00:16:58 · Mark Jacobstein
[00:16:58] S2: undertakings. And more highly leveraged. I mean, is one of these things, you live in Silicon Valley for long enough and we like to think we're sort of the center of the universe and the companies that we build are going to change the most impactful thing you can do in human society. And I don't wanna underestimate the importance of technological advancement, but president of The United States runs a pretty... Has a pretty big budget and a pretty big finger on the lever as we know for good or for bad. And so I I do think it's it's interesting. Sometimes you get people from DC out here and they're like, you know, people in Silicon Valley are kind of full of themselves. I think it's a it's a useful perspective and reminder every once in a while.
00:17:37 · Andrew Yang, Mark Jacobstein, Mark Jacobstein
[00:17:37] S0: Well, this is a frustration I'm going to express to you guys. I I just wanna share this with you too. So I can prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that I had no intention of running for president as late as 2017 because Venture for America operated in 12 cities, and none of them were in Iowa or New Hampshire. I could easily have been like, hey, we're gonna roll out in Iowa City and Manchester, New Hampshire, and I never did because I had no intention of running for that office. One of the things that moved me was watching the Republican presidential primary debates in 2016 and thinking, these people are fucking terrible. Like, you know, you watch them. And some of them, I'm sure, like maybe some of you know and worked with Carly Fiorina as an example. But like, I watched a bunch of these others and I was like, these guys, man, like, I'm like... I mean, I didn't... I even... Then at that point, I did not think like, oh, I'm gonna do this myself. But I thought, I'm at least as smart as these guys, and I'm pretty sure I have better ideas and better intentions. And I'm sure there are a lot of folks in Silicon Valley to that point, Mark, who are like, hey, I'm smarter than these people. Like, I think I can do a better job. But then they don't actually run [00:18:50] S3: They don't [00:18:50] S2: actually do it.
00:18:50 · Mark Jacobstein, Andrew Yang
[00:18:50] S2: actually do it. [00:18:51] S0: You know? Unless the name is Tom Steyer or like a couple of people that have gone down this past. And so that step... Look, I don't think everyone should run for president, though I do think more people should run for president. I think that would be better, interesting, more dynamic. There's that sense that so many folks I know from some of these elite circles look and say, like, I could do better, but then they... Their life is too good, you know, and then they stop there. [00:19:20] S2: So it's interesting. I I haven't thought about this as to whether or not it is that their life is too good or that even for the folks who are entrepreneurs, like, I'm gonna change the world and make a business and it's super hard to do, think, like, running for president, that's crazy. I mean, like, who am I to run for president? I I still... I mean, I do remember the day you... We we met at Guardant Health, you were like, I'm running for president. And I literally thought to myself, president of what? Because it is such a... Like, the idea is you do it from the establishment. You you weren't already a congressman or a senator or like it's it's it's just a very odd idea, and it shouldn't be. Like, we're a democracy. Like, our our original framers, like, they were [00:19:56] S0: two rules. It's just natural born citizen and 35 years of age. There's not like, and you have to be an office holder, and you have to do this. Like, no. No. [00:20:03] S2: And very importantly, you can only have done it for a total of eight years.
00:20:03 · Mark Jacobstein, Mark Jacobstein, Andrew Yang, Aditya Agarwal
[00:20:03] S2: And very importantly, you can only have done it for a total of eight years. [00:20:07] S3: Yeah. Yeah. [00:20:09] S2: There's a [00:20:09] S3: third rule. Oh, Yeah. [00:20:12] S0: Yeah. That's true too. [00:20:13] S1: Whenever anybody who is in the arena is being criticized by the peanut gallery, I'm just like, nah, if you haven't been in the arena, then you have no right to comment on what can or should be done. If you've never been an entrepreneur, it's so difficult to criticize people who are going through the journey. How do you know the vicissitudes and the ups and downs of the roller coasters? I mean, you know this, this is probably your third or fourth company. It is super fucking hard to start a company, right? And if you have never started one, you don't actually realize just the magnitude of difficulty of dealing with your own emotions on a day to day basis that you just never have to face. Frankly, your paycheck is guaranteed on a day to day basis. Whereas if an entrepreneur, you have to generate that payroll every two weeks. Coming back to your point, I'm like, it's great that Tom Steyer is maybe running for, I don't know, it sounds like he might [00:21:05] S0: be He's for governor in [00:21:07] S2: running for [00:21:07] S0: governor And in
00:21:07 · Andrew Yang, Aditya Agarwal, Mark Jacobstein, Mark Jacobstein
[00:21:07] S0: governor And in [00:21:08] S1: Tom spoke at SPC a few years ago and I'm like, listen, don't know how far you're going to get, but it's a lot of respect for the fact that you're out there doing something, You're actually doing something. And I wish more people did it. Frankly, I'm looking at myself, I'm like, why I can't run for president because I'm a naturalized citizen, but why can't I think about being a senator or a congressman or something? And the fact that I don't makes me think [00:21:35] S3: that You have I'm about firm to run with this. [00:21:37] S2: We're not ready [00:21:38] S3: to give you... Have a firm to run with this. [00:21:40] S2: Could already give you up to it. [00:21:42] S1: Sorry, Mark. What we have done is that two people in the San Francisco Board of Supervisors are actually from SPC. So we are helping, I would say the political change. But Andrew, you're going to say something.
00:21:56 · Andrew Yang
[00:21:56] S0: Oh yeah. So I gave a TED Talk last year. It was the number seven TED Talk of 2024. One of the things I want to put out there is that the highest level of value that can be produced, the highest leverage now, is not even running for office oneself. It's trying to fix the system and the incentives. And there are ways that you can contribute to that without running for US senator or whatnot. So I just want to put that out there because here's the trap. And this is something like I've heard any number of times where people think, okay, I should vote, I should give money, and then I should run for office. And that should be like the hierarchy. But then people are turned off because like, wait a minute, if I run for office, some people are going to hate me and yell at me. It's going to be a lifestyle downgrade. I'm not sure if I'm going be able to do as much good as I want to anyway. And by the way, like rational, totally rational. I even had in my list of life schools when I was first dating Evelyn elevate a national political figure. It was not be one. It was like find one, find another schmuck, and then help them. And so that's totally, again, smart. It's rational stuff. And then a lot of excellent people are turned off by politics of today and reasonable. So there are things you can do though. Like the highest level thing you can do right now is try and cure the system. And the way to cure the system is not to play on one team or another, but to create a new team and fix the incentives. And if that's totally mystifying to anyone listening to this, please just do look up Andrew Yang TED Talk. And then I go through it in like ten, eleven minutes and say like, this is why things are so fucked and here's a real life concrete way we could fix it. And, you know, there are some awesome people that are are working toward that. So there there are things you can do that don't involve running for office.