Rick Harrison explains why he believes government regulation can make life more difficult for lower-income Americans and small businesses.
Speaking at CPAC, the Pawn Stars businessman discusses pawn shops, access to credit, and the impact of financial regulations on consumers with limited borrowing options. Harrison argues that restrictions intended to protect borrowers can sometimes push them toward more expensive alternatives, while also describing excessive regulation as a major challenge for small businesses.
CPAC hosts incredible guests and speakers including Ben Shapiro, Michael Knowles of the Daily Wire, the late Charlie Kirk of Turning Point USA, Steve Bannon of War Room, Donald Trump Jr., Vivek Ramaswamy, Glenn Beck, Mark Levin, Dan Bongino, and many more leading voices in conservative media and politics.
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Hi, sir. Thank you for being here.
My name is Marissa Kearns. I'm the elected Republican
Lieutenant Governor in Hawaii. Aloha! Mabuhay!
My first time here, sir. My question is,
when I was campaigning in Hawaii,
most of the islands' pawn shop owners are closing down.
You know, again, as everybody knows,
tourism is our number one business. So, of course,
only locals can, you know,
go to your pawn shop and buy whatever out there, right? What can you
do is there any way you can come to our state
and pretty much you know give us some guts to
bring back the pawn shop business we need to grow business there
because they're all dying because
all the democrats running our state all right we're anti-business
those suckers they monopolize
everything down there help us please i'll pay
for your trip i own an airbnb come down i'll pay all
right so what i mean basically the solution
is i mean most people don't realize this 25 percent
the American population do not have a bank account
and can't get a bank account. And they have to use
places like pawn shops. Government regulation just makes it
a hundred times worse for poor people in
this country. I'll give you an example.
Back in 2008, federal government passed a law on subprime
credit cards. And what it did was it basically made,
you can't charge more than 36% on a credit
card, which sounds like a lot. It really is.
But these companies were giving loans to people with
really, really bad credit. If they didn't charge
these high interest rates, they would lose money
and go out of business. So in turn, what happened was,
is the credit card companies around the
United States stopped issuing subprime credit cards.
Poor people around this country, that was
their lifeline at the end of the month.
If, you know, things were bad, they would use that. It was
literally 3% a month. It's a lot.
And there's extra fees on top of that. But since the federal
government just basically made subprime credit cards impossible,
what happened? I guarantee in
the majority of this country,
you saw payday loan centers pop up everywhere, charging on average of
30% a month. They did nothing for poor people in this country.
Government regulation just made it
worse. And that's what happens.
That's why the pawn shops in Hawaii, why they're doing bad,
they're regulated to death. Government regulation kills business.
Trust me, the American people
knows what's best for them. The problem with the Democrats
is they think they know what's best for
you. And it's, you know, it never works out that way.
Last two questions. Hi, Rick. My name's Ian.
I'm from New Jersey. My question is,
what advice would you give to someone who's looking to start
their own small business okay if someone wants
to start their small business my best advice is
just really be prepared to work like 20 hours a day
and let life suck for the first few years
okay after that it'll be great thanks everybody
for having me i like i said i only had a short
time and see you next year
