentina has dramatically declined and they
went from being one of the world's rich countries to
being sort of a relatively weak middle income country. And
Malay says, we have to stop that we're going to collapse.
Things are going in the wrong direction under the pronus.
(07:57):
Right about the time Malay got elected, inflation at irocketed
to about two hundred and thirty percent. The tax system
is incredibly burdensome on the people of Argentina. Poverty had
spiked to more than fifty percent under the pronus, all
sorts of really bad numbers, which again confirm that economic
policy does matter. Malay gets in office, he slashes government
(08:20):
spending by records and record amounts.
Speaker 2 (08:22):
In the first year, poverty has gone down, private sector
incomes are going up.
Speaker 3 (08:27):
Inflation has collapsed from two hundred and thirty percent down
to close to twenty percent, and of course it's heading
down towards zero. And then, by the way, this election
might give Malay the ability to dollarize the economy, which
would not only protect against their central bank printing money
to finance, bake government today, but it will protect it
(08:48):
will protect the country into the future, just in case
that Pronus ever get in office.
Speaker 2 (08:52):
There are a lot of reforms that still need to happen.
Speaker 3 (08:55):
Malay has done great work, but he's never had control
of the legislature and he's still doesn't after this election,
but his party picked up a ton of seats and
there's a great chance. Now we're working with some of
the independent parties, not the coronas.
Speaker 2 (09:10):
But the independent parties, he might be able to.
Speaker 3 (09:12):
Do tax reform, labor law reform, free trade, all these
things that are needed to as malaise as to make
Argentina great again.
Speaker 1 (09:21):
We're talking with Dan Mitchell. He has one of the
best economic blogs you're gonna find, and one of the
reasons I love it so much is that, in addition
to covering what's going on in American economics, he covers
a lot of interesting economics from around the world. So
if you just do a Google search or whatever your
search engine choice is for Dan Mitchell International Liberty, you'll
(09:44):
find it, and you can sign up for free for
his daily emails. Just so much great information there all. Right,
last thing for you, Dan, do you what do you
think the chances are of there being a little contagion
in a positive way this in other parts of South America. Actually,
it seems like we've seen a little bit of that already.
(10:06):
But what are you cautiously optimistic that a continent that
has been drifting leftward for a generation or two might
start getting a little better.
Speaker 3 (10:17):
That's to me the most exciting part of what happened
in Argentina yesterday. We already see that Malay's economic free
market reforms have delivered great results, lower inflation, higher income,
lower poverty. But the key thing, the signal that's needed
for politicians and other countries, is that it's politically successful
as well. And this libertarian land flight of the midterm elections,
(10:40):
that's great. I mean, Chile's having a presidential election later
this year.
Speaker 2 (10:44):
But the key thing is all over the world.
Speaker 3 (10:47):
I've been speaking this year in Europe and Asia and
Latin America.
Speaker 2 (10:52):
Every place I go, people.
Speaker 3 (10:54):
Are asking about Hobby or Malay. At least in the
policy world. People know that that is the same the
most important economic experiment happening today.
Speaker 2 (11:03):
They see the good results.
Speaker 3 (11:05):
Economically, and now they're going to see the good results politically,
so just like Reagan and Thatcher triggered free market reforms
around the world forty forty five years ago, I think
hobbyer Malay is going to be the leader in global
economic reform in the coming years, And for once in
my life, I'm actually optimistic.
Speaker 2 (11:25):
That doesn't happen very often.
Speaker 3 (11:27):
But I am so pumped up about how Argentinian voters
did the right thing and voted for freedom over statism.
Speaker 1 (11:34):
Last question for you, Dan, have you ever had the
opportunity to meet or talk to Javier Malay.
Speaker 3 (11:40):
I did meet him at a conference back in August,
albeit briefly, but I got my celebrity photo shoot with them.
Speaker 2 (11:47):
And you know, because I'm really angry.
Speaker 3 (11:49):
I met Reagan several times in the late seventies, but
I was too stupid to ever get a photo. So
I have a photo with Margaret Thatcher, I've a photo
with Hobby or Malay. Sadly there's not one with Ronald Reagan.
But what's that beat? Love song two at a three
ah fan?
Speaker 1 (12:05):
It's funny. One of the great moments in my life
was the just the few minutes that I had standing
with some other people too, not just me with Milton
Friedman and I did not get a picture, and I
wish I had, But I imagine is that kind of
thing for you? And I get it. I mean the
fact that this guy in South America might, especially if
(12:29):
he has a little more continued success, be legitimately mentioned
in the same breath as you just did with Reagan,
and Thatcher is an incredible thing. I'll give you the
last seventeen seconds.
Speaker 3 (12:43):
I am so hopeful that not only will other countries
around the world follow Malay's example, I'm hoping that Donald
Trump will pay attention to what Malay is doing and
become a little bit more robust in his push for
a limited government of free markets.
Speaker 1 (12:58):
I'm not that optimist, but from your mouth to Trump's ears.
Dan Mitchell's blog is called International Liberty. I just go
look it up. You'll find it. It's also will be
on my blog as well. He's the co founder of
the Center for Freedom and Prosperity. Go Bulldogs. Thanks for
being here, Dan, Go dogs, all right.
Well then I got to hit a button here on
(00:01):
my ZOOMI thing. All right, there we go, We got
that going. That should be good. All right, Shannon, you
can put the zoom audio up now. I am very
pleased to welcome back to the show my good friend Rabbit,
Georgia Bulldogs fan, and a man wearing a very unusual
shirt right now. And that is my friend Dan Mitchell,
(00:22):
who is co founder of the Center for Freedom and
Prosperity and a longtime economist at the Cato Institute and
also an economist on Capitol Hill, so he understands how
politicians really work. He has a fabulous blog that you
can subscribe to and get pretty much daily emails called
International Liberty. Dan.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
It's good to see you.
Speaker 1 (00:44):
And what the heck is that shirt?
Speaker 2 (00:47):
It's a Georgia Bulldog shirt, of course.
Speaker 1 (00:50):
Okay, all right, he's leading. It looks like an oil
rig or something on it there, all right, a Georgia
Bulldogs shirt. Not surprising, not surprising.
Speaker 2 (00:59):
All right.
Speaker 1 (01:00):
You, more than any other person I know, or certainly
any other American I know, have been paying very close
attention to Argentina, to hobbyer Malay, and to the mid
term elections they had yesterday. So I'm just going to
open this up with a broad question for you to
kind of edumicate me and my listeners as do not
(01:22):
just what happened yesterday, but what's going on bigger picture
in Argentina, and then even one step above that, why
should Americans care?
Speaker 3 (01:35):
There's a lot to answer there, ross, But what happened
yesterday in Argentina was great news.
Speaker 2 (01:41):
Hobbier Malay is.
Speaker 3 (01:42):
The libertarian president of Argentina, a country that for seventy
years was basically governed by socialists, by interventionists, the Parotus,
who increased the burden of government and posed protectionism, regulated
everything they had, sort of this corp fascist socialist model
of government being everywhere controlling everything. The economy went so
(02:07):
far down that Argentinian voters did something really radical two
years ago and elected a libertarian hobby Or Malay.
Speaker 2 (02:14):
I mean, this guy is as rabbit as I've ever
wanted to be.
Speaker 3 (02:20):
I mean, and just imagine electing Ron Paul as governor
of California or something like that. That will give you
an idea of how completely unexpected that was. And then
Malay gets into office, he does all these great free
market reforms. At least, what he was able to do
with a hospital legislature reduced the burden of government spending
(02:41):
by six percentage points a GDP, a world record for
spending cuts in peace time. But everyone was worried, well,
the midterm elections are coming up, will there be a
backlash against this so called austerity?
Speaker 2 (02:55):
And I was worried yesterday.
Speaker 3 (02:57):
I'm messaging back and forth with all the people that
have gotten to know and Argentina because of my trips
down there over the last couple of years, and we
were all very concerned, Well, maybe the pronus would win
the popular vote, and more important, they might strengthen themselves
in the legislature. But what we got was a landslide
for the Libertarians. And the reason this matters for Americans,
(03:18):
And probably getting around to your last question, Jabier Malay
is a role model. When I talk to Republicans on
Capitol Hill, many of them know we need to reform
a toitaments, we need to push back against Trump's protectionism.
We give many of them know what good policy is,
but they've been scared of voters. And Hobbier Malay is
(03:40):
showing not only American Republicans, but the Conservative Party in
the UK, the Christian Democrats in Germany. He is showing
supposed right of center parties all over the world that
you can do the right thing and as long as
you explain it to voters, they're going to reward you.
Speaker 1 (03:59):
So one of the other things that I've found very
interesting in this conversation is that the United States has
gotten involved here with what looks like two separate twenty
billion dollar deals. One maybe and I don't really understand them.
Maybe you can explain, but do it in plain English
if you do, but something that strengthened the currency, and
then another maybe larger loan. Don't you can explain. But
(04:24):
what that seems to have done is shown the voters
of Argentina that Trump supports Malay and Malay's policies. And
you know, a lot of the chatter online is that
is that maybe Argentinian voters were moved towards Malay because
(04:47):
of Trump. Do you think there's anything to that.
Speaker 2 (04:51):
Here's some important background for your listeners.
Speaker 3 (04:56):
Two months ago, less than two months ago, actually, I
think it was September fifth, there was an important regional
election in Buenos Aires Province, which is the most populous
province in Argentina, and the Coronas the left won that election.
Not only did they win it, but they won it
by a very strong margin. Overnight, that made everybody very
(05:16):
pessimistic about what was going to happen in the midterm elections. Oh,
voters don't like austerity, that they want to go back
to the free spending Santa Claus government of the Pronus.
And what happened is immediately financial markets weekend, the currency drop,
the stock market drop, and Trump, even though I'm not
a big Trump fan, I gave him credit that they
(05:39):
did this currency swap, which all you really need to
know is that the US government, with the Treasury Secretary
and Trump's blessing, sort of stepped in to say, no,
we're not going to allow financial markers to deteriorate because
Coronas won an important election. Now, how much did that
affect what happened? And yet yesterday's libertarian landslide, I don't
(06:03):
know a lot of libertarians in the country were worried
that being too closely linked to Trump might hurt Malay
and obviously that wasn't the case. So I don't know
what the net effect of Trump was, but I know
that Trump wanted to help Malay. That they don't exactly
see eye to eye on economic issues because Malays a
(06:23):
free trader. Malay wants to cut government, and Trump's sort
of okay with big government.
Speaker 2 (06:27):
But they are definitely allies in the.
Speaker 3 (06:30):
Cultural and sort of global war against the left, you know,
the woke left, the Marxist left. They definitely see themselves
as allies in that fight, and that paid off for Argentina.
Speaker 1 (06:43):
So some of the stuff you mentioned that Malay has
done with cutting government spending and cutting regulation and so on,
you know, to econ nerds like you and me, like,
we get that and we kind of understand how important
that is. To a lot of folks, that stuff seems
a little bit ethereal So I wonder if you could
please explain the impact of Malay on inflation, which is
(07:05):
something that everybody in Argentina would not just understand but
would feel every day.
Speaker 3 (07:12):
Let me give you some background information. First, economic policy matters.
If you go back to the end of World War two,
Argentina was one of the ten richest countries in the world.
They were on par with the other advanced democracies, only
a little bit behind the United States. But because of pronisms.
Sort of this seventy plus years of just gradual statism,
(07:37):
bigger government, more intervention, Argentina has dramatically declined and they
went from being one of the world's rich countries to
being sort of a relatively weak middle income country. And
Malay says, we have to stop that we're going to collapse.
Things are going in the wrong direction under the pronus.
(07:57):
Right about the time Malay got elected, inflation at irocketed
to about two hundred and thirty percent. The tax system
is incredibly burdensome on the people of Argentina. Poverty had
spiked to more than fifty percent under the pronus, all
sorts of really bad numbers, which again confirm that economic
policy does matter. Malay gets in office, he slashes government
(08:20):
spending by records and record amounts.
Speaker 2 (08:22):
In the first year, poverty has gone down, private sector
incomes are going up.
Speaker 3 (08:27):
Inflation has collapsed from two hundred and thirty percent down
to close to twenty percent, and of course it's heading
down towards zero. And then, by the way, this election
might give Malay the ability to dollarize the economy, which
would not only protect against their central bank printing money
to finance, bake government today, but it will protect it
(08:48):
will protect the country into the future, just in case
that Pronus ever get in office.
Speaker 2 (08:52):
There are a lot of reforms that still need to happen.
Speaker 3 (08:55):
Malay has done great work, but he's never had control
of the legislature and he's still doesn't after this election,
but his party picked up a ton of seats and
there's a great chance. Now we're working with some of
the independent parties, not the coronas.
Speaker 2 (09:10):
But the independent parties, he might be able to.
Speaker 3 (09:12):
Do tax reform, labor law reform, free trade, all these
things that are needed to as malaise as to make
Argentina great again.
Speaker 1 (09:21):
We're talking with Dan Mitchell. He has one of the
best economic blogs you're gonna find, and one of the
reasons I love it so much is that, in addition
to covering what's going on in American economics, he covers
a lot of interesting economics from around the world. So
if you just do a Google search or whatever your
search engine choice is for Dan Mitchell International Liberty, you'll
(09:44):
find it, and you can sign up for free for
his daily emails. Just so much great information there all. Right,
last thing for you, Dan, do you what do you
think the chances are of there being a little contagion
in a positive way this in other parts of South America. Actually,
it seems like we've seen a little bit of that already.
(10:06):
But what are you cautiously optimistic that a continent that
has been drifting leftward for a generation or two might
start getting a little better.
Speaker 3 (10:17):
That's to me the most exciting part of what happened
in Argentina yesterday. We already see that Malay's economic free
market reforms have delivered great results, lower inflation, higher income,
lower poverty. But the key thing, the signal that's needed
for politicians and other countries, is that it's politically successful
as well. And this libertarian land flight of the midterm elections,
(10:40):
that's great. I mean, Chile's having a presidential election later
this year.
Speaker 2 (10:44):
But the key thing is all over the world.
Speaker 3 (10:47):
I've been speaking this year in Europe and Asia and
Latin America.
Speaker 2 (10:52):
Every place I go, people.
Speaker 3 (10:54):
Are asking about Hobby or Malay. At least in the
policy world. People know that that is the same the
most important economic experiment happening today.
Speaker 2 (11:03):
They see the good results.
Speaker 3 (11:05):
Economically, and now they're going to see the good results politically,
so just like Reagan and Thatcher triggered free market reforms
around the world forty forty five years ago, I think
hobbyer Malay is going to be the leader in global
economic reform in the coming years, And for once in
my life, I'm actually optimistic.
Speaker 2 (11:25):
That doesn't happen very often.
Speaker 3 (11:27):
But I am so pumped up about how Argentinian voters
did the right thing and voted for freedom over statism.
Speaker 1 (11:34):
Last question for you, Dan, have you ever had the
opportunity to meet or talk to Javier Malay.
Speaker 3 (11:40):
I did meet him at a conference back in August,
albeit briefly, but I got my celebrity photo shoot with them.
Speaker 2 (11:47):
And you know, because I'm really angry.
Speaker 3 (11:49):
I met Reagan several times in the late seventies, but
I was too stupid to ever get a photo. So
I have a photo with Margaret Thatcher, I've a photo
with Hobby or Malay. Sadly there's not one with Ronald Reagan.
But what's that beat? Love song two at a three
ah fan?
Speaker 1 (12:05):
It's funny. One of the great moments in my life
was the just the few minutes that I had standing
with some other people too, not just me with Milton
Friedman and I did not get a picture, and I
wish I had, But I imagine is that kind of
thing for you? And I get it. I mean the
fact that this guy in South America might, especially if
(12:29):
he has a little more continued success, be legitimately mentioned
in the same breath as you just did with Reagan,
and Thatcher is an incredible thing. I'll give you the
last seventeen seconds.
Speaker 3 (12:43):
I am so hopeful that not only will other countries
around the world follow Malay's example, I'm hoping that Donald
Trump will pay attention to what Malay is doing and
become a little bit more robust in his push for
a limited government of free markets.
Speaker 1 (12:58):
I'm not that optimist, but from your mouth to Trump's ears.
Dan Mitchell's blog is called International Liberty. I just go
look it up. You'll find it. It's also will be
on my blog as well. He's the co founder of
the Center for Freedom and Prosperity. Go Bulldogs. Thanks for
being here, Dan, Go dogs, all right.
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