Are Merit and Token Positions in Tension?

What happens when a country tries to create a real-life utopia with unlimited money? In this episode, Simone and Malcolm Collins dive deep into the Gulf States—Qatar, UAE, and Kuwait—to explore what happens when citizens receive massive government support: free healthcare, education, luxury housing, and guaranteed jobs. Is this the ultimate universal basic income experiment? Does a post-scarcity society actually make people happier, healthier, or more innovative? Or are there hidden downsides to a life without struggle? Join us as we break down the data, share personal stories, and compare these “natural experiments” to UBI trials in the West. We cover everything from happiness rankings and birth rates to innovation and cultural exports—plus a few wild anecdotes about falcons on airplanes and luxury villas. If you’re curious about the future of work, AI, and what it really means to thrive, this episode is for you.

Simone outlined this episode, so here’s her messy outline should you want some links and/or notes! The transcript can be found after it. :)

Based Camp - How Subsidized Life in Middle East Makes People Qatarded

Is buying a plane seat for your falcon a sign that you’re happy and productive?

The Gist

* We covered how cash handouts fail, both in recent tests and with programs like those for Native American tribes in the USA

* But what about the cush benefits given in gulf states like Qatar, the UAE, and Kuwait?

Lifestyle Support

Qatar

* Qatari citizens do not receive a universal basic income (UBI) in the sense of an automatic regular cash allowance for every citizen, regardless of need or employment status. Instead, the Qatari government provides extensive social benefits and subsidies that significantly improve the living standards of its citizens.

* These include

* free healthcare,

* free education (including abroad for some),

* heavily subsidized or free electricity, water, and other utilities,

* generous pensions,

* financial support for newlyweds (+ in-kind benefits: (e.g., free villas upon marriage for some))

* The villas provided to newly married Qatari couples are modern, spacious, family-oriented homes that reflect both contemporary architectural design and high standards of comfort. These villas are located within planned communities featuring amenities for families, often with green spaces, play areas, and convenient access to schools and shops.

* Key Villa Features

* Size & Layout: Most government-issued villas offer multiple bedrooms (typically 3-5), separate living and dining rooms, a kitchen, and several bathrooms to accommodate growing families.

* Design: They are built with a focus on privacy, convenience, and modern lifestyles—often with attached gardens, private parking, and sometimes maid’s quarters.​

* Exterior: Architecture tends to be sleek and contemporary but still references Qatari cultural aesthetics through decorative facades, arches, and use of local materials.

* Community Amenities: Villas are part of larger residential developments designed for family living, with communal parks, playgrounds, mosques, and easy access to retail, education, and health services.​

* Comfort: Air conditioning, energy-efficient systems, and modern appliances come standard, and interiors are finished to a high quality compared to typical middle-class homes in other regions.

* These government-developed communities, such as “Bliss Villas” in Huzoom and Abu Sidra, are described as designed for comfort, joy, and modern living for Qatari families. The scale of quality and amenities reflects Qatar’s commitment to supporting young families and national population growth as part of broader social benefit reforms.​

* Here’s a Huzoom villa for sale for about $1.4M USD

* Government-guaranteed high-paying jobs, especially in the public sector.

* Overall, Qatari public sector roles entail real work, and ongoing modernization policies are making these jobs increasingly merit-driven and results-oriented, in line with international best practices

* Additional cash allowances are given for people with disabilities, widows, orphans, the elderly (over 60), or those unable to work

* 6,000 Qatari Riyals (1,647.85 USD) per month for the elderly, people with severe disabilities, widows, “vulnerable women”, and qualifying orphans.

* 4,000 Qatari Riyals (1,098.57) per month for children with disabilities.

* Dependent supplements: 2,000 QAR per month for a dependent wife (549.28 UD) and 1,000 QAR (274.64 USD) per month for each eligible child

Kuwait

* Kuwait is the most well-known in the region for giving direct and substantial cash allowances to its citizens. Proposals have included sums as high as USD $50,000 per working-age adult per year, although in practice the direct stipend, coupled with employment guarantees and generous government jobs, is significant for Kuwaiti citizens.​

* Kuwait also provides free healthcare, housing allowances, educational supports, and subsidies for energy and food, along with the guarantee of public sector employment for most citizens.​

UAE

* Emirati citizens enjoy free healthcare, free education (including university), subsidized or free utilities, residential land grants or housing, interest-free loans to build homes, marriage and birth grants, exemption from income and most other taxes, and priority or guaranteed government jobs.​

* There are also monthly cash allowances for families with low incomes—for example, up to AED 500 ($136 USD) each for a husband or wife, and AED 250-350 per child, with extra allowances for housing, academic excellence, and inflation.​

Does the Support Produce Better Human Outcomes?

Innovation

Happiness

World Happiness Report: Recent Rankings

* USA: The USA’s score in the 2025 World Happiness Report is 6.72 (ranked around 23rd globally).​

* Qatar: Qatar’s latest reported happiness score is 6.37 (ranked around 36th globally).​

Globally, both countries are well above the median (about 5.4), but the USA consistently outranks Qatar in these surveys.​

While Qataris benefit from national wealth, safety, and generous government support, Americans tend to report higher subjective happiness—possibly due to broader personal freedoms, higher rankings in life satisfaction, and a cultural emphasis on individual achievement.​

Cultural factors and the ways happiness is measured mean differences may not fully reflect day-to-day experiences, but global benchmarks show the USA consistently scores slightly higher than Qatar.

Health

Episode Transcript:

Simone Collins: [00:00:00] Hello, Malcolm. I’m so excited to be speaking with you today because we are going to talk about universal basic income again, but from a very different perspective.

This is one of those really important things because AI is coming for our jobs. We’re gonna get to this point where I don’t know where people are gonna make their money, and we’ve already talked about how the initial UBI experi experiments that have been run in the United States where cash transfers have been made and varying amounts to Americans have yielded very disappointing results.

In terms of basically while people report that they, they make their lives better. They don’t have any measurable improvements in health time spent with kids or even savings over time. Yeah, they have

Malcolm Collins: lower savings after UBI. Mm-hmm. And, and then

Simone Collins: anecdotally, I mean, well not anecdotally, but also when you look at a lot of the cash programs related to various indigenous American tribes, they also have terrible outcomes.

So basically just giving cash to people. Doesn’t look great.

But

Malcolm Collins: let’s suppose you have an infinite money. Well, right. And [00:01:00] you wanted to try to uplift your people. Mm-hmm. Is that what you’re going to be going down here? Yeah. Yes.

Simone Collins: Imagine. Yeah. But I mean, like, people are arguing, well, but this isn’t, this isn’t how it’ll work with ai.

I mean, AI can give you so much more money. So what would happen in a world in which people just have so much money, they can give a ton of money and in kind services to their citizens. Surely these people will be the ultimate thriving society, the star Trek of our future. Okay, well great. ‘cause we have a natural experiment where this has taken place and it’s a lot of those really wealthy Middle Eastern countries.

So yes. Thanks to someone pointing this out in the comments on our other UBI epi episode. We’re gonna take a look. Specifically the most generous countries in the Gulf States. So we’re gonna look at especially Qatar, but also the UAE and Kuwait because they’re also pretty spendy when it comes to support for their citizens and.

Let’s be clear. It’s for their citizens. Nothing. And,

Malcolm Collins: and for, for people [00:02:00] context here, this isn’t something I am talking about without a degree of personal experience and having, you know, been to these, some of these countries. Yeah. And I haven’t, so I’m gonna depend on you for this exploration of them knowing people from these countries.

And I pointed out to Simone, and she didn’t even know this, that. In Qatar, there is a common word in, in the business world called q Tarted and it is the name for they, they, they call it is you talk about Qatari. Token, Qatari being really, really stupid. Because it’s

Simone Collins: basically like a, a country where everyone is a trust fund kid,

Malcolm Collins: right?

Well, it, it is more than that. If you wanna operate business in a lot of these countries, 50% of it has to be owned by a Qatari or a a a Emirati or you know, depending on, on, there’s different ways of structuring it. Mm-hmm. But basically all of the major companies that operate in these countries are forced to hire.

Give equity to and give often sort of token managerial positions to some of the native population [00:03:00] that really hasn’t earned it. And so it leads to a note here. I’m not saying people in Qatar are stupid or like Emiratis are stupid. This is not the case. I, some of our

Simone Collins: favorite people are ems.

Yeah. One of the smartest

Malcolm Collins: people I know is, is an Emirati. Actually, like genuinely really smart person. Scary smart. Yeah.

Simone Collins: But also like based and cool and fun, so yeah. Yeah.

Malcolm Collins: Based and cool and fun. She’s like, yeah, yeah, I’m gonna have to marry one of my cousins. Or, you know, sometimes you just need to put down a rebellion or whatever

I would note here that I don’t actually see the cousin marriage thing disparagingly. I actually see it’s pretty based, , to admit that your culture, , has preferences that are non-normative with the urban monoculture and would be shamed by it and just be like, yeah, that’s part of my life. That’s my tradition.

That’s the way I’m different And as far as the genetic effects, you can watch our videos on this. They’re not as big as people pretend they are.

Malcolm Collins: But anyway so very, very cool. Also really cool looking. She’s, she’s got this you know, she, she wears the full head thing and perfectly circular glasses that [00:04:00] look like super nerdy and like work really well on her.

So like this, not your

Simone Collins: only friend though. There are other, and like, great.

Oh yeah, I have, I have other, I mean,

Malcolm Collins: one of them is a famous YouTuber who I’ve talked about a number of times, Khalid who’s one of the top YouTubers in is, is

Simone Collins: that the cod? Who is always like Malcolm? It’s my name.

Malcolm Collins: Yeah. That is I love him. So, yeah, so. So his channel, by the way, gets like 5 million views per video.

I mean, like famous. Famous, right? Yeah. And, and so they, there’s a lot of really smart people in these countries. Mm-hmm. The reason why you get this stereotype is it’s a stereotype that’s downstream of being forced to hire people when you do not have people qualified for these sorts of positions.

Mm-hmm.

Simone Collins: Well, or I mean this, you could say, this is just a, another example of affirmative action. It just happens to be that this is affirmative action. In favor of the, the dominant. Group in your country, right? Like

Malcolm Collins: the people I know, they don’t need to take the token position at whatever firm in, in their country, right?

Yeah. Because

Simone Collins: they, they have merit and, and on their [00:05:00] own, you know, they, and on their own position, influence can succeed

Malcolm Collins: anywhere. Right. You know? Well, yeah.

Simone Collins: Keep in mind, like Colin, for example. That YouTube doesn’t have an affirmative action program. Yeah. You can’t, you can’t get anything for that. Right. You know?

Yeah.

Malcolm Collins: So, so the point being is, is the, the, when you get people who are hyper competent from these environments, they do end up in positions of, of power and influence. Mm-hmm. The problem is, is that the hyper competent people from these environments, as would be true of any base population, make up like.

0.5% of the population. That’s, yeah. And the

Simone Collins: question that we need to ask is the, the question, what happens

Malcolm Collins: with the mids? What happens with the lower rates? No, not just with the mids, because you get a separate phenomenon, but you need 5% to fill the, like, the, the, the top positions at these companies. And so you often get incompetent people put in these positions.

Mm-hmm. And it’s it, and it leads to a perception and then a stereotype around people who have to work in these environments. It’s like, oh, it’s the, the lazy Emirati coming in again, right? Like, [00:06:00] who did actually earn his position? Like everyone else here who didn’t actually, and even

Simone Collins: people who have merit may not be taken as seriously.

And

Malcolm Collins: I remember how comical it was ‘cause I went to a startup pitch competition in the, in the Emirates to see, oh, what it was like was this, oh. And there were like people who had like gone through, like, gotten money. Built like a product and gone up and pitched, and they didn’t even have URLs, like working URLs.

Like this would be like at the end of like, you know, combin Combinator, not having even a website like, oh, the level to which, like for a certain class of people in these countries. Life is just a lrp. Mm-hmm. Is really sad. Yeah. And it was so interesting as well because the whole place was styled like Silicon Valley.

Right. Like, it, it felt like a Silicon Valley pitch place.

Simone Collins: Well, no, I think in, in, in that case, like in that startup pitch competition and, and this, this is the case with many of the, the industries that they are [00:07:00] trying to jumpstart. They’re kind of, building a set and attempting to. Jumpstarted, but that doesn’t mean that it’s, it’s homegrown.

You know, they haven’t, like, this is not a geographical area. Built around a unique elite world class university that has for over 100 years through various like literal geological events and also various economic events attracted various. Risk friendly autistic people who are going to do brilliant strange things like San

Francisco.

Yeah, San

Francisco. I mean, first there was the gold rush and then there was the 1906 earthquake. Both of those attracted very risk friendly entrepreneurial people who were like, here’s an opportunity. I can strike it rich panning for gold, or selling to the people panning for gold. Or I can strike it rich, rebuilding the city.

And then it was, I can strike it rich working in the tech scene. Yeah. These are people who, and, and by

Malcolm Collins: the way, I, I would say for people who haven’t and. You’re talking [00:08:00] about how like San Francisco ended up, it, it drew from all over the world because of the gold rush. Yes. People who were into high risk, high reward opportunities.

Mm-hmm. They’re not like, it wasn’t like drawing like one ethnic group or something. Yeah. And, and now you see a, a cycle of that was in that region. Mm-hmm. And one thing I note, if you don’t know people from these regions, like what are they like, you’re like, what’s their general, my read from having met a lot of them is the general sort of personal personality vibe I gave.

A personality vibe of French people recently, which was not very positive. But for Asian

Simone Collins: people specifically, ‘cause you haven’t really Yeah,

Malcolm Collins: yeah. Is, is that they are generally very cunning, pragmatic, and very hospitable. Like, like very like focused on being a generous and good host. Hmm. And other than that they’re kind of broey.

Is, I guess the word I’d put it. And, and that’s sort of the, the bundle of personality, which is actually very similar. And actually, I, I had one of my friends from the region come see where I lived in Texas, and they were like, they were [00:09:00] surprised at how much the people in rural Texas really were reminded them of the people in the Emirates.

That’s really

Simone Collins: funny.

Malcolm Collins: And I, and I agree, like I, I think that the two cultures actually do have a lot in co common. So I, I, I would note here. I think that like naturally this is a people that could do really well. I think one of the things that holds them back the most is the infinite money generators and the ways that those have been handled by the state.

Simone Collins: Yeah. But I still think they make a really good object lesson allowing us to. Investigate and explore this concept of generous in-kind services and, and things approaching universal basic income in a context that’s more similar to what we could get in certain AI timelines. Yeah. And not all keep in mind that this is, this is what we would get in the.

Very, very optimistic AI timeline where for whatever reason, those who end up getting the concentrated small amounts of like immense power like that, like 0.001% of people and or ais and or businesses [00:10:00] decides, okay, we, we are going to give. A, a post scarcity paradise to people. This is what we’re looking at.

This is not the timeline that we personally expect. We personally expect societies and groups to, to largely be left behind and for the very wealthy and very connected to coalesce into walled gardens that are highly secure and very isolated. Meaning that most people should prepare for permaculture and basically.

Living off the land and, and depending on, on the graces and support of a community that is very tight knit, that they themselves also support a lot. However this could happen, this may happen in some areas, and it is already happening in a lot of gold states because they have had basically the, the, the false jumpstart via oil money of a post scarcity society.

They have so much money, they can just support life. So let’s kind of go over what exactly. People are getting in terms of lifestyle support in countries [00:11:00] like Qatar. Because I didn’t know exactly how it worked. I was like, is it UBI? Is it something else? And to be clear, Qatar citizens don’t receive a universal basic income in the sense of an automatic, regular cash allowance for every citizen.

But instead they, they get a lot of social benefits and subsidies that significantly improve their standards of life. So let’s go over what they do get, they get free healthcare, they get free education, including, especially for guitar. And we’ve talked about this in other episodes education abroad.

They’re, they’re one of the biggest, what, like donors to us universities, right? They get heavily subsidized or free in, in many cases, electricity. Water and other utilities. Imagine just having all your utilities paid for. They have generous pensions, so they still receive retirement benefits. They get retirement or sorry newlyweds get additional financial support.

This includes. Some very interesting in kind benefits, like [00:12:00] free villas upon marriage. For some I had to free villas. I love this. I had to, yeah, I had to double click on this ‘cause I was like, what, what do free villa like, sign me up. What, what did they look like? Did you, did you find pictures? I did, yeah

.

So just, just to, for those listening, the, the villas for newly married Qatari couples, they’re modern, they’re spacious, they’re family oriented. They reflect both contemporary architectural design and higher standards of comfort. To your point about hosting, like they have really nice hosting spaces. They’re located within planned communities featuring amenities for families, often with green spaces and play areas, and convenient access to schools and shops.

So. They have three to five bedrooms, plenty of room for a family, like talk about prenatal list, separate living and dining rooms. They have a kitchen, several bathrooms to accommodate the growing families. Like definitely this, this is a focus on families. They have a, a big focus. They, they feel kind of compounding, so there’s a big focus on privacy and convenience and they’re very modern.

And they look. You [00:13:00] know, anyone who lives in Los Angeles, like they’ll see these new houses that crop up whenever someone buys a tear down, like in San Diego that are very like, sort of blocky and compounding. So the architecture is very sleek and contemporary like that. But it also references Qatari cultural aesthetics through some of like the arches and local materials.

And, they’re, they’re like like I said, in these, in these very new planned communities in many cases. So, some of the government developed communities such as Bliss Villas in Zum and Abbu Sidra are described as being designed for comfort and joy and modern living for Tari families. I’m gonna send you a link to.

The development website for Abu Ra, because it looks like maybe it’s not done yet and I have to be.

Malcolm Collins: I I, I will note that the thing that she’s not mentioning that is actually by far the biggest benefit that you get within these countries mm-hmm. Is the legal regulations I mentioned around when you need to hire Qataris or you need to have stock ownership by Qataris.

Same with the Emirates. That is by [00:14:00] far Oh, that’s, that’s really nice.

Simone Collins: Yeah. Well, that, that’s the really big thing. Instead of UBI, you basically have government guaranteed high paying jobs, especially in the public sector. Yeah, and to your point about there being like an issue of merit that is something that people have alleged and has is, and has been an issue, but apparently there is more focus on reform now, like people are being held to higher standards of accountability.

And yeah, keep

Malcolm Collins: in mind my experience was this is like a, a decade ago. So yeah, and these roles

Simone Collins: do involve real work and ongoing modernization policies are making the jobs more merit driven and results oriented. So this

Malcolm Collins: is something I’d note about the sort of elite Arab, communities that mm-hmm.

That I have engaged with. Because the, the, the elite Arab communities are very different from the non elite Arab communities. There’s, there’s quite a, it’s a very high power distance sort of area in terms of cultures. Yeah. Which means you get more cultural distance. And so when I talk about Arab culture right now I’m talking specifically about the, the culture of the elite.

And we have another episode where we talk about how rare democracies have been in Arab majority [00:15:00] countries. And I think part of the reason is, is because the elite culture is so differentiated from the mainstream culture. More competent. Yeah. But would I back to the villas

Simone Collins: though, I just wanna show you one more.

Okay. I’m, I’m sending you photos from one of the zum villas, like, ‘cause I actually found a property listing.

This one is for about 1.4 million US dollars. So I think you can also buy properties in these. Oh my God. They’re all like marble and stuff. These are, I know, it’s, yeah. It’s, it’s actually like, it’s, to me, the interior feels very cold and soulless, but it is,

Malcolm Collins: oh no. All the nice stuff there feels that way. So like when you go to like a, like a princess palace there or something like that. ‘cause I know a few actually they’re, they’re like giant rooms that feel very empty and covered in gold often, and like really high beams and everything. Yeah, it seems like a

Simone Collins: very, like a, a very high scale hotel room.

Just marble, a very, very high, high scale millennial gray. Kind of beige gray. Yeah. Grge. It’s grge. It’s very grge. Lots of marble. But,

Malcolm Collins: but the point I was, I was making there is one of the, the things about these cultures mm-hmm. [00:16:00] Is remember the, the first thing I said is that they’re very cunning. Is what, and cunning.

Pragmatic. And, and hospitable. When you get this sort of cunning pragmatism of which you do get within these cultures in a disproportionate amount they are like, if, if you go to one of them, right? Like back back. When I, you know, back then, right, I, back when this was more of a problem, presumably.

Mm-hmm. And you were like, Hey, there’s this problem where people who aren’t competent are getting into these positions and it’s leading to like, lower outcomes. Yeah. They’re not gonna be like an American, like DEI person. They’re like. Yeah, I mean that happens. And what’s a better way that we could structure things so that our people continue to have disproportionate power?

And, and in the, in the west, people would be like, what? What do you mean? It’s like, well, I mean it’s our money and our country. Why wouldn’t we attempt to lift up our people ya knob, like right now that’s not working well. What’s a better way to do it without handing power to outsiders? [00:17:00] Right? Like.

That’s not a, that’s not a, like I, I, I, I think there’s people who might hear this and think that, that they, they were in this situation because of some degree of incompetence in the way things were structured. And what you seem to be indicating is even past then, they have been trying to make things better.

And, and you do, you do absolutely see this in these, in these cultures around their elite population is they are aware of these problems. And unlike the American like DEI scene or something there is long-term strategy behind it.

Simone Collins: You know, this is, yeah, this, this doesn’t come from some kind of like, how do I, so it, it’s not like Venezuelan.

Yeah, like Venezuela just ruined, like, they were like, oh, we have stupid money. Like, and then they ruined it all. Whereas in these Gulf States it’s like, oh, we have stupid money. Like, let’s try to turn this into a long term tra long-term strategic advantage for our people. And I really, I, I admire that and I appreciate that.

And again, this is why I wanna look to these countries as a case study. And, and look at their success. Like learn from their successes, but also learn from [00:18:00] their failures. American get the failures. Yeah. It’s not a case

Malcolm Collins: study. And I wanna point out here where anyone was acting, and this is what makes it such a good state case study.

Without pragmatism. Mm-hmm. Without practicality. Yeah. Without a long-term plan. Uhhuh and without a degree. Of, I would say intelligent ruthlessness. Absolutely. Yeah. So, and keep

Simone Collins: like, you know, these villas aren’t dink villas. These are three, five bedroom. They’re like, you’re gonna have kids, right?

Have kids. Make sure that you have kids. And keep in mind, while Qatar gives most of its benefits is like in kind like, oh, you will get a job and you’re gonna work for it. And that was another thing that we talked about in our UBI episodes was that people who received cash transfers, even ones that weren’t like that big, worked less.

And it, it wasn’t good for them. And same with Native American groups, like some people chimed in the comments with anecdotes in response to that episode and pointed out how one person was talking about a Native American. Community that he was aware of that was just like floundering in addiction and just tons of social problems.

And then the tribe changed their [00:19:00] policy and required more merit to justify any cash payments and it really started to turn things around you. It’s clear and that you can also see this with the New deal and especially the, civilian Conservation Corps in, in the United States history, like during the Great Depression, people who participated in that experienced very long-term benefits.

And it, it is clear to me from the data that working for your money and your benefits gives you a sense of empowerment, gives you a sense of purpose. Like you do really need to work for this. So what I really appreciate about guitar here too. Is that while they’ll give you free education and healthcare and electricity and water and homes and all these things they’re also like, no man.

You, you, you have to work, like get a job. I’ll give you a job, but you have to work. However you know, on, on the cash transfers front, they do nevertheless give pretty generous. Allowances for people who can’t work. So widows, orphans, the elderly, like people over 60. Yeah. They get let’s see. So for the elderly, they get 6,000 [00:20:00] Qatari reels, which is around 1,600 US dollars for children with disabilities.

Families get per child just over 1000 US dollars per month. And for a dependent wife about 550 per month. And just for normal child who’s not disabled, about $274 a month, that’d be huge for us. Like, that’d be great, you know? Yeah. I wouldn’t mind it. So in terms of other countries and in the area that I mean, and the most generous Gulf countries and a lot of, like most of them that are wealthy have benefits like these Kuwait’s the most.

Close to giving on universal basic income. They give more direct cash allowances. Some proposals have included sums as high as $50,000 per working age, adult per year. But in practice, the, the direct stipend coupled with employment guarantees and generous government jobs is really how most citizens get their income.

And again, I think that’s really important. It’s jobs, but they do again, provide healthcare, housing allowances, educational supplements, [00:21:00] subsidies for energy and food. And again. Guaranteed public sector employment. And I, I do think that if UBI or some like post AI thing is gonna work, it’s gonna have to be through jobs.

And Emirati system, citizens in the UAE also have free healthcare free education, including university subsidized a free utilities rent, residential land or housing interest free loans to build homes. Can you imagine marriage and birth grants? ‘cause remember when we talked in our, in our Muslim fertility, right?

One, they’re the ones who were like, yeah, we’ll give you $16,000 for a wedding. Please get married.

Malcolm Collins: Yeah. Yeah. Well, no, I think it’s so funny to talk about these countries because there’s been a lot of countries that have like stumbled into wealth in various ways. Yeah. And these countries, I mean, obviously one of the best in terms of how they handled it was, I can’t remember if it’s Norway or Sweden was their local fund, but the Saudis have done a pretty good job, and the UE has done a pretty good job and Yeah.

And guitar has done a pretty good job. Yeah. And, and, and like exceptionally good when you contrast it with, with other countries where it’s like, just like the warlord in his family. Suck everything up. Yeah. [00:22:00] Whereas in these countries like they did like the least, they sat down and they’re like, okay, so I want to use this to like increase the quality of life of my people.

And then DEI guy comes in and he goes, you mean everyone who lives in your country? No, no, no, no. We’ll treat them like slaves. Yeah. My people. My people. But, but what he, yeah. You know, they, they can live like they live. Wherever they’re coming from. Okay. Yeah.

Simone Collins: Well, and it is really, really tough for non beneficiaries in these countries.

You know, prices are, are really high for them for food and groceries. It, it really sucks. I did check to see, ‘cause a lot of people have said no. Well,

Malcolm Collins: not, not necessarily. I mean, as a, as a non-native, if you’re like hyper competit. If I wanted to, like, if I wanted a good, like really reliable income I could probably get it in in the UA e maybe.

Yeah. Because no, no, no, no. It’s not like a maybe thing, this is like for like Stanford MBA type people. It’s like a known thing, right? Like if you did very well [00:23:00] in the Americas and you are like elite class in the Americas there are certain places that you can go where they always need. Like a, a really good oh,

Simone Collins: like someone to actually work.

Except again, I think that they’re, they’re getting better at, at really focusing on merit.

Malcolm Collins: Right? They are, but they always still need to bring in and, and they’re smart about it as well. Like a lot of these countries, they don’t have so much pride. They’re not like that it blinds them again to pragmatism and cuing.

They’re like, okay, but obviously we’re not gonna have the final decisions being made by, you know, the, the people who are here on, like the DEI hire, I like

Simone Collins: our freezing stone, Pennsylvania farmhouse. I mean, I, looking at that house. Oh no. It’s a miserable place to live. It. Yeah. The villa, like, it feels like a sterile Barbie dream house.

Like I, I would just feel existentially depressed in it. And I, I like the struggle. I like the fact that like, we can’t really afford to pay electricity. No, no. I agree

Malcolm Collins: with all that. I mean, and it’s not the only place in the world that’s like that, like Singapore is another really good place if I wanted to get a [00:24:00] decent.

Reliable driver. We’re not

Simone Collins: going somewhere so hot. Oh my God. No. Well, UIE is pretty

Malcolm Collins: hot as well. So is

Simone Collins: Qatar. Yeah, but they have free energy, so you can just do air conditioning forever.

Malcolm Collins: But you know, you know why I can’t live in any of these countries? I, I, I don’t know because you just called

Simone Collins: them catted, maybe.

Malcolm Collins: No, no. They’re, because you’ve,

Simone Collins: you’ve, you’ve thrown China under the bus million times. I, I,

Malcolm Collins: these, as I’ve said, these people are, are very pragmatic. I know, I know. They just want competent people. Okay. Why can’t you, why can’t you work there? They don’t really have any tolerance for a lot of the. DEI stuff of the west, but, oh, I thought you were gonna say alcohol.

Sorry.

Simone Collins: It’s like, it’s alcohol. Yeah.

Malcolm Collins: Alcohol is incredibly expensive in every single one of these countries, including Singapore. You’ll be a copper.

Simone Collins: Yeah. Yeah. It won’t work. Yeah. I mean, God, I mean, we, we can barely, I mean, with the alcohol taxes here, i, I, the Pennsylvania alcohol industry is such a weird racket anyway, owned by the state.

What we need to do. Yeah. What we need to do though is discuss now, does this. Paradise of post scarcity for citizens in [00:25:00] these countries produce better outcomes because that’s, yeah. What happens again, what we need to be asking, and that is what you know, we, we talked about in our universal basic income episode, because while people were like, yeah, yeah, yeah, I’m definitely better off by measurable policy outcomes in, in the words of Kelsey Piper who wrote the blog post that we read.

Not really. No. So let’s start with happiness. ‘cause everyone just cares so much about happiness. We don’t, but people do. So if we look at the World Happiness Report, ‘cause of course there’s one in recent rankings. The USA score in 2025 was 6.72. It was ranked around 23rd globally, which is pretty good. Qatar it has the latest reported score of 6.37.

It’s ranked about 36th globally. So, while both countries are well above the median, which is around 5.4 USA, consistently outranks Qatar in the happiness surveys, which is very interesting because you can imagine, you know, describing the [00:26:00] benefits I described the villas, the free education to most Americans, and they’d be like, that’s all I need to be happy.

That’s all I need. So it’s interesting that while Qatari benefit from national wealth and safety and generous government support. Americans still tend to report higher subjective happiness, and maybe this is due to some broader personal freedoms. Maybe it’s, it’s just higher satisfaction or Americans

Malcolm Collins: are happier than

Simone Collins: they are.

Yeah. Amer, yeah. Like I said, Americans rank around 23rd globally, and Qatari as of 2025 are around 36 globally. So maybe

Malcolm Collins: I,

Simone Collins: I, I can see why

Malcolm Collins: I mean. I haven’t, like in, in my time there, the people I met are not as happy as the people in the United States.

Simone Collins: Yeah. Yeah. I mean it’s, it’s interesting though ‘cause when you ask,

Malcolm Collins: well also keep in mind the responsibilities they feel.

So I think that this is also like when I talk with UAE friends and stuff like that mm-hmm. The, their, their life [00:27:00] is often much more sort of planned out from day one than people in the United States where, well, and where’s the

Simone Collins: struggle? Like, where’s the tension?

Malcolm Collins: No, no, the, that’s where the struggle is.

It’s in actually stressful stuff. You gotta marry one of your cousins. Oh, you gotta build up that relationship from like day. Super important because you gotta marry the right person to build family alliances. And you’ve gotta, you know, it doesn’t sound stressful. You’ve gotta, hold all of these traditions.

And you’ve gotta host guests in just this way with just these plates being brought out in just this procession. And then you’ve got a fast for like freaking half the year and then you’ve gotta do, do this and this and you can’t even drink. And you can’t. I don’t think they’re allowed to gamble either.

You can’t so, so you’re, you’re, what, what are you, how are you recreating Was and hookah bars, which just gives you the jitters. You, sorry. It’s,

Speaker: Welcome to Muslim sensitivity training. It is important for us to understand why the Muslims feel the [00:28:00] way they do first of all, there’s no sex until marriage in the Muslim world. Now, this would be fine, except that in the Muslim religion you also can’t jack off.

And what do we know about the places Muslims live? They live in. Sand. Now put yourself in the shoes of a Muslim. It’s Friday night, but you can’t have sex and you can’t jack off. There’s sand in your eyes and probably in the crack of your . And then some cartoon comes along from a country where people are getting laid and mocks your prophet.

Well, you know what? I’d be pretty pissed off too.

Malcolm Collins: I dunno, what I, what I

Simone Collins: always think of is, and I’m sending this picture to you on WhatsApp, is that famous photo of the Falcons that the Saudi princes bought seats for on, on a plane

.

Simone Collins: And I’m just like, I don’t know, like are are buying seats for your falcons on an airplane. Is that a sign of human flourishing? Like, are you thriving if you’re, if you’re flying around your birds on, oh my God, I had

Malcolm Collins: no idea it was like this. Yeah. And so literally. [00:29:00] The entire middle row is just Falcon seats.

Simone Collins: Yeah,

Malcolm Collins: Falcons on what

Simone Collins: the heck

Malcolm Collins: these are, these are the

Simone Collins: falcons that are flying in Coach.

Malcolm Collins: There’s just like a big thing there. I’ve heard. I don’t know the full story here ‘cause it’s been a while, but my sister almost married a prince from the region who was really into Falcon. Now part of me wonders if it was this guy.

No, not almost. No. There’s a lot of

Simone Collins: people into Falcon. I’m just like, they

Malcolm Collins: weren’t, they weren’t like it was like a proposal or something. I, I don’t understand the specifics of it. I, I just remember hearing this story at one point. I’m

Simone Collins: just saying like, I don’t. I don’t think I would be happier if I had that.

Malcolm Collins: Yeah. I would not be happier. Happier, a happy liar with 20 falcons. That, that does not make me happier. Having, yeah, it doesn’t even seem like a particularly fun hobby. I mean, different people are into different things, but

Simone Collins: yeah, just, you know, money, money only goes so far. So anyway, happiness. They’re not no.

Not necessarily the thing. So let’s go to health. Right. Okay. So a lot of people, and, and we, we, we’ve covered a lot of different surveys on what people [00:30:00] value the most. And health is, is up there really ranked high, especially among Gen Z, gen Y, millennials. So let’s look at that. Let’s compare the Gulf States that have all this money with the eu, with the uk, Canada, and, and also in the us.

So broadly, let’s keep in mind first for context. Healthcare is universal and high quality in the Gulf States, in the eu, in the UK and Canada, they have nationalized healthcare. You can get healthcare. It’s, it’s just part of the package in the us. Health insurance is patchy. It’s really expensive. Not everyone has it.

It’s sometimes if you’re at the poverty level and you get free healthcare, it’s, it’s confusing, you know, if, if you’re asthma, gold and people think you’re homeless, they’re just not gonna bill you with emergency. Sure. I love that. That

Malcolm Collins: happens to asthma gold on multiple occasions. Hospitals not charging him.

Everyone just thinks

Simone Collins: he’s a homeless man. I love him so much. Homeless privilege. So anyway,

Malcolm Collins: that’s really so weird. Like all of these weird like libelous attacks and slanderous attacks I’ve seen against him recently that I didn’t see before. I think

Simone Collins: that’s because he’s. His profile is [00:31:00] rising and people now see him as a threat.

They’re like, because how do you, how do you compete with him? You can’t, you can. No. Especially

Malcolm Collins: if you’re a leftist. ‘cause you can’t paint him as like a rich elite. Right? Yeah. You may have money because of his streaming now, but he still lives in a place that looks like a crack house.

Yeah. You know, he is, he is.

Doesn’t even like put all of his teeth in because he’s like, ah, they don’t see that on camera. Yeah. He just doesn’t to decide.

Simone Collins: That shows up on camera. Anyway, I, so I’m just, anyway so I just wanna say like, because I obvious spoil alert, the US doesn’t rank the best for health, but also we don’t have universal healthcare in all the competition does.

And I actually think we’re doing pretty well. So the, the life expectancy in years for the US is 78 to 29. And then the best ranking one is the EU, where it’s 84 to 80, but honestly like 78 versus 84. Like, honestly, like you’re old, your quality of life isn’t that great anyway. Like I’m, I’m not mad about that, especially [00:32:00] considering that, that healthcare is more spotty in the United States.

So in Canada it’s 83 uk, 81 eu, like I said, 80 to 84. In the UAE where we have all this money, it’s 79. SA is 78 to seven to 79. All right, so in in post scarcity, futuristic ai, utopia world, they’re not necessarily living longer. Qatar 80, that’s one year more than 79 in the us. Kuwait 78. At the, the lower end of the us

Malcolm Collins: And then this is the thing is that these are the countries where it’s managed the way we would manage it if you had the top minds working on it, right?

Because if you were to ask like a, a

Simone Collins: person in the US they’re like, well, what would it take for us to, to get to 84 like in the eu? They’d be like, well, of course universal healthcare, it just needs to be paid for. Well guess where it’s paid for the most generously? How are they doing the same as us? Okay.

And one, I think the big factor here though, do you wanna guess what it is, Malcolm? [00:33:00] What? Tell me. It’s obesity. They’re fat. They’re fat like us. Oh,

Malcolm Collins: well, especially if

Simone Collins: your whole body can be covered easily. That’s true. The billowing clothes, you know, you gotta, they need introduce the Star Trek uniforms.

They already have the post scarcity society introduce the spandex. You’re gonna shame them into being thin right away. Right away.

Malcolm Collins: They never do. So, I mean, one of the things I love about these, these environments, if you’re not familiar with them is in the United States pretty much, and this is true across Western cultures when you are in upper class environments, like at an office or something like that, especially like in elite office, you’re often expected to come in a uniform like suit and tie, right?

And, and very few cultures in Texas where I’m from you can. If you are Texan, get away with modifying that

, you know, with jeans, the kbo and belt and Ebola and stuff like that. Yeah. Minor modifications, but, but you know, there, they’re one usually reserved for Texans. You’d be seen as pretty weird if you were a non Texan and you did that.

[00:34:00] And you, you, but in Texas, I think it’s one of the few cultures where they, on the broader side, think it was kind of cool that you were that into Texas culture. They, they’re not gonna be like, you’re appropriating my culture. They’re like, ah, that’s cool. But in the UAE when you are in, in, and this is also too in Qatar, but it’s like different outfit.

When you are in like high society very like wealthy like business office or whatever they wear their traditional outfits,

Simone Collins: which they look pretty

Malcolm Collins: awesome, I think is really cool. Yeah. I think that’s, but you’re right, they’re a

Simone Collins: little forgiving when it comes to those inclined to, could be

Malcolm Collins: quite obese in these traditional outfits without anybody really

Simone Collins: Killer.

Malcolm Collins: Yeah.

Simone Collins: It’d still look. Yeah.

It reminds me, , St. Andrew’s where at the end of winter, so I, I went to school at St. Andrew’s, which is in Scotland. , And at the end of winter they do this thing called may dip. But obviously over winter everyone’s dressed in very, like, layered puffy clothing and it may dip. I remember being shocked about how many of the [00:35:00] girls had become quite fat without me realizing it because of all the puffy clothing that they were wearing.

And this is why when you normalize outfits that hide how obese people are, people just naturally become more obese. Moto Moto would’ve had a field day. It may dip.

Speaker 4: I like him big. I like him. I like, I like,

Malcolm Collins: if you, if you look at the male ones, they’re sort of like. Robe thing, drab Dr. Over you think Jedi. They all, they all walk around dressed like Jedi. Jedi. Yeah. And so would think about in

Simone Collins: just really a sci-fi post scarcity world.

Malcolm Collins: Yeah. How, how fat does the Jedi need to be before you notice, I mean, yeah, right.

And, and you’re like, well, you notice in the neck. And it’s like, no, they’ve got things that cover the neck. Mm-hmm. So you wouldn’t even see that.

Simone Collins: Mm-hmm.

Uhhuh,

Malcolm Collins: tell you what,

Simone Collins: but yeah, so that’s, it’s, it’s the obesity, it’s the nutrition, both the Gulf states and, and the US diets. They’re, they’re much more calorie [00:36:00] dense, whereas EU diets are healthier overall.

Also the men, the mental health situation in, in the West is actually much better. Or at least like they, it’s hard to kind of read this. Maybe you could argue maybe that the Gulf States are better because they have a stigma against mental health problems and just don’t treat them. But as far as as some people are concerned, the Gulf is improving, there’s less.

Stigma. Stigma, but it’s still far behind the Western countries, and I’m not sure if that’s good or bad. I, we suffer from the happiness rates though, that like they’re not as happy. So let’s talk about if people below on our

Malcolm Collins: show. We often say that the US mental health industry is a bit of a scam, which mostly perpetuates mental health problems rather than, yeah.

Makes it worse. Doesn’t, doesn’t make it better. I mean, I would imagine that they probably deal with this stuff much more directly in the Yeah, they’re like.

Simone Collins: Nut up,

Malcolm Collins: nut up. Stop acting. Sad. You win. Yes. Ifferent matter.

Simone Collins: Stop hyperventilating. So mental health we’re just gonna, whatever, but birth rates.

Okay. This is, this is kind of the key, key indicator of health, right? Yeah. Like, are you perpetuating your genes like you’re fit or you’re not, you know, that’s ultimately what [00:37:00] it comes down to. Yeah. Kind of. I mean, it’s not as bad as I thought. So Kuwait. Which has like, you know, the closest to the UBI situation.

Mm-hmm. It’s 1.5 to 2.2. That’s kind of a huge range. So I don’t know what to do with that. It’s way

Malcolm Collins: below the US though.

Simone Collins: Yeah. So the SA is 1.6 ish. So like 1.5 to two point keep mind. We don’t get paid to marry in the United

Malcolm Collins: States.

Simone Collins: I know, I know. And well, you don’t get like, everything taken care of, you know, get subsidies for kids, so like.

I’m, I’m not impressed given everything that they offer. In Qatar, it’s 1.4 to 0.9 is get

Malcolm Collins: married. So, so something you’re forgetting in these countries is if you are from like an elite family or something like that, or you are like an extremely high performer mm-hmm. Who you marry is much more difficult to organize than it did in the US because you’re typically marrying into a family network.

Oh, so you’re saying

Simone Collins: it’s kind of the Catholic situation here where like. Because so much thought and and effort gets put into getting married [00:38:00] that they’re overthinking it, getting married too late and then not able to have as much kids as they otherwise.

Malcolm Collins: Yeah. Yeah. That’s what I suspect is really going on.

So if you look at the United States, I mean, you just need to find somebody who like you’re like is hot and you want to spend time with, you don’t need to like go into. Who they’re you, you’re not first limited to only people within. And we’ve noted this isn’t like bad genetically speaking, especially if you’re talking about second cousins.

Mm-hmm. Which is actually the, the highest genetic third

Simone Collins: cousin. Third cousin or third cousin is the highest genetic. Yeah.

Malcolm Collins: But, but in these countries these are things that you actually pay attention to. You know, you are marrying within sort of your population group. Second is a much smaller population.

Mm-hmm. Like for me when I’m dating it’s just broadly white people, right? Like there’s a lot of white people, well, I’m sorry Eugene, have you not dated

Simone Collins: a lot of non-white people?

Malcolm Collins: I did date non-white people, but not that frequently. It wasn’t actually, I didn’t even have a preference really for white people.

It’s just I happened to date them more. I don’t know why.

Simone Collins: I felt like white people responded more to my outreach on dating platforms. [00:39:00]

Malcolm Collins: Yeah, I, I like, I definitely, I dated

Simone Collins: Indian, Asian, black.

That’s it. In white. Yeah.

Malcolm Collins: But in these countries, I, I’m saying like, even, even if you have a preference, right? You, you’re still like, broadly, I can go to the UK and find somebody and I’m not, no one’s gonna think that, like, none of my family’s gonna have a problem with me marrying. Somebody from the uk right?

Or Germany or France, or really any part of the United States. If, if you are in you know, one of these countries your like global population of people you can marry without your family throwing a, a a, a banana is going to be. Muslim. Still Muslim by the way. So not deconverted, Arabs likely within your family network.

That’s, yeah, it

Simone Collins: makes it more complicated. That’s a logistical nightmare.

Malcolm Collins: Yeah. Anyway, continue

Simone Collins: birth rates, Qatar 1.4 to 1.9, so like I [00:40:00] would put that at roughly 1.6. Like they’re, they’re not beating us despite having all these things. . The UAE is even worse. It’s, it’s, it’s at approximately 1.4. Again, compare that to 1.6 in the USA, where we basically offer no help at all to parents.

I

Malcolm Collins: mean, keep in mind when we talk about differential fertility rates. And religion. And I’m like, Muslim countries and Muslim cultures have a very low fertility rate.

When you adjust for religion when, when you address for income, that, that’s what we’re seeing here. It is, it’s, it’s the cultural system. And note this cultural system isn’t necessarily just their beliefs. When I talk about why their fertility rates are likely lower, I talk about the logistical difficulty in getting married.

In this sort of clan based system. Mm-hmm. And that’s, that’s not like an inherently Muslim thing, but it is an Arab thing. Right.

Simone Collins: I, I wonder if it’s also a little bit downstream of all these benefits. Keep in mind that, that education, high quality education, often international, sometimes university could also be.

Suppressing this [00:41:00] by again, shifting marriage from being a cornerstone to a capstone element of life where like you get married after you get your education and that’s moving things back instead of having them get married before they go off to university. So that could also be a factor here be also because it’s government subsidized.

You’re like, well, I’d be stupid to not make sure I get this in before I start my family. You know, there’s something like that, especially if you’re gonna leave the country, it gets complicated. I don’t know. But anyway so the USA’s at 1.6 and again, so Canada, the uk, the eu, while they’re not the Gulf States, giving you like a free house and free electricity, they still have free healthcare and they’re at 1.5 in Canada at 1.5 in the uk.

And the EU average is 1.4. So they’re doing worse than the United States at at 1.6. So again, not really seeing the results we’re looking for in terms of birth rates. So let’s look at innovation. Okay. You know, a big sign that you and I would count with human flourishing beyond birth rates is like, [00:42:00] are they contributing?

To the advancement of humanity. Are they moving us forward technologically, entrepreneurially, economically? Are they uplifting the human race? The 2025 Global Innovation Index. This is something created by the World Intellectual Property Organization, which I figure probably does a pretty good job at, like tracking people, introducing new new Tech, the USA ranked third globally.

That’s after Switzerland and Sweden. The UK ranked sixth. Canada ranked 15th. Top EU nations were just in the top 10 to 20 worldwide. The UAE is 31st globally. It’s, it’s best in, in like the Gulf States. It’s rising rapidly, but that’s 31st. Qatar is 51st globally. And Kuwait isn’t even in the top 60.

And, and I can send you the, the beautiful ranking graph that shows sort of 2021 to, to now. To 2025, and you can kind of see how they fluctuated over time, but you’re not, you’re not seeing Gulf States in there that just throw money at their people. Maybe they’re too [00:43:00] busy flying their falcons around, I don’t know.

But they’re, they’re not, they’re not using their money to innovate. And that’s also something that I think about, you know, is, is when you make people comfortable. Mm-hmm. You know, are they going to invent new things? Are they going to move us forward? Or are they just gonna kind of, like you said, be like broey.

You know, cutting and, and like pretend

Malcolm Collins: entrepreneurship. And that’s the problem with projects like Neum, right? Mm-hmm. Is it’s all pretend entrepreneurship. It’s a good idea on paper. If anybody, actually it’s a cool idea on paper. I don’t know if it’s a good idea. I, I, I don’t hate the idea of trying to create a special economic zone with unique laws that is closer to Israel, which is really what they’re trying to do is to create.

Create like a tourist, sort of a hotspot. Yeah. And tech bro hotspot where they can mean Dubai. Dubai did a really good

Simone Collins: job at becoming Yeah. A like tech hotspot. Uh uh, like it can be

Malcolm Collins: done like Dubai exists. Mm-hmm. You know, so don’t, you know, I I wouldn’t, I wouldn’t poo [00:44:00] PII hear you.

Simone Collins: I’m just saying like, it’s not.

Showing up as an export of these regions, despite the fact that I would’ve hoped that in this post, post scarcity Star Trek style world where everyone walks around like Jedi and has money for things and gets free education, that they, they would then, and I think people have this, this delusion that that’s what happens is you, you just, when you have, you know, when the government is your patron, you have free time to just sit and invent new things and make the world better and produce gorgeous.

Art, and we’re just not seeing that. I mean, even just look at the designs of these houses, it is like literally millennial grge everywhere. It’s so. Soulless. And I just it looks great. It looks great in a very AI kind of way. Not that like cool, funky, weird AI where like, you know, build a mansion but make it on a cliff and all pink and rainbow unicorn themed.

But just like generic, I. Optimal. So also we need to look at entertainment. You know, maybe, I, I thought maybe, okay, [00:45:00] it’s not innovation, it’s entertainment, but no, I mean, like India has Bollywood, of course we have Hollywood, South Korea is able at being a, you know, top tier in terms of cultural exports and.

Very little cultural

Malcolm Collins: experts come from this part of the world. It, it’s like actually kinda shocking anything. It’s, it

Simone Collins: is a regional player is sort of how it’s, it’s it’s categorized in, in indexes. You know, USA is a world leader, UK’s top tier Canada, Switzerland and Germany are seen is strong. I don’t really, but I mean like the best that they, that, that the, the Gulf States can be diplomatically categorized as.

Is regional players. Yeah, regional players. So in the end, that’s, which really

Malcolm Collins: shouldn’t be the case. I mean, I’m pretty sure like, for example, Israel outputs like pretty successful movies. Like, it’s, it’s not that you can’t, if you’re a smaller country like that output, high quality, again, South Korea

Simone Collins: outputs amazing things.

Yeah. South

Malcolm Collins: Korea like blows and they’re super

Simone Collins: small. Japan. So yeah, Japan has [00:46:00] produced amazing stuff. So yeah, I, I really don’t. I don’t think it’s that. I, I just, yeah. So in the end, what I’m taking away from this is it is possible to keep your people afloat with jobs based and in kind support, not cash transfers.

And that’s kind of, if you’re gonna do UBI, if you’re gonna create a utopia for some select group of people using your AI superpowers and resources. Give them guaranteed jobs and support and education in healthcare,

Malcolm Collins: but let them suffer and fail if they’re going to suffer and fail.

Simone Collins: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Or, well, I don’t know.

Like, I, I actually think you need to give people more hardship and struggle if you want them to actually keep pro to, to produce cool things. I, I, I. I don’t know. Failure needs

Malcolm Collins: to be a possibility in a system for thriving to happen.

Simone Collins: Failure. Yeah, failure needs to be a possibility.

Malcolm Collins: If people aren’t afraid of failing, if the whole thing can just be done.

Again, if there’s no real cost to anything [00:47:00]

Simone Collins: or if you introduced, I mean, maybe it’s more of an attitudes thing, like I feel like maybe if this existed in America, we’d have a shot because Americans would still be so competitive with each other that like we would see a down and out in the Magic Kingdom by Corey Rio situation where.

While everyone has their luxury villa and their free education and their perfect healthcare, they’re still ruthlessly fighting for attention on social media. They’re still ruthlessly fighting for whatever the lullaby of the time is. You know, for this, the few scarce resources that exist for the Basquiat that, that, you know, everyone wants to collect, like they’re still going to fight for things that are artificially or just circumstantially rare.

And, and, and hopefully that that thine vlan style of, of status and security never leaves us, because I think it, it is a huge contributor to both American happiness and innovation. So I’m hoping for that. I’m hoping that, that maybe, maybe that is the ideal [00:48:00] scenario is that maybe when certain populations.

Like, an American population is, is given these kinds of post scarcity resources. They actually do keep fighting, but my intuition is that they won’t, and that we’ll get situations where. No one is necessarily happier. The birth rates aren’t necessarily better. I need family

Malcolm Collins: culture. You know, you need to build an envi where, like, as I said, when I was growing up, it was always just me versus other people in my family, right?

Like mm-hmm. That was my benchmark of success. Mm-hmm. And I was told to not benchmark myself against the wider world.

Simone Collins: Yeah. You, you, you genuinely didn’t care. You could not care less about what other people were doing. You were like, or really, like you benchmarked like many of history’s greats, benchmark against.

Alexander the great, you know, they weep at the thought that like, oh no, like I’m the, I often felt very bad

Malcolm Collins: that Alexander had accomplished more than me specifically. Yeah. So like,

Simone Collins: benchmarking not to a local peer group, but rather to either your own high achieving family or historical [00:49:00] figures. That profoundly changed.

I, I lecture

Malcolm Collins: to more people than Alexander did every day. Okay. You know, more people are gonna listen to me and my ideas, and that’s what I care about most. So in a way, I’m doing better than Alexander the Great.

Simone Collins: I would say in many ways you know, I, I think it sucks to be a leader that’s surrounded by yes men and simultaneously a bunch of people who would benefit from you being dead.

It would be a very stressful lifestyle. I mean, he came from a family where like people just kept dying, like. I, I don’t know. I’m, I’m glad you’re not Alexander the Great, just as someone who cares about your wellbeing and happiness. Oh, plus he was such a drama king. I, I cannot believe he was, he was.

Malcolm Collins: Well, because he learned from like the, the, I know he was trying to model

Simone Collins: Achilles. I just think he was trying to

Malcolm Collins: model Achilles, but what a bad role model. They talk about like bad celebrity role models today. Yeah. Achilles worst celebrity role model.

Simone Collins: Yeah. Yeah, [00:50:00] seriously, like just trying to like to ape his, his toxic tantrums, but whatever.

So that’s

Malcolm Collins: how you be manly. Throw a toxic tantrum. Yeah,

Simone Collins: it’s very strange. It’s very strange. So whatever. But yeah. I’m glad that our audience, which is. So smart. You guys always humbled me with like the, your insights encouraged us to look at this. I think it is a good case study. Yeah. And I think the biggest thing that I’m taking away from this is, is the smartest thing they did was you have to get a job.

I’ll guarantee you a job, but you have to give a job. And this is where we see a repeat of what we saw with the civilian Conservation Corps of the the New Deal in the United States and the Great Depression, which really did produce lasting. Good outcomes for those who participated in it. They had better health, longer lifespans, more wealth over time.

I think if memory serves. And I, I really do think that empowering people through work is, is the way that it goes. Work will set you free. [00:51:00]

Malcolm Collins: Yeah. Work will. Oh God. Simone, you So is that what we’re gonna end this on? Gonna get us in big trouble. You just love throwing those grenades out.

Simone Collins: I love you Malcolm.

Malcolm Collins: I love you. What am I

Simone Collins: making you for dinner tonight?

Malcolm Collins: Well we’ve got the curry that is out. Oh,

Simone Collins: crap. Yeah. But do you want me to like, dress it up in something you want me to make? Like, actually I

Malcolm Collins: was gonna say, do we have non that we can like heat up? We do. Do you want me to, Ooh, do you want me to like make a pizza of it or do you just,

Simone Collins: just with non.

Malcolm Collins: Actually that’s a good idea. And then you put some like mozzarella on top.

Simone Collins: That’s what I was thinking. But I could also just do it the way we’ve been doing Bullock, where I just heat it, like, I basically kind of dry it out into a curry meat pancake in the air fryer on a still pat. And then we with cheese on top.

Then it, well, I’ll probably put the cheese on top after I dry it out. And then I serve it to you like a curry meat pancake pizza with. Mozzarella cheese on top.

Malcolm Collins: Okay. I, the one thing I changed about it is I [00:52:00] put honey on top of it. It’s

Simone Collins: clearly don’t have that sweet honey that, that got trendy and that no one actually uses.

It’s supposed to go on pizzas like spicy honey.

Malcolm Collins: Oh yeah, hot honey.

Simone Collins: But we can also just drizzle. We have real honey too, so like,

Malcolm Collins: I’d rather use get real honey, real honey. And because the, the like sweetness of the mangoes isn’t really tasteable in it anymore. Interesting. And so I thought that honey might help.

And yeah, cook it however you want. I, I love the idea of having some mozzarella in it, that that could work really well. Okay, so we’re gonna do a,

Simone Collins: I’m hearing slamming. We’re gonna do a curry pizza.

Malcolm Collins: It’s gonna be, I, I don’t know if I would cook it on top of the non, I will put it on the non

Simone Collins: Oh, no, no.

Oh, I was just thinking like, if you wanna do it Bullock style.

Malcolm Collins: Yeah. Bullock style and then, and then scoop it with Aon.

Simone Collins: Okay, so you still want non, okay. Yeah, I guess that’s fair. ‘cause Bullock has the rice things. What are those called again?

Malcolm Collins: Yeah, so you don’t need the, the pizza with the [00:53:00] bullock, but you do need it with this the pizza crust, which is what we’re doing was the non

Simone Collins: Yeah, that makes sense.

Malcolm Collins: Good.

Simone Collins: Well, I love you. You, I’m gonna go get the kids. I’m gonna play with them and bathe them, and then when everything’s ready for dinner. Hi, avian. You wanna say hi to the Hold on. Hi.

Octavian Collins: Hey,

Malcolm Collins: Octavian.

Octavian Collins: Yeah.

Malcolm Collins: What are you up to?

Octavian Collins: I want to say, I want, I can subscribe for everybody. We can subscribe if you like down subscribe, forgive us. A coming down below. Did you just

Simone Collins: fart?

Octavian Collins: No,

Simone Collins: you totally. Oh. Alright buddy, you’re a butt. You just came over here and farted. Alright. Game over man.

Octavian Collins: Farted

Simone Collins: Simone. Over and out. I gotta get outta here.

Bye. Oh dude, boy.

Malcolm Collins: and I am loving you to death. My beautiful, beautiful princess. You are so wonderful. I love my new mic set up so I can go.

No [00:54:00] hands,

Simone Collins: guys. So fancy. So very fancy.

Malcolm Collins: And you’ve got a baby, a new one, but you’ve had a baby on you for five years at this point.

Simone Collins: I love that and I never wanted to change. It is the best. And it’s nice he’s, he’s more awake now. He’s more alert. Such a luxury

Malcolm Collins: that so many women would do anything for.

Simone Collins: I know.

That’s the thing is, as we know, having struggled with infertility

Malcolm Collins: done with the last of these, so we, we’ll have three bonkers for the kids. I noticed that this bottle makes a very good bonker. So we’ve been washing them and we’re gonna store them and then set them all up so the kids can whale on each other with them.

Simone Collins: Yeah. They’ve already had a lot of fun with him. I mean, what, what India insisted on doing that, why? One of them got so messed up last night and so dirty was that she kept walking, like she walks like a, you know, a cowboy. She kept sidling around the kitchen and then like trying to drink out of it. And just looking super proud of herself.

So

Malcolm Collins: because she saw [00:55:00] how we drink and she doesn’t drink from cups yet.

Simone Collins: Yeah, yeah. She wants to clearly. So, yeah. Anyway alright I will kick us off.

Speaker 7: Okay. Okay, now you’ve got your shields. Let’s see.

Hi.

Speaker 8: Okay, Kristen, let’s go open and leave for there. Okay. No, no Shields. Shields will make it hurt less.[00:56:00]

Let’s go again.

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