Special Episode of We The Builders from Hill & Valley Forum 2026: Conversation with David Friedberg on rise and fall of empires, the state of US economy, robots as an economic platform, what has changed since the Winning AI Race Summit featuring President Trump, reindustrialization, the end of institutional education and of course the California bankruptcy.
Watch on Youtube:
Timestamps:
01:21 - Shifting landscape between Silicon Valley and DC
02:51 - AI has become a political attack vector
04:46 - Late-stage empires and the impact of national debt
07:03 - Potential for AI to rewrite the story of US economy
08:26 - AI’s recent performance and productivity gains
10:03 - Bullish outlook on humanoid robots
11:16 - Robots as a platform for economic mobility
13:41 - Reindustrialization and energy production challenges
15:15 - The “functionally bankrupt” status of California
16:50 - The declining value of institutional education
18:46 - Personalized AI-driven tutoring as the future
20:01 - Emerging private sector models for education
