Oct 16, 2025 · 50m · allin
1929 vs 2025: Andrew Ross Sorkin on Crashes, Bubbles & Lessons Learned
Andrew Ross Sorkin · 25m spoken Chamath Palihapitiya · 11m spoken David Sacks · 8m spoken Jason Calacanis · 6s spoken
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gold bands on the timeline = statements, start to end. Hover to read, click to jump. CC turns on captions
In this episode of The All-In Interview, hosts David Sacks and Chamath Palihapitiya converse with author and financial journalist Andrew Ross Sorkin about his book 1929, drawing explicit parallels between the human drivers of the Great Crash and contemporary market dynamics in 2025. Together, they explore credit leverage, outdated financial regulations, modern AI capital expenditure bubbles, national debt cycles, and trade protectionism.
How this conversation actually went
Every chapter scored 0–10 on four independent dynamics. Hover any point for the reasoning behind the score. The hosts hold 42.8% of the talking time here. How this is scored →
The hosts as informed peer 5.5 Guest teaching 4.7 Guest disagreement 1.9 The hosts pushing back 3.2
speaking balance: gold is the hosts, purple is the guest (3 minute bins)
Sharpest disagreement ▶ 38:41 1950s Dream as WWII Monopoly Aberration
Sorkin directly challenges Sacks' framing of the 1950s American dream, arguing post-war prosperity was a historical global monopoly aberration rather than standard market capitalism.
Hardest push from the hosts ▶ 31:31 Chamath Rejects GDP Exclusion FramingChamath forcefully rejects Sacks' analytical framing of excluding AI data center spending from GDP, calling such comparisons dumb and defending tech capital deployment.
Biggest teaching moment ▶ 35:42 Correcting 1929 Post-Crash Timeline MythsSorkin corrects common historical misconceptions, explaining that anti-capitalist public backlash did not occur immediately in 1929 but resulted years later from specific policy errors and Prohibition.
The host holds their own ▶ 41:59 Sacks Explains Government Subsidy Market DistortionSacks demonstrates deep market knowledge by explaining how single-buyer government promises in housing, education, and healthcare destroy two-sided market dynamics and cause cost inflation.
the scores for every segment, with the reasoning behind each
| Chapter | Topic | The hosts as informed peer | Guest teaching | Guest disagreement | The hosts pushing back | Why |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Casual Pre-Show Banter on Sorkin's Book | 2 | 2 | 1 | 1 | Casual introductory banter regarding Sorkin's new book title and vacation reading habits. Sorkin lightheartedly defends his book as an engaging character-driven narrative rather than a dry history text. | |
| The Economic Setup: Credit, Speculation, and Margin | 6 | 5 | 1 | 3 | Sorkin walks through the pre-1929 credit expansion including GM, Sears, and National City Bank. Chamath demonstrates financial expertise by highlighting how un-underwritten bank margin and corporate balance sheets funded stock speculation similarly to hypothetical modern banks buying Nvidia stock with depositor funds. | |
| Social Contagion and 'Everybody Ought to Be Rich' | 4 | 5 | 1 | 2 | Chamath and Sacks probe the demographic and social shift from agrarian life to urban wealth speculation. Sorkin details John Raskob's influence and the cultural shift from Horatio Alger work ethic to lottery-style wealth accumulation. | |
| Media Amplification and Business Celebrity Culture | 5 | 5 | 2 | 3 | Hosts draw parallels between 1920s media amplification and modern social platforms. Sorkin shares primary archive discoveries from JP Morgan partner Thomas Lamont, while offering mild pushback against drawing exact one-to-one parallels with modern markets. | |
| Speculation as the Twin of Innovation | 7 | 4 | 1 | 2 | Sorkin frames speculation as the essential twin of innovation. Chamath strongly agrees and articulates Silicon Valley's model of price discovery, risk discovery, and risk capital deployment. | |
| Consumer Protection and Outdated Regulations | 6 | 4 | 1 | 2 | Sacks asks about post-crash consumer protection tendencies. Sorkin explains the history of accredited investor rules and regulatory capture, while Chamath provides commentary on modern contortions around financial regulations. | |
| Rigid Regulations vs. Modern Financial Realities | 7 | 6 | 1 | 2 | Chamath offers detailed analysis of regulatory rigidity from the 1940 Act to the S&L crisis. Sorkin educates the hosts on key 1929 figures Charlie Mitchell and Carter Glass, detailing how Glass-Steagall was driven by banking rivalries rather than pure consumer protection. | |
| Macroeconomic Anomaly: Are Markets in a Bubble Today? | 7 | 5 | 3 | 6 | Sacks presses Sorkin on whether modern markets are in a monetary or fiscal bubble, citing 7 percent peacetime debt-to-GDP and gold prices. Sorkin outlines peripheral leverage in AI deals while questioning why bond markets have not demanded higher premiums. | |
| Personal Investing Restrictions & The Bitcoin Regret | 6 | 3 | 2 | 4 | Sorkin explains personal trading restrictions imposed on journalists. Chamath highlights his own expertise by recalling past CNBC appearances where he advised Sorkin to buy Bitcoin at $100 while Sorkin echoed Charlie Munger's warnings. | |
| Identifying the 'Main Actors' of 2025 | 7 | 5 | 4 | 6 | Sorkin lists current key economic and political actors. When Sacks questions whether AI spend distorts GDP metrics, Chamath forcefully rejects the premise of stripping out AI investments, labeling such comparisons dumb and defending the process of creative destruction. | |
| AI Productivity Gains vs. Employment Impact | 7 | 6 | 3 | 5 | Sorkin poses questions regarding AI productivity gains versus job losses, then corrects popular historical assumptions by explaining that anti-capitalist sentiment developed slowly after 1929 due to Hoover's specific policy missteps and Prohibition. Sacks elaborates on how government over-promising distorts free markets. | |
| The Post-WWII Monopoly Myth and The National Debt | 6 | 7 | 4 | 4 | Sorkin directly challenges Sacks' vision of 1950s prosperity, arguing post-WWII American economic growth was driven by temporary global monopoly power rather than standard capitalism. Hosts probe Ferguson's 2040 empire cycle theory. | |
| The Political Paradox of Government Spending and Living with Less | 7 | 5 | 3 | 5 | Sacks provides detailed economic reasoning for why government single-buyer subsidization in healthcare and education inflates costs. Sorkin counters with the political reality of convincing voters to accept less spending. | |
| Tariffs, EV Competition, and the Cost of Resource Independence | 7 | 6 | 3 | 5 | Sorkin poses a dilemma regarding tariffs protecting domestic auto manufacturing against superior foreign competition like BYD. Chamath defends protective tariffs on the grounds of national resource independence and strategic optionality. | |
| Movie Rights, Historical Storytelling, and Hollywood Packaging | 3 | 5 | 1 | 1 | Discussion shifts to media adaptation rights. Sorkin explains current Hollywood market dynamics where projects are expected to arrive pre-packaged with talent rather than developed internally by streamers. | |
| Recording the Audiobook and the Gravitas of Narrators | 1 | 2 | 0 | 0 | Brief wrap-up conversation about recording audiobooks. Sorkin jokes about hiring British narrators to sound smarter before pleasantries end the episode. |
Statements from this episode (26)
Sorkin: General Motors introduced consumer car financing in 1919
“In 1919, General Motors says, you know what, we're gonna start lending people money so that you can buy a car.”
Sorkin: RCA was the Nvidia of the 1920s technological boom
“So RCA was like the Nvidia of its time.”
Chamath: Pre-1929 banks used customer deposits to go long equities
“By the way, it wasn't just individuals that was investing and overextended with margin, but the banks would take depositors' money and they were going along the stock market.”
Sorkin: JP Morgan chief Thomas Lamont kept transcripts of calls with Hoover and FDR
“Inside the boxes, his secretary is keeping transcripts of his phone calls with Hoover and Roosevelt.”
Sorkin: Modern financial leverage differs fundamentally from 1929 levels
“I don't think it is One to one. I think there's a lot of leverage in the system today, but it's a different kind of leverage.”
Andrew Ross Sorkin: Innovation cannot occur without speculation
“There is no innovation without some speculation.”
Sacks: Regulatory protection triggers when retail consumers lose money, not institutions
“No one gives a when a big fund manager or a big bank or some kind of dark pool of capital loses, loses money. But when it hits the consumer, when it hits the individual, then there's this rush to protection.”
Chamath: Crypto and private credit contort around outdated 1940 Act
“The entire crypto economy contorts itself around the 40 act. All these BDCs contort itself, private credit contorts itself. And why? Well, right now we don't have the regulatory will to just go and have a wholesale rip and replace of what is really old legisla…”
Palihapitiya: Fear of bad outcomes prevents beneficial regulatory reform
“When you try to go and rewrite those rules, there isn't the legislative will because what Andrew says comes up over and over again, which is the fear of what could go wrong stops people from doing what I think could go right.”
Sorkin: Glass-Steagall was driven by Chase lobbying against JP Morgan
“It almost has nothing to do. I don't want to say it has nothing to do with breaking the banks apart for like political reasons, but it actually has to do with business reasons, meaning there was like some major bank money and lobbying going on behind the scene…”
Sorkin: Peripheral AI energy and real estate projects carry hidden leverage
“And for the most part, the big corporations are spending real cash. So it's not, that's not leveraged, but you look at a lot of the Real estate plays, the energy plays that sort of on the periphery of this, there's a lot of leverage there.”
Sorkin: Current leverage levels remain below 1929 margin debt and 2008 subprime crisis
“Now, I don't think that any of that is as leveraged as what we were talking about, this like 10 to one situation in 1929, or maybe, or even like the subprime situation in 2008.”
Sacks: US running a 7% deficit-to-GDP during peacetime expansion is historically unprecedented
“I mean, the seven percent debt to GDP in peacetime with an expanding economy, never seen that before.”
Sorkin regrets not buying Bitcoin when Palihapitiya recommended it at $100
“I remember those moments fondly and sadly because I should have listened.”
Sorkin: Jamie Dimon and Larry Fink are legacy finance's most powerful players
“Probably Jamie Dimon and Larry Fink are probably the most sort of powerful players in the sort of traditional legacy piece”
Chamath: Data center spending adds 100 to 200 basis points to US GDP
“It's definitely a hundred to 200 basis points of GDP.”
Chamath: Private equity firms refuse to buy his successful software startup
“The least success I've had At the software company I started has been selling into private equity. It's like I have fortune, 500 and fortune, 1000 customers lining out the door. I couldn't sell to one single private equity company.”
Palihapitiya: AI is currently in a novelty slopware phase
“Right now, I think we're still in the novelty slopware phase of AI, where most of it is about speed, and you know, you're spending a lot of money to try to get crappy outcomes out faster.”
Palihapitiya: Real AI productivity gains will stem from quality, not speed
“Eventually, we'll replace that with quality outcomes, and they'll take a lot more time, and I think that that's when you'll have the real productivity improvements.”
Sorkin: U.S. stock market ended 1929 down only 17%
“People forget at the end of 29, the stock market actually was down only 17% by the end.”
Sorkin: Roosevelt won 1932 election over Prohibition, not the economy
“When you go back and look at why Roosevelt won, it wasn't actually on the economy. If you go and look at the polls, it was over prohibition, crazily enough”
Sacks: Distrust in capitalism stems from government overspending and overpromising
“That my personal opinion, as you know, is that it's fundamentally a function of overspending by the government and over promising rather than allowing natural market forces to bring everyone up, which fundamentally I think created and creates a lot of the dist…”
Sorkin: Post-WWII US union success depended on global industrial monopoly
“The reason why unions even worked, I would argue, for, in large part, was because there was this period of time where we were the only players in town, so we could charge monopoly rents for a lot of things, and people could buy a house with a white fence and h…”
Sorkin: US tariffs will yield higher costs and inferior cars in 10 years
“Having said that, if we do this, which we are, We will probably spend more to buy less technologically capable cars 10 years from now than the next time we all, you know, if you go on vacation to Europe or Asia and get in the back of one of these other cars.”
Sorkin: Hollywood is buying less content and prefers pre-packaged projects
“Right now, just the way the business is, you know, the Hollywood's buying a lot less stuff, and I think is more interested in sort of the former version where you show up with the whole thing sort of pre-packaged, pre-planned, but, you know, it almost changes,…”