The Ben Mulroney Show - How much more will it cost you at the grocery store because of Tariffs?

Episode Date: March 6, 2025

Guests and Topics: -How the trade war will affect your breakfast table with Guest: Sylvain Charlebois, Canadian Researcher and Professor specializing in the Food Industry -Canadian jobs and industries under threat with Guest: Goldy Hyder, President and Chief Executive Officer of the Business Council of Canada -Google Co-founder on the 60-Hour Workweek with Guest: Mohit Rajhans Mediologist and Consultant, ThinkStart.ca If you enjoyed the podcast, tell a friend! For more of the Ben Mulroney Show, subscribe to the podcast! https://globalnews.ca/national/program/the-ben-mulroney-show Follow Ben on Twitter/X at https://x.com/BenMulroney Enjoy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

At Desjardins, we speak business. We speak startup funding and comprehensive game plans. We've mastered made-to-measure growth and expansion advice, and we can talk your ear off about transferring your business when the time comes. Because at Desjardins Business, we speak the same language you do, business. So join the more than 400,000 Canadian entrepreneurs who already count on us and contact Desjardins today. We'd love to talk business Welcome back to the Ben Mulrooney show. Thank you so much for joining us. Thank you for listening on this Thursday There's a lot of news being made and one of the people who can speak to an issue that is very Important to so many of us and our pocketbooks, our food insecurity issues in this country is our next guest, Sylvain Charlebois,

Canadian researcher and professor specializing in the food industry. Sylvain, welcome to the Ben Mulroney Show. Oh, thank you, Ben. So there will forever be a debate in this country as to whether or not one tactic is better than another tactic as it relates to retaliation in this tariff war with Donald Trump. You have taken the position in an article that you've written

that Canada cannot win a trade war by taxing its own people. True leverage comes from targeting American reliance on our exports, not undermining our own food security and economy. Talk to me about what you mean by that. I'll be honest with you, Ben, over the last several weeks, I've started to realize that many Canadians don't understand what the dollar for dollar rhetoric response actually means. It essentially means that we're going after the largest economy

in the world, dollar for dollar responding with counter-terrorists but these counter-terrorists will only hurt Canadians. It just makes our market less attractive and if someone actually does import products from America well those products will be more expensive for us to consume and of course eat which is the one thing I'm concerned about food security and food prices at the grocery store. That's why I've always been very uncomfortable with this dollar for dollar rhetoric because we just can't win a tariff war. Nobody can win a tariff war. Yeah, but what I'm coming to realize, or at least this is sort of an idea that's getting

comfortable in my mind. I don't know where I land on it yet, but what I'm coming to realize, or at least this is sort of an idea that's getting comfortable in my mind. I don't know where I land on it yet. But what I'm coming to think about is that I don't know that the Americans thought we would punch back at all. I think they thought we would roll over and take it. And I think what they're seeing is, I think we recognize we don't have the ability to really affect their bottom line.

However, we're leaning into the chaos and the chaos is getting is exacerbated by what we're seeing on the stock market. And Donald Trump, we know Donald Trump pays attention to the stock market. And if we can lean into that and make it just a little bit worse, then that will have the effect of making him notice that maybe these tariffs were a bad idea. Well tariffs are a bad idea for sure, but let me use the analogy of a bully in a schoolyard. So Trump decided to punch us in the face and so our response was to punch back. What I'm arguing is that we shouldn't be punching back.

We should go to that school yard bullies house and burn it. Okay, now, okay. That's what I'm saying. Okay, so now put that in, in terms of our food supply and our farmers and the grocery store. So, so instead of, of using counter-terrorists and penalize Canadians, we should actually remind Americans of how important we are when it comes to food systems and target Canadian exports, key Canadian exports into the U.S. like potash, beef, pork. So they decide to slap a tariff on our products. Let's double the ante and make these products even more expensive and that's when you realize that not only you're making

American companies less competitive but you're hitting something that is precious to Donald Trump, his base, farmers, food manufacturers and so on and so forth. You're basically going to hit America where it hurts. Well I'm glad you mentioned the farmers as they relate to Donald Trump because he posted on his Truth Social, to the great farmers of the United States, get ready to start making a lot of agricultural product

to be sold inside of the United States. Tariffs will go on external product on April 2nd. Have fun. When you see something like that, what do you think? You're not looking at the same numbers we're looking for sure, because of course, America, like Canada, they feed the world. So they're thinking about China, they're thinking about other markets to make money. So that that pose from president may makes no economic sense at all. Okay, so let's assume that the snapshot of the way things exist today, the tariffs as

they are applied today, remain for a while. What does that mean over the next few weeks to my grocery bill, to the cost of my breakfast? Listen, Ben, we're probably a couple of hours away from hearing either Howard Luppnick or President Trump making an announcement about tariffs on food and agriculture. So there may be some exemptions in a few hours from now. Forecasting anything right now is close to impossible. All we know right now is that there are tariffs, okay, and counter tariffs will include many products coming into Canada that will affect some products in the produce section,

center of the store, shelves, table trucks, and the frozen aisle. So those are the three sections that are likely going to be impacted by current tariffs. Now in three weeks from now there's another layer of uncertainty. Who's going to be leading our country? You and I have no idea. That person will have a huge say on how we're going to implement a second wave of tariffs if tariffs are still there. Yeah, no, the amount of uncertainty that we're dealing with on this side of the border is unbelievable.

We got the economic and the political and this is no way, if I were a business owner, I wouldn't know what to do. To be honest, Ben, I mean, on the American side, you have a president and everyone's scared of him. His own party's scared of him, so he's doing whatever he wants. Our best hope is to see his approval rating drop significantly and that's when he's going to start making better decisions. Let's talk about the odd exception that is eggs. White House press secretary Karen Levitt said that President Trump is open to additional tariff exemptions, including for Canadian eggs.

Now, I know I've read, I haven't been an expert on it, but I know that they have a shortage of eggs in the states. And generally speaking, the cost has already been very high. Give me the state of play on eggs. Yeah, so essentially what's happening in America is that they've lost control of the avian flu. I mean, they had to call almost 200 million chickens. That's more than 10% of the entire American flock.

And so they're struggling and we're getting closer to Easter, which is arguably the one season where eggs are most popular. And so prices are only going up and eggs are important because it is the cheapest, cheapest source of animal protein out there. And so a lot of Americans are concerned. So they're not thinking, Americans aren't thinking about the border. They're not thinking about tariffs.

They're thinking about the price of eggs and the price of milk and things like that. So I think this is probably the one thing that is going to hurt Donald Trump's popularity over time. Well, this is what I, this goes into what I was saying earlier about leaning into the chaos about furthering it, making it so that what, what they have posited as a deliberate important move, it only sows more chaos, both in the markets and in terms of the cost of things

that will ultimately affect Donald Trump's popularity. Exactly. So we do have enough eggs to export, not much because of supply management, but we do have some. Yeah. If my approach would be very simple, because right now they're looking at importing from Turkey,

that wouldn't be a popular decision in America, but Canadian eggs are trusted, but I would say this, you want eggs? Sure, eliminate all terror. Yeah. Thank you. Hey, before- Burning down the house, my friend. Before I let you go, have you tried any of these apps that allow Canadians to go into a grocery store and determine whether a product is made in Canada produced in Canada packaged in Canada?

No, I have not. Have you? Well, there's a couple of them. I had the I had someone on my show with someone called Maple Scan. Apparently, it's a fantastic app. There's also one called Oscanada. I think you should try these out and then let us know. Absolutely. By the way, sales are up for K-In products at the grocery store, but most important is that sales for American food products are down almost 7% in the last month. And so people are clearly telling grocers, you know what, de-Americanize your store for a while because we want to buy other things. You know, I do not think the Americans expected us to rally around the flag as we have. And I think they thought we would just roll over and take it. But Sylvain Charleboix, always a pleasure to have you on the show. Hope to hear back from you soon. All right, take care, bye bye. This tariff threat, it's not a threat anymore, it's the promise of tariffs that we're now living under.

It requires, to understand it, I think it's really important to hear from everyone. And that includes the leader of the Bloc Québécois, Yves-Francois Blanchet, who every now and then says something that I agree with. You know, you're not going to disagree with everybody all the time. And Blanchet has a theory. He doesn't believe that Trump wants to annex Canada.

That was part of the narrative here. He doesn't believe that Trump wants to annex Canada. He has a belief that it's about something else. I don't believe he wants to annex Canada. He has a belief that it's about something else. I don't believe he wants to annex Canada. That's one of his fantasies and he might sometimes believe himself. I'm not this psychiatrist. But it's just not even possible. It cannot happen.

So do not disdain fear by repeating something which will not happen. There are some real and important threats on Quebec and Canada from this weird man. Let's face the real threats. Yeah, he went on to say that Trudeau is only using that threat to mobilize liberals. And I believe we've seen it. I believe we've seen the evidence of that. I believe that Justin Trudeau has been suggesting that our sovereignty is at risk. And I do believe that he there's part of me that believes that the liberals have been

slow playing this to benefit them electorally. Until I see evidence otherwise, I'm gonna believe that. But so I believe that Francois Blanchet got that part right. But here's where he goes off the rails because one of the things that we are wrestling with as a country is once we're past this threat, how do we improve life in Canada? How do we make ourselves more resilient to threats like Donald Trump in the future?

And one of them, I think there's a general consensus that diversifying our markets and our clients and finding more places to sell our oil and gas is part of that recipe of success. And we have heard time and time again that we have been approached by the Europeans, by the Japanese, to buy our oil and gas. We haven't had the ability to do so. Well, Yves-Francois Blanchet has a hot take on that. So far, an inter-provincial trade deal has been marked by three things. First,

a lie. There are no tariffs between provinces. Second, oil. It became the pretext for Canada to have a pipeline go through Quebec. While we know that Europeans won't want this oil, won't want this gas at the end of the day before it's even constructed. So that's a pretext which is against us. And one of the rules which is very important for Quebec that we want to protect is the language issue in trade. Okay, so first of all, I don't think anybody suggested that there are tariffs in Canada. They're called inter-provincial trade barriers, and we know that those have grown over time

in terms of regulations that have just made it impossible or very hard to allow the portability of goods and services from one province to the next. So I don't think there's a lie there. I think that it's a fundamental misunderstanding of what an inter-provincial trade barrier is from Yves-Francois Blanchet. Secondly, I heard from Alberta Premier Danielle Smith just a few minutes ago,

who challenges what Yves-Francois Blanchet says. She has people in her office on the daily from Europe and from elsewhere, begging for our oil and gas. And thirdly, I have no idea what language has to do with a pipeline. There's not a whole lot of people talking inside a pipeline in English or in French. So she said earlier that she believes that this is a man governed by ideology and I think she's right. And so if this, but if he and people like him are going to be a sticking point, we're going to have

to figure out a way around it. Now to her credit, she did say she was quite optimistic. She said, I'm sure we can make a business case that will make sense to even the most protective of Quebec politicians. And I've from her, from her lips to God's ears. I'll say that. Christia Freeland, who is running second to Mark Carney, if surveys are to be believed in the liberal leadership, has said that there is a role for Mark Carney in a government run by Christia Freeland. Let's hear how she envisions these things going.

I intend to win on Sunday. And when I win, I will invite Mark to serve as finance minister in my government. I think we'll make a great team. I think right now we need a prime minister who has a seat in the House of Commons, who can lead a government that has the political legitimacy to fight this tariff war, and someone who has experience as a political decision-maker

in a crisis, someone who has the experience and the plan and the guts to stand up for Canada in this critical moment. That is... I am the leader who is uniquely qualified to fight for us right now. Well, she's not wrong that she has a seat. I mean, granted, the House is prorogued. But she's been in a crisis and all that stuff. My prediction is if Mark Carney doesn't win, that's the last we're gonna see of him in the political sphere. I think he's in it to be prime minister and that's it. If he doesn't get it,

he's gonna take his toys and go home. Very much like Michael Ignatyev. And it was predicted by the Tories. He's just visiting and sure enough, as soon as he lost, he took his toys and left. I think he moved to Europe. I don't even think he stuck around North America. I do not think Mark Carney has it in him

to be anyone's number two. And I certainly don't think that he would run the risk. This party, I do not think is gonna win in the next election. I don't think that he's gonna stick around for very long as the leader of the opposition to try to rebuild the Liberal Party. I don't think it's in him. I think he wants the top prize that or nothing. But in the meantime, as he is preparing

to accept the leadership of the Liberal Party, to which I say, WTF, this is, he's, who's Mark Carney right now? He is a private citizen. What's he doing getting a briefing from a cabinet minister? He hasn't been elected dog catcher. He's already said he's not gonna disclose his financial dealings because he's not going to disclose his financial dealings because he's not subject to them because he's a private citizen. He's not a member of parliament.

He doesn't have to do those things. So how can you have it both ways, sir? If you're going to be getting briefings as if you're a member of government, shouldn't you also also give Canadians the respect of disclosing your financial connections as you would were you a cabinet minister? Were you in government? It seems like he wants it both ways. He wants the freedom to keep certain things opaque, but he wants direct access to cabinet as if he were in government. I don't think that that's right. I think that that's wrong. But anyway, here's a sentence I never thought I would utter. I wonder what the Green Party is up to. And frankly, I don't even know why,

sometimes my producers stick stuff in the document and I just have to learn about it in real time with you. So what's Elizabeth May up to, please? We have been in conversation with different levels of insiders within the Liberal Party, the New Democratic Party. We've talked to colleagues in Parliament. What kind of interest would there be in listening to the voices of Canadians, like the grassroots group that has sprung up of Cooperate for Canada, who want to see party sit down

and talk to each other about how we can potentially cooperate across this country and be able to have that common resolve. Sounds to me like Justin Trudeau is lining up all everything he needs to come back to Parliament and not fall victim to a vote of no confidence. We already heard the NDP say they're open to it. Elizabeth May says she's open to it. I said it yesterday. I'll say it again. I don't think we are going to have an election until October.

That's just one man's opinion. We'll see whether I'm right in the coming weeks. Well, we learned today from Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick that Donald Trump intends to pretty much walk back almost all of the tariffs that he levied on the country just a few days ago and give us a quote unquote reprieve for a month. Here to talk about this ever-changing situation and what it can mean for business in this country is Goldie Heider, the President and Chief Executive Officer of the Business Council of Canada. Goldie, welcome for the first time, hopefully not the last, to the Ben Mulroney Show.

Thank you for having me. It's a pleasure to be with you. So this is good news. You can't say it's not, but it doesn't change the fact that we are living in an exceptionally chaotic time. As someone in your position, what do you tell members of your organization about how to deal with this sort of chaos? Hang on tight for the ride.

It's just been six weeks, because look, you know, this better than anybody, but business loves predictability and certainty. And we're not getting any of that. I mean, I think it is unbelievable to witness what we're seeing in just the last 48 hours, nevermind the last six weeks. As I mentioned, what you're seeing is an escalation, a de-escalation. You're seeing tremendous pushback, not just from Canada. I would point out the pushback is he's responding to his president is the

pushback he's receiving in his own home country. A number of lawsuits have been launched there. A number of industries from auto to agriculture to energy and others are saying, here are the consequences of your action. Not only will life get more expensive and inflation return, but it's hardly going to make life affordable, which is what you ran on. And so I think when your opponent is having these difficulties, get out of the way. Yeah. Let them figure it out themselves.

But it also means being prepared for two things, right? I'll be honest, I've been thinking a lot about Mr. Moroni at a time like this because I did have the privilege of having a lot of conversations with him and access to his advice. And I kept asking myself, what would he say to me today? And I think what he would say is, look, stay calm, be united and get yourself to that negotiation table. Because what you've not heard the president ever say is, I'm getting rid of the USMCA.

I wanna have bilaterals. He's never done that. And I think the advice would be find a way to get back to that table and negotiate a win. We know the scenario, they must win. So what's the win that we can live with? Let's figure that out. And then I think he would say, pivot to making sure you don't waste this moment of really

creating a competitive Canada that can diversify its markets, that can sell what it has to the rest of the world. As I tell the Americans, one of the things you've done is reminded us that it's good to be wanted because it means we have what you want and therefore others want it too and we got to smarten up. Good news on the inter-provincial trade barriers here but we've got a lot more to do. But Goldie, he's got the wind staring him in the face. He's got the border win. I mean he's, in all the conversations I've had with newsmakers and people who are in the arena, the general consensus is the fentanymakers and people who are in the arena, the general consensus is the fentanyl and the border thing,

that was a pretext so that he could open up a tariff war with Canada. So if it was a pretext, then the victory itself can be made up as well. And so he could just as easily announce that he got what he wanted out of Canada, that we weren't being serious about the border, we weren't taking drugs seriously, we weren't taking the cartel seriously,

but now we are hooray, hip hip hooray for Donald Trump, and then he can and then we can move on to what this is really about a renegotiation of NAFTA 2.0. Yeah, I think that's that's pretty accurate. I mean, it's not that the crisis is not real. I do believe the fentanyl thing is real. I do think you know, when you have 56,000 Canadians die or you bust the largest lab in Alberta here in Canada, it's not a it's not real. I do believe the fentanyl thing is real. I do think, you know, when you have 56,000 Canadians die or you bust the largest lab in Alberta here in Canada, it's not good. We obviously want to address those things. And I think in many ways you do it not because the Americans are asking you to do it. You do it because it's the right thing to do for Canada and Canadians. And so good that we're able to address that. But the question, central

question still remains, what do you want? I think I think you're spot-on in saying this was a manufacturer but this was identified as the way in which the executive branch could usurp the power of Congress to be able to impose tariffs and to deal with trade. Yeah. I think what you're going to see in Washington over a period of time is when the honeymoon kind of slows down here Congress will have to reassert itself over the executive branch so this is about them it's not about us what is about us is we have a trade agreement with you that you're violating uh... we

we should advance the the renewal of that let's get to the table all of us so we can strengthen north america leverage the supply chain when you look at the auto announcement what exactly to the president think will happen in thirty days right uh... that what companies are going to shut down their plants in Windsor and move to Detroit? Well, they won't be able to move there in his term, let alone the next 30 days. Bingo. You'd be lucky if you could do it in five, never mind the fact that you don't have the labor in America today to do any of this. So it's just, as you said, he needs his wins. Let's figure out what those wins are. But at the same time, let's not waste this moment in terms of what we can do as a country

to wake up and leverage the opportunities that are before us because never short Canada. I mean, you know, as I know. Yeah, I'm very bullish on Canada as well. When the puck goes in the corner, a Canadian comes up. I don't know that. I'm talking to Goldie Heider, the president and chief executive officer of the Business Council of Canada.

We've been talking, Goldie, about this economic uncertainty and how it's bad for business. Is there, for your organization, is the political uncertainty that we've been living with since Parliament was parodied, is that a problem for business in this country? Well, I believe the politics to the politicians and the timing and all of that. What I will say is if ever the country needed a strong, stable, government uh... this is it and we need that as as we as we go forward as canadians enter into uh... and an opportunity to uh... to uh... to make that choice

i think we need to be thinking about how do we ensure that we're going to be in a position of strength uh... the the the reality is and i say this with the greatest respect but there's there's no surprise in what i'm about to say, but there is no love lost between the President and the Prime Minister and I suspect this reciprocal. And you saw some of that in the President's social media posts just yesterday, which is disrespectful at the very least. But the reality is, that's not something he's going to be able to point to after March 9th.

There will be another Prime Minister and at some point in time we will have an election and Canadians will choose one but I do think it's really important that this election reflect the seriousness of the times in which we find ourselves. I'm calling on our political leaders to rise to the moment and acknowledge that this is no longer about what was, it's about what is. We have a legitimate threat. Let's build consensus in our country business, labor, government, indigenous groups, our provinces. Let's truly work together as Canadians for not just our country, but the future of our country. And I think this is the opportunity.

And Goldie, what does the Business Council of Canada want to hear from anyone looking to be the Prime Minister of Canada? What are you hoping to see as priorities? Well, we've just put out a paper effectively on ambition and action and much of it is about urgency. It's also about tone. As I mentioned, let's work together. Let's have a partnership here. You can see it in other countries. Mexico is a great example of that, business, government, labour working together. Secondly, we have to get our fiscal house in order. I'm a little concerned. Everybody's getting a little excited about just, you know,

like let the spending start on all kinds of supports and things. We have liquidity in our country. We have employment insurance in our country. We have work sharing. We have mechanisms by which to make sure that we soften the blow should things get bad. We're long ways from that happening. So let's not get too excited about running the country into deficit. And most importantly, let's diverse the blow. Should things get bad, we're long ways from that happening. So let's not get too excited

about running the country into deficit. And most importantly, let's diversify our markets, which means we need permitting reform, we need to be able to build things in our country. Again, we need to be able to get the minerals out of the ground, we need to be able to sell to more than one customer, those are the lowest hanging fruits available to us. And you know what, that could be a gameanger for our country's economic prosperity. I had someone on the show yesterday who posited that one of the things that

could spur growth in Canada would be for us to essentially open up Canadian markets to all sorts of international competition that are traditionally protected. The airlines, our telcos and that sort of thing that would drive down price. Now we may lose an airline and we may lose a cell phone provider, but the benefit would come in in more money in the pockets of Canadians. What do you think of something like that? Yeah, look, I would just caution on the sort of populist rhetoric behind that, right? The truth is we're a country of 40 million people. No member I work for, no CEO is an uncompetitive one. They want to compete with anyone.

What they will say to you is two things. First is create a level playing field. You can't have me compete with others with one hand tied behind my back. Secondly, they would say to you that it's in fact government policies that make us uncompetitive. When you look at the telcos, they are forced to collect and effectively flow through tax on in terms of spectrum costs. Japan, Korea, zero costs, half the price, most of the money going back into innovation. You look at what's taking place in the airlines, a one dollar flight from Ottawa to Montreal or

from Edmonton to Calgary will get you an invoice for about $171 because all the rest of it is nothing but taxes. Service charges, right? And they can go down. And as far as the banks go, A, there are many American banks that are here in Canada. Remember, so there's a problem. 16 of them. Hey Goldie, we're gonna have to leave it there, but I'd love to chat with you again soon. Thanks so much.

I'll record, great, thanks for having me. And I'm joined now by one of my favorite guests is Mohit Rajan's, Mediologist and Consultant with ThinkStart.ca. Mohit, welcome to the show. Hey, how are you? I'm good. Let's jump into some of these conversations that,

I mean, I see these stories pop up and I was like, oh, this is gonna be a good one to talk to Mohit about. And one of them is Google co-founder, is talking about the 60 hour work week. What does this mean? No, the headline is one of those grabbing headlines, right? This idea that, Oh, wait a minute, this big company called Google that thinks that they're going to interrupt our lives with whatever they're doing with AI,

et cetera, is actually maybe set out to make the person work more, make us all work more. And that's what the headline lets us to believe. But the truth is that what he's alluding to is actually really on brand for what Google has tried to do for people is basically Working smarter is going to make you feel like you're not working at all Okay We're using the their tools will make you feel like that you will be spending all of this time working in your most optimal way

Yeah, optimal environment and so not you won't necessarily be adding more work hours to your life But you will be working 60 hours a week because you'll be loving what you do. Okay, can you listen? I love that idea and you know If you believe that if you love what you do, you don't work a minute in your life Then this could be sort of accessory to that This could be a spinoff idea of that but I'm gonna need to know what that means in practice before I think this is is just because this could be just bluster or this could just be their way of selling me their products that I probably don't want and don't need.

I think what's happening right now is a lot of tech companies have to move to this idea of what is the height of productivity, right? And so Sergey is really trying to implement here that we're never we might even get to a point where we're not even looking at the clock when it comes down to the work that we're doing. One of the things that I found interesting about this is this idea of, you know, do we even work 40 hours a week? Are we always kind of on in our connected environment? And do we maybe if you look at all the screens combined, do we actually already work 60 hours a week between commuting and and getting to places? So I think it's opened up a conversation from a concrete perspective. He's

really talking about efficiencies here. This idea that, oh, you know, you might be able to free up more time in your month eventually, but when you're focused on productivity, you're going to be working at about a 60 hour work week level. But let's be honest, Ben, you and I both know that a lot of the times the tech companies predictions for the way that they're that we're going to adapt to their environments don't really pan out. I want to talk about this sort of the debate between Instagram and TikTok. There's a lot of overlap between those two apps. Some people view them completely differently. I have no time for TikTok in my life.

So as far as I'm concerned, they are anagel, anagelous, they are one in the same. But I remember back in the day, Instagram tried to buy TikTok, right? And I don't think they, they obviously didn't succeed. And so they tried to create a competitor on their own platform in the form of reels. And now there is a rumor suggesting that Instagram could spin off reels into a standalone app.

What are you hearing about that? And I always heard that the special sauce of TikTok wasn't the fact that it was video, the full video, it was the algorithm that made it so special. Yeah, what we're seeing right now is a communications battle essentially, because there really was a drop-off for TikTok as a result of all the political conversation of its potential to be banned.

What we didn't see necessarily was a natural migration of all of that audience to Instagram for everything that Instagram has been able to offer from Reels to Threads. So we're not necessarily seeing Facebook and Meta coming out and saying, hey, we're here to be the successor. We're your diet Pepsi to the Pepsi. They're not saying any of that.

But what they are hoping is that people who have been turned off because of the conversation around TikTok, the uncertainty around whether it's going to be around, will understand that they can still be fulfilled in that environment. But the truth is exactly what you said. No one's been able to replicate the, the effect that Tik Tok has been on, on social media in the past five years. And so they're all jockeying for position on this promise. But the truth is maybe we don't need another Tik Tok. You know, maybe we need something new in our lives.

Exactly. So, yeah. And so I don't think necessarily that this is much more than a communications play. Gotcha. Hey, I want to play some audio for you and for our listeners that will, I don't know, what it's gonna make you feel, but it's not gonna make you feel right. Gavin Purcell, who's the co-host of the AI for Humans podcast, posted an example on Reddit where there's a human being pretending to be an embezzler and he's arguing with a boss and it's dynamic One of them is is AI and one of them is real and I can't tell the difference. Let's listen listen I I don't have all day you got something to say or are you gonna waste my time? Oh, I got something to say I got something to say to you something big

I've been embezzling from the company for four freakingin years and you haven't figured anything out and you know what you're not gonna tell anybody because you have been doing super illegal things across the board and I know and you're gonna keep paying me and I'm not gonna work here anymore you're kidding me embezzling for four years you think you can just waltz in here and dud me you got some serious nerve pump you think you're the only one with skeletons in the closet? Oh, tell me your skeletons because I know them. You better tell me some skeletons. What do you got? Okay, like I don't even it doesn't matter which one is the human and which one is the AI.

Because one of them is and that to me is in real time with no prompts, the AI is adjusting to the conversation. That is freaky, Mohit. We are at such a new level of interaction right now. We're exactly, you know, this debate that you're having online, what we're seeing is many people interacting with these voice agents just to do exactly what you're talking about, just to see if people can figure out the difference between whether it's real or synthetic. It's getting very scary. And here's another level of where it's getting scary. The personalization of it is being embedded in a lot of things like gaming and the way that people can interact with certain apps. If we don't start seeing where the timestamp

is or at least the authenticity stamp is or where we can at least verify some of these voices, it's going to be the Wild West for a little while. And I hate to think what some of this technology is going to be able to do when it's used nefariously. We are talking specifically, I think, about Sesame AI, which is there, this is the breakthrough one that a lot of people are talking about viral, from a viral perspective. And that's an example of what you just played. And Sesame AI is another breakthrough and it's showing that conversational AI is here.

It's accessible on your phone and people will start embedding it in more and more things. It's a question of whether we are going to be able to identify it with our naked ear, as they say. And just like everything else, every single tool can either be used as a shield or as a sword. It can either be used as a weapon or as a way to help people.

And I don't know how much, like we've got this story we're talking about here about teaching critical media literacy skills to people, but in order for them to avoid online scams and misinformation, but the tools are getting so sophisticated that I don't know how much education, like I don't know how you educate people to not believe their eyes and ears,

especially their ears, like the example we just had. I don't know how you defend against this. I don't know either. And it's so interesting that you say that because every time I've had to do a school conversation, I've had to update it with the new rules of the road. And that's every year of change that we're seeing. The changes we're seeing are happening every year,

at least with social media. It took a while for certain things to sort of bubble over and become things that we needed to pay attention to. Right now though, I will say, Ben, that it'll take a very, very coordinated effort for tech companies to be able to understand that the guardrails have to be put in place. Otherwise, it is going to become very, very messy. I mean, we just heard, sorry,

we just heard about the grandparents scam recently that swept this country and how there were just recently arrests of it and millions were lost. And I just fear what some of this technology can do. Well, yeah, I mean, all it's going to take is for one deep fake of Donald Trump to go viral. And it could it could upset markets. It could start a war. I mean, it all the audio is at a point where I can't tell the difference. The video is almost there. Mohit. I mean, this is this is getting to get getting to a point where it's quite frightening. But the other side is it's going to help in things like healthcare and personalization and language barriers

and all of that stuff. Mohit, we're going to leave it there. Thank you very much. Mohit Rajan's, a mediologist and consultant with thinkstart.ca. We'll talk to you soon. Take care. Hi, I'm Donna Friesen from Global National.

Life moves fast these days and we want to make it even easier for you to get the news you need. That's why you can now get Global National every day as a podcast. The biggest stories of the day with analysis from award-winning global news journalists. New episodes drop every day, so take this as your personal invitation to join us on the Global National Podcast. You can find it on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, and wherever you find your favorite podcasts.