Joe Rogan Simply Used a $25 Sandwich to Torch the Minimal Wage Whereas Speaking AI and Automation

He’s the controversial king of podcasting, a multimillionaire media mogul who constructed an empire on a cocktail of MMA, psychedelic evangelism, and institutional skepticism. Whereas Joe Rogan has lately drawn criticism from the left for his contrarian views, in a second that feels each inevitable and totally weird, he could have simply change into the nation’s only advocate for elevating the minimal wage.

The catalyst wasn’t a dense financial report or a progressive coverage paper. It was a viral TikTok video a couple of single, outrageously costly sandwich.

The scene unfolded throughout a June 24 episode of The Joe Rogan Experience, the place Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) returned for an additional one in all his now-classic deep dives into the state of America. Their dialogue, nonetheless, went far past politics, pertaining to the very way forward for human labor.

Earlier than the dialog turned to wages, it was grounded in a urgent, trendy anxiousness: the specter of AI and automation changing human employees. Rogan and Sanders mentioned a future the place jobs at manufacturing giants like Ford and GM could possibly be rendered out of date by robotics, as each carmakers closely put money into automation to streamline manufacturing. Their dialogue is well timed, as the controversy over job displacement intensifies. Whereas main companies roll out cost-cutting tech, labor advocates are asking a vital query: what occurs to the employees?

Sanders argued that society faces a vital alternative. Moderately than merely dismissing hundreds of thousands of employees as expertise advances, he proposed a basic shift in our method to labor: lowering the work week. The senator recommended {that a} 32-hour week may enable extra folks to stay employed, sharing the advantages of automation quite than changing into its victims. This proposal comes as a recent U.N. study highlights the dimensions of the difficulty, discovering that one in 4 jobs worldwide is probably uncovered to generative synthetic intelligence (GenAI).

This broader anxiousness concerning the worth of human labor in an more and more automated world set the stage for the episode’s most viral second. The dialog pivoted from the summary risk of AI to the rapid, tangible battle of employees at present.

What adopted was a potent rant concerning the absurdity of the federal minimal wage from a person who can simply afford any sandwich he desires. But, confronted with the stark math of working hours versus the price of lunch, Rogan discovered himself making Sanders’s core argument with extra uncooked, everyman ardour than the senator himself.

“I believe the minimal wage on this nation is ridiculous. I imply, it’s $7, what?” Rogan stated in disbelief. “It’s insane. How do you reside off $7? You go to Jimmy John’s, you get a sub. How a lot is a sub? Like a giant sub at Jimmy John’s?”

He continued, referencing a TikTok video: “Some man did a video the place he’s like, ‘They’re attempting to say that minimal wage $15 is an excessive amount of.’ I believe he had a sub that he purchased for 25 bucks. So think about that’s your lunch. So think about it’s important to work three and a half hours simply to pay for a sandwich. Think about how insane that’s.”

Rogan added, “That’s insane. Like, how do you eat? And the way do you eat dinner? How do you eat lunch, breakfast?”

Sanders: “I’ve talked to individuals who make 10, 12 bucks an hour attempting to lift a child.”

Rogan: “Jesus. Nicely, the argument towards that’s, ‘Hey, these are entry-level jobs which might be speculated to be for youths.’”

Sanders: “No. And that’s factually—yeah, in fact, it’s true to some extent…”

Rogan: “To some extent, however if in case you have grown adults which might be working these jobs, now it turns into disgusting.”

Sanders: “That’s proper, simply precisely! Particularly whenever you’re coping with an infinite company.”

Rogan: “Proper!”

Sanders: “So we put a whole lot of stress, you realize, we are attempting to lift the minimal wage, federal minimal wage, to 17 bucks.”

Rogan: “That’s an affordable amount of cash. You realize, I imply, it’s nonetheless—it’s gonna be actual troublesome to dwell off of 17 bucks an hour, however not less than…”

Sanders: “That’s proper.”

Rogan: “A minimum of you will get a sandwich in underneath two hours’ price of labor.”

Rogan didn’t specify which video precisely, however there are numerous videos on TikTok of individuals ranting about $25 subs. Sub costs range relying on the toppings, and the federal minimum wage is $7.25 per hour.

The trade is outstanding not only for the purpose being made—Sanders has delivered this message for many years—however for a way Rogan arrived at it. After briefly entertaining the traditional “jobs for youths” counterargument, he instantly dismissed it with palpable revulsion, calling the truth of adults in these positions “disgusting.”

His frustration, stripped of political jargon, is probably going extra resonant for his large viewers than any speech on the Senate flooring. By endorsing Sanders’s proposed $17 minimal wage as “cheap,” Rogan grounded all the debate in a visceral, comprehensible metric: what number of hours of your life it ought to value to purchase lunch.

For Sanders, who’s campaigning towards company energy, he couldn’t have discovered a greater ally. Rogan is likely one of the most influential voices amongst males, and younger males specifically, making this unlikely alignment a probably important second within the public dialog about financial equity in America.