JULIA LA ROCHE: Great to see you, Ken. Who better to discuss if the American dream is alive and well than Ken Langone, the co-founder of Home Depot, the chairman of Invemed Associates. Ken is the grandson of Italian immigrants, he grew up on Long Island, and he comes from humble beginnings. As a kid, he worked various jobs from a caddy to a ditch digger.
His parents worked hard to send him to college at Bucknell University, where he studied economics. And after Bucknell, he did two years in the US army. He then made a name for himself on Wall Street. 50 years ago this month, when he was 33 years old, he took Ross Perot's Electronic Data Systems public, his first IPO.
And Ken and his wife are well-known philanthropists, especially here in New York City at NYU Langone Medical. He is the author of the best selling book, "I Love Capitalism." Ken, thank you so much for joining us.
KEN LANGONE: Thank you for having Me.
JULIA LA ROCHE: Well, Ken, we do have to talk about your book, since you are this author of this book that's a bestseller now. So I have a very important question for you.
KEN LANGONE: Go ahead.
JULIA LA ROCHE: All right. So last month, a recent Gallup poll came out that showed that more young people are holding a positive view of socialism, and their views of capitalism are at a decade low. So what is your reaction to that?
KEN LANGONE: I think it's natural that this group-- their first taste or their first knowledge of capitalism was the collapse in 2008. They were 8, 9, 10, 11, 12 years old. So capitalism did not present itself very well. But that wasn't capitalism. That was a system that's gone amok. Run amok. And, you know, there's an old saying, there's plenty of blame to go around.
I think the financial regulation thing was Dodd-Frank. That was a big guy that was going to clean the mess up. I would remind you that Barney Frank, about nine years before that, was saying it was an inherent American right to everybody to own a home. And it was that mentality-- I'm not suggesting he did it all by himself. But it was that mentality that allowed the insanity to spread.
So as I said-- and give Wall Street credit for one thing. If you give them an opening on how to make money, they'll take advantage of it. That's-- that's the way the system works. Sometimes for the good, sometimes not. So I understand their bias based on that period of time.
But I would argue to any of them, I'll put you in my plane and I'll fly you down to Venezuela, and let's see how good socialism is doing down there. Or Cuba, or any place you want to name. Capitalism is like anything else in life. Too much of anything is no good. I think we need to be conscious of our obligations and our responsibilities.
But the one statistic that matters to me more than anything else relative to the Home Depot, entry level job at the Home Depot is pushing carts in the parking lot and helping customers load their cars up, hopefully with enormous amounts of merchandise.
We have 3,000. They started out as 18. Barely out of high school. Weren't going to college. We had 3,000 of them. They're multimillionaires today. And if you want a testimony to capitalism, talk to any one of those 3,000 people.
JULIA LA ROCHE: Well, Ken, when you do have conversations-- I'm taking it that you've visited some of these young folks and you have talked about your book. What are you hearing from them, though? I know you have this message of capitalism, but what are you hearing? What are their frustrations?
KEN LANGONE: Thank god that generation has a great sensitivity for other people. And that's good. The hurt and pain that's out there, we all should be doing something about. And I commend them for that. But I urge you, don't throw the baby out with the bathwater. I'll only give you a benchmark.
If you took every single nickel I've spent, or my wife and I have spent, which really adds a number up when you include her, OK? Because she's a spender, not a shopper, all right? God bless her.
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/langon...
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