Carl Icahn Warns America: ‘Danger Ahead’

On the right to vote

“The middle-class guy who’s making $50,000 a year realizes ‘I’m being taken advantage of.’ He can read. He can understand. You know, czarist Russia, they had to have a revolution and the czar would bring out the machine guns and mow them down. All these guys have to do is vote.”

On “repatriation”

“There is $2.2 trillion in profits that American companies have earned in Asia, South America and Europe. Companies that have domiciled in this country but make goods in another country – produce them and sell them there, nothing to do with the United States. That money is sitting there and the companies would bring it back, but it is completely and totally unfair, the companies say – and rightly so – that they have to pay a double tax,” Icahn said. He added, “Our country is shooting itself in the foot. Because these companies say, ‘Well, we’re not going to bring it back then.’ So who are they punishing? They’re punishing the little guy again, because if that money came back it would make for jobs. That money doesn’t go to the mattress; that money is given to somebody who then will invest it somewhere else in this country and help to create more jobs. As opposed to taking the money over in Europe and invest it in Ireland or somewhere like that.”

On keeping interest rates lower for longer

“It’s like giving somebody medicine, and this medicine is being given and given and given and we don’t know what’s going to happen,” he said. “You don’t know how bad the end of this is going to be. You do know, though, that when you did it a few years ago it caused a catastrophe; it caused ’08. Where do you draw the line here?”

On junk bonds

“High yields really stand for junk bonds. People are buying these and not really understanding what they’re buying,” he said, adding, “Wall Street does what Wall Street does best: It sells securities. I used to laugh with some of these guys that sell these bonds. I used to say, ‘The mafia has a better code of ethics than you guys.’ You know you’re selling this crap and you keep selling it. And in fact you’re shorting some of this and that’s what is really going on. If and when there is a problem with the economy, there is going to be a rush for the exits, like in a movie theater. And people want to sell those bonds and think they can sell them, there is no market for them.”

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