Mark Cuban

He’s a billionaire tapped by the president to help boost the economy. This week on Firing Line. 

On Shark Tank

I’m out! I’m so out I’m so out. 

At the NBA

The Dallas Mavericks are NBA Champions. 

And in the public arena

Would I hire him to run a company for me? No, um but he’s our president.

Mark Cuban is known for calling it like he sees it 

He doesn’t do the work. He’s lazy.

He’s now among those called to advise the president on reopening the economy

We want to have our sports leagues open.

VO: With live sporting events suspended

It’s like out of a movie. It’s  not even real. 

businesses struggling

Another five million Americans were laid off last week. 

And the President warning the cure shouldn’t be worse than the disease

Our country wasn’t built to be shut down. 

What does this billionaire reality tv star say now?

‘Firing Line’ with Margaret Hoover is made possible by the Margaret and Daniel Loeb Foundation. Robert Graneiri through the Vanguard Donor Advised Fund, the David Tepper Charitable Foundation Inc. The Asness Family Foundation. The Kahng Foundation. Additional funding is provided by.

HOOVER: Mark Cuban, welcome to Firing Line.

CUBAN: Thank you Margaret.

HOOVER: You’re an entrepreneur, the owner of the Dallas Mavericks, and have invested in more than 150 small businesses as a shark on the hit television show Shark Tank. And since both of us are social distancing, you’re joining us remotely from Dallas. 

CUBAN: Yes. 

HOOVER: What is social distancing like for Mark Cuban? 

CUBAN: It could be worse, let’s put it that way. I’m glad I’m not living with six guys in a three bedroom apartment any longer. And, you know, I have space here with my family. So, you know, we still have cabin fever every now and then, but it’s not so bad.

HOOVER: So you were just announced to have been chosen for President Trump’s advisory council to reopen the economy. Did you know you were going to be selected for this? 

CUBAN:  I found out about an hour before. And so someone had asked me a couple of weeks ago. Said that they were looking at doing something. I’m like, sure, whatever I can do. But then I found out that they officially we’re going to ask me about an hour before. Then got the news like everybody else. 

HOOVER: And why do you suppose you were selected? 

CUBAN: You know, I go both ways on that. But, you know, I think because I have a good feel for small business and I’ve been vocal and kind of out front. And I think they also recognize I have a lot of connectivity to small businesses through Shark Tank. 

HOOVER: What advice would you give the administration about how to handle this pandemic and the economic rebooting of the country? 

CUBAN: Very straightforward advice. Talk to a lot of small businesses, talk to people who have lost their job. You don’t, talking to just the rich people that run the companies is not going to give you near the guidance as talking to people who are the ones struggling the most from this. Because we’ll figure it out. Right. I mean, I’ll land on my feet. Doesn’t matter how much money I’ve lost. It’s the people who have lost their jobs that have the real struggle. The economy really can’t rebound unless this is a bottom up recovery. This won’t be a top down recovery. And that will be my point. 

HOOVER: So do you think they are insufficiently listening right now? 

CUBAN: Look, it’s really hard right now to pass judgment on anybody. Nobody is going to make a good decision because we have imperfect information. So, you know, I give him credit for trying. And we’ll see where it goes from here. 

HOOVER: There are a lot of people on that list on this economic advisory task force, more than a hundred. And there are people who have been very complimentary of the president, people who have not been complimentary of the president. You’ve been both. I want you to take a look at this. 

CLIP: 

ANNOUNCER: We’re about seven weeks into the Trump administration. What do you think? 

CUBAN: No leadership skills, no management skills, not very good communication skills. But he’s obviously had an impact on the economy. So he gets credit for that. 

CUBAN: I think Donald Trump has recognized that he can drive the conversation right now and take control of it. And the Democrats are just falling right behind the right place, letting him drive the conversation. 

CUBAN: I’m not a fan of Donald Trump as president. I haven’t been for a while. But that said, he’s obviously adjusted and adapted. And he’s doing his best.

HOOVER: Look, it’s no secret that the president likes people who compliment him. 

CUBAN: Yes. 

HOOVER: And I just want to ask you, earlier this week, President Trump told all the governors of all the states to start putting together robust plans to begin reopening the country on May 1st and suggested that some of them may even be up and running before May 1st. And I’ve heard you say the dumbest thing you can do is put a date on it. 

CUBAN: Yeah.

HOOVER: So my question for you is, is that wise? Do you think it’s wise for the president to be gunning for May 1st? 

CUBAN: So the balance is playing cheerleader in chief versus executing on different orders, right. You know, if he’s playing cheerleader, great. If he wants to give people hope and give people incentives to try to get ready, that’s fine. But the reality is, I still think it’s dumb to set a date because you can’t we just don’t have enough data to to make any commitments at all.

HOOVER: So you were on this phone call with many industry leaders and the president. Do you get the sense that he’s balancing his role as cheerleader with his role as the person responsible for public health?

CUABN: I think he’s trying. You know, I think he’s doing the best he can. And so, you know, but I think at the end of the day, I don’t care what the politicians say. I don’t care what the media says. No disrespect. I care what science says. I care what my employees think. I care what I think is going to get the best results. And I think every citizen of this country has got to do the same thing. You know, maybe in the past we could defer to our politicians, but we know how much we trust our politicians now. Right. We know how much you know, I don’t think — it’s a game that their playing really isn’t relevant to me at all.

HOOVER: Will you tell him you think it’s dumb to set a date? 

CUBAN: Will I tell him that? No, there’s no point I’ve got lots of other things to tell him. 

HOOVER: What will you tell them about sports, because the president had said just this last week, I’m tired of watching baseball games that are 14 years old. You’re one of 16 sports industry leaders to join the task force. What are you going to tell him about reopening basketball? 

CUBAN: Safety, first period, end of story. You know, if our players aren’t safe. I would never ask anybody to do what I wouldn’t do to ask my kids to do. And if I don’t feel it’s safe for my kids to participate, I’m not going to ask any of my employees, any of the players to participate. No exceptions. 

HOOVER: Let’s take a step back. There is March 11th, will be really remembered to most people as this day of this wakeup call about the pandemic.

CUBAN: Yep. 

HOOVER: Because it was the day that the World Health Organization declared that COVID-19 was not just an outbreak, it was a pandemic. It was the day that President Trump announced European travel restrictions. The day Tom Hanks tweeted that he and his wife had coronavirus in Australia. And the day that the NBA suspended the season indefinitely. Let’s take a look at the clip that went around the world of you, of you. And a game against my hometown team, the Denver Nuggets. Let’s take a look at. 

CLIP:

ANNOUNCER: You can see right here the reaction from Mark Cuban when he got the news looking at his phone. And then he went and started to discuss it with members of the Mavericks organization on their bench. 

INTERVIEWER: What concerns do you have right now for your team? 

CUBAN: You know, now that we’re not playing games, what about all the people that work here on an hourly basis. They said, you know, we’ve put together a program for them. But, you know, this is so many things that go through your head. It’s hard to know what’s right. 

HOOVER: You know, at that point, you had already started researching — 

CUBAN: Yeah. 

HOOVER: — pay for those workers. And after the suspension announcement, you said that you would be taking care of paying all the arena workers as though games were being played even though the season had been suspended. Just to be clear, people really understand what you meant by that. Are you spending your own personal resources to ensure that the employees get paid? 

CUBAN: I don’t know whose else’s resources I would spend. Yeah, it’s my money. 

HOOVER: How much is it costing you?

CUBAN: I don’t know exactly. It’s in the millions of dollars. 

HOOVER: I want to talk about unemployment with you, because while your employees will likely be spared that fate. Millions and millions of Americans, more than 20 million after this week, will have filed for unemployment, unemployment insurance claims. And it’s such a staggering number. I wonder, as you look at these unemployment numbers coming in every week. How bad do you think it’s going to get before it gets better?

CUBAN: Very bad. 

HOOVER: Worse than the global financial crisis?

CUBAN: I mean, we’re way past that already. I mean, I’m not ready to use depression because it’s hard to define what that is, but it’s going to be difficult for a lot of people. It’s already difficult for a lot of people. And it’s going to be difficult for businesses to keep people employed. Now, I do have confidence that the entrepreneurs in this country, the innovation that happens in this country will get us through this. I don’t think this is, you know, a three, five year problem. I think it’s more of a 18 to 24 month problem. But those 18 to 24 months could be difficult as we start to work our way out of this. 

HOOVER: I mean, unemployment in the Great Depression was 25 percent. Do you think we’re going to get to that level? 

CUBAN: I don’t even want to guess, you know. Rather than looking back and saying, you know what, this is going to — let’s just recognize it’s bad. Recognize that, you know, employers are going to have to ask the question, what do I want my company to look like? How am I going to deal with my employees the day we come out of this? Because those are the important questions. Can I pay them enough so that they don’t have to be on government assistance any longer? Because that’s really the most important thing that we can do. You know, we. To me, the worst socialism is having an employee that’s also on government assistance and me asking taxpayers to subsidize the work they’re doing for me. 

HOOVER: I want to get to that small business, part of the Cares Act, the two trillion dollar Recovery Act Debt Relief Act that was passed. There was a part of it that dealt specifically with unemployment benefits. And unemployed workers are now eligible for an additional 600 dollars a week on top of what they already received. Senator Schumer, who you’ve had choice words for, called this unemployment on steroids. And there’s some really strong analysis that this is a well-meaning but perhaps misguided effort because people may be incentivized to stay out of the workforce because they’re getting paid so much. What do you think about that?

CUBAN: I’ve seen that happen. Right. But that doesn’t make it bad. Right. So depends on how long we keep it going. The incremental six hundred dollars, yes. It’s led people to leaving their jobs and it’s led employers to say, you know what, we know you can get $600 more than you would have otherwise in unemployment. Can we lay you off or fire you so that you can go in that direction? And a lot of employees are saying, yes. But that only gets us through a certain period of time. Right. It’s not forever. And we don’t know what’s going to happen when that time period is done. So we’re going to have to be agile more than anything else. 

HOOVER:  I’d love to talk about what’s going on with small businesses, because you have invested in more than 150 small businesses as a shark on Shark Tank. And you know, of the two trillion dollar plan, nearly 350 billion dollars was allocated specifically for emergency lending to small businesses called the payroll protection plan. And 350 billion sounds like a large number to regular people on the street who, you know, don’t think  about government budgets a lot. 

CUBAN: It’s not. Yeah, it’s not

HOOVER: Right, right. I mean, there are economists who say if you’re going to keep every single small business in this country, I’ll 30 million of them going full speed for the next three months, it’s going to cost 1.5 trillion dollars. So is this enough money in the PPP, paychecks protection plan? 

CUBAN: No, of course not. Right. But the question becomes, it’s not even just about the amount of money. It’s about the timing of the money and the utility of the money. The goal was to reduce as much friction in the economy as possible and keep people on payroll. Right. Because it’s cheaper to pay businesses to keep them on payroll than it is to give them unemployment. But the process, as has had so much friction, via the banks. And I understand why. They’re trying to protect themselves, because the Treasury isn’t always forthcoming on the things they need to do to get reimbursed. But all this friction is making it more difficult. So not only is it not enough money, but by the time the second tranche comes along, so many people may have lost their jobs because the timing of it doesn’t work for the small businesses, that it may be less effective as well.

HOOVER: There’s another 250 billion that is being held up in the Senate right now by the Democrats who want extra money, another 250 billion for state local governments and hospitals. What do you say to those Democrats now who are holding up that relief to small businesses? 

CUBAN: Right idea, wrong time. You know, I don’t disagree with what they’re trying to accomplish. But now’s not the time because every day we lose costs far more than any dollar we gain whenever we get it. Because every day another small business is going to collapse and more people are going to be put out in the streets. So while the concept is good and your intentions are right, now’s not the time. 

HOOVER: Then there’s this other question about are the small businesses that need it the most, the smallest, and the, you know, at the lower end of this small business scale, the mom and pop on the corner. The bodega down the street — 

CUBAN: Right. 

HOOVER:  — that don’t have the preferred relationships with the commercial banks in order to be able to even get to the front of the line. You know, what do you — What are you advising those kind of companies?

CUBAN: They’re in deep doo doo. Right? It’s a real problem because not only- even though the PPP opened the door for sole proprietorships and independent contractors: Lyft drivers, Uber drivers, etc., they literally changed the rules just two days ago. And so now there’s a whole lot more paperwork in terms of the tax filings that are required in order for a bank to give that to you. And that creates so much more work for a bank. It puts you typically at the end of the line for the reasons you mentioned. You’re not a typical customer for them. You’re not a big customer for them. And so that- and these are the people who need the money the worst. But hopefully the second tranche, hopefully people will speak up loudly. Hopefully, look, I’ve never been a unions guy, but this is the time, right? This is the time for people to come together and organize themselves to speak up with a singular voice. You know, whether you’re an Uber driver or whether you’re a Lyft driver, whether you work for a big employer and you don’t think that they’re treating you well, now’s the time because the line worker, the people who are making the hourly wages, even though a lot of them have been laid off, those who are staying with their companies have more voice and more power than ever if they come together.

HOOVER: Why do they have more voice though? For example, Sephora is one of these companies that laid off three thousand people in a mass conference call and employees reportedly, you know, we’re given less than an hour notice. When Sephora decides to rehire, why are those employees going to have more leverage? I mean, why aren’t they just going to-

HOOVER: Because they can’t get open without them. And the hardest thing to do is going to be to retrain new people.

HOOVER: Aren’t people going to be desperate to get rehired? 

CUBAN: Well, that’s- yes, but that’s one of the values of the unemployment insurance paying so much more. Right? Because there’s more money in unemployment and most likely we’re going to have to continue, at least for some period of time. And when that door opens up and any company, any retailer is going to want to retain or bring back the people who are already trained because it’s cheaper that way than onboarding new ones and going through all the hassle. So those people who are being asked to come back are gonna have more leverage, not less. 

HOOVER: You’re really optimistic that this kind of a pandemic can lead to that kind of transformation. Why are you so, why are you so hopeful?

CUBAN: That’s who we are.

HOOVER: You’re pretty confident in that. And I mean, I applaud the optimism. I share it. But why do you think this can be the moment to capitalize on it?

CUBAN: That’s what makes this country, country different than every other country in the world. That’s who we’ve been for, you know, since 1776. You know, we start businesses, we create opportunity. You talk about side hustles.You know, you talk about what are people going to do when they don’t have their jobs? The biggest opportunities, particularly in the small business side are little side hustles in every little community, because you’re going to have feet on the street. You’re going to know what your neighbors want. And being able to sell and service them in new things that we haven’t even anticipated. It’s- a lot of those are going to turn into great companies. I’m optimistic that when we look back in five, 10 years, there’ll be 10, 20, 30 great companies that are created out of necessity because of the pandemic of 2020. 

HOOVER: You care a lot about ethics in business. That becomes clear if you watch Shark Tank. And I want to show you a great moment from Shark Tank where that that really typifies your response to a certain at a certain pitch. 

CUBAN: Thanks. 

CLIP: 

HOOVER: Why is ethics so important to you in business? 

CUBAN: Well, I mean, in Shark Tank in particular, when you have millions of people who are watching the show over and over again with the repeats turning to the tens of millions, I want people to know that the only way to do business right is by doing business ethically. And when someone comes on, whether it’s supplements and making bad claims or an ion watch and making the claim that’s ridiculous that it’s not just about the money for most investors and for most entrepreneurs. They really do care because the best businesses are ethical. It may not catch up to you in the short term, but it always catches up to you. Karma’s a bitch, you know, and I’m a big believer in karma. 

HOOVER: So you wrote on Twitter back in March. Whenever we get through this, we’ll look back and we’ll wonder why we didn’t use this as an opportunity to attack income inequality. Let’s not make that mistake. This is our chance to do the right thing to reward everyone who contributes to the turnaround of the economy. I know income inequality is something you’ve talked quite a bit about. What is the opportunity in the midst of a pandemic to address income inequality? 

CUBAN: Well, I think line level employees, hourly workers will have far greater importance than they have in the past because in order to get back to work companies really need to try to retain the same people they’ve always had. And so that’s part one. Part two is in order for people to get beyond living paycheck to paycheck for the uncertainty of how many hours you’re going to be working. They have to have assets that appreciate and those assets that appreciate typically are going to be stock options or warrants in a company. And that’s really the only way to start the process. 

HOOVER:  Do you think that capitalism in the United States is insufficiently compassionate? 

CUBAN: Yes. 

HOOVER: Why do you say that? 

CUBAN: Because, look, in America 1.0, the drive to just see how much you can get the bank and look out. I’ve been just as guilty. When I was first starting out and I was sleeping on the floor, I was driving around looking at the houses, thinking, you know, if only I could make enough money to have this or that. And so I feel that drive. But I think now, particularly because this is the worst we’ve seen in a hundred years. You know, now particularly we have to recognize that there was a Bernie Sanders movement for a reason. Right. There was a reason why so many people look up, look at socialism as not being a dirty word anymore. And so you have to be cognizant of what’s happening in the country today. And the only way to deal with that as a capitalist is by being more compassionate and recognizing trickle down economics don’t work. Trickle up economics do work. That’s the stronger the bottom is, the higher you raise it, the stronger consumerism is, the more they have to spend, the more things they can buy, the more appreciable assets they can participate in, the more their net worth will be. And the more money capitalists can make. So they’re again, they’re not mutually exclusive. 

HOOVER: You’ve said that you’re rich, you’re fine. A certain amount of your wealth goes to the government. You think that the government is the right mechanism for spreading out the wealth and for sharing concentrations of riches? 

CUBAN:I mean, for today. Yes. Given the circumstances with COVID. Yes. I mean, we have no other means of distribution. Right. So the answer is absolutely, positively. That’s why you’ve heard me say positive things about the various programs we’ve discussed. Longer term, potentially. Right. It depends on what you think government should look like. And so from my perspective as a techie, right. I think artificial intelligence can literally change the way government is enabled. Government as a service can actually work. The old model of having, you know, millions and millions of employees pushing paper and acting as bureaucrats and friction and getting things done didn’t work before. before all this was probably enough money going into the government coffers. We just didn’t manage to get it to the people who needed it the most. So we weren’t very efficient. But I think with new technologies, we can become more friction free. And distribute more to those people who need it the most. 

HOOVER: And so your work with President Trump has already begun in terms of your role on the advisory council for restarting the government. Obviously your interaction with the president now, you’re trying to be helpful. You’re a good citizen and you’re a patriotic person. How would you grade the president’s handling of that COVID pandemic right now? 

CUBAN: I’m gonna freak you out, but I’ll give him an A and I’ll tell you why

HOOVER: Why? 

CUBAN: Because nobody can do a good job. Nobody can do a good job. Doesn’t matter who you are, you’re going to be able to second guess anybody. And so rather than just saying, you know what? Here’s what you did wrong. Here’s the worst part about it. You could have done this sooner or you could have done that sooner.  It doesn’t really matter at all. I mean, I’d rather have a conversation about where the doors opened back up. What are the things that we need to do to make sure that people have jobs? What are the things that we need to do to get people paid more? Should we be talking about freeing things up for people to unionize because they might need unions more? There’s so many things I’d rather look forward on and just playing grader. I would, you know, I wouldn’t make a very good teacher from that perspective and giving grades. It’s just not worth the odds. So I’d give him an A and just walk on. 

HOOVER: If the election were held today, would you vote for him?

CUBAN: Probably not. Yeah, probably not. 

HOOVER: There’s, vice President Biden has promised to pick a woman as his V.P. candidate, Gretchen Whitmer, the emerging star from Michigan who’s dealing with the COVID crisis in her own backyard. Amy Klobuchar, Kamala Harris.

CUBAN: I know Senator Klobuchar and Senator Harris right now. I’ve spent some time with both of them and they’re both incredible. I could have voted for either one for president had they gotten the nomination. 

HOOVER: How would you handicap the presidential race right now? 

CUBAN: I wouldn’t. There’s so much that can happen. What each candidate does between now and then makes all the difference. Right. Because there’s the real risk of resurgence. There’s a real risk that the virus mutates. There’s a real risk that we can mishandle any type of therapies. If a therapy comes out and some percentage of the country can’t afford it because somebody played favorites with a pharmaceutical company that candidate’s going to get crushed. Right. And so there’s so many things that can change. And we really haven’t seen Joe come out and say a whole lot yet. And, you know, it’s very difficult in the midst of this. You know, the typical saying is don’t let a tragedy go unused right when it comes to politics. But, at the same time, you know, to say too much, it could be misconstrued. And so I think hopefully we get more we get past this more and we’ll have a better fundamental understanding of what each is going to do going forward. But I’m far more concerned with the day after. Right, because all we’ve said is all we’ve talked about is the complete uncertainty. Nobody knows. Yet I haven’t heard anything about the day after from either candidate. So I’m not ready to handicap anything yet.

HOOVER: You said there were a lot of things that you would tell the president in terms of how to handle this crisis or things that he should do with respect to small businesses and the economy. What are some of those things? 

CUBAN: Let me take a step back. Right now, we’re pushing down interest rates. Where The Fed is effectively buying assets from banks, for bonds. What we’ve got right now is effectively UBI for rich people. Anybody who has appreciable assets, they’re creating a floor for those assets and for people like me who understand that and can deal with those things. All right. We’ve seen the market go up, you know. But no one’s talking about buying assets from somebody who’s living in a dump, you know, rented location that they can barely make the rent, if at all. They don’t have a job any longer and they don’t have any appreciable assets for anybody to buy. And nobody’s buying anything from them. Right. To prop them up. 

HOOVER: I’m going to ask you, are you running for president? 

CUBAN: I’m leaving the door open. We’ll see. In these crazy times anything is possible. But I wouldn’t I wouldn’t bet that it would happen. As of now. 

HOOVER: So you could spend 30 million dollars of your own money to get on the ballot in all these states? 

CUBAN: No it wouldn’t require that. See the good news bad news is, the bad news of COVID is that it’s impossible to go out and get signatures. The good news is, from a legal perspective and getting on the ballot, it’s impossible to go out and get signatures. And plus, there’s obviously smaller block parties that I think would be wide open for having me as a candidate. But again, those are all hypotheticals. I’m not saying that it’s certainly going to happen. If it were today based off the circumstances today, the answer would be no. But for all the reasons we’ve just discussed, a lot of things can change. A lot of things are happening in real time as we go forward. But there’s all these issues that we discussed also that make me wish I had done it. 

HOOVER: All right. Mark Cuban, thanks so much for taking time to be on Firing Line. We appreciate your views. Thank you for sharing them. And thank you for your leadership in this time. 

CUBAN: No, Margaret, it was a blast. Thank you for having me on. I hope we get to do it again. 

‘Firing Line with Margaret Hoover’ is made possible by… Additional funding is provided by… Corporate funding is provided by…
You’re watching PBS.