Arianna Talks 'Third World America': We Have A 'Surplus Of Talent' That's Not Being Used (VIDEO)

In appearances on CNBC's Squawk Box and MSNBC's Morning Joe Tuesday morning, Arianna pushed for community-based solutions to the country's economic crisis, emphasizing the importance of looking beyond political parties.

"Whether you're a conservative or a liberal, America is not America without a middle class," she said on Squawk Box at Fortune's Most Powerful Women Summit in Washington, DC, discussing the subject of her new book, Third World America, which is currently on the New York Times best-seller list.

The U.S., she said, now ranks tenth in the world in upward mobility, with 100 million people worse off than their parents. While she proposed government solutions to this problem, such as creating jobs to repair infrastructure, she said there's another, more immediate, resolution. As Seth Reams, founder of the community organizing website We've Got Time to Help, has said, Americans who have time on their hands can use it to help their neighbors.

WATCH Arianna's appearance on Squawk Box:

Arianna highlighted the charitable work of Susan Buffett, daughter of billionaire investor Warren Buffett, ranked number two on this year's Forbes list of wealthiest Americans. Buffett, Arianna said, has focused her foundation's resources on Omaha, her "backyard."

It's a message that spans both political parties. On Morning Joe, conservative commentator Pat Buchanan expressed his support of her ideas. "It sounds like the title of a Buchanan book," he said.

Arianna also criticized the influence of lobbyists on public policy. The financial sector, she said, now "makes things up" and has ceased to work for the larger economy -- and the financial reform legislation has been diluted by lobbyists. The "too big to fail" problem, she told CNBC, persists.

With special interests determining policy, it's up to the governed to bring about "community solutions."

'We have a surplus of talent and time that we need to tap into, that we are not using," Arianna said. "And that's beyond left and right."

Comments

[SiouxSayer]

11:25 AM on 10/16/2010

America, we hardly knew ye'.
So many out here are suffering the misery of this recession...myself included. The vast amount of talent, skills, years of solid work history, creativity, etc, ...just wasting away and being swept under the rug. The stories that have been posted on my website are a testament to the failing economy and the decomposing working class American way of life. I've lost everything (and I mean everything) in this recession after having to close my business. I am literally weeks away from being on the streets. I can't find work anywhere...and I search nationwide. I/we need a miracle...an angel...a JOB!
Come to my website and read the stories, make a donation or post your own story. The word is getting out and people are coming together to help one another. Please come and be part of the solution.

http://theincomepoop.wordpress.com

[whosbinfarteen]

11:37 PM on 10/10/2010

We are a third-world country, with nuclear weapons.

[Hare]

11:42 PM on 10/09/2010

In the words of Michael Douglas character of that Wall Street movie. YOU ARE ALL FC Ked. Time to open those eyes and see this horse is done, the race has gone to another place. Nothing will ever be as it used to be, and no puppet they put up there is going to change the demise of this had been empire. No body is looking our for ya, so look out for number one. To the young be smarter, don't fall in the trap of this animosity and conflict of divide and conqer game the old are playing. Fighting for scraps is not gonna feed you. Follow the winning horses and get out while you can.

[Fenom]

03:56 PM on 10/07/2010

America's dominance was co-op'ed to China with the help of Wealth Republicans who value their money a lot more that they care about the country they profess to love (example: The U.S. Chamber of Commerce). The love of the USA is just a smoke screen to keep down the anti USA sentiment that, if not kept in check, could affect their profits. "Power" not "Love of Country" is what drives them. Case and point: Why would Carly Fiorrina and Meg Whitman spend in excess of over $150,000,000.00 of their own money to aquire a job that only pays $150,000 a year. It's not to help you or me. You can be sure of that. It's to help people like them, other millionaires, who look down at the peasants (you and
me). This happens on both sides of the aisle. Some Democrats are not exempt. It basically boils down to the lesser of two evils.

[flossophy]

01:23 AM on 10/06/2010

Good questions from the CNBC guy.... @rianna stonewalled the answer.

[theseusofaustralia]

08:40 AM on 10/06/2010

He is wrong though, if you have responsible government it can regulate the economy and stop this crazyness from happening. Both The great depression and the recession happened because wall street was an unregulated hotmess.

[NineOneFour]

06:28 AM on 10/14/2010

Which CNBC favors...

[breakingpoint]

09:47 PM on 10/05/2010

"social media to create jobs, social media to help each other..."
http://financialterrorists.org

[breakingpoint]

09:43 PM on 10/05/2010

What's missing is justice.

Without it the crooks own the place.

Over 1000 criminals went to jail during the S&L scandal NOT ONE has gone to jail under Bush Obama.

In fact, Geithner who was NY FED RESERVE President under Bush and key in the melt down is NOW and STILL Sec of the Treasury under Obama.
http://financialterrorists.org

Either way - Geithner is the poster boy or Fraud or Fail.

Get rid of this scoundrel and stick Warren in there
shake things up
make the cockroaches run and the rats scurry

give us all some change we can believe in or let us legally secede.

[peter777]

12:59 PM on 10/06/2010

Geithner has been mostly a disaster for the Obama administration. He and the FED have conspired to leave in place a broken system that rewards the filthy rich, represses real economic development, and does almost nothing about economic woes at the personal level. To the FED, high employment is not so bad, as it holds down inflation. Low salaries are not so bad as it holds down inflations. We have fools in charge of banking, finance,and monetary policy.

[breakingpoint]

03:41 PM on 10/06/2010

no we have crooks in charge

[amabO-useless]

08:22 PM on 10/05/2010

Can the World survive without the USA = YES
Can the World survive without China = HELL "NO"

[xilduq]

08:59 PM on 10/06/2010

can't argue with that logic...

[norkas]

07:32 PM on 10/05/2010

America has unfair trade with China and we have lost millions of jobs and loosing more because everyone is thinking how they can source out to China and improve their bottom line.

As a result we will continue to have very slow growth and a middle class that will continued getting hurt.

Please do not over think this if you read a little about our trade laws with China they no longer work and must be modified NOW!

[Markrsm]

07:14 PM on 10/05/2010

Dear Friends,

This why we are a third world nation, http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-county-salaries-20101005,0,6953779.story. The only place you can make this type of money, and get 90 percent of your highest year salary for life is the government. Working for the government has nothing to do with service it is all about the money. Look at this http://www.ihatethemedia.com/california-is-paying-5115-retired-public-employees-over-100000-per-year

I am sure I am going to get called all types of names, but the question you want to ask yourself, is your government so good, that you are willing to pay them 3 times what a private sector employee would make?

[weekendpartier]

08:58 PM on 10/05/2010

UH, like almost all CEOs get lifetime pensions after they tank a company and it has to bailed out by the bank or government...why can't the average worker get the same respect? Don't blame the government because the government is YOU! Stand up and vote, protest, organize, write, inform your neighbors - - what did you do during the idiocy of the Sub-Prime years? And, so on!

[wittgene]

06:44 PM on 10/05/2010

how about the president and congress take a pay cut!

[Markrsm]

07:15 PM on 10/05/2010

Dear Wittgene,

They do not make as much as a fireman in LA, http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-county-salaries-20101005,0,6953779.story.

They make their money the old fashion way, bag door deals, and payments for favors future and a favors past.

[NineOneFour]

06:29 AM on 10/14/2010

Yes, let's focus on the fireman in L.A. and not the people who created the financial crisis and walked away crying all the way to the bank, the billionaire Wall Street fat cats. Plutocratic, much?

[Eilis27]

06:32 PM on 10/05/2010

While families work harder, their wages continue to decline. Middle-class families are working harder and earning less today than they were at the start of the Gdubya’s Administration. According to the Wall Street Journal, "Since the end of the recession of 2001, a lot of the growth in GDP per person that is, productivity has gone to profits, not wages." Median household income, adjusted for inflation, has declined $1,273 from $47,599 in 2000 to $46,326 in 2005.

[Olderandwiser55]

06:48 PM on 10/05/2010

And less and less real growth from companies-when profits were announced, they were largely cuts in workforce or wages

[NineOneFour]

06:30 AM on 10/14/2010

Oh, it's far worse than that. Real median salaries have stagnated since 1974. The only reason household incomes have gone up is because most families went from one jobholder to two.

[merlinspinoza]

06:23 PM on 10/05/2010

barter system

WTO is a barter system very sophisticated investment deal it is not a trade agreement [ natural trade fair trade like the world knew it for millenia ]

investment flows to low wage markets low standard places then we import the cheaper things

BUT we cannot avoid importing consciousness e.g. from china ; along with the things we have imported chinese wage levels [ in terms of downward pressure on our wages] ; american houses are not affordable fro chinese wages and our obsession with security proves we have imported some chinese standards;

fro 30 years america was bartering oil for weapons e.g. $ 13 000 000 000 in weapons " sold " to iran's Shah in one year $ 30 000 000 000 in weapons " sold " to saudi arabia so in effect the oil was sortof free

america bartered consumer goods from Japan to make up for industrial production in america devoted to military goods rather than civilian goods

this barter system does not work with china ; it is way too big ; allready with japan it didnt work well

trade is only supposed to be about excess things here traded for excess somewhere else which we want ; trade is not a substitute for military costs and not about exporting jobs

the only way america can affford to shift jobs to china is to import 500 000 chinese soldiers [ send to afghanland ] and 1000 000 tenants for troubled houses

[NineOneFour]

06:30 AM on 10/14/2010

Can anyone translate this for me?

[Atlantavet]

06:18 PM on 10/05/2010

The private banking system in the US worked when it was regulated and insured through funds provided by the banks and S & Ls. After Roosevelt set this system up, it went 50 years without government assistance.
Reagan deregulated the S & Ls in the early 80s, and within 10 years the insurance fund was bankrupt and the taxpayer provided $80 billion to save the financial system.
The deregulation of the late 90s led to another collapse and about $800 billion from the taxpayers.
If these financial networks think that a deregulated system is private, they have ignored 80 years of history. We saw the 50 years, when it worked, and we saw the two deregulation efforts that caused the crises and led to this last recession. This is the worst economic environment since the depression and proves once again that Roosevelt was right.
These talking heads toss around a misconception when they suggest the government is taking over the financial system. CNBC gets low marks for not understanding the difference between a private banking system that is regulated and a deregulated system that requires frequent intervention by the US taxpayer.

[Markrsm]

07:18 PM on 10/05/2010

Dear Altantavet,

The key is size of the banks, in the S&L years, it was the large S&Ls that failed, as they became large as they promised huge returns. To make huge returns you have to lie, as it is impossible to do if for a long time, ie Madoff.

We need to have more banks, as banks are just the keepers of our money, why should somebody get a huge bonus loaning to me the people's money?

[pmag88]

06:14 PM on 10/05/2010

BTW – I harbor no ill will towards China then or now because they were just trying to build a middle class.

Also, I understand that we needed to diversify and ship some jobs overseas and we needed to build a more interdependent world economy, but the way it was done and how it’s still being done is not humane, ethical, or moral.

Most economists agree. We need to bring back some manufacturing to America and rebuild our infrastructure. There are people standing in the way of that happening. They are the same people who have been standing in the way of that happening for the past 30 years. They are the republican party. Don't vote for them unless you want to live in a third world nation.

[Longtimeliberal]

06:24 PM on 10/05/2010

All Republican Senators voted against ending subsidies and tax loopholes for big multi-natl corp outsourcing to give those breaks to American Business.