00:00Can you square this idea of incredible spending and the ongoing American consumer continuing to uphold the underlying economy
00:08and this real feeling that cost of living is becoming unsustainable?
00:12Well, there's obviously segments within our society, and there's a group of people who are still managing to do well.
00:17There's another group of people who are really hurting.
00:19Now, they may have the money to go out and buy their children a gift for Christmas.
00:23On the other hand, there is an increasing cost of insurance, whether it's health, property and casualty, or flood insurance,
00:29as well as the increase in cost of groceries.
00:31They have extra money up here, but there's a lot of folks down here who are hurting.
00:36This is the reason why a lot of people are expecting, even though we are seeing profits at companies continue to increase,
00:41they're expecting the Fed to cut rates to respond to that K-shaped economy or the mass of people who really aren't feeling the gains.
00:48And I'm just wondering how much you're prepared to step in, that you think that it's government's job on the fiscal side
00:54to really support that lower tier of consumers that are really feeling the pain.
01:00I would argue that in the tax cut for workings families, or the one big beautiful bill, we attempted to do that.
01:06We did it both by no tax on overtime, no tax on tips, for seniors eliminating the tax that most would pay on their Social Security,
01:13but also putting in some pro-business efforts that would encourage business to reshore, to build out their manufacturing.
01:21Lastly, I will say, there's a lot of money taking place on infrastructure right now, and that infrastructure creates jobs.
01:28AI cannot swing a hammer.
01:30And so AI is not swinging a hammer.
01:32Those folks are being employed.
01:33I would say that there is a business strategy to help those folks who are in the kind of struggling area of the economy.
01:40Senator, there's one area when it comes to affordability that actually might become a lot more expensive next year if Congress does not act,
01:47and that's the enhanced premiums when it comes to the Affordable Care Act.
01:50You have a hearing this week regarding this.
01:53Do you think we can get to a decision before the deadline?
01:56Yeah, I think we can.
01:57I have a plan, but it's one that other Republicans have proposed some form of.
02:01And we take that enhanced premium tax credit, and instead of giving it to insurance companies,
02:06where they take 20% for a profit and overhead, we give 100% to the patient in the form of a deposit within a health savings account.
02:13This allows her not to buy the more expensive silver plan, but also get a cheaper plan called the bronze plan.
02:20Now, did I say it's cheaper?
02:23It's cheaper.
02:24And so we're helping her on our affordability.
02:26By the way, the money in her health savings account also gives her first-dollar coverage for her child's trip to the ER.
02:32You know, I practiced for 20 years as a doctor caring for the uninsured and the poorly insured.
02:36I learned that if you give power to the patient, you can lower health care costs.
02:40So we're giving power to the patient, not profit to the insurance company.
02:43Well, Democrats come on board with this plan.
02:46It doesn't seem like they're interested in this.
02:48They want, at minimum, an extension for a year or two of the extended premiums.
02:52So think about it.
02:53We would actually be, if you will, in one sense, extending the enhanced premium tax credit.
02:59But instead of giving 100% to insurance companies, they take 20% for profit and overhead, we're giving 100% to the patient.
03:06So you're getting an extension.
03:07But the pool shrinks, that money.
03:09No, it doesn't.
03:10Why would it shrink?
03:11It does not shrink.
03:11Well, for the insurers, are they going to have to pay more?
03:14Are you going to have to, say, you're on, say, the premium plan?
03:17Or is your plan going to be even more expensive because it's not being subsidized by those on the lower end?
03:24No.
03:25Again, going back to this, if you've got this amount of money, and currently, under the current plan, you give 100% to insurance companies, and they take 20% for overhead and profit.
03:34Instead, you give 100% to patients in terms of deposits within a health savings account.
03:39First, you're lowering their deductible.
03:41And because you have lowered their deductible, they can take a cheaper bronze plan.
03:46Normally, you don't because your deductible is higher.
03:48We just lowered their deductible.
03:50They're getting a cheaper bronze plan.
03:52By the way, when you give power to the patient, she gets the health care she chooses to have that she knows she needs, as opposed to the health care the insurance company permits her to have.
04:01A lot of wins in here for the patient.
04:03Who would not be for that, whether you're a Republican or a Democrat?
04:06Do you think that this is enough to prevent the government from shutting down again in January when this comes back up?
04:13Absolutely.
04:14Why?
04:14Because we've actually addressed affordability on the exchanges.
04:18I would argue we also begin to address the overall increase in health care costs.
04:23When you give that woman, and women make all the decisions in health care, when you give her the power of the purse, and you say, listen, if you go here, you save money.
04:31If you go there, you don't.
04:32If you go there, everybody begins to lower their costs to where they can attract her business.
04:36You know, you said something earlier that I think is really important.
04:38You said that businesses have a role in creating jobs and creating a better landscape for the lower quartiles and deciles of the U.S. economy and the U.S. earners.
04:50I just wonder what policies you think need to be implemented to do that, because right now it doesn't seem to be working.
04:56Are you talking about in terms of overall business development?
04:58Overall business, yes.
04:58Yeah, so I think that the tax policy that we've put in, and frankly with President Trump's tariffs, there's an incentive for people to begin to reshore, and certainly nearshore.
05:07And so when you reshore, you're going to create jobs.
05:10Now, that doesn't happen like that.
05:12Think how long you need to put together your financing stack.
05:14But that's going to happen.
05:16And so as it happens, we'll see that kind of upswing in jobs for construction, for service, all those jobs that are related to that reshoring of manufacturing activity.
05:26And that will cause a general boom.
05:28So that is a sustainable strategy to create prosperity for folks.
05:33A lot of people are saying that the reason why companies haven't created more jobs is because they're using artificial intelligence for efficiencies.
05:41And you're seeing that in terms of Amazon coming out and saying they're laying people off because of some of the efficiencies they're getting from algorithmic learning.
05:49I'm just wondering, from a legislation standpoint, what you think that the government's role is in trying to make sure that people aren't left behind in this transition, given that a lot of these new programs can take on roles previously done by humans.
06:05I'm a technical optimist.
06:06If you've got something that's going to increase the productivity of our nation, we'll increase tax revenue not by increasing rates, but by increasing the overall growth of the economy.
06:15When you increase that overall growth of the economy and you have more money, we've got like trillions of dollars of backlog in infrastructure.
06:22Let's just focus once more there.
06:24If you begin to invest that money in infrastructure, AI does not swing a hammer.
06:28You're going to create a lot of jobs for folks who right now are struggling to get better jobs.
06:32By the way, we're also building out our oil and gas industry, our energy industry.
06:36That creates a heck of a lot of jobs.
06:38And so everybody looks at the negative, oh, we're going to downside.
06:41We need to look at the positive.
06:42That will just shift investment to a more productive area of the economy.
06:46As we grow at the expense of other nations, or maybe we all grow together, we'll create that employment.
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