Joel needs to count the number of times where he justifies his big ideas by stating that "we're already doing that" and stop to consider the state of our current reality. If all those things we're already doing were so great, we wouldn't be in such a mess. I also liked the part where Joel claims we can afford this or that in the context of $26 trillion in debt, not counting the unfunded liabilities. News flash. The only thing we can afford to do is shrink government and to stop enslaving future generations to an ever increasing debt burden.

Let me summarize Greenblatt's solutions: Social engineering screwed up our institutions but my form of social engineering will fix them. I say we've had enough masterminds tinkering with our society in the last several decades.

I suspect this interview will divide people. I am a big libertarian free market guy but I really appreciate Joel's approach. A few thoughts - 1) I wish more people would think outside the box as Joel does. 2) While Joel focuses on social issues, he avoids the common pitfall of misaligned incentives. I noted that all of his proposals are driven by aligned sensible incentives. 3) On the working wage supplement, this makes a lot of sense. Free market capitalism works brilliantly but it does lead to extreme inequality. The minimum wage and unemployed welfare simply don't work. I have met people who want a job and would improve by being employed, however no one would hire them at minimum wage. It would be much better for them to be paid less and have the state make up the difference (with an incentive). There is a saving on welfare, an improvement in skills and it works for the employer and economy as we can produce more. 4) I worked for investment banks for 13 years. I can tell you that every step of the way we gamed the regulations. The more complicated they became, the bigger the joke, and the few people truly understood them. And we knew we were too big to fail. Joel is correct that the only way to solve this issue is simpler regulations but allowing the private sector and employees to take the loss. My suggestion was to introduce a new junior tier of debt which senior managers would need to buy into when taking the job. Being junior, this would pay a high coupon, and act as a bonus should. And it would encourage genuine stewardship as senior managers would be well compensated with salary and coupon but would encourage responsibility as senior managers realise they would lose their investment if the bank failed. 5) I grew up in Australia. There approach to superannuation works well. The state incentivises savings for retirement (and can't be released before), which saves the state money when it comes to future pension payments. Sorry central bankers and Paul Krugman, but savings are useful in a society. Having people able to retire without being a drag on the state is a winner. Thank you Joel and Ed.

A question for Mr. Greenblatt: if you subsidize workers (from $68B to $1T) without creating proportionately more output, won't you just have more dollars chasing the same (or only marginally higher) goods/services, and thus inflating away any nominal income gains? The real question is how to make workers more productive -- and it doesn't have a money-printing answer, I say.

I'm really shocked at how much of a socialist Joel is.

You have my vote if you run for president, Ed, You'd clearly do extremely better at managing the country than our current options.

With all due respect to Mr. Greenblatt, I find the ideas he is floating around education reform to be misguided and detrimental to American society at large. Education is not about the “marketability” and “credentials” of applicants in a utilitarian economic mindset, and certainly not about having monopolistic companies like the FANGs design credentials (good Lord). Rather, it’s about the deeper formation of young people into thoughtful, competent and kind citizens who are able to enhance society through the pursuit of their varied talents. Furthermore, if we were to adopt his model and generalise it across America, what would be the role for writers, artists, musicians? My fear is that there may be none at all, and we would lose that vibrant American culture we have enjoyed in recent centuries.

Anyone that listens to this entire interview we need to set up a $1 donation fund never been done before RV decided to do what it is doing

(50:11 to go) The solution for (unemployment) technology moving too fast is education and job training ... so you can move up the job curve ... what an idiot. This guy ... I think ... will be one of the first they come for with the pitch forks.

Quick thoughts here from the interviewer's perspective, as I've also read the book. James S wrote: "It seems to me this is a corollary to an apprenticeship model which works much better for many. You learn what you need to support your ability to do a job as opposed to a generalist education model. Some people learn much better if they have job context first." That seems like right to me. What Joel was saying is that the signaling effect that employers in the US use with college excludes a lot of people from jobs who don't have to go to college or don't have the opportunity to go. What he was saying is that we need to develop a way to figure out who has the skills to do the job even if they don't go to college. That's why the part from James about "you learn what you need to support your ability to do a job" resonated with me. It's not about getting a degree. It's about having the skills to do a job. And having a certification process to prove that skill instead of a college degree makes sense.

Ed, do you think this long-term compounding narrative is still valid in a world where every bit of future yield is earned upfront by bidding up valuations in a low yield environment and the Fed comes in every time to save the day? I feel that talking younger generations into saving without thinking about prices being paid / valuations is a setup for disappointment. I know Raoul would say ‘Bitcoin’, which is fair enough, but I think compounding at relatively high rate in the next decades will require a different attitude than just passive investing. It would be great to also hear Joel’s perspective on this.

Interesting conversation and some interesting ideas. As a participant in the European bond markets, I would like to make one comment about the CoCo bonds. Pre-crisis the Tier 1 bonds were only loss-absorbing in insolvency and clearly were ineffective. The post-crisis form (Additional Tier 1) has "going-concern loss-absorption". When Banco Popular was bought by Banco Santander for 1 Euro their Tier 2 and AT1 were written down to zero. So, based on one example, it served its purpose.

Great interview Ed and Mr Greenblatt. Thought provoking, and interesting. I would definitely prefer an idea like the living wage rather than outright MMT!

You have my vote if you run for president, Ed, You'd clearly do extremely better at managing the country than our current options.

I'm always glad to hear someone really thinking about these issues. I may have different ideas on some details, but our political leaders typically just ignore social concerns. If they just advetised and targeted metrics besides the headline numbers CPI-U, GDP, and U-3 unemployment it would help a lot.

What’s the point of sending people to College if you then just bring in “skilled immigrants” to do the same jobs?

Did I miss the Bitcoin/crypto value question? If there wasn't one, can anyone give a pointer to where he has stated an opinion?

A great interview and the perfect retort anyone that suggest that free markets and capitalism are at odds with social democracy. The only thing holding these ideas back are vested interests and embedded institutional identities. Unleash the free market, replace regulation with incentives driven by long-term outcomes and wonder and the change that manifest. Common sense indeed.

Wow! Joel Greenblatt on RV! It was worth 4 years of waiting.

I am extremely conservative and I enjoy differing opinions on handling the issues we face. Notice I said "handling" and not "solving." Conservatives believe there are no solutions, only "trade offs." That being said, I found this interview to be outstanding. Ed does a great job as usual and Mr. Greenblatt's opinions are very well thought out and should be taken seriously by people of all political persuasions. In a time of political acrimony, it is good to hear new ideas and be willing to test them in the "real world."

Market this as a way to create access to high paying jobs. Real purpose, create an employers rather than an employees market by flooding the market with job applicants. This has the result of reducing the bargaining power of applicants. Being a M.D. has been good because there are barriers of entry and bottlenecks in the production of doctors. That why hospitals are trying to change the language from visiting your doctor to health care provider so they can supplement services with other professions that don't have the bottlenecks.

Market this as a way to create access to high paying jobs. Real purpose, create an employers rather than an employees market by flooding the market with job applicants. This has the result of reducing the bargaining power of applicants. Being a M.D. has been good because there are barriers of entry and bottlenecks in the production of doctors. That why hospitals are trying to change the language from visiting your doctor to health care provider so they can supplement services with other professions that don't have the bottlenecks.

More college? We’ve been doing this for 40 years, now we have a generation deeply in debt, that’s frankly been more indoctrinated than educated. That’s the fault of the Universities but also the idea that people who are perhaps not that intellectually gifted need to be sent to college. This is out of date thinking, we need to move away from this.

It seems to me this is a corollary to an apprenticeship model which works much better for many. You learn what you need to support your ability to do a job as opposed to a generalist education model. Some people learn much better if they have job context first.

I have to be honest that I was really disappointed with this. Ed did a great job (like he always does), but the interview reeks of the fact that Joel only agreed to the interview if his new book was the center of the interview. There isn't anything wrong with it, but it was so US focused that it really was a let down that only 10 minutes was focused on the things that he really is famous for (ie. value investing beating titans like Buffett). The interview could have contained so much more interesting things - how does Joel look at a business, how does he treat the balance sheet and earnings and how is he trying to estimate cashflow going forward and what level of safety margins does he apply. Little book that still beats the markets is to this day still one of the best investment books out there for any new investor to pick up and it really is a shame that the interview only contained 10 minutes regarding Joel principles of investing.

I agree with Daniel. It's a tough sell to younger investors that compounding at 1% or so for the next 5-7 years is an enticing proposition. Many respected studies show that's the likely outcome when entering the market at the current high valuations.

Joe Greenblatt for president....Why cant we get people like him in politics GREAT INTERVIEW..