President Clinton speaks with Elizabeth Holmes and Jack Ma (2015 CGI Annual Meeting)

in Europe and in the United States there has been a great deal of talk about increasing income inequality even in the face of our economic recovery from the financial crash a trend which was well underway before the crash in your country China there has been a great deal of concern about whether you've achieved the biggest movement of people out of extreme poverty into the global middle class in history but done in a way that overheated the economy leading to the current difficulties one in which you deal with every day because of the nature of the work you do between countries there is still growing inequality notwithstanding the fact that dramatic progress has been made with the effort to achieve the Millennium Development Goals which just expired in reducing extreme poverty and basically what we're finding is we have done as a world quite a remarkable job in creating a structure of opportunities for people to move from being just under the poverty line to getting over it but the people who are more isolated in deep poverty and had a greater difficulty escaping it for Geographic and other reasons the political debate is taking a turn in most countries rather different from the partnership and networking approach we take pushing people further apart when most of us believe this can only be made better by working closer together so first I'd like to ask you given that the incredible advances in technology in the last few years and the likelihood of the pace only accelerating as well as the advancements in biology physics and other areas is it realistic to expect more shared prosperity anytime in the future and if so how should we define equality Elizabeth for example she can talk about this punishment she has become wildly popular among those of us who follow things like this for developing a comprehensive blood test that will tell you all kinds of stuff for prices that are more than 50 percent below the normal rut Medicare reimbursement rate that and demanding the democratization of access to those results to the people who give the blood there that's another way of defining increasing equality both in terms of what information you get and how much less cash you have to pay out so and we all know that Jack started off providing goods at a breathtaking pace and is now looking into all kinds of other things so I'd like to give both of you a chance just to talk about this a is it realistic to think that we can continue to reduce inequality across the world and within advanced economies given the rate of technological advance and B do we need to be more creative and realistic about how we define what reducing inequality means an increasing opportunity we go first I think absolutely I think the promise of technology is that we can make access to basic infrastructure and in many cases to more advanced infrastructure than is even currently available today in developed economies available to people who are the most in need in the same way that cell phones have leapfrogged over the lack of landlines in so many places and I think the the promise of Silicon Valley and these places in the world in which there's so much creativity is that we can demonstrate that there are models for doing well by doing good and for applying technology and developing technology for those who are who are most in need I mean the the best business models now are ones where you're developing goods and services for prices that are lower than those that are subsidized by foundations and when you bring that type of basic access in our case we're focused on health and access to health information it's the first step in being able to get people well enough to go to school and to be able to pursue economic development for I want to make a point and then give both of you a chance to follow up on that but I want Jack to answer the question buried in that very eloquent statement is an assumption that the market can be made to work for social good given the right incentives and that it is a if you believe as I do that every place we work with my foundation not CGI my goal is to work ourselves out of a job I believe people want to stand on their own two feet I think they want to be empowered and and that's one of the reasons I've been so impressed by your dogged determination not only to cut the christ' cost and increase the quality of lab tests but to give people who give the blood the results of their tests yeah so Jack yeah um I think today people worry a lot about the world about the economy China economy in the world and I'm a very optimistic when people start to worry that that is the opportunity is I worry about the blood testing and she created and I think great innovations great company's always happening in the tough times the lives like the music you have a pivot down you have a longer shot notes and I like your American movie life life is like a box of chocolate you never know what you're going to get right so I'm pretty optimistic the opportunity in the future for equality is huge because in the in in the last century the IT is for big companies the globalization is for big companies but now with the technology we can serve those 80% of the companies that never been served we can serve the 80% of a young people that never served technology for Internet is so cheap so easy to use one of the reasons why we grow in China e-commerce so fast much faster than the USA because our infrastructure of commerce in China was too bad when it is too bad something happening goes today we are working on the rural areas of China I can never imagine that China but 800 million people still live in the rural areas of farmers and they're about close to 200 million people they are income is less than one dollar per day and before the internet it's impossible for these guys to reach the PC because it's so difficult even people like me I don't know how to use in PC but now 80% of the farmers those will be using mobile phones when have the mobile phones the internet the data things change it a lot so I'm excited about the future people always worry that's the you know I love the young kids sitting there and talking about the dream their hopes because if they have the hope we have the hope that's what I believe and let's just take what you do and I loved every description I've ever heard about how you serve people and your story about the bamboo farmers and your wife and her friends it was fabulous but where's this going what are you going to do what are your plans Tim maximize the use that people in remote rural areas of China can make of their cell phones besides ordering your project how are you going to get it are you going to get them in the banking system through cell phones how well um we we never know that we can't grow so fast the past five months we covered 4500 villages and these people not only they they using very traditional way that take them like - we went to the rural area took them the farmers two hours to work to the downtown in in the middle of the town and buy things but today because the mobile phone and we deliver we can deliver things to their home to their village within 72 hours I remember there is a well last week I read very interested in this is chant amazing there is a grow she told me a story she said her grandfather 92 years old a birthday and for his life he always wanted to try one western-style food but he lived in the rural areas there's no such a restaurant food so she said I tried on the Internet book a restaurant dinner for Western food delivered to that village and they finally immediately find the one restaurant there are three guys they took like a three days bus from the from Shanghai to that village made a italic spaghetti and beef for them for this 92 years old bursting and whole village was excited everybody says wow you can order food rest rest rest of style food so buy almost everything and also we are helping there are a lot of farmers they plunder love apples great apples but 90% of the apples routed because there's nobody by Allah they normally buy by track you know if you sell the the apples they sell whole track and using the traditional way they can they can sell buy whole basket of the Pappas but now because of the internet the cell by one by one each app of the cell one daughters you know one imv or - I'm just for each so the pharmacists see using internet they can buy a new cell and use the mobile phone that change their lives and I think it's exciting and people need examples when they see well the other my neighbor maker made a money through online to selling things my neighbor may you know buy much interesting things online people start to learn and more people started by the mobile phones we cannot have we cannot make all the factory the mobile factories to sell phones to them only they know the mobile phone really works helping change their lives they started by the mobile phones just one more question and do you think this will make the current problems like the current problem in China less likely that is if we'll have more market information in the market will drive where the investment goes instead of the government trying to make judgments about I better build another housing development or office development here there yonder and you wind up with a bubble well it comes from the bottom up is it more likely that fewer bad things will happen yeah they know I think the last week I was in Seattle discussing about the China economy I think the you American people worry too much about the China economy well you see every time where you start to worry about the China China goes better every time you think China is in problem you know we're good you know we'll get better but we never say Joe ever you have a high expectation er China always a problem like a parents of the expectation of the kids you know are the same but there's a big difference between the American consumption because people say wow you know the economy is bad so China consumption would be good look no totally different you American love to spend it tomorrow's money and the other people's money maybe oh maybe the Kudus money we Chinese love to save money we are probably the largest er country under the deep safe deposit in the whole world that will be with us because we've been poor for so many years when we made money we're put in the banks because someday we know that disaster is coming so we can spend the money so when the economy's bad we still have the money to spend you guys probably don't you worry and the second thing at the China be it marketing China being focusing on developing for the past 30 years China government so strong on investment so strong on exporting but they are too weak on the domestic consumption domestic consumption is not driven by governments driven by entrepreneurship driven by the market not the government so in the past two years past 20 years government is so strong now they get a week it's our opportunity it's our show time to see the market economy entrepreneurship how we can develop the real consumption I think we're if the China developed the great consumption we have a 300 million middle class in next 15 to 20 years we're going to have been a middle-class we need to import a lot so when we start to import that's a great it's going to I worry a lot when we export you know when we export we got a terrible sky we have a terrible water we have her book environment when we start import we got to be better so that's all the great opportunity guys be happy about that I'm serious I'll give you that you serious yeah and then we learn it yourself don't worry reason was the reason some of us worried about China is we depend on you to buy our debt however I tried to be more Chinese when I was president I saved a lot of money so good good good but uh I just wanted you to say that because I really believe that I mean I think you're absolutely right that the trend toward greater internal consumption is I think will remain unbroken in spite of whatever the difficulties are in the next few months I think it's important not to over react you can't break the trend you've got to clean out the land from chemical contaminants you've got to clean up the air you're going to do it and a lot of Chinese will make a lot of money out of that there'll be a lot of great new companies and there'll be opportunities to import from other places yeah so can you discuss your theory of what you're doing and other things in terms of whether it advances equal opportunity and social solidarity tell them what you think is going to happen and what other kinds of when your opening remarks you just said technology is going to be active in this way in other areas of the economy what do you think the next big opportunities are but first tell them just in two sentences what you're doing because Jack and I know and we haven't been clear enough explain it and explain how you think that advances social solidarity and equality of opportunity our work is in the belief that access to health information is a basic human right and that lab information particularly because lab data drives 70 percent of clinical decisions I'm needs to be accessible to pee Boal before they're sick so if you look at the word diagnosed in the dictionary today it says to determine the presence of disease from symptoms which means by definition we're determining that people are sick once a disease has already progressed and our work is in being able to make lab testing accessible to people in time for therapy to be effected and to do that in a way in which every person irrespective of their insurance status irrespective of where they live can afford the ability to get a test done so that means in our case we've invested the last 12 years in now developing hundreds of tests many of which are less than ten dollars so in two dollar tests in the United States and I think one of the amazing things about this country is that we have such an incredible ecosystem for fueling creativity and that creativity can create new markets so answered your question about the market being able to conform itself to social good I think the creativity that goes into creating these new technologies creates new markets in and of themselves and and our basic belief that is that those new markets come from empowering individuals and in franchising individuals and trusting that individuals have the capability to engage with information and in accessing that information beginning to take control of their own outcomes and their own health outcomes and in doing so changing the way our healthcare system works think what this could mean for rural China you know for rural India for Native American reservations in America for the Mississippi Delta for the remote areas of where all the jobs were lost from culture all of a sudden giving people information and one of the most important things I think we did in my second term as president and health a front was developed as diabetes self-care program and all of a sudden you could be Jack's company could be delivering the means to self care based on your test I mean I think that this is really this is a very big deal we all want to live as long as well as we can and Gregg Benner was here we were joking about whether we'd make it to a hundred but in the meanwhile do you want to keep people healthy and if they're sick you want to intervene early not late yeah well and if you look at I mean the ability to engage with this information we have a four trillion dollar health care problem in this country 20% of it is type 2 diabetes which is reversible and we have 90 million Americans who do not know they are pre-diabetic but access to information and the ability to engage with that information is the foundation for being able to change those outcomes and and cost right one more factor than I want to call it Jack you founded this company twelve years ago right tell him how old you were I was 19 so don't worry about the future we're in good hands it's okay I was think about 19:1 at where I am 90 have not the past examination for university yet I failed of three times but I think it worked out yeah I'm not a good at schooling well yeah that's why I give confidence to a lot of young people in China if jack mccann success can be successful 80% of the people can be successful people like her are jealous well equality I I would like to make a little bit cut technology helping because yesterday I was joining the United UN Women conference about gender equality and I think the first a technology revolution happened 200 years ago in the UK released the human body they're armed stronger the second technology revolution in the USA for energy you can last long but this technology of revolution relief release the brain so this century is not a competition who is strong whose muscles are stronger this who is a smarter who is up who can listen you it's the challenge of a wisdom so men women equal on the Internet you can never see he's a woman a man and on the Internet women can serve much better than men on the Internet in a man talking about a business talking about you know numbers competition to make business very cold women they make business very cozy lifestyle and interesting 50% more than 50% of our shop owners want to have five million shop owners of women and people looked at me this is this is a great thing I see that this century we see more and more women leaders on the state leaders the president's aimed in the future we're going to general sector of your nation should be women leader and this is the great century for equality and I feel excited about that let me ask you and we're almost out of time but I want to think that we haven't talked enough about here and not just here but generally is whether the leap frogging we saw with cell phones which was instrumental in your phenomenal business success and which will make it possible for you at the appropriate time to do what you've done on a global scale in the to unimaginable and all of human history for anybody to have any of their own health data we haven't we've seen examples but not the kind of dramatic penetration we need with energy and clean energy and enough and it's short enough time to avoid the worst consequences of climate change so do you believe that I mean your country has done more than anybody else to try to put up solar panels and some of your companies went broke because you overdid it right beforehand and you got to work out the phase-out of the coal the phasing of the Sun and all that meanwhile Africa which is growing like crazy because of the cellphone in no small measure and as six of the fastest growing countries in the world still has vast swathes of its land totally dark at night do you believe that it's possible for us to scale up with distributed solar power is rather than centralized as quick as we did with a cell phone and if so and if that were your business if you had to quit what you're doing today and start there how would you do it and how would you do it Lydia first I know that you know I'm such a huge believer in technology and I think especially right now we're at an incredible time in terms of new technology and the ability to apply technology in a scalable way towards solving some of these problems so I would look at it in the context of some of the renewable solutions that we already have and in the context of empowering connecting individuals with access to those solutions and in the context of creating markets around them I think that there's real opportunity to actually create an ecosystem in which people can financially benefit from these solutions and I think that's going to drive an adoption I think in developing economies there's a revenue stream associated with that and the more we can turn even already some of the technologies that we have into markets the more that we can fuel I believe local growth and individual engagement in in beginning to adopt some of these solutions I just related to that would Jack you answer it and then I'll ask you one final question yeah I I'm a strong believer that technology can make were much better because people say China economy is getting slower I'm happy about a 7% even 5% even 5% of the GDP of the number of China of the second large economy is big enough but you don't expect China keep on growing 11% because like one body won't human body when you have 1.8 meters tall you cannot keep on like a 10% growth every year you have to grow the quality your mind the wisdom so I think China needs new technology to solve these problems and which today the data the the clean technology all these things that China is supposed to do if you keep on the tradition that the other ways will go nowhere but this is why I've you excited because people ask me what is your dream now because I never thought I would be today I can sit here talking to president I'm like a guy you know on the street and like failed or three times for university five times for high key schools I applied for ten times in Harvard school or rejected I never thought because of the technology because the Internet give me this opportunity so I think when I retire I don't want the Chinese people have a terrible water to drink and it's safe for food and people the money we make or spend in the hospital that's disaster so how we can using the technology to enable young people the greater chance of this road don't worry about we got 1.4 billion people who are born in 1980s they are the people of the internet times they are going to have new ways to solve the world problems the things you are worried about today they can solve it and a human being have these kind of worries for centuries and young people can always solve it and today when you have a right direction clean energy you know the climate change all these issues they will be solved and these are the great opportunities ahead of us anything else I agree with that I think the more the more we can the more we can enfranchise people the more we can create ecosystems in which individuals are empowered than where we give rights to individuals to be able to build businesses to be able to to pursue the economic benefit of technologies the more you see these markets change before they leave the stage I want you to look at them and I want you to think about the time we have had to spend here dealing with the refugee problems in Syria and Lebanon stand up Ellis this is my friend Elias Musab he's the education minister in Lebanon he's got to educate all these kids and so he left a miracle that very much reflects the lives that Elizabeth and Jack have lived he was in a very responsible position at the American University of Dubai they started bringing American scholars over there to live in an Arabic culture he did all these wonderful things Lebanon control he went home to save his country what is the difference how much more could he and every smart Lebanese person do if they could focus on these things and why can he not because the place is dominated by people who think their differences are more important than their common humanity and their common challenges you cannot imagine Jack miles proud of being Chinese I like that he'd never hit it he's happy about it I'm the product to be a global citizen - yeah yeah and I imagine Lizabeth proud to be a blond-haired blue-eyed American techno whiz in Northern California yes but they don't not a word either one of them has said has defined the meaning of their lives or the direction of their work with negative reference to someone else my friend Dikembe Mutombo stand up no you don't stand up it'll hurt you too much you're an old man my 7-foot too rich fall friend was just inducted into the National Basketball Association Hall of Fame and he my family my whole family loves them and I have seen how much he has given back to his native country Congo which has been so troubled I've known him a long time we both went to Georgetown University I did before he was born I think I've never heard him say a resentful thing about anybody I have seen him give and give and give and try to give the people in his native land opportunities why am I telling you this he's had a good life because he never defined his life with negative reference to anybody else he never be drugs anybody else's success and he thought he had an obligation to help other people I'm telling you this is the we are back in a time of collective global insecurity where the main struggle is the oldest one in human history just in modern techno realities I mean if you were trying to build the Middle East you would think about our permanent sponsor here the Ambassador from Oman who tried to her government tried to help head off a calamitous war in the Middle East over the nuclear issue in Iran we all pray to God that it will work out all right and the least you make you look around all these places wherever people are putting aside their differences and working together good things are happening we cannot achieve economic or social equality without living in the factional realities of the world we face looking at the obstacles looking at the opportunities making the best decisions and those of us who even feel good about ourselves because we think we spent a lot of time giving our whole goal should be to work ourselves out of a job one of the things that the Bill and tani Austin are sitting there with Starkey they started giving away hearing aids and then they decided what we better teach these young people how to speak if I get the gift of hearing they'll have to learn that so they got into the education business sunny Varkey got into the education business decided somebody ought to do something really dramatic to remind people that the only people that really matter the teachers so he gave the first global Teacher of the Year award last year and an international panel gave the prize to a teacher from Maine who promptly gave the entire million dollars to her school mother never made any money in her life she gave all the money away immediately the future is going to be forged by people who think of how to use the modern tools that we are given as Elizabeth and Jack have to create opportunity through empowerment and it will not be a straight line it's too too many moving parts and but I just want you to think about that the reason you feel good looking at them and that you identify with them even though they're different from you and that's basically where we are all over again and we can't slip back we can't give up that's why we had the Prime Minister of Italy and George Soros talking about the future of Europe and George said it was coming apart and the Prime Minister said no it doesn't have to come apart if it's about something more than economics I thought it doesn't have to come apart if you will it not - and you put yourself on the line for it there are no guaranteed outcomes today but you can guarantee that the trend is right so go ahead and we're going to say something which yeah I just wanted to add I mean if we're talking about the future and and from my own experience and looking at all the faces here I think a huge part of the your question is also to raise our little girls with the stereotype that they can be the best in engineering and science and math because when they do in all of these industries it changes everything and we need to do that in this country and we need to do that as parents in other countries yeah I was thinking about if what you say I think about when you want when you talk about problems you normally is like a politician we can talk about opportunity opportunities that the business people I was thinking about how we can using you know this all the problems that change the problem becomes the opportunity and I don't know I just a few excited when people talk about problems I think that's think about if you can solve one of them that's the chance and today nobody in live in this century has so many opportunities and so many tools they can use to change other people's life and I think in in the last a century which I called IT time this century is called a DT time data technology IT is to empower yourself make yourself strong DT is to empower the others when you empower the others you empower your future yourself so when I listen to you talk I agree and I think that's why we were born in this century that's why we how we can use the internet to help more people it's given my hand thank you

Channel: Clinton Global Initiative

Views: 1,733,599

Keywords: Clinton Global Initiative, CGI, Jack Ma, Elizabeth Holmes, Theranos, Alibaba Group, President Bill Clinton, Equality, Opportunity, Technology

Id: l7Be_6NEPQE

Length: 37min 1sec (2221 seconds)

Published: Wed Sep 30 2015