Scott Galloway: Why Young Men Are Falling Behind | PBD #758

I think if you spend enough time telling young men that they are the problem and that they're predators, they begin to believe you. >> How much of a young men struggling today is them versus the system. >> And the most frightening statistic is that if you go into a morg and there's five people who have died by suicide, four are men. >> I I don't think we have enough voices of men that are good examples and challenging boys to become men. And if you if you reverse engineer to the single point of failure when a boy comes off the tracks, it it's to one point and that's when he loses a male role model. The far-left hasn't been any more productive because their advice is to say, "Okay, you don't have problems. You are the problem." And my advice to you as a young man is to act more like a woman. 30 seconds. >> Did you ever think you were made? I feel like I could taste sweet. >> What's your point? The future [music] looks bright. >> My handshake is better than anything I ever sign. It's right here. [music] >> You are a 101. I don't think I've ever said this before. So, I've been looking forward to uh our visit today uh with uh Professor Scott Galloway. He's got a great podcast. When you speak uh on the topic of men, fatherhood, and finance, I think everybody's got to listen to it. Of course, you know, New York Times bestseller, done great work, made millions, very successful. I even think at one point you were a major, was it a majority shareholder or New York Times or something about New York Times? you were sitting on the board. But anyways, incredible, incredible voice for young men. Professor Scott Galloway, great to have you on the podcast. >> Patrick, thanks for the kind words and I'm glad to be here. >> Yes. So, a question for you if we can just get right into it because I I don't think we have enough voices of men that are good examples and challenging boys to become men. And I love seeing the stuff you say to I have have four kids, two of them being uh 14y old and 12y old. And a lot of things you talk about were aligned when it comes down to men. But I want to read you three stats and I'll again get to a question and then today I want to talk about fatherhood, boys to men and finance. So seven out of 10 high school validictorians right now are girls. >> 20% of men 25 to 34 live with parents up from 14% a decade ago. And 15% of young men have zero close friends. Five times higher than what it was in the 1990s. How much of a young men struggling today is them versus the system? >> That's a thoughtful question. Let me just pile on with a couple more stats. 62% of men under the age of 30 are not even trying to date. 42% of men 18 to 24 have never asked a woman out in person. And the most frightening statistic is that if you go into a morg and there's five people who have died by suicide, four are men. So, and if any other special interest group was killing themselves at four times the rate of the special interest or the control group, we would weigh in with programs. And one of the things that's really hurt this community and these efforts is there's a lack of empathy uh for this group because of what I think is a fair accusation or observation and that is men of my generation have had a disproportionate amount of advantage. But we're seem to be holding young men accountable for my advantage. Anyways, to your point, is it them or is it society? I think it's both. I would say the majority, it's a complex problem. There's biology at play here. A a boy's prefrontal cortex is 18 months behind a girls. You're going to see, you said you have two boys and two girls. >> You're going to have I don't know if you've already had this moment, but you're going to have your 15 or 16 year olds going to have a party and boys and girls will come over and the boys are dopes. Uh can't you look look you in the eye? They look like boys. And then there'll be two or three 15 or 16 year old girls who will come who could be the junior senator from Pennsylvania. I mean, girls are just maturing faster than boys. And they're excelling and good for them. They're ascending. I think it's wonderful. But the gap between boys and girls, if a if two seniors, a boy and a girl in high school are applying to college, essentially the the girl who's a senior is competing against a 10th grade girl. The boy biologically is 18 months behind >> the girl. There's economic issues. A lot of the traditional on-ramps into the middle class for boys who don't get a college degree. Do you remember that guy Patrick in high school who was just never going to go to college but he could fix your car >> and he was going to get a job. Uh there was there was auto shop, there was metal shop, there was wood shop, and primarily was sort of vocational programming such that men who weren't going to end up at University of Florida or Carnegie Melon could still find an on-ramp into kind of the manufacturing sector. A lot of those jobs have been offshored, so there's fewer and fewer sort of on-ramps into the middle class economically. Also sociologically, I think if you spend enough time telling young men that they are the problem and that they're predators, they begin to believe you. And so, you know, the way out here, the far right, I would argue, and I'm curious to get your feedback here, to their credit, they recognize the problem before anybody else. They said, "Look, there's a problem with our young men. They're struggling. Lack of empathy for them." But I would argue the solution was to take was not the right solution and that was to take non-whites and women back to the 50s. And I think a a lot of people on the right have conflated or incorrectly correlated the ascent of women with the descent of men. And I don't think that's true. At the same time, the far-left hasn't been any more productive because their advice is to say, okay, you don't have problems. You are the problem. And my advice to you as a young man is to act more like a woman. That's not helpful either. I went to the Democratic National Convention. I know you're a conservative. I'm a progressive. And I saw a parade of special interest groups talking about the very real issues that still face special interest groups in the United States. But not one word about the group that has fallen furthest fastest in America, and that is young men. So it's it's a combination of economic, sociological, biological, uh political issues that have all converged to basically rob opportunity. And then the and the last comment I'll make on this is that our tax policy has effectively transferred wealth from young people to old people. Uh the average 70-year-old is 72% wealthier than they were 40 years ago. The average person under the age of 40 is 24% less wealthy. Housing and education prices have skyrocketed. Those are the two primary means for getting ahead and for building economic security and finding a mate. And we've transferred wealth from young to old. The two biggest tax deductions, mortgage interest rate and capital gains, who owns homes and stocks, people my age, who rents and makes their money from salary, uh, young people. So, we've had a just a a series of kind of moons line up that have robbed opportunity and dignity and cultural standing uh from our young people and especially our young men. >> Incredible answer. And I want to go a little bit deeper into it because I want to I want to see what you're going to be saying about this because you went into politics. You said, you know, the numbers that we saw, young men shifted 18 points towards Trump in four years. And when you look at these numbers, it's not like they were sold on Trump. The article says they felt alienated by Democrats. But a part of it also, if you think about, I'm sure you remember the great the late Charlie Kirk. He played a very big role in talking about family, kids, faith. And these 16, 17, 18 year olds are looking at saying, who would be my role model? So for you, I think you are a role model for young men. But if I was to ask you right now, you know, Scott, who would you say is a young liberal role model for young men? Who would that be? >> Oh, I don't know. I I think they're everywhere. Representative Taler Rico, a man who appreciates faith and family, but also what are traditionally seen as progressive values. I think there's symbols of mas good masculinity everywhere. I, you know, weird one, Christopherson just passed away. Army captain, road scholar, a a poet, a great rock star, was known for being generous, >> married for 40 years, helicopter pilot, but more than anything, the roles of masculinity are next door. It's the guy who wakes up every morning who didn't dream of being a mechanic, but every goddamn day gets up at o dark 100 hours because he wants to support his family. And he takes a lot of blows and he just kind of toils away in relative anonymity, but is very loyal to his wife, loyal to his kids, works hard, tries to stay in good shape, be a good citizen. You know, I think there's I think there's I think there's examples of masculinity everywhere. I think we lack generally speaking good public role models across both aisles. But where I find great examples of masculinity is in everyday men who are loyal, who uh are very patriotic, maybe have served and find themselves trying to serve in the agency of other people and see their purpose is raising. You know, you have four kids. I don't know for you what happened to me. me. I was very selfish for most of my life and I finally found my purpose. My purpose is to raise loving, patriotic men. But I think there's examples of masculinity everywhere. But I I would agree that there is a dir of what I'll call public figures that demonstrate an aspirational form of masculinity. >> That's interesting when you're saying that. I guess my question the follow-up question for this would be uh uh the eight Jonathan Hyde which I think you and him are either colleagues or friends but you know he wrote the book anxious generation right and I love that book anywhere I go I recommend every parent to read that book we were a couple years ago I don't know when it was when it came out probably two years ago or so what what's the timeline yeah two years ago when it came out exactly March two years ago when it came out I had everybody read it and one of the interviews he did I'm curious to know your thoughts the interviewers asking him a question and he's talking about how much anxiety young girls have, right? And he asks, he says, "So, which which philosophies raise more peaceful kids and which one raises kids with higher anxiety? Liberal parents or conservative parents?" Without hesitation, Scott, he says, "Conservative parents." And then he says, "So then why are you a liberal?" And he says, "Because I'm academia. I can't change my philosophy." So the guy's integrity, the way he answered, I respect the hell out of him. Why do you think even he says that conservatives raise more calm, lower anxiety kids than liberals do? You know, it's it's it's it's a good question. I'm not sure I have a good answer for it. the two primary drivers according to Jonathan and Gene Twangi who did breakthrough research on this and by the way Jonathan's a friend and a scholar uh he's probably the most conse consequential scholar in the world and you know there's entire countries banning phones in schools because of Jonathan's work but generally speaking the two drivers they think of an increase in anxiety amongst our children are one some of it is our fault when I say I mean parents and that what you call concierge or bulldozer parenting and that is we use so many sanitary wipes on their lives that they don't develop their own immunities and I struggle with this. I keep wanting to save my kids from themselves and every you know I but I know my my more rational self goes let them fail let them fall down otherwise they're never going to learn to pick themselves up. Now, if you wanted to, if you were looking for a thesis, you could argue that maybe progressive parents make too many excuses for the kids and think they're loving them and being more understanding as opposed to being more kind of traded much adversity. their parents have cleared out every obstacle and then they get there and they get their heart broken or their first D and they literally freak out because they haven't known any failure up until that point. >> So I guess the argument if you were trying to bridge it would be maybe more progressive parents in an effort to do what they think is right end up overprotecting their children and not preparing them for the real world. The second thing that appears to have driven anxiety is about the time social went on mobile about 15 years ago, you saw a spike in depression and anxiety, especially among young girls. And the reality is we are every day up against this indomitable foe of the deepest pocketed, most talented organizations in history that are all trying to do one thing and that is sequester you from the most meaningful thing in your life and that is your relationships. And young men seem especially susceptible to believing that they can have a reasonable faximile of life on a screen with an algorithm. Why go through the pecking order of friends when you can have Discord and Reddit? Why put on a tie trying to navigate the corporate world, which is difficult and hard when you think you can make money trading crypto or stocks on Coinbase or Robin Hood? Why on earth would you go through the pain, perseverance, rejection, showering, working out, the expense, the resilience of trying to find a romantic or a sexual partner when you have life like porn? So, I think big tech plays a bigger role than uh progressive versus conservative parents. But I can see, you know, if I trust Jonathan, one of the things I love about Jonathan, I would consider myself center left. I think Jonathan doesn't like to talk about politics, but I would consider him center right, but he has incredible fidelity to the data. So, if he says that in general conservative families are raising less anxious kids, I'm inclined to take him at his word. >> Yeah. And and I think both of you guys are fair in where you're at. So, I think that the two voices, center left, center right, there's at least reason in there when you're having conversations. When it's the far left or the far right, that's when you're going to have some issues there that kind of pushes everybody away. But why why does this topic matter to you so much? I'm curious because to me being a father matters to me a lot and I love hearing other men who you have two boys. I believe you have two boys. You're married. You got a family. You know, you're doing your thing. Why does this topic of being a great father matter to you so much? >> [snorts] >> Well, I mean I So there was a moment kind of the aha moment for me was a kid named Alex Karns in uh fall of 2020 was trading stocks on Robin Hood sophomore at Oklahoma State and you know you see this you see this kid Patrick and you just see your son and he got an errand email from Robin Hood saying he was down $60,000 and that he needed to transfer 60,000. And of course, it ended up that was an errand email was a mistake. And he furiously all night sent emails to customer service saying, "I don't understand what's going on because they don't have humans involved." No one got back to him. And in the morning, he took his own life because he left a note saying he didn't want to indebt his family. >> Remember this. >> And I started going down this rabbit hole of teen suicide and young men. And just the data was so incredibly stark. I thought, people aren't talking enough about this. This isn't young men. It's clearly it's which is so clear. We don't have a homeless or an opiate problem in the US. We have a male opiate and a male homeless problem. Three out of four addicts are men. Three out of four homeless or men. >> Uh you know you you just men we might have two to one female tomale college graduates in the next 5 years. Only >> when you're walking down the avenue of America, one in three of the men haven't had sex in the last year. And you hear the word sex and your brain fires a bunch of different ways. that if you think of sex as a a key to the most important thing in life and that is an intimate relationship with a partner, a lot of men just aren't having access to that. So, I started going down this rabbit hole. I was really interested in it. I reached out to the Karns family and just on a personal level, I relate to it because I could have been one of those guys. I didn't have a lot of economic or romantic opportunities when I was a young man and also I was raised by a single immigrant mother uh who lived and died a secretary and just you'll relate to this as a as a dad you start to see the difference between boys and girls and also you see boys getting mixed messages at universities unfortunately we've created this zeitgeist of oppressed versus oppressor and I think it's gotten better because we realized at universities that it was it was damaging what we were doing. But one of the ways we immediately identified as the shorthand for oppressor was how white and how male you were. And I think a lot of young men have started uh to get confused messages around mating around their role in society. So, as a dad, as someone who worries a lot about their sons, as someone who likes to think of themselves as willing to wait in dangerous waters, as being data driven, and as someone who quite frankly just relates to young men who don't have a lot of opportunity at the moment, it just it just uh was something I got fascinated with and I' I've been on sort of this five-year journey. And what I'll say is that the dialogue, Patrick, has gotten so much more productive because when I first started talking about this, if five years ago, if you brought up or in any way advocated for men, I was called Andrew Tate with an MBA >> or they're like, "Oh, you're one of those guys." And there was an immediate gag reflex, especially from the left, that, "Oh, this is another guy who's going to blame women for men's problems." And I have never done that. I think we should celebrate our mothers, our sisters, and our daughters progress. I think it's amazing. If women hadn't been gone into the factories in World War II, we wouldn't have won the wars quickly. If we hadn't protected women's rights in the workplace in the ' 60s, '7s, and ' 80s, we'd be a second rate economic power to China. We have benefited enormously from the progress of women, but it's not a zero- sum game. We can walk and chew gum at the same time and recognize that if our young men don't are flailing, our country and women aren't going to continue to flourish. And when I speak to young women, you know, who wants more economically and emotionally viable young men, women. So, we all have a vested interest in our youth and our young men. It's not a zero- sum game. We can we can have empathy for everybody. >> And I think it's a common sense message, you know, that that this is, which is great. But Scott, what was what was your relationship like with your father growing up? What was that like? >> Well, I I'll answer and then I'll put the question back to you. My dad was married and divorced four times as far as we know. My mom was his second marriage. He started his third marriage while married to my mom. >> Wow. >> You know, not a very sophisticated person. When they got divorced, he moved to Ohio. So, he wasn't very involved in my life. Wasn't a bad father. Never abused me, but wasn't as generous with his time and affection with me. Uh, and also made my life difficult because my mom and I struggled economically. and he could have been just a little bit more generous. He would have made a lot our lives much easier. So my relationship with my father was pretty distant. And then as he got older, a big unlock for me, Patrick, was I said, "Okay, instead of having a scorecard and thinking, okay, he was this good or not good a father. That's how good or not good a son I'm going to be." I thought, "I really enjoy time with my father. I want to think of what what kind of son do I want to be? I want to be a loving, generous son. So that's who I'm going to be. and I'm not going to put away the scorec card. And when I did that about 20, 30 years ago, it was a huge unlock for our relationship. And the learning and the advice I would give anyone is instead of keeping score on your marriage, your friends, you know, ask yourself, what kind of husband do you want to be? What kind of member of the congregation, your church do you want to be? What kind of business partner do you want to be? What kind of boss do you want to be? and just be that man and put away the scorecard because you'll naturally inflate your contribution to the relationship and accidentally diminish theirs. And if you have a scorecard, you're always gonna you're always going to be upset or angry or feel like you're not getting the better end of the deal. >> So what the unlock I got from my father was just be the person in that relationship you envision and put away put away the scorecard. And that was a huge unlock for me and made my relationship with my father much more productive. What was your relationship like with your father Patrick? >> You my dad and my parents got a divorce twice uh to each other. They married each other and divorce divorce each other twice. So married sisters born divorce remarry unborn divorce. So in Iran I would see my dad once a week. In Iran the Friday was the Sunday here. So we had one day off. So I would hang out my dad on Friday was the best day of the week for me. When we went to Germany out of refugee camp, I didn't see my dad for a year and a half. And I didn't have a male role model. Then we came to the States. I would see my dad once every other week. And then of course I joined the military. But uh he was my hero since I was 6 years old. I wanted to be him. The guy was a cashier at a 99 cent store. Regular guy, eighth grade, dropped out to support his parents in Iran. Came from a very, very loving family. I mean, these guys have each other's back. And it was very weird for him to get a divorce, but they had each other's back, his side. But, uh, you know, a part of this, Scott, for me is like, you know, how you're coming like, you know, I wish he did this and I wish this and I wish that. How how much of him do you see in you now where at what point maybe you were critical and now you're like, you know what, he used to sell and and I learned how to sell, I think, from him. you know, he used to Is there anything that you look at now, the way you raise your voice, that maybe you picked up from him? >> Well, okay. So, a couple things. First off, it sounds like you had a strong male role model, even though maybe just logistically wasn't around as much. If you if you reverse engineer to the single point of failure when a boy comes off the tracks, it it's to one point and that's when he loses a male role model. When a boy loses a male role model through divorce, death, or abandonment, at that moment, he becomes more likely to be incarcerated than graduate from college. And what's interesting is that girls in single parent homes have similar outcomes to girls in dual parent homes. They're a little bit more promiscuous because they're looking for male attention in the wrong places, but they have the same rates of college attendance and the same income, same rates of self harm. It ends up that while being physically stronger, boys are neurologically and emotionally much weaker than girls. >> So, one thing we need to instill into our society is that the moment there's a divorce or a death, the community needs to weigh in and the mother needs to recognize that boys need men in their lives. And even just saying that 5 years ago triggered people, especially on the left, what? Women can't raise boys. No, lie to my life, my mother. But boys need uh men in their lives. As it as it relates to my dad, the biggest lessons I took from my dad and around fathering. Quite frankly, he tried. He he checked an instinctive box around evolution. And that is he was a much better father to me than his father was to him. His father was alcoholic and actually abusive of him. My father was never abusive to me. So he he checked the primary box. The thing I have taken away is my father was not physically affectionate with me. I have gone the exact opposite way. I kiss my boys. I, you know, read with them. I I, you know, I I constantly I hug them. My, my, unfortunately, my, when my oldest turned 16, he no longer wanted me to let me hug him. But now he's come back a little bit. You know, I I try to be just physically affectionate. I tell my boys every day, and if I can't get a hold of him on the phone, I text them that I love them and I'm proud of them, and I try and give them a reason why. uh because I didn't hear that and I realize how important it is. But on the flip side, I like you, I make my living storytelling and and I make an exceptional living telling stories, finding data, creating a narrative arc, and then getting on podcasts or writing books or getting in front of a a corporate audience. I do a lot of speaking gigs and I got that from my father. It's through no fault of my own. I practice a lot because when you teach you get a chance to it's like being a comedian doing standup you you get to practice your stuff. I get to practice my stuff or at least I used to twice a week in front of 160 kids paying a lot of money visav tuition. So I had incredible practice but I think 51% of it I inherited from my father. My father could hold a room like no one's business. >> Really? >> Oh yeah. He's fantastic. Uh really >> he was a great storyteller. >> Yeah. And he had this Scottish accent. He was handsome. So that's why he probably was the reason why he was married four times and divorced four times. But there's no reason why you can't be grateful even if your even if your parents didn't didn't intentionally give something to you. You know, I'm tall. I have broad shoulders and I I'm a decent storyteller and all of those things I got from my father. So there's no reason I can't be grateful for those things that I'm looking at a picture. I don't know if you see it or not. This is your Berkeley graduation. Can he see it, Rob, or no? Is it shared with him on his end? Okay. Okay. So, I see a picture of you 1992 flashback uh Berkeley graduation. Dad in the background, big smile on his face. You got your smile with the whole I wish you could see this here. What a cool picture this is. You posted it 27 weeks ago. >> You know, to me, my father showed up. I'm at boot camp at South Carolina >> and they say, "So, but David, who's going to come and visit you?" I said, "Nobody. I don't have any family coming. They live in LA. They don't have the money to fly." So, I'm upstairs in a barracks and then a guy named Wiggins, he says, "Your dad is here. Come on, Bed David." I said, "There's no way my dad is. I'm telling you, your dad is here." I said, "My dad can't come." I He says, "There's a man with a sombrero on. He's downstairs. He's telling everybody he's your dad." I said, "Dude, you got he's not going to come." He told me he's not going to come down. I go downstairs, Scott. My dad drove 2500 miles. He rented a car. They didn't ask him how many miles he was going to put on. He returned the car $24.99 a day with 5,000 additional miles. He was at graduation. It was priceless to see the guy there uh with me at the military. So, the role is a very important role. Let me let me ask you a different question. I saw a stat the other day about birth rate. >> We we used to be at 3.57 birth rate in 1950. We're now at 1.58. And as we got deeper into it, three times in the history of America, we went on a run of making four million babies a year. One time it was 5 years, another time was seven years, another time was 11 years that we made four million babies every single year. And I think the biggest year ever was 4.3 million. And one of the stats that came up and I'm curious what you think about this is in 1950 where the birth rate was a higher birth rate workforce women and workforce was 35%. >> Today it's 70%. How much of an impact do you think that has made in raising kids of women now competing with men saying, "I don't know if I need you. I can go make my own money. I don't need you. You know, I can make my own money. I'm an independent woman. There's no need for me to have a kid. I don't need to go out there and make kids." You know, women in 50s used to have kids at 20 years old. Now it's 28, 30 years old. How much do you think it's getting women into the workforce that impacted what we have today? >> Well, it's complex. So, first off, I don't think there's any doubt that if women are in the workforce and and it's more difficult to or or they're not as focused or their quoteunquote purpose, they find purpose somewhere else other than having children is going to result in lower birth rates. But I also don't think that's necessarily a bad thing. And I think corporations, the reality is men and women have largely equalized their income. Women and men under the age of 30 in urban areas make about the same money. Now where you do see some impairment professionally is when women decide to have children. Now the issue is has women's ascent professionally resulted in lower birth rates and I think the answer would be yes but I think some of that is a good thing in the sense that women have leveled up economically and are no longer as dependent upon a man for their economic independence >> and so they are demanding more from men and they are demanding more quite frankly fewer women just feel trapped. divorce rates have gone up one because I think my generation is more selfish and doesn't see marriage as a commitment but an enhancement to their life but also women have more economic freedom and I do think that you asked before how much of it is men's problems of society versus their own problems or their own issues. I do think men need to level up. Um, I hate So, just to your question, there's no doubt about it. Women's entry into the workforce and their economic independence has resulted in lower birth rates, but I think some of that is a positive. I think that women deciding that they have other options than just being tied to somebody and uh necessarily, you know, I think women having more freedom around the choices they make is good and that it's incumbent upon men. No one has the right to reproduce. Only 40% of men have reproduced throughout history. So if women have more economic independence and don't feel the same obligation to reproduce, I think that's probably a good thing. And it should be a motivator for young men to level up. There's a cartoon, and this is where I sort of I think I disagree with uh some of Charlie Kirk's philosophies, and that is there's this cartoon of a woman in her 30s who never found romantic love. She pursued a career. Now she's alone and depressed. Okay, >> there's probably some examples of that of women said, "I was totally focused on my career. I didn't spend enough time trying to find a mate and I've missed out on a family and I'm really bummed out about it." Let's just be honest. I think that happens. At the same time, she when women don't have a relationship, a romantic relationship, they tend to pour that additional relationship energy into their work >> and into um their friend at work. >> Yep. When a dude doesn't have a relationship, he often times pours that energy into video games, conspiracy theory, and porn. It ends up that men need relationships more than women. Widows are happier after their husband dies. Widowers are less happy. A woman in a relationship does live longer. She lives two years longer, but a man in a relationship lives four to seven years longer. It ends up that men need relationships more than women. And something I've said that upsets people on the left and what I tell my boys, I think men should pay for everything in the company of women. And people say, my dad's like, or my dad, my my 18-year-old was like, "Dad, that's so boomer." I'm like, "Look, a woman's fertility window is shorter. Men benefit more from relationships than than women. The downside of sex is greater for her than it is for you. And if you're on a date, you're in the back of your mind hoping maybe at some point you'll have sex." Mhm. >> So the asymmetry in risk value of the relationship or fertility window means that there's asymmetry. And every mammal has a courtship process. And when you're dating, you're courting and you want to demonstrate valor. And one way you demonstrate valor and recognize the asymmetry is that you pay for everything. And if you can't pay for everything, you don't go out and you don't go on the date. And I've gotten pushed back from the left. That's so boomer. And I've just said to my son when he says, "Dad, that's not true." I'm like, just keep in mind any woman you split the check with is never going to kiss you. Let me just just say that. That's just that's just real. [laughter] So, while I do agree that in the US, if you look at us demographically, we're actually not as screwed as many other nations because of immigrants and because um there are certain populations that are having kids. We demographically look challenged, but not, you know, in in South Korea, it's like one out of 17 people are going to have a grandkid. There are some places that are really demographic Yeah, we keep hearing about the whole sexless society concept. When we set out to create a shoe that blends [music] comfort, function, and luxury, we had the choice to make it fast. We had the choice to make it cheap. We chose neither. Instead, we chose Tuscano. We chose true Italian craftsmanship. Each pair touched by 50 [music] skilled hands. We chose patience, spending two years perfecting every detail. And we chose the [music] finest quality at every step. Introducing the future looks bright collection. Not rushed, not disposable, not ordinary, rather intentional, luxurious, timeless. So, I think the the the the notion that women going into the workplace has resulted in a lot of unhappy women and a declined birth rates. There's a kernel of truth there. But I also think women getting economic independence has for the most part been a good thing for them. As somebody who came from a family where my mom not being economically independent but being independent in other words we didn't have anyone else to rely on >> was a huge source of stress. So I would never tell a woman discourage women from pursuing economic independence. For me, the big message is that as women ascend, it's a challenge to men to level up. And the movement I hate, and I'd love to put this back to you, Patrick, I hate the incel movement. >> And that is there's a group, there's this movement that says, okay, >> women aren't interested. Men, 80% of women want 20% of the men. I give up. And it's like a badge of honor to say I'm involuntarily celibate. Well, okay, I was involuntarily celibate the first 19 years of my life. [laughter] I I I wanted to be unelibate at high school, but no one would participate in my plan. >> Yeah. >> And 99% of men for 99% of history have been involuntarily celibate. There are few men who wouldn't rather be having sex right now than whatever it is they're doing. >> Yeah. They have issues, but I get it, >> right? Something. >> So, I leveled up. I started working out. I took Accutane. I went to UCLA. I made friends with girls >> so that I could learn what women wanted. They could introduce me to their friends. And what I coach a lot of young men, I have something called the rule of threes. And that is if you work out three plus times a week, if you work at least 30 hours a week outside of the house, and at least three times a month you're in the company of others in the agency of something bigger than you, whether it's church, temple, a nonprofit, a sports league, you're immediately in the top 5% of men. What does that mean? If you are in the top 5% of young men for long enough, you are going to be voluntarily incelibate, which is awesome. So, what I would argue is that the vast majority of men who claim they're incelss aren't incelss, they're ves. They're voluntarily celibate. And that is it is up to them to level up. So, while I think there's a lot of obstacles facing men, they have more agency than the majority of men throughout history. Only 40% of men have reproduced in America. It's now 75%. So you have more agency than most men throughout history. So for most men claiming to be incels, it's like boss, this is on you. We've all had to level up and you probably have to level up more now because women are kind of, you know, doing it for themselves now. And that's a wonderful thing, >> but level up and you will be voluntarily incelibate. >> No, I agree. And I think also there's the the other uh the the Playboy model which is like look go get what you can smash them run you know never get married if you're going to have kids have a structure in place that you can have kids with a bunch of different women. There's also that messaging that's uh very strong today that the women all they want is money and if they they'll leave you for a guy with more money with better looks with better this. So screw women. All you want to do is just take advantage of them. There's that as well that's becoming very attractive. I think both of those arguments, the one on the far left, which is, hey, feminism, you know, equal power, we're the same. That's a lie. And on this side, you know, hey, you know, screw everybody. You know, the women, all they want to do is take advantage of you. That's also a lie. You know, >> um, you know, I like the rules of three. I guess maybe let me ask you this question. >> U, I know you're an atheist yourself. You can correct me. I read that you're an atheist. Maybe you're not. I just read. Okay. So, how big of a role do you think faith plays? Because, you know, I had a guy on a podcast, his name is Dr. Taylor Marshall, and he's a YouTuber. He's got a podcast himself. He does very good. And I said, "How many kids do you have?" He says, "I have eight." I said, "You got eight kids?" "Eight kids." He says, "Yes." I said, "Wow." "How many marriages?" He says, "No, I've just been married once." I said, "To the same woman?" "Yes." I said, "Your wife has given you eight kids." "Eight kids?" "Yes." "Wow." "Why?" "We're traditional Catholics. Go look it up. Nobody has more kids than traditional Catholics. I pull it up. It says it was either 3.9 or 4.9, more than Muslims, more than Mormons, more than anybody else. I was blown away. The other day, a guy comes in, one of the lieutenant governors, he was running for governor himself. So he comes to his team and one of his right-hand guys, very successful guy, Jewish guy in um Miami. And I said, "So, uh, how many kids do you have?" He says, "I got 11 kids." So, okay. You know yours? No. Me and my wife. How old are you? 46. How long you been married? 20 years. How many twins did you guys have? None. How many adopted? None. Wait a minute. Your wife had 11 kids. Yes. Jewish, traditional Catholic. How much of a role you think faith plays in us, you know, kind of getting men and women to realize they need each other? Kind of getting this whole concept of women not competing with men. And also to be able to increase the birth rate we have now down to 1.58 to the 2.1 2.2 number. Uh so first off, Patrick, are you religious? >> I am. >> Um I think that that church attendance at an all-time low or religious attendance or attendance of religious institutions being at an all-time low is not good for America. >> And your faith, >> I won't say I'm jealous or envious, but I respect it. And I would like at some point I I you know when I was younger I considered myself a scientist and I was somewhat derisive or disparaging of people. You know I used to say I don't have an invisible friend or I believe in one less God than you. I really do respect and admire people of faith. And I think that young people I I really I like I said I coach a lot of young men. I mean go to a church group and they're like I don't buy into that stuff. I'm like, "Okay, when you say that stuff, it's a group of people getting together that want to be in the presence of other good people who are, you know, want to love the poor, want to shake each other's hand, want to figure out how to help their community. Uh, I was exposed to a lot of religious institutions growing up because my dad was married four times. So, I went to temple, I went to church, I went to Unarian church. And generally speaking, I benefited from all of it. I generally I think religion is a bad brand right now because of some unfortunate actions uh mostly in the Catholic church and what gets reported in the news is basically sometimes people from the extremist side of religions but I think we're we're better off for religion and I I encourage young men to find community in religious institutions so what you have in religious institutions is similar to what you have in in office work and that is going back to the mating crisis, right? If you talk to people who've been married longer than 30 years, 80% of them, four and five, say one was more much more interested in the beginning than the other. And it was almost always the men. >> Men have millions of sperm. Women have one egg. So we've been taught for millions of years that our job is to spread our seed to the four corners of the universe. And women are taught to put up a much finer filter to pick the strongest, smartest, and fastest seed. And that's the reason why every generation is taller and smarter than the previous generation. Although Jonathan I would argue we're getting stupider. But what men need is a place to demonstrate a venue to demonstrate excellence. And when you interview these couples, you hear stuff like, "Yeah, I didn't like him, but we went to church and I loved how nice he was to his parents. I hung out with him and his friends and I found out he was a great dancer and really funny and I started getting attracted to him. I worked with him and he was so good at what he did. I found myself drawn to him. Where do men demonstrate excellence right now? Most people are now meeting through online dating which distilled down to a number of anodine anodine metrics specifically your ability height and your ability to signal wealth. And everyone else gets shut out and doesn't have an opportunity to demonstrate excellence. And traditionally when when people meet met each other at temple or at the mosque or at church it was kind of like okay here are the eight single guys here are the eight single women and they kind of paired off based on if you will their attractiveness weight class but they had the opportunity to demonstrate excellence or men need venues to demonstrate excellence and when they're not going into work remote work is a disaster for young men when they're not going to religious institutions when they're not connecting through school because fewer men are going to college. Where does a man have an opportunity to demonstrate excellence? Not only demonstrate excellence, but to fail and learn and iterate. And if a man hasn't been in a relationship by the time he's 30, if he hasn't cohabitated with a woman or been married, there's a one in three chance he's going to become a substance abuser. So men being in the company of others, friends, mentors, and potential mates, and quite frankly, falling flat on our face, and then getting up and maybe learning a little bit about how to approach someone and express romantic interest while making them feel safe, developing a sense of humor, developing a kindness practice, having a plan. You don't have to be a baller. You don't have to show up with a Range Rover and a Panerai, but you have to have a plan. I'm planning to go to junior college, then to vocational school. I want to learn how to install HVAC energy heaters. This is a great job. You have to have a plan. Even if you don't stick to the plan, every young man needs a plan. You have to demonstrate economic viability because distinct of what the Atlantic or the New York Times will tell you, 75% of women still say economic viability is central or key to a mate. It's only 25% of men. Men effectively don't care. The >> zero. Yeah. >> It's that Chris Rock joke that Beyonce could work at McDonald's and marry Jay-Z. The opposite is not true. >> That's right. So, and I've gotten push back for this, but I say to young men, you have to have a plan to be economically viable. And by the way, part of that plan may be you end up with someone who's working at Goldman and for a certain amount of period, you're going to take more responsibility for the household. Fine. Maybe maybe you're more supportive and get out of the way of your wife who's better at that money thing than you. But at the outset, you have to assume that at some point you need to take economic responsibility for your household or societyy's going to judge you harshly. You're going to judge yourself harshly and you're going to have a difficult time finding a mate. See, my my concern isn't for guys like us, you know, and and I love when you said in one of your interview, by the way, I saw a clip yesterday. It could have been some could have been you. It says, "Sometimes all women want is a man that's got a vision, selling a vision. One day we're going to do this. One day we're going to be this." They need to have a man be in a pursuit of a vision and a dream, whatever that may be. But going back to it in regards to this with, you know, uh uh you know, the idea of faith and all that stuff, I'm assuming you're a big reader. >> Uh have you because I was an atheist for 25 years of my life. And for me, I didn't believe in God. I lived in Iran. I saw the war. I saw people dying. There was nothing for me to say if there is such a loving God, why the hell is he allowing this stuff to happen? That was my biggest disconnect. I'm like, listen, I got kicked out of Bible study. I'm like, don't even bring me any of this stuff. So, I was the opposite. I didn't like going because I didn't believe any of it. And I thought it was BS for weak people. And then I read two books. One was by CS Lewis, Mere Christianity. I don't know if you've read it or not. If you've never read it, >> CS Lewis, >> CS Lewis wrote a book called Mere Christianity. And by the way, I don't know if you're a fan of Anthony Hopkins, one of my favorite actors of all time. Anthony Hopkins uh played CS Lewis in a movie called Shadowlands. I think you would enjoy watching the movie Shadowlands. Phenomenal love story. And what happened to CS Lewis? But Mere Christianity, great book to read. The other side, if you're a math guy, I'm assuming you are because you went to uh uh Arthur, I think you went to UCLA, right? You got your MBA in entrepreneurship and and uh >> Yeah, I think I like math. Yeah. Yeah. So if you like math, Case for Christ was written by an atheist who's a mathematician. I think those two books for you consider it. If you're if you said I' I'd like one day, too. I'd like to be open to it. I think you would enjoy those two books because CS Lewis came from a Oxford professor atheist who eventually is like I don't know, man. I think there may be something there. You may enjoy those two those two books. But I want to ask you something. So, you know, I was a, you know, I was like the teacher. You know, I was a student that teachers couldn't control. It's like, "Oh my god, I'm going to do this." I was always hard charging, moving. I was selling something. I came to school with two backpacks and, you know, I'm like, "Hey, one backpack was books. The other backpack was hats. I would buy the hats for 99 cents and sell them for seven bucks." And I was my my way of making money when I was 14, 15 years old. >> By the way, that's so Iranian. That's so [laughter] >> Let me just say I've been I've been getting a ton of [ __ ] because I'm one of the 10% of Democrats that's supportive of military action in Iran. >> I grew up in Los Angeles. Largest concentration I think of Iranians outside of Tehran. >> And my roommate my sophomore year Iranian. I I've said this before. Iranians are the only immigrants I have ever met who are more American than Americans. Love education. super into capitalism. And I say that in a good way. Like they're they're traders. They they love making money. They love to have a good time. I've always thought for me, and I've been saying this, I have this vision and it's probably a bit of a naive vision. I think Iran and America someday are going to be outstanding allies. >> I agree. The Iranians in my life, my mentor Hamid Mogadam, Bak Baseri, a friend of mine, Alex Dilei, my roommate David Ail, more American than Americans. And I've always thought if that culture, and I believe it does, still exists in Tran and everything I've in Iran, everything I've read about it, it's more it's more non-seular than people believe. It's less anti-West than people believe. I think that the unlock of the 21st century could be an incredible alliance between Iran and America. >> And by the way, you know, I watched your entire interview beginning to end with Fared Zakari. It was a phenomenal interview you posted and I heard you say that there as well as him and it was interesting to see where both of you got. It was a phenomenal phenomenal conversation between the two of you guys. I watched it this morning. It was great. But going back to it, you know, you know what the question is? So, you know, one of my sons, sports guy, if you see him, he's like a little Bo Jackson. He'll play all sports. He plays soccer, travel, he plays football, basketball, and straight A student. Just one of those kids that cannot sit still, right? But then I look at the, you know, education system. You almost, you know, rigged against boys. Boys develop slower, but school, uh, but start school at the same age as girls. We kind of talked about that a little bit at the 20-minute mark. Schools reward sitting still, following instructions, pleasing teachers, behavior traits more natural to girls. Okay. All right. So then when I'm looking at the stat that my guys gave to me this morning, I said, "Can you pull up what percentage of public school teachers in elementary are women?" 89%. Okay. Only 11% are men. So, what do you do when your kid gets in trouble and it's like, "Hey, go to detention. You're going to sit there for one hour every day. You're not going to go out there and play for one week." That that may work for a punishment for a girl, but it may not work out for for men. And by the way, K through 12, it's 77% women, 23% men, but specifically public. Elementary, it's 89% women. How do we fix that? How do we fix, you know, women teachers understanding young boys better? But you've just zeroed in on one of the problems and that is look the K through2 primary education system in America is biased against boys. A boy is twice as likely to be suspended for the exact same behavior as a girl. >> That's two kids two kids both cheated on the chemistry exam. Yep. Exact same infraction. If it's a boy, he's twice as likely to be suspended when he leaves the office. If he's a black boy, he's five times as likely. And it's understandable if if you're a a young woman in teaching, you're naturally going to champion the people that remind you of yourself at that age and you're going to feminize the culture around you. And so seven of 10 high school valadictorians. When they have boys onlyly schools, within a year of their founding, they have twice as much recess. Even if you think about what are the natural advantages of a boy, a boy has greater gross motor skills. He's faster and he's stronger. A girl has greater fine motor skills, writing and oral skills. What do we ask kids to do in in primary school? Push around a pencil and answer and ask questions. >> So our education system once we leveled the playing field and quite frankly it wasn't level women girls just blew by boys. So what do we do? I think one we red shirt and this is my one of my Yodas here uh Richard Reeves the American Institute of Boys Men. We red shirt boys. I think boys start school at the age of six, girls start at five and girls will still be ahead >> wow >> still be ahead of girls. We need to get more men involved in K through 12. And I'm not suggesting affirmative action where we pay men more than women. What I'm suggesting is that small small fixes. Men are more inclined to be coaches after school, but that's unpaid. We need to start paying men and women who stay after school to coach athletic teams. >> I like that. So there's, I think, a series of little tweaks to try and get more men. My male role models growing up were coaches. I was a decent athlete. I became quite close with my baseball coach. He bought me my uniform. He came over for dinner a couple times. He was a nice role model for me. So we need to get more men involved. Absolutely. In K through 12. >> Yeah, that's a that's a very good point about six and four, right? red shirt him and keep him and then put him in there. Uh um I like that. But to me it it's it's what do you do to get because if I if my son is being coached, he's never he's played sports with a lot of different organizations. Never once has a coach called and said, "Hey, we have an issue with your son. Never, not one time. And he's a very very feisty, competitive, strong personality guy." But thank God forbid they sit him down in school. You get a complete different side of them. We have a few minutes left at the end. I want to focus on the topic of creating wealth. [snorts] You made a lot of money. And the part I like about how you made your money is you started with nothing and you ended up, you know, getting into schools that you probably shouldn't have gotten into, right? You you went into school with a 2.2 GPA. And I think you told the story at your TED talks, which was phenomenal. And you also told the story how you got into college and how at first they didn't look at you, but then you're like, "No, you got to give me a chance." And you went and sold yourself on how to get in there and now created wealth. I saw one of the stories about you invested into Apple and Amazon in 2009 and today it's worth $40 million. So, you've made some very good investments as well. I'm 22. I'm 25. I want to marry a beautiful girl. I want to be a stud. I want to be a father, but I also want to make a lot of money. What advice can you give me about creating wealth? Uh, first off, have an honest conversation. If you expect to be in the top 10%, much less the top 1% from an influence or economic standpoint, you're going to have to work your ass off. I just don't know anybody who has attained a certain level of economic security or influence who hasn't spent 20 or 30 years doing not nothing but work, but if if you keep using the word balance in your objectives, fine. but move to a less expensive place and recognize you're probably not going to be that wealthy. From the age of 25 to 45, I did pretty much nothing but work. And by the way, my way isn't necessarily the right way, but if you're looking to be economically secure, as I was as a young man, buck up and get ready to work really, really hard. So, the first thing is I kind of have an algorithm for wealth. And that is the first is focus. Your job in your 20s is to find something you're good at where maybe you could be in the top 1% that you could be great at it. Like your job isn't to find your passion. My I thought I was going to be an athlete when I was in high school and I when I went to UCLA I found out what real athletes were. So but I found out I was pretty good with numbers. I found out I was a good storyteller. So I went into academia and I started writing books and I started uh speaking and I started p you know I started an analytics company business intelligence company where I take data and I tell companies essentially a story on what their strategy should be. Find something you're good at and go allin on it. I hate side hustles. If you have side hustles that means your main hustle isn't working. Find something >> funny. I'm with you on that. Find something you're good at that you could be great at. And then if you get to the top 1% of something within a decade, the accutrants of being in the top 1%. Relevance, economic security, camaraderie, prestige will make you passionate about whatever that thing is. And here's the key thing. Find something you be in the top 1% that has at least a 90 plus% employment rate. >> You want to be an actor, a model, design jewelry, be an athlete, be in sports, open a nightclub, a restaurant, fine. But now you got to be in the top 0.1% because there's an overinvestment of human capital. The top 10% of tax lawyers get to fly private and have a much larger selection set of mates than they deserve. The top 10% of actors can't even get health insurance. So be clear, if you're picking a romance industry, you got to be in the 0.1% not the top 10%. So be have a sober conversation. Find a focus. Then stoicism. What I mean by stoicism, and it might be the wrong word, from the age of 22, you got to start putting 10, 50, 100, then if you can, a,000 bucks a month aside in lowcost index funds >> because I was always I was always waiting for the big hit, a best-selling book, going allin on things. Someday I'll sell my company. If I had just I bought my first bonus from Morgan Stanley. I went out and bought a $35,000 BMW, hung swim goggles from the rearview mirror because I thought that would make me more attractive to women. If I'd bought a Hyundai for 12,000, [laughter] 23,000 into the market, I think it'd be worth 1.9 million now. You do not realize, take advantage of the fawn the species. We do not realize how fast time will go. Like, I mean, literally, Patrick, we were 22 yesterday. >> I know >> it will go like this. Yeah. So, if I said to you, there's a magic box, and for every hundred bucks you put in this magic box, I'm going to give you $4,000 back in an instant, that's called investing in index funds when you're young. >> So, you want to have some stoicism and find a way, whether it's not having that Starbucks every day, not taking Uber as often, whatever it is, find a way to put 10, 50, 100, then a,000 bucks a month away while you're young. And by the time you're my age, you're younger than me, you're going to be set. And it doesn't matter if you don't have go double platinum or you ever make a million bucks as an investment banker. If you just have that discipline, you'll be fine. >> The third thing is diversification. And that is don't be like me and go allin on things. I went all in on things. Technology, my own companies, and I've been wealthy three times, which means I've gone broke twice. I went broke for the first time in 2000. I was looking at jets in 1999. By 2000 with the dot bomb implosion, I was broke. Crawled my way back. 2007, money again. 2008, again, not diversified, all in tech, wham, broke again. And that was about the time my son had the poor judgment to come marching out of my girlfriend. And it was a hugely insecure and anxious time for me. Diversification. And then let time take over. Put stuff away. Ignore it. Lowcost index funds. Take 30% of your portfolio and have some fun and things where you think you can pick stocks or crypto. And then you'll figure out a lesson that you do not know how to pick stocks, that you can't beat the market. But if you do those things, focus, stoicism, diversification, and let time take over, by the time you're our age, even if you don't hit it big, you're going to be economically secure. And that's the key. Such that you cannot have the economic anxiety in your life and you can focus on what really matters, and that is relationships. >> I love that. And but when what year did you work at Morgan Stanley? >> Oh god, I'm old. I I joined there when I was 21, right out of UCLA. Uh I was there. It was my first job, 87 to 89. I was in the analyst program. >> So I worked at Morgan Stanley at 21. I'm the only kid they hired without a four-year degree. I got my serious 766 3126 life and health. A day before 911 is when I started with Morgan Stanley Dean Wither in Glendel, a man named Dave Kirby hired me. I'll never forget that. And >> what office? >> Glendel. Glendel, California. And then New York Life building. I think it was eighth or ninth floor. So you were just smiling and dialing. >> I was just smiling and dialing is what I was doing. And then later on I went to insurance, Transamerican, and then built my own insurance company from 66 agents to 60,000 agents in 50 states. And we sold it to an aggregator where the money came from Silver Lake and Harvest three years ago, three and a half years ago. So >> you just brought up I wish I had a fifth thing. It's called the spoon. And what I mean by the spoon is the following. 99% of people aren't willing to get out a spoon and eat [ __ ] When you called people at 21, I bet what 98 99% of you them didn't want to hear from you. >> Nothing. >> Nothing. Yeah. >> And you develop resilience. And if you if you are if you want to be really successful, if you see a guy who's got real money and a mate that's more attractive and higher character than him and doesn't appear to be a genius, here's what that guy has. He has a spoon. He's willing he's willing to endure public failure. He's willing to call people that don't want to hear from him. 99% of the public isn't willing to start calling strangers and say, "Have you thought about single premium variable life?" >> That's right. which you were doing at the age of most people just don't have that resilience. I don't know if it's you played with the wrong toys or the right toys, but the people who are really punch above their weight class all have one thing in common. No. You know, Patrick and Scott, I can guarantee you, have heard millions of nos to get to a couple dozen really important yeses. And there's no way to short circuit it to the yes. You got to be willing to endure the endure the nos. You got to have the spoon. No question about I'll tell you a funny story and then we can wrap up. So I I called I would call clients. I'm like yes this is Patrick B David from Morgan Stanley Dean with her office in Glendel. You know you have to give the address and where you're from. Like okay. And then I went to a couple clients. They're like wait a minute you said your name is Patrick and last name is B. I said yes. You don't look Irish or Jewish. What are you? I said I'm from Iran. My mom's Armenian dad's Assyrian. I thought you were Irish or Jewish. You know listen. So, it it it it worked in some instances and I had to learn how to break the ice very quickly, just like yourself. You got a sense of humor. Scott, I wish we had a couple hours together. I know you're in London, it's tougher for you. Next time you're in South Florida, I'd love to do a couple hours with you here in house. I got I have so many questions to ask you and we barely uh touched the surface, but for the hour that we had together, it was phenomenal. The audience that's watching this, do yourself a favor. Go order the book, Notes on Being a Man. what Scott teaches young men need and fathers. You need to read it so you can raise stronger men as well. Scott Galloway, thank you so much for your time. >> Patrick, thank you. And I I just a shout out or just a recognition that center left, center right, we're all Americans. My parents are immigrants. Uh it sounds like you're an immigrant. Uh we have more in common than than separates us. So I really appreciate the opportunity to come. >> I agree, brother. Appreciate you. Take care. Take care, everybody. Bye-bye. Bye-bye. When we set out to create a shoe that [music] blends comfort, function, and luxury, we had the choice to make it fast, we had the choice to make it cheap. We chose neither. Instead, we chose Tuscano. We chose [music] true Italian craftsmanship, each pair touched by 50 skilled hands. We chose [music] patience, spending two years perfecting every detail. And we chose the finest quality at every step. Introducing the future looks [music] bright collection. Not rushed, not disposable, not ordinary, rather intentional, luxurious, timeless.