Live From LA: Andrew Yang

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This week on the Andrew Yang Podcast. But the main goal for me is to accelerate and modernize our structures to a point where we actually can solve our problems and also get a real feedback mechanism going where if things are getting worse for us, that things change. And the disease right now is that what happens to us and what happens to our political leaders is increasingly no relationship.

Let's get a round of applause again for Andrew Yang for being here. Very exciting.

Yes, thank you, Matt. And thank you for reading it, because as someone who does these sorts of events, you can tell if someone's read the book or not. And Maddie definitely read the book.

Oh, thank you. That's very nice.

Yes, because Maddie loves books. She's a book reporter for the LA Times, among other things.

I'm very excited to be here. I want to start with the title, Hey Yang, Where's My $1,000? My first question being, can I have $1,000?

Let's talk after. I'm all about it.

Uh, yeah, yeah, I'm curious. You— I really feel like you really introduced the idea of UBI and universal basic income into like the cultural milieu, and that was something I feel like I really credit you in your 2020 race as kind of popularizing the idea. Do you feel like that's obviously like a point of pride? Is that something that you really feel like has been like a centerpiece?

Oh, yeah. It's my proudest achievement in many respects because I feel universal basic income is both common sense and inevitable now that AI is here in earnest to eat our work and our jobs. And when I was making that case in Iowa and New Hampshire and South Carolina in 2018, 2019, AI was not something that we all used every day yet. But I feel like that message has aged very well. And if I can accelerate the adoption of universal basic income, that was the entire point of my run in 2020. And very grateful to Yang Gang and everyone who supported that run and helped make it possible. And if we get it across the finish line, you should take credit for it. Should be like, I was there from the beginning. We're like a rock band where if you're an early fan, then you're one of the real ones. And then all the latecomers, we can— turn our noses up at them. You know who you are. I'm just kidding. But this is my single biggest achievement and goal. The goal, self-consciously, the whole time was if we can mainstream universal basic income, then mission accomplished.

Yeah, jumping off that—

Not just mainstream it, but make it happen. I'm a goal-oriented fellow. And sometimes people say, it's like, oh, you impacted the culture. It's like, great, but where is your $1,000?

I'm curious, because you talk about this in the book, but you implemented those ideas during COVID where you started like a pilot program where you offered $1,000 to people in very specific areas. Can you talk about the success of that program?

Yeah, we gave away $8 million during COVID uh, and it was very successful. Uh, I also lobbied for the stimulus checks, the COVID relief checks that many people got. And one of the misconceptions about those checks So if you do the math, and you all remember these stimulus checks, people received, let's call it typically between $1,200 and $2,000 over the course of those months. And we experienced some level of inflation. And so people said, oh, the stimulus checks were why the inflation happened. But if you do the math, all of the stimulus checks amounted to about 15% of the money that was spent On the relief packages, trillions of dollars were pumped into the financial system and to the city and local and state governments. What we had a choice on at that time was, are we going to make people and families whole, or are we going to make shareholders whole? And we chose shareholders. We said no company is allowed to fail or lose value. And that's where most of the value— that's where 85% of the money went. And so to the extent that we had a hot economy for a period of time during and after COVID, it was not the stimulus checks to us. It was money into the financial system.

That's interesting. I'm curious too, since this is a book event, what made you write this book in this specific moment in history? Like, why this book? Why now?

Yeah, I was talking to you in the green room a little bit, Maddie. I struggled to write for a number of months because if you look at The War on Normal People, I was like, hey, AI is gonna come, it's gonna eat the jobs, we should adopt universal basic income, was very, very solutions-oriented, data-driven, lot of research, lot of policy. And then the next book I wrote forward was about how the two-party system was gonna get more and more dysfunctional and polarized because of bad incentives in the system, and the way out of that would be to have nonpartisan primaries and ranked-choice voting, where you end up converging around a candidate or policies that the majority of people find appealing, and it doesn't get refracted through the party primaries that end up amplifying the viewpoints of a relatively small proportion of Americans. I gave a TED Talk on that topic in 2024. It's called How to Fix American Politics in 11 Minutes. And so both of those books were very, very dense and, you know, like a lot of facts and figures. And I just didn't have it in me to write another book like that, in part because I was still grinding away at making universal basic income happen and primary reform happen. So if you write like a net book about another set of policies, like, wait a minute, like, you haven't even gotten the other shit done, you know? It's like, like, stop, stop. So, which I agreed with. So I was like, oh man, like, I can't write another book about these big problems if I'm still working on the problems I'd already laid out. And so the problem I tried to solve with Hey Yang was a different problem, which was just what's been going on behind the scenes, and can I deliver a story that's entertaining and enlivening and not make you want to shoot yourself in the head in a difficult time. And then after I reframed the mission to that, then I was like, okay, I can write this book. And then I enjoyed writing this book, and I hope people enjoyed reading it.

Well, that kind of leads into my next question. The book is— I found to be tremendously funny. The voice is so comedic. You talk a lot about your inspiration of The Onion, Shane Gillis, Dave Chappelle. And I'm curious, Was it difficult to nail a tone that was both political and both kind of like astute, but then also very funny and personal?

Well, shoot, if you think I nailed it, Maddie, I'll take it. Like, you would know, because Maddie, as you can tell, is a brilliant comedienne and has written for CollegeHumor and a bunch of others. I wanted to write something that was easy to read and fun and funny. And my early readers, the first reader was my mom. So my mom was like, "Love it, Andy." And I was like, "Oh, great." I felt good about the process. I felt good about writing it. I enjoyed writing it. And I thought people would enjoy reading it. And I've gotten great feedback on it.

I'm curious too, you open up a little bit about your journey as a father and meeting your wife and kind of the dating journey there. What was it that you wanted to get personal in this book and kind of reveal your personal side as well?

Yeah, so it was to enliven and entertain, but also to express my gratitude to everyone who put Yang Gang and Andrew Yang on the map. I talk about how Andrew Yang is a thing now, and like, it is a person, obviously, like flesh and blood. But Andrew Yang is a thing, and so I was like, I wanted to express what the journey was like internally, and obviously you can't do that if you don't include your wife, who's, by the way, here and like looking, not looking for the room, she knows where the room is, but she's just like, yeah, like grabbing something. One of the things you do as a partner— I don't know if you have this experience, Maddie, so check it out. I write stories. I include stories about Evelyn. And then I need to get her to sign off on them before they get published, because if something gets published that pisses her off, then that's a major problem. So then I find the chapters that involve her or the family and just be like, hey, baby, could you take a look at these before I release them?

I find it to be so flattering. I would love if someone wrote about me the same way you wrote about her.

Oh, I'm sorry. Thanks, Maddie.

I say that.

In addition to trying to make good things happen, my other mission is stay married, and so you gotta do what's necessary on that side. But after she said she enjoyed the pages that involved her and the boys, I was excited to share them, and I do think two things. Number one, I think there's kind of this simulacra of positive family vibes that most political figures put out there. Sometimes it's real, sometimes it's not, honestly. And so I wanted to try and convey the reality of what our family relationship was like in a way it's like, OK, they're actual people. They have real relationships. But the other thing is that I think being a husband and father are some of my greatest joys and achievements in life. I talk in the book about how positive versions of masculinity are all the more important in an era when more and more men feel pushed to the side and then get placed in this false choice of like, you're either the root of all evil, or reactionary in a particular way. And I, consider myself somewhere in between the ideological extremes there. And I think a lot of that's being a husband and father, and also father to two boys. So I try and be a good role model to them, and I wanted to include that set of experiences in the book in a way that was not heavy-handed. It was not like, oh, you should— you know what I mean? It's like trying to be like a good role model. And even as a dad, I think the best thing I can do is just walk the walk every day, because kids— don't really listen to anything you say. They observe you. It would be a little bit like if you told a kid, like, don't use a screen, and then bust out a screen in front of them every day. It's like, they're going to totally ignore you. Or it would be like— so in my case, it's like, I know how I interact with Evelyn is going to be the most important example that they can take.

You touch on something in your book that you just talked about now. You talk about the male loneliness epidemic, essentially, which is something that's been written about a lot. There's a lot of think pieces coming out. And you had your own take because The Washington Post, I think, approached you about doing an op-ed.

Yeah.

Can you talk about your ideas about that?

Sure. So I wrote a social media post about the male loneliness epidemic. And then The Washington Post said, hey, can you write an op-ed, which is very flattering. As a writer, you're like, ooh, my thoughts are important. They matter. So let me try and do this. The things that I wanted to present, it's like, by the way, if you look at that op-ed, I think 90% of it is just facts and figures again. And I tend to interact with the world that way, where people will say something to me, and I'm like, all right, let's just like figure out what the fact is. But male dysfunction is factual. You know, I mean, you look at it, like higher rates of behavioral and academic problems when they're young. Men are now about 40% of college students, which ends up also presenting all sorts of problems. And there is this sense that guys have it great and need to be checking their privilege in various ways. And then a lot of men are like, what privilege? I'm like at home in my basement in my pajamas trying to find some kind of footing. And I think a lot of that is around humanizing men, humanizing everyone. One of the things I believe is that that male and female success actually go hand in hand. They're tied together, that it's not some kind of weird zero-sum game where if one group gets ahead, that it's going to somehow hurt the other.

Completely. Essentially what you're saying is male achievement and obviously male support doesn't necessarily have to be at the detriment of women. And obviously they can coexist. And women's achievement too can be also supplementary to men's.

Yeah, 100%. Unsuccessful men tend to be terrible to women. You know? I mean, that's just—

We were just talking about this at drinks, the three of us.

Yeah. And women objectively are succeeding at school for sure, and in many professional environments and occupational fields. But successful women, great for men. You know? Like, it's just— it's all— win-win-win in my view. And certainly me and Evelyn, our marriage is like that. It's not like if something great happens to Evelyn, I mean, I'm the happiest person there is. Thank you, listeners. Please make sure to like and subscribe. And if you have any questions, send them to mailbag@andreyang.com. We'll do our best to answer them. Thank you. It's the summer, which is supposed to mean we all get fit and healthy. But if it means what it means to me, you eat a lot of crap and junk and it's actually not great for your waistline, which makes it a great time to switch to Factor. Factor makes chef-crafted, dietitian-designed, ready-to-eat meals that are sent to you. Even a klutz like me in the kitchen can get them done in 2 minutes. Salmon burger, shredded pork, collard greens, plus desserts like pumpkin-flavored cheesecakes, protein shakes you'll actually like. Factor's been a game changer for me because I'm kind of a set-it-and-forget-it guy. I just want to go to the fridge, bang out the meal. Let's eat real. Head to factor meals.com/yang50off and use code yang50off to get 50% off and one free breakfast item per box for one year while supplies last until 10/31/2026. That's code yang50off at factor meals.com. Yang50off at factor meals.com. See website for more details.

I want to switch gears a little bit and talk about something that really is important to me, obviously as a writer, but to a lot of people is that the threat of AI that feels quite existential and something you brought up during your presidential candidacy that I think has only been more omnipresent since. Can you talk a little bit about AI and automation and what that can do to our economy and the dangers of that?

Yeah, AI is forming a super vortex with capital and data and processing power that's going to hoover up more and more value into the cloud. And Los Angeles is one of the epicenters of that phenomenon right now, where you look at the studios. There are a number of reasons why the productions have been scaled back very, very significantly. But a lot of it, though, is that the tech giants have overrun the content creators, where now it used to be was the content is king and you have the creatives. And if they come up with a great story, then people will pay to find it. Now it's become reversed, where instead it's like, I am a member of a distribution pipeline. Let's call it Netflix or Apple or Prime. And then whatever you jam in front of me on that pipeline, I'm going to consume. And I have the algorithm. I have gajillions of dollars. And so, by the way, one of the dangers of that is the commoditization of art. And the commoditization of art then leads to AI-produced art. Because at this point, it's like, oh, I'm just going to watch weird CGI slop, then I certainly don't need a human producing that. So that's the direction that— Unfortunately, the media industry is going. Social media, and I'm sensitive to this too. I'm sensitive to this for a lot of reasons. One, it's just factual. There's the numbers. But two, I am a participant where I produce social media posts. I write a newsletter. I see how that stuff gets monetized. And I am grateful every day that I don't actually rely upon that stuff to pay the rent and keep a roof over. Are ahead. So I imagine how it is for folks that are making their livelihood centrally through it. And I know it's just getting harder and harder, and it's going to get worse and worse. And these are for people who are at the top of their fields. I mean, local journalism as a field has been devastated. And I've seen— look at the numbers there. It's like literally hundreds of thousands of journalists have gotten wiped out. In this country, and that's been a disaster for communities and our politics because local journalism used to be the most non-polarizing factor. And if you get rid of it, then where do people get their news? Cable, their social media feed, the algorithm, and that's how you wind up getting divided into two camps that regard the other, you know, as the problem.

Do you feel like there's any hope, or do you feel like Things have only gotten worse and continued to worsen.

I have been staggered by how much shittier things have gotten since I ran in 2019, 2020. And that's in the numbers. I mean, I used to say this was the most extreme winner-take-all economy in the history of the world 6 or 7 years ago. And it has gotten much, much worse with the advent of AI. You have now, you know, you had a trillionaire for a little bit. But you're minting centimillionaires and billionaires on the back of this AI juggernaut that is, by the way, produced on the backs of all of our data.

Is it also a bubble?

It's also a bubble. There is that. So it's a bubble that's subsidized by all of us via federal dollars. And it was built off of hundreds of billions of dollars worth of our data, of which we saw zero. I don't think I have this story in the book. Maybe I did. No, I don't. It's in the next one. So I got a note from my publisher saying, hey, an AI company wants to eat your book and absorb it into the collective intelligence, and we'll pay you $2,500 for the privilege of doing so. And I saw this and had a mixture of emotions. So one is like, frankly, you feel flattered. It's like, oh, AI wants my stuff? Like, great. Like, I'm going to be part of the hive mind? I'm going to live forever? Great. Also $2,500. It's like, oh, I didn't expect this particular bit of money, so that's great too. I can go eat a steak or something. But then there was part of me that was like, wow, I'm so easy to pay off. You could take hundreds or thousands of hours of my work and just smash it into the algorithm, and I'll just take my little fee. And it's your perspective on whether $2,500 is a big or a little fee. And then, hey, they're offering me something. They're offering the average American zero. You know, the average American didn't get that memo. And if you do the math, the average American has contributed well over $2,500 to the models via your consumer data and everything else. So it's gnarlier and worse than I imagined it would be. And I was very pessimistic in The War on Normal People. I don't know how many of you read that book. This is a test. To see how many of you— how many of you actually read The War on Normal People? Oh, wow, not many of you. I guess I have good feelings about that because that means that you were drawn here for some other reason. But The War on Normal People was a book I wrote about how AI is going to suck up more and more of the work and the value and how we need to transition to universal basic income and a human-centered economy. And I wrote that in 2018. And it's like my major— intellectual contribution. It made the New York Times bestseller list many, many times, sold a couple hundred thousand copies, that kind of thing. And my worst prognostications have been realized genuinely. I was pessimistic, and I don't think I was inaccurate.

I guess, do you feel— because I feel like there's so much activism around, people do not want data centers in their town. Do you feel like— and I feel like it's kind of bringing about this new environmental movement. Do you think that's— going to cause change that has legs to create this almost revolution against AI?

There is burgeoning hostility towards AI for sure, and that was hand in hand with an alteration of the narrative that happened about 2 months ago. I don't know if you're all savvy to this. 3 months ago, multiple AI CEOs were saying, "Hey, we're going to get rid of your jobs, and so we should figure that out." And then 2 months ago, they all said, we were just kidding. Your jobs are going to be fine. No, genuinely, you can actually look at the timeline of the posts. And around that time frame, someone threw a Molotov cocktail at Sam Altman's house, and then another person took a gun and fired at Sam Altman's house. And around literally 2 weeks later, everyone was like, yo, yo, your job's going to be fine. And I was in Michigan, and I said to them, look, I'm the MATH guy, which stood for Make Americans Think Harder, which Americans did not want to do. But we've spent, let's call it, $3 trillion-plus on AI thus far. Can you imagine a world where we spend $3 trillion-plus on AI and it doesn't affect anyone's job? Does that make sense to anyone? I asked people in Michigan this, and they all were like, that makes zero sense because In Michigan, they saw jobs leave for globalization. They see all the substitution. They know what happens if you're going to spend $3 trillion on AI. And so the narrative has shifted because the AI CEOs have said, look, people are really starting to hate us. So the backlash is building, and it's going to be beyond political. It's going to get into the real world. And the backlash against the data centers is part of that.

I want to touch on something that you talk about in the book, which is ultimately politics is very emotion-driven. It's very theatrical. You talk about one of your first debates experience not having a great time because you're like, oh, this is ultimately about emotions and having to tap into emotion as someone who's kind of math-forward. Can you talk about that process and entering politics and having to build an emotional narrative around your advocacy?

Yeah, sure. This is my wife, Evelyn. Let's give her a round of applause. Hey, baby. You're one of the stars of the book. Yeah, it was a learning process. When I started running in 2018, I wasn't very theatrical. I suppose. And most people had just ignored me. And I would show up on occasional tech podcasts. Thank you, sir. Well, I'll take the green tea. And when I would have in some emotion or humor or humanity in some ways, sometimes, by the way, by accident, like it wasn't deliberate, just like I would do it as a natural reaction to something, we did better. And so then my team would say, Ooh, do more of that. Do more of that. You're like a little bit of a dancing monkey where they're like, what other moves do you have? So I think I described this story in the book where I did the Cupid Shuffle in like a rec center in South Carolina. It went viral. And then my team was literally like, what else can you do? What else can you do? And so they would bring me to things being like, can you do this? Can you do that? And they would find I actually don't have that many talents. But that was the dynamic of discovering my— inner performer, I suppose. And it turns out that is very, very pivotal in today's attention economy. It's one reason why I did say yes to the reality TV show, where it's like, you know what, I think that is going to end up being additive and positive. Being good on a social media snippet is actually value-add in this environment. So my goal was to accelerate meaningful solutions, and it wasn't going to happen unless I tried to ham it up more. And so then you got to ham it up more. And also, I had a team around me that's like, yo, man, we bet our careers on you. So fucking do it. Get it together. It was like that. Or some of you in this room were supporters of mine and extraordinarily grateful, and I wanted to do right by you too. I still do.

Here's to you. You have this chapter in the book I found very interesting where you talk about leaving the Democratic Party formally, and you were called a grifter. People were really upset about it, but you make this larger point about how the two-party system only does a disservice to democracy, basically. Can you talk a little bit about your decision to leave the Democratic Party and the point you make in the book?

Oh, sure thing, Maddie. So this afternoon, I did a podcast on Pod Save America. With Jon Favreau. I don't know if you guys know that podcast, but he— former Obama speechwriter team and the rest of it. And we had this fascinating conversation where it was like, hey, you left the Democratic Party in 2021. What was your thinking, and how has that thinking aged over time? And I said to him, it's like, look, I left the Democratic Party because I did the math, and I looked at the maps, and I realized that it was going to be nearly impossible for the Democratic Party to build a durable governing majority when it was deeply unpopular in 30 of the 50 states, and that the only way out would be to have a more dynamic, competitive system where you can actually compete in places like Montana or Nebraska, where Dan Osborn, who ran as an independent, got 47% of the vote in the Senate race against a Republican incumbent. You have to open up more of the country, and the only way to do that would be to create political infrastructure for what I consider positive independents. By the way, Dan Osborn, Seth Bodnar, pro-choice. So if you have pro-choice independents running for US Senate, and they win in some of these red states, then you can actually get something, you see the sort of the vision. So that's what I figured out in 2021, was like, look, this two-party system's just gonna get more fractured and fragmented, weaker in some ways, but defensive in others. It was going to deliver worse and worse results. It wasn't going to solve problems. And so the only way I thought we can improve it would be to have, frankly, and I'll tell a joke here, the worst number of parties you can have is 1. The second worst is 2. And then the third worst would be 3. But by the way, the ideal number of political parties in a country like the US according to political scientists, is 4, 5, or 6. You'd create a dynamic system where things kind of wax and wane. In other countries, anytime I run into a European, any of you are all from Europe? No, it's totally cool. But anytime I run into a European, they're like, "Love you, because in my country, a new party comes up every cycle. And the fact that you're trying to make it happen in the US, like, you know, like, get it, like, see it." The two-party system in the United States, is bad design that's getting worse all the time, and it won't fix itself. And so this is the thing I figured out in 2020 and '21 when I left the Democratic Party. And it was shocking to me that I got accused of so many mean things. I was like, oh my gosh, guys, I was like hanging out with you 5 seconds ago. Like, what the hell? I was like, I like headlined a fundraiser for you, you know, like a couple of months ago. And like, now I'm what? Like, you know, but— But because I'm kind of a contrarian sort, like the accusations actually made me think, okay, I must be doing the right thing. You know what I mean? Because I think that's what happens sometimes when you do the right thing. I did just watch The Odyssey. No, I'm kidding.

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You talk about in the book, you feel like the 2028 Democratic Party identity is really up for grabs. I'm curious, for you, what would be the best version of that, or where do you hope the Democratic Party moves at large?

Well, did I say up for grabs? It's interesting. It's going to be contested for sure. It's going to be like that. There are going to be a lot of candidates throwing their hat in the ring. I know there are some people I'm friends with or friendly with, and I like better than others. In that field. I hope one of my favorites emerges from the scrum and winds up the nominee. No matter who it is, I just do not believe that the Democratic Party is the vessel that can solve our problems. I just don't think it is. Now, that doesn't mean that I am not still a human being who prefers some of these folks to others. And to the extent that I can help some of them do well, like I will. But the main goal for me is to accelerate and modernize our structures to a point where we actually can solve our problems, and also get a real feedback mechanism going where if things are getting worse for us, that things change. And the disease right now is that what happens to us and what happens to our political leaders is increasingly no relationship. One of the numbers I use, because I am the math guy, what is the approval rating for US Congress as we're here together tonight?

Anyone know?

I'm anchoring you low. You can just guess a low number. It's 12%. What is the reelection rate for incumbent members of Congress? 94%. Essentially, total opposites. And so one of the jokes is, Imagine if there was a restaurant where 88% of people didn't like the food, and you never changed the menu. Like, that's how most of us now are responding to politics. And you wonder why everyone's pissed off or frustrated. And this is something that both parties have just agreed on. It's like, look, if we have to compete for votes, it's bad. Let's just give you a blue zone, give me a red zone, slicey-dicey, and then we'll fight over— 5% of congressional districts. And even those 5% of congressional districts that are competitive, they're like, hmm, let's see if I can shrink that. Maybe— like, that's the preferred feedback loop for both parties right now. And I will just throw out a California thing. I'm here in California for a part of the summer. This place is awesome. This place is great. Like, a lot of you choose to live here because of, you know, the creativity, the sunshine, the food, the diversity, the fact that people come in from all over the country. And yet hundreds of thousands of people are leaving California right now because they can't afford to live here and that there are various problems. And this is an environment where you really cannot blame anything but the one party that has a supermajority and is in charge of everything. And so what's happening here in California is an emblem too, where people are looking up being like, OK, We control everything, so why are there so many problems that seem to get worse? Why do we spend billions of dollars on a fast-track train to nowhere? And then who's accountable for that? It's like, who's to blame for any of this stuff? And so that is something I think Californians should demand. It's like, what is our accountability mechanism if you're— I'm going to lump myself in with you, obviously. I'm like an honorary Californian, in part because everyone thinks I'm from here anyway. Because I'm a cool Asian.

And— UC Berkeley, represent.

Yeah, my parents met at Berkeley. My brother's named after Lawrence Hall of Science. I sometimes think the fact that I did not grow up here in California was like, you know, something I should really be like mad at my parents about. But then maybe I wouldn't have done all this crazy stuff, like run for president and the rest of it. I don't know. I'd be like some tech douchebag. No, I'm kidding.

You talk about something so— I found this to be so charming and funny in your book, where you talk about when you started running for president, in it, you'd have to tell your friends, and it felt awkward.

Yeah, you think?

It was such a big undertaking that they were like, OK.

I mean, a real response I got was, of? So— but it was deeply uncomfortable. It took months before I could say, like, I'm Andrew Yang, and I'm running for president, without it seeming self-conscious or stupid, or whatever it is. But something did click within me. Where I could say it without a trace of self-consciousness. And that's something else I'm also grateful to everyone who supported me for making that happen, because that doesn't happen unless people respond. And if you didn't support me, where the heck were you?

No, I'm kidding.

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You spent so much time, you ran for president, you ran for the mayor. I'm curious, you spent so much time running for office, what would you say would be like a big takeaway you spent in that process that you'll take forward?

Well, I mean, there were very different, uh, learnings, uh, from each But I think the most important thing for me is that if you're going to run, you have to have a clear why that goes beyond winning or losing. And I had that in 2020 where it's like, look, I'm going to accelerate our understanding of the Fourth Industrial Revolution and AI, mainstream universal basic income, and hopefully improve the human condition by making it so that we can alleviate poverty quicker. In our lifetimes. And I do almost want to throw out some big picture numbers. US GDP right now is around $84,000 a head. And AI, despite its bubblicious nature, will increase that number to $100,000 a head. So if you have $100,000 in domestic product per person, at what point do you start looking around and saying, you know what, we can actually stake people $12,000 or $15,000 in order to keep them from falling into an abyss because we're going to make the footing in front of their feet much, much rockier. That's something that I felt and still do feel deeply passionate about, regardless of whether I'm in the Oval Office or not. You know what I mean? So you have to have something that if it doesn't work out, you can still be perfectly thrilled for the outcome. And one of the strange elements, and I think I talk about this in the book, is that I overachieved in 2020 by most any rational measurement. You know, it's like my parents tried to talk me out of running. We overachieved, and despite our overachievement and arguably accomplishing the goal of mainstreaming universal basic income, I felt terrible about our future. I wasn't like, "We did it!" You know, like, "I can go home and do something else." Instead, I was like, "Oh my God, this is going to get terrible." You know, I think if I were to run again, I think I would be able to take some of the elements that were positive and successful, and then hopefully lean into them, and be savvier about some of the input you get, and some of the advice and guidance. So here's— I think I have this in the book, so check it out. We raised $40 million in the presidential, and as soon as you raise $10 million or more in the presidential, the consultants arrive. So then you're like, oh my God, these consultants are terrible. And so you fire one or two of them, but then eventually your team's like, yo, we need at least some of these people because we have to buy ads in Iowa. And I don't know how to do that. Do you know how to do that? You need a consultant and you need a media buyer. You need someone who can do the things. You need someone who's shot an ad before. And so we're like, all right, I guess we have to— pay for some of these people. And so we started doing it, learned a ton from that. And if we had to do it again, I think there are some people you would work with again. There are some people you would never work with again. A lot of it is human. I'll give you an example that's sort of funny. This just came to mind for me, but whatever. There's a guy named Jeff Weaver who was one of Bernie Sanders' campaign managers. And then he was a co-campaign manager on Dean Phillips' campaign. So me and Jeff were hanging out in New Hampshire trying to make Dean— by the way, Dean, I think, got 19% of the primary vote in New Hampshire in '24, which is not nothing against an incumbent and whatnot. So then on the final day in New Hampshire before I went to South Carolina, Jeff was like, hey, see you in 4 years. Stuff like that. They're actually relationships that that you build up and to some extent trust. And so I think we'd have a real leg up that way because as much as we put our heart and souls into it, we had to learn some things the hard way.

That kind of dovetails into my next question, but can you talk about your plans for the future and what's next for you?

Well, sure, Maddie. Yeah, I'm excited about— I'm excited about— The fact that Americans are wising up to the need for something new and different, and that our mechanisms are failing, really. And that's played out in part because of Trump's winning not once, but twice. You could write off the first time, it's like, "Oh, it's kind of an aberration, sort of botched that." But then losing to him a second time, it's like, "Oh my God." a direct result of institutional dysfunction on the part of the DNC and the Democratic Party. I mean, Joe Biden running again, terrible decision. But then equally terrible was the falling in line of every other Democrat being like, yup, that's our guy. And there was only one officeholder who raised his hand and said, no, no, we actually need to have a process. And that was Dean Phillips. And then his reward was getting maligned and shivved by every other officeholder as like a narcissist and like a jerk and the rest of it. And so because of that, if we come around to 2028 and folks say like, look, neither of these parties have our best interests at heart and don't have it figured out and we need something new, there's such openness to that in a way I've not seen in my lifetimes. And I wish it weren't that way in the sense like I wish stuff was clicking and everyone was like, oh, whatever we're doing now is working. But no one feels that anymore. Very, very few. And so there are two great opportunities in this time, Matty. Number one is we can flip from scarcity to abundance based upon the ability of— and I don't want to say this in a way that is terrifying, but like AI and robots are going to do a lot more of the work. And so if you accept that, you realize, wait a minute, we are going to produce a ton of value. And if we had our acts together as a country, we could share in that value in a way that enables us to be creative, to be caring, to be community-oriented, and have those things lead to a fruitful, fulfilling life. So that's opportunity number one. And then opportunity number two is The path to get there, now folks are open to different roads, whereas before they just thought there was frankly one road, that one road being the Democratic Party in this example. But now there's a much greater openness. And I think these two things are tied together. I think the path to abundance and some kind of modernization of our political system.

Great. Thank you so much. Make it— please make it loud one more time for Andrew Yang.

Thank you so much for being here.

Thank you.

Thank you, Los Angeles. I love it. Let's give it up for Maddie Connors.

Thank you.

Hi, Maddie.

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