Economics Matters with Laurence Kotlikoff

What if solving Argentina's inflation crisis required nothing more than a single televised announcement — and the government is still not making it?Emilio Ocampo advised President Milei during his 2023 presidential campaign, spent decades as a managing director at Morgan Stanley, and has spent the better part of his career making the case for Argentina to do the one thing almost everyone agrees would work, and almost no one in power is willing to do: dollarize.In this episode, Professor Kotlikoff, who visited Buenos Aires in November and published his own dollarization proposal in the Financial Times, sits down with Ocampo for a frank insider conversation on where Argentina actually stands, why the Milei reform is in a race against the electoral calendar, and exactly what it would take, mechanically and politically, to end Argentina's century-long cycle of inflation, default, and despair.This is not theory. Both men have been inside the government and believe the window is closing.What You'll Learn:[00:03:00] Where Argentina's inflation stands today: down from 200% to 30% annually, but the hard part is still ahead[00:05:08] The K-shaped recovery: energy and mining are booming while manufacturing and construction, the biggest employers, are stagnant[00:06:00] What Peronist corporatism actually is, and why half of Argentina's economy still runs on a philosophy lifted from Mussolini's Italy[00:15:42] Why Argentina's debt ratio is technically manageable but still pays 420 basis points over US Treasuries: the price of a bad reputation[00:18:54] Larry's Financial Times proposal: the US funds dollarization via a contingent loan, Argentina gets monetary stability, and the loan disappears unless a future government undoes the reform[00:41:16] The Ecuador precedent: dollarized by presidential announcement in January 2000, survived a coup 10 days later, two sovereign defaults, COVID, and oil price collapses...and is still dollarized today[00:45:00] Why Argentina is already de facto dollarized: surgeries paid in $100 bills, apartments priced in dollars, roughly four times more physical dollars than pesos in circulation[00:48:00] The mechanics of how to actually do it: set the exchange rate at market, declare the dollar legal tender, keep the peso for small change[00:51:32] Why December 2025, after Milei's election win and with full US Treasury support, was the optimal moment to dollarize, and why that window may be narrowing[01:00:00] Why Ocampo says do it today: with elections 18 months away, the probability math favors moving now instead of betting on a recovery that may not arrive in timeFeatured Guest:Emilio Ocampo is an Argentine economist, author, and professor at UCEMA in Buenos Aires. He served as economic advisor to President Milei during Argentina's 2023 presidential campaign and is internationally recognized for his work on monetary institutions, dollarization, and Latin American economic history. He previously held senior positions at Chase Manhattan Bank, Salomon Brothers, and Morgan Stanley, where he was a managing director. He is co-author of Dolarización: Una Solución para la Argentina and a regular contributor to La Nación.Resources:Dolarización: Una Solución para la Argentina by Ocampo and Cachanosky: amazon.comProfessor Kotlikoff's FT article summary (Ocampo Substack): dolarizacionargentina.substack.comProfessor Kotlikoff's earlier dollarization piece: larrykotlikoff.substack.comSargent, "The Ends of Four Big Inflations" (1982): ideas.repec.org2025 US-Argentina currency swap background: wikipedia.orgEmilio Ocampo's Substack: dolarizacionargentina.substack.comEconomics Matters Substack: larrykotlikoff.substack.comEconomics Matters: The Podcast is hosted by Larry Kotlikoff, Professor of Economics at Boston University.Disclaimer: Any opinions expressed on Economics Matters are those of the authors and guests. These are not the opinions of Boston University or Economic Security Planning, Inc.

What if the single biggest financial threat facing young Americans right now isn't student debt or housing prices, but a $22% credit card rate on one side and an online gambling habit disguised as investing on the other?Beth Kobliner has been writing about personal finance since she ghostwrote Sylvia Porter's syndicated column at age 22. She spent eight years at Money Magazine, appeared with Elmo on Sesame Street to teach kids about money, served on the President's Advisory Council on Financial Capability for Young Americans, and has now published five editions of her New York Times bestseller Get a Financial Life, the definitive money guide for people in their 20s and 30s, over 30 years and still going.In this episode, Professor Kotlikoff sits down with Beth for a wide ranging conversation that covers compound interest, credit card debt, the rent vs. buy decision, online gambling statistics that should alarm every parent, and the timeless financial principles that have quietly made thousands of readers wealthy over three decades.What You'll Learn:[00:33:04] Why starting early is the single most powerful financial move you can make: the compound interest case in plain language[00:38:13] Why credit card debt is worse now than it has ever been: the average rate has hit 22%, and even good credit gets you 18%[00:39:01] Paying off a 22% credit card is the equivalent of earning 22% guaranteed after taxes: there is nowhere else that math works[00:37:23] The index fund case: Fidelity at .015%, Vanguard at .03%, and you can start with as little as a dollar[00:41:42] When the stock market is the wrong place for your savings: the down payment scenario and the high-yield savings account alternative[00:50:48] 34% of Gen Z gambles online regularly, and one in four young people believe prediction markets are a form of investing[00:52:38] Two-thirds of prediction market winnings go to one-tenth of 1% of accounts: who is actually winning, and who is losing[00:43:09] The "different selves" framework: why your current self is the fiduciary for your middle-aged and retired self, whether you like it or not[00:49:17] State and local housing programs most young buyers have never heard of: the National Council of State Housing Agencies and what it offers[00:29:03] Why connections are not cheating: how Beth landed every major career opportunity, and why her father's approach still works in 2026Featured Guest:Beth Kobliner is a personal finance journalist, author of two New York Times bestsellers, and a member of the President's Advisory Council on Financial Capability for Young Americans. She has written for Money Magazine, The NY Times, The Wall Street Journal, PBS NewsHour, CNN, and MSNBC. She is currently working with the Heckscher Foundation to create a financial literacy curriculum for New York City high school students.Resources Mentioned:Get a Financial Life: Personal Finance in Your Twenties and Thirties (5th Edition) by Beth Kobliner, the definitive guide now over half a million copies sold across 30 years:https://www.amazon.com/Get-Financial-Life-Personal-Twenties/dp/1668095351Make Your Kid a Money Genius (Even If You're Not): A Parents' Guide for Kids 3 to 23 by Beth Kobliner, translated into nine languages:https://www.amazon.com/Make-Your-Money-Genius-Youre/dp/1476766819Beth Kobliner's website — resources, recommendations, and updates:https://bethkobliner.comNational Council of State Housing Agencies — state and local homebuyer assistance programs:https://www.ncsha.orgEconomics Matters Substack (Larry Kotlikoff):https://larrykotlikoff.substack.comEconomics Matters: The Podcast is hosted by Larry Kotlikoff, Professor of Economics at Boston University.Disclaimer: Any opinions expressed on Economics Matters are those of the authors and guests. These are not the opinions of Boston University or Economic Security Planning, Inc.

What does it feel like to watch an AI solve a problem in a single prompt that you've spent years working on, and produce a stronger result than your own published papers?Professor Kotlikoff grew up academically alongside two economists, Yuri Dadush and Michael Pomerleano, who were his classmates when he began his PhD at Harvard in 1973. In this episode, he sits down with their sons: Daniel Dadush, a professor of mathematics and optimization at Utrecht University, and Daniel Pomerleano, a professor of pure mathematics at UMass Boston, both of whom are watching AI upend their fields in real time.This is a conversation about what's actually happening inside mathematics right now: which problems AI has solved, how it solved them, what those solutions reveal about the limits of human specialization, and whether the next generation of mathematicians will bother showing up at all.What You'll Learn:[00:17:39] The moment ChatGPT produced a stronger result than two of Daniel Dadush's published conference papers: what happened in a single prompt session[00:31:13] The Erdos Distance Problem: open for 60+ years, solved by AI in a few pages, and why the ideas inside it cracked other problems too[00:35:39] The cycle double cover conjecture: an open problem with a short proof human mathematicians simply overlooked[00:36:26] Why AI proofs tend to be strikingly short: what that reveals about how differently machines approach mathematics[00:41:46] Why AI companies used math as their benchmark: what solving long chains of abstract reasoning was really designed to prove[01:00:39] The PhD thesis problem: how Daniel P. generated what would have been a strong thesis three years ago, in an afternoon, with a problem list and ChatGPT[01:08:46] Why pure mathematics may become a less attractive field for the next generation: and what's lost if that happens[01:09:23] The conference room scenario: an audience member spinning up 20 AI agents during a talk to answer the speaker's own research question before the talk ends[01:11:42] The policy question: NSF funding going to zero for economics while $200 billion flows to AI, and what hollowing out academic talent actually costs usFeatured Guests:Daniel Dadush is a professor of mathematics at Utrecht University and leader of its Networks and Organizations Group. He completed his PhD in Algorithms, Combinatorics, and Optimization at Georgia Tech and held a Simons Postdoctoral Fellowship at the Courant Institute at NYU. He specializes in theoretical computer science and mathematical optimization.Daniel Pomerleano is a professor of mathematics at UMass Boston. He completed his PhD at UC Berkeley and has held positions at Imperial College London. His research focuses on mirror symmetry, symplectic topology, and non-commutative Hodge theory.Resource Links:Fermat's Last Theorem by Simon Singh: the popular mathematics history book Larry recommends for non-mathematicians, available in multiple editions:https://www.amazon.com/Fermats-Last-Theorem-Simon-Singh/dp/1841157910The Man Who Knew Infinity (2016): the biographical film about Srinivasa Ramanujan, starring Dev Patel and Jeremy Irons, available to rent or buy on Amazon Prime Video:https://www.amazon.com/Man-Who-Knew-Infinity/dp/B01HRX0T8KEconomics Matters Substack (Larry Kotlikoff): https://larrykotlikoff.substack.comEconomics Matters: The Podcast is hosted by Larry Kotlikoff, Professor of Economics at Boston University.Disclaimer: Any opinions expressed on Economics Matters are those of the authors and guests. These are not the opinions of Boston University or Economic Security Planning, Inc.

What if the Medicare premium increases heading your way aren't just a number, they're a signal that the entire system is heading somewhere most retirees aren't prepared for?Phil Moeller has co-written a New York Times bestseller on Social Security, authored the definitive consumer guide to Medicare, and spent decades covering personal finance for US News, PBS NewsHour, and Money Magazine. He's also a Medicare enrollee with strong opinions about what's working, what isn't, and what you should do before your next open enrollment window.In this episode, Professor Kotlikoff sits down with his longtime friend and co-author for a conversation that starts with the nuts and bolts of Medicare: Medigap, Part D strategy, Medicare Advantage trade-offs, the birthday rule — and ends somewhere bigger: a frank discussion of whether America's healthcare and retirement trajectory is fixable at all.What You'll Learn:[00:03:45] Why Phil chose traditional Medicare with Plan G Medigap — and why he still thinks it's right for people of means[00:05:42] The $1 million hospital bill story — how a $3,500 Medigap premium produced zero out-of-pocket cost[00:06:38] The $5-a-month Part D strategy — and when to stop caring about the deductible[00:09:48] Why the Part B premium is rising at roughly twice the Social Security cost-of-living rate[00:15:23] When Medicare Advantage makes sense — and where it breaks down when you need it most[00:18:23] The birthday rule most people have never heard of[00:19:39] What the One Big Beautiful Bill means for Medicaid in your state[00:27:45] The hidden $600-$700 billion annual subsidy inside Parts B and D — and who's really paying[00:35:32] How seniors went from the poorest to the wealthiest generation — and what that data looks like[00:44:51] What Phil Moeller would do as healthcare czar[00:59:10] Why 35 cents of every healthcare dollar goes to administration[01:00:42] The purple billionaire argument — why Larry thinks an independent candidate is the only path to real reformFeatured Guest:Philip Moeller is a veteran personal finance journalist and author of Get What's Yours for Medicare and co-author of the New York Times bestseller Get What's Yours: The Secrets to Maxing Out Your Social Security. He publishes the Substack Aging in America.Larry Kotlikoff is a Professor of Economics at Boston University and one of the country's foremost experts on Social Security, Medicare, and generational fiscal policy.Referenced Links:Get What's Yours (Revised): amazon.comGet What's Yours for Medicare (Revised): amazon.comAging in America Substack: philmoeller.substack.comWe've Got You Covered by Einav & Finkelstein: amazon.comGerontocracy in America by Samuel Moyn: amazon.comCost Plus Drugs: costplusdrugs.comMedicare Extra Help: medicare.govEconomics Matters Substack: larrykotlikoff.substack.comEconomics Matters: The Podcast is hosted by Larry Kotlikoff, Professor of Economics at Boston University.Disclaimer: Any opinions expressed on Economics Matters are those of the authors and guests. These are not the opinions of Boston University or Economic Security Planning, Inc.

What if the three most dangerous regimes on earth — Russia, China, and Iran — are all weaker than they appear, and yet America is still losing ground to all three at once?Sir Niall Ferguson has spent a career studying how empires rise, overreach, and fall. He watched the Soviet Union collapse from the inside out while everyone in Washington assumed it would last forever. He's been warning about China's hidden fragility for years while the consensus said otherwise. Currently, he's watching the United States make the most conventional mistake of Donald Trump's entire political career: getting bogged down in the Middle East on the side of Israel, just like George W. Bush before him.Professor Kotlikoff and his old friend have a wide-ranging, rapid-fire conversation covering the real state of the Iran conflict, why a Taiwan semiconductor crisis is the single biggest threat to the world economy in the next two years, why Putin cannot win in Ukraine and knows it, why nuclear weapons won't be used, what Ferguson would actually tell Trump to do right now, and whether American universities brought the current backlash on themselves.What You'll Learn:[00:11:45] Why this is not World War III[00:13:50] The "American Suez" framework[00:17:00] Why there is no great military option left[00:19:15] The desalination plant vulnerability[00:22:00] The missile economics problem[00:25:00] The authoritarian axis[00:31:53] How the regime change in Iran already happened[00:34:15] Ferguson's actual policy prescription[00:45:11] Why Ferguson doesn't think China will overtake the United States[00:45:33] Cold War II and the Cuban Missile Crisis parallel [00:47:01] Why Russia is no longer a great power[00:48:00] Why Putin won't use nuclear weapons[00:53:35] The optimistic scenario[00:56:29] The university debate [01:01:26] The 75% to 35% collapse Sir Niall Ferguson is the Milbank Family Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University and Senior Faculty Fellow at the Belfer Center at Harvard. He holds a DPhil from Oxford University and has taught at Oxford, Cambridge, Harvard, and Stanford. He is the author of 16 books including The Ascent of Money, Civilization: The West and the Rest, The Great Degeneration, Doom: The Politics of Catastrophe, and the two-volume biography Kissinger (volume two forthcoming). He was knighted in 2023. He writes regularly for The Free Press and Bloomberg.Resources Mentioned:The Ascent of Money: A Financial History of the World — Ferguson's recommended starting point for an economics audience, now in a 10th anniversary edition:https://www.amazon.com/Ascent-Money-Financial-History-World/dp/0143116177The Great Degeneration: How Institutions Decay and Economies Die — the book most directly influenced by Kotlikoff's generational accounting work:https://www.amazon.com/Great-Degeneration-Institutions-Decay-Economies/dp/1594205450Doom: The Politics of Catastrophe:https://www.amazon.com/Doom-Politics-Catastrophe-Niall-Ferguson/dp/0593297377Kissinger: 1923-1968: The Idealist — volume one of the biography Ferguson is still completing:https://www.amazon.com/Kissinger-1923-1968-Idealist-Niall-Ferguson/dp/0143109758Full Niall Ferguson book catalog:https://www.amazon.com/Niall-Ferguson/e/B000APQ8G0"How to Stop Iran from Winning the War" by Ferguson, Haass, and Zelikow — the Strait of Hormuz Authority proposal referenced in the episode, published in The Free Press, April 13, 2026:https://www.thefp.com/p/how-to-stop-iran-from-winning-the-warNiall Ferguson at The Free Press: https://www.thefp.comKarim Sadjadpour at The Atlantic — Ferguson's recommended source on contemporary Iran:https://www.theatlantic.com/author/karim-sadjadpour/Economics Matters Substack (Larry Kotlikoff): https://larrykotlikoff.substack.comDisclaimer: Any opinions expressed on Economics Matters are those of the authors and guests. These are not the opinions of Boston University or Economic Security Planning, Inc.

What if the passive investing revolution (the idea that just buying the index and holding is the smartest thing most people can do) has quietly turned into something that no longer resembles the efficient market it was designed to track?Every month, $33 billion flows automatically from 401(k) contributions into U.S. equity index funds. That money doesn't stop to ask whether Nvidia is fairly valued. It doesn't check whether 50% of the S&P 500 being tied to AI makes sense. It just buys, systematically and relentlessly, concentrating more and more capital into fewer and fewer companies — and in doing so, may be inflating the very market it's supposed to passively reflect.Professor Kotlikoff sits down with Jack Schibli, principal at Lane Generational, for a wide-ranging conversation about the structural changes quietly reshaping the U.S. stock market. From the mechanics of passive investing to the fragility of private credit, the vulnerability of the insurance industry, and the real competitive threat of Chinese AI to the trillion-dollar data center build-out Wall Street is betting on.This is original, ground-level analysis from an investor who's doing the work most institutional researchers aren't.What You'll Learn:[00:08:06] The "Illiquid Jenga Tower" — Jack's original deep dive into the fragility of private credit[00:12:20] Why the insurance industry could be the next AIG[00:15:01] The redemption gate hiding in plain sight inside private credit funds[00:19:19] What would actually need to happen for a systemic market event[00:35:33] The illusion of diversification inside your index fund[00:37:30] Why China is winning the AI cost war[00:42:56] The IP transfer problem nobody's discussing[00:46:49] How passive investing mechanically inflates valuations[00:47:44] Apple's $1.46 trillion buyback problem[00:51:18] The inelasticity trap — and why it only gets worse[00:54:35] The pod shop dynamic: 440% leverage and no long-term thinking[00:58:25] How retail investors became 20% of daily trading volume[01:02:51] Palantir at 310x earnings — and Lululemon's collapse in reverse[01:10:28] The causal chain that's flipped: the market is now running the economy[01:12:05] The Bessent paradox — criticizing Yellen for exactly what he's now doingFeatured GuestJack Schibli is a principal at Lane Generational, an independent registered investment advisor accessible through Fidelity Investments. He studied economics with a minor in computer science at Middlebury College, trained as a competitive ski racer, and began his career working with Lane Generational co-founder Fred Lane at Raymond James. He writes a quarterly investment research blog at lanegenerational.com/insights, known for its original structural analysis of market dynamics, private credit, and AI-driven disruption. His recent pieces include "Poker Face," "The Illiquid Jenga Tower," and several widely circulated posts on passive investing mechanics.Resources MentionedLane Generational — Jack Schibli and Fred Lane's independent RIA, accessible through Fidelity Investments: lanegenerational.comLane Generational Insights Blog — Jack's quarterly research pieces, including "Poker Face" and "The Illiquid Jenga Tower": lanegenerational.com/insightsDisclaimer: Any opinions expressed on Economics Matters are those of the authors and guests. These are not the opinions of Boston University or Economic Security Planning, Inc.Lane Generational is an SEC Registered Investment Advisor. The information provided is for educational and informational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice, and it should not be relied on as such. It should not be considered a solicitation to buy or an offer to sell a security. I, Larry Kotlikoff, am an investor with Lane Generational. This is not an endorsement, and I am not compensated by Lane Generational.

What if one of the most famous and widely cited findings in modern economics (that money doesn't really make you happier) turned out to simply be wrong? And what does the economist who proved it wrong have to say about where America is heading next?Justin Wolfers is not a typical economist. He's written landmark papers on happiness, divorce, racial discrimination in NBA officiating, corruption in college basketball, gender and wages, prediction markets, and the political economy of elections. He runs one of the most widely read economics Substacks on the internet, co-authored a leading undergraduate economics textbook, and once showed Danny Kahneman data that changed the Nobel laureate's mind on a question he'd spent decades answering.In this episode, Professor Kotlikoff sits down with the University of Michigan professor for a wide-ranging conversation that moves from the science of happiness to the economics of marriage and divorce, the crisis facing young men, the future of American institutions under pressure, and a closing argument for why — despite everything — there has never been a better time to be alive.What You'll LearnWhat You'll Learn:[00:09:03] Why Gary Becker is the most important economist of the 20th century[00:17:51] The radical idea that economists should tell people what to do [00:20:00] The ice cream story that turned Justin into a behavioral economist [00:34:57] Why your grandmother said "opposites attract" — and why she was wrong [00:37:54] The divorce statistic nobody is talking about [00:40:05] Why the 1950s marriage model was the historical anomaly, not the norm[00:42:01] The Easterlin Paradox — and why it was wrong[00:58:21] The 60/40 gender split in college enrollment [01:01:16] Is there a crisis of masculinity?[01:04:48] Why attacking institutions is the most dangerous economic move America can make[01:06:51] The optimist's closing argument [01:08:32] Why Justin named his Substack "Platypus Economics" Resources Mentioned:Platypus Economics — Justin Wolfers's Substack, with a simple mission: teach the world economics in an accessible way that helps us all collectively understand it better:https://newsletter.platypuseconomics.comPrinciples of Economics (3rd Edition) by Betsey Stevenson and Justin Wolfers — Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Principles-Economics-Betsey-Stevenson/dp/1429237864Justin Wolfers's full research catalog — available at the National Bureau of Economic Research:https://www.nber.org (search "Justin Wolfers")Of Boys and Men: Why the Modern Male Is Struggling, Why It Matters, and What to Do About It by Richard V. Reeves — a Book of the Year according to The New Yorker and The Economist, and included in President Obama's 2024 summer reading list, tackling the structural challenges facing boys and men in education, the workplace, and family life:https://www.amazon.com/Boys-Men-Modern-Struggling-Matters/dp/0815739877Featured GuestJustin Wolfers is a professor of economics and public policy at the University of Michigan, a research associate of the National Bureau of Economic Research, a non-resident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and the Peterson Institute for International Economics, and a visiting professor of economics at the University of Sydney. He earned his PhD from Harvard University and his undergraduate degree from the University of Sydney, where he won the University Medal. Named by the IMF as one of the 25 economists under 45 shaping how we think about the global economy, he is the co-author of a leading undergraduate economics textbook and the author of the widely read Substack Platypus Economics.Disclaimer: Any opinions expressed on Economics Matters are those of the authors and guests. These are not the opinions of Boston University or Economic Security Planning, Inc.

The headlines say Social Security is running out of money. But what if the real numbers are actually far worse than what the headlines are showing you, and the trustees' report is burying the truth in an appendix table that almost nobody reads?The 2026 Social Security Trustees Report just dropped, and the media coverage has been loud, alarming, and, still understating how serious the problem actually is. In this Substack Live conversation, personal finance journalist and retirement specialist Pam Krueger sits down with Professor Kotlikoff to cut through the noise, decode the actual math, and answer the question every pre-retiree and current beneficiary is asking: what does this mean for me?This is not a doom-and-gloom session. It is a clear-eyed, numbers-first look at what the system is, why it is broken, what fixing it would actually require, and what you can do right now to protect yourself.What You'll Learn:[00:06:26] The table buried in the Trustees Report that tells the real story — Table VI F1, hidden deep in the appendix, reveals the system needs a 46% payroll tax hike, not the 22% benefit cut the headlines are running with[00:08:54] The difference between the 2032 cash flow problem and the real, permanent problem — why the 22% cut number is actually the short-term version, and the true immediate fix requires a 31% permanent benefit cut starting today[00:10:01] Will Social Security checks actually stop? — the straight answer, with context on what "enough money to pay 70% of benefits forever" actually means for your household[00:12:11] How the pay-as-you-go system actually works — a plain-language breakdown of FICA taxes, covered earnings, the trust fund checking account, and why the demographics have turned against the whole structure[00:16:00] Why fertility rates are at the heart of this crisis — the U.S. fertility rate has dropped from 2.1 to 1.59, and what that means for the number of workers available to fund your retirement[00:17:23] The Ponzi scheme history nobody taught you — how every president from Eisenhower to Nixon took turns goosing benefits when the baby boom made it look affordable, and locked in promises the system can no longer keep[00:25:44] What younger workers should actually expect — Social Security will likely exist, but the tax burden on younger generations is the real threat, not elimination of the program[00:34:39] Why simply lifting the payroll tax ceiling is not the silver bullet it sounds like — and who actually gets caught in the crossfire[00:43:00] Larry's Personal Security Account proposal — a Singapore-style fully funded replacement for the current system, modeled on what major U.S. corporations did when their own pension Ponzi schemes ran dry in the 1970s and 80s[00:51:54] The three radical fixes that could actually work — reform Social Security at its core, adopt a Scandinavian-style healthcare system, and overhaul the tax structure. Tweaks will not cut it.Featured Guest:Pam Krueger is a personal finance journalist, entrepreneur, and co-host of the podcast Friends Talk Money with Terry Savage and Richard Eisenberg. Her Substack, Count Up with Pam Krueger, focuses on practical retirement preparation for people in the years leading up to retirement.Economics Matters: The Podcast is hosted by Larry Kotlikoff, Professor of Economics at Boston University.Disclaimer: Any opinions expressed on Economics Matters’ episodes are those of the authors and guests. These are not the opinions of Boston University or Economic Security Planning, Inc.

What does it actually take to consistently beat the market when 90% of professional fund managers can't, and what is a Wall Street veteran seeing right now that has him warning ordinary investors to get off margin immediately?Steve Laffey has lived several lives in one. Raised in genuine poverty in Cranston, Rhode Island, he earned his way to Bowdoin College and Harvard Business School, landed on a trading desk at PaineWebber surrounded by guys with names ending in vowels, survived the crash of '87 up close, built Morgan Keegan into the most respected stock picking shop in the country according to the Wall Street Journal, returned to Cranston to become a two-term Republican mayor of a Democrat city, ran for president in the last election, and has spent the intervening years quietly running what he calls "the hedge fund I never started."In this episode, Professor Kotlikoff sits down with Laffey for a wide-ranging, story-driven conversation on how great investing actually works. The gut instincts, the discipline, the hard lessons, and the very specific warning signs he is watching right now in the current market.This is not theory. Every lesson in this episode comes with a story.What You'll Learn:[00:11:22] Lesson 1: "Eat like an elephant, poop like an ant" — ride your winners hard, but cut losers immediately and without emotion, no matter how right you think you are[00:13:08] Lesson 2: Never use margin — margin debt in the U.S. stock market has just hit an all-time high, and Laffey's single most urgent message is: get off margin now[00:29:36] Lesson 3: Crashes don't happen from all-time highs — they happen after a selloff has already begun and people panic, a pattern Laffey has watched repeat across four decades[00:43:36] Why Laffey doesn't own ETFs — when every stock moves together because of passive fund flows, being right about a company doesn't protect you from the market going down[00:51:54] The 15-stock rule that beat Goldman Sachs — why concentration and personal accountability beat committee-driven diversification every time, and why past 15 stocks you're just buying noise[00:45:00] The A2 Milk story — how a cattle show in Colorado, a book called "The Devil's in the Milk," and a hunch about Chinese baby formula led to buying a New Zealand stock at 20 cents and selling it at $9[01:00:32] The Galaxy Digital play — how Laffey found a Bitcoin company trading at 60 cents with $1.20 of Bitcoin on its balance sheet, on an exchange most U.S. institutions legally couldn't access[01:02:10] Why you should never watch CNBC — and what it means when a network that hated Bitcoin suddenly loves it[01:06:09] The Jim Cramer contrarian indicator — when Cramer declared oil "uninvestable," energy was at 3% of the S&P, its all-time low. Laffey bought. He made a lot of money.[01:16:33] The single most important thing to do with your portfolio right now — get off leverage, know your age, and never put yourself in a position where a 50% drawdown changes how you liveFeatured Guest:Steve Laffey is a former Wall Street trader and investment banker, one-time head of Morgan Keegan's nationally ranked stock research operation, two-term Republican mayor of Cranston, Rhode Island, author of Primary Mistake, and 2024 Republican presidential primary candidate. He has been a practicing private investor since leaving institutional finance and is a frequent public speaker on fiscal reform, investing, and American economic policy.Economics Matters: The Podcast is hosted by Larry Kotlikoff, Professor of Economics at Boston University.Disclaimer: Any opinions expressed on Economics Matters’ episodes are those of the authors and guests. These are not the opinions of Boston University or Economic Security Planning, Inc.

What if the most powerful tax-advantaged account in your financial life was designed by one economist with a better idea, and the full version of that idea was never actually implemented?You've probably heard of the Health Savings Account. You may even have one. But the man who invented it says the version Congress passed is a watered-down shadow of what it could be. And that's just the beginning of what's broken.In this episode, Larry Kotlikoff sits down with Dr. John Goodman, the Wall Street Journal's "father of HSAs," author of 16 books, Bill Buckley's primetime debate partner, and one of the four most influential figures in post-war American healthcare policy. This is a high value conversation between two economists who've spent careers trying to fix the same broken system with notably different tools.What You'll Learn:[00:09:06] The HSA origin story — how a Cato Institute assignment in 1990 produced the idea now powering 37 million accounts, and why every special interest in Washington opposed it[00:10:13] The design flaw Congress built in from day one — and what a "Roth HSA" would actually look like[00:19:16] Why Medicaid patients visit the ER 40% more after enrolling — and the HSA-based fix that hospital lobbyists killed before it got a hearing[00:34:43] The LASIK principle — why cosmetic surgery gets cheaper and better every year while everything else in medicine doesn't, and what that tells us about markets[00:36:24] The California reference pricing experiment — how one insurer drove hip replacement costs from $100,000 down to $30,000 statewide in just over a year[00:44:51] Why your employer plan was designed, possibly by accident, to attract healthy people and repel sick ones[00:21:17] The Columbia dissertation that caused a near-riot — Goodman's economic theory of democratic decision-making that predicted exactly why healthcare reform is nearly impossible[00:50:33] The Social Security and Medicare crisis Congress discusses privately but won't touch publicly — and why seniors must see something in it for themselves before any reform can happenFeatured Guest:Dr. John Goodman is president and CEO of the Goodman Institute and Senior Research Fellow at the Independent Institute. He is credited by the Wall Street Journal as the father of Health Savings Accounts and one of the four most influential figures in post-war American healthcare. Author of 16 books including Priceless and Patient Power (300,000 copies sold), he appeared approximately two dozen times as Bill Buckley's debate partner on PBS Firing Line.Resources Mentioned:Priceless: Curing the Healthcare Crisis: amazon.comPatient Power: amazon.comA Better Choice: Healthcare Solutions for America: amazon.comThe Goodman Institute: goodmaninstitute.orgFull John Goodman book catalog: amazon.com/authorEconomics Matters Substack: larrykotlikoff.economicsmatters.comEconomics Matters: The Podcast is hosted by Larry Kotlikoff, Professor of Economics at Boston University.Disclaimer: Any opinions expressed on Economics Matters’ episodes are those of the authors and guests. These are not the opinions of Boston University or Economic Security Planning, Inc.

What happens when five completely unrelated thinkers, writing across five different decades, all point to the exact same moment in history as a coming crisis point...and that moment is now?Samuel Huntington, Neil Howe, Ray Dalio, George Friedman, and Peter Turchin never collaborated. All of them landed on the 2020s. In this episode, Larry Kotlikoff sits down with Bruce Mehlman — founder of Mehlman Consulting, former Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Technology Policy under George W. Bush, and author of the widely-read Substack Age of Disruption, for a conversation covering geopolitical aftershocks, political polarization, AI's economic risk, and whether the median American worker has gained any ground in fifty years.What You'll Learn in This Episode:[00:08:05] What the Iran conflict revealed about global supply chain fragility — and the permanent changes companies are making now[00:11:43] The "mid-2020s crisis" convergence — five major historical frameworks, developed independently, all pointing to right now[00:15:39] Why 11 of the last 13 federal elections have been "change" elections — up from just 3 of 10 in the 1960s and '70s[00:21:02] The staggering partisan perception gap — how badly Republicans and Democrats misjudge what the other side actually looks like[00:31:02] A sharp disagreement over whether AI is overhyped — Larry argues AI gets deterministic financial questions catastrophically wrong; Bruce pushes back with the early-aviation analogy[00:40:52] The "servant economy" concern — whether AI eliminates good middle-management jobs while leaving low-wage service work behind[00:48:38] A Social Security trustees report most people missed — the program is now 46% underfunded, requiring a payroll tax hike from 12.4% to 18.1% just to keep pace[00:27:30] The gut-punch question from The 5 Types of Wealth — how many more times will you actually see your aging parents?Featured Guest:Bruce Mehlman is the founder of Mehlman Consulting, a bipartisan firm that helps Fortune 500 companies and startups navigate policy and political risk. He previously served as Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Technology Policy under President George W. Bush and held roles at Cisco Systems, the U.S. House of Representatives, and a Washington law firm. He is the executive director of the Technology CEO Council and publishes the widely-read weekly Substack Age of Disruption, known for its data-driven infographics on political and technological trends, regularly cited by The Washington Post, Axios, Politico, CNN, Bloomberg, and Fox News.Resources Mentioned:Bruce Mehlman's Age of Disruption - https://brucemehlman.substack.com/ Six-Chart Sunday (#100) - How to Navigate an Age of Disruption" — https://brucemehlman.substack.com/p/six-chart-sunday-100-how-to-navigate "Six-Chart Sunday – Stuck" - https://brucemehlman.substack.com/p/six-chart-sunday-stuck The Storm Before the Calm by George Friedman - https://www.amazon.com/Storm-Before-Calm-Americas-Discord/dp/0385540493The Fourth Turning by Neil Howe - https://www.amazon.com/Fourth-Turning-American-Prophecy-Rendezvous/dp/0767900464Changing World Order by Ray Dalio - https://www.amazon.com/Changing-World-Order-Nations-Succeed/dp/1982160276The 5 Types of Wealth by Sahil Bloom - https://www.amazon.com/Types-Wealth-Transformative-Guide-Design/dp/059372318XThe Vertigo Years by Philip Blom - https://www.amazon.com/Vertigo-Years-Europe-1900-1914/dp/0465020291Larry Kotlikoff's Substack, Economics Matters (link: larrykotlikoff.economicsmatters.com)

What does it actually take to solve a scientific puzzle that stumped researchers for fifty years — and why are the same AI tools that cracked it still getting basic financial math catastrophically wrong?In 2024, Demis Hassabis won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for something that sounds almost too ambitious to be real: teaching artificial intelligence to predict the three-dimensional shape of any protein, a problem that had resisted traditional science for half a century. The breakthrough, called AlphaFold, has already mapped over 200 million proteins, a feat with profound implications for how we understand and treat disease.In this episode, Larry Kotlikoff sits down with Sebastian Mallaby, the New York Times bestselling author and veteran journalist behind The Infinity Machine, his deeply reported new biography of Hassabis and the rise of DeepMind. Mallaby walks through the improbable arc of Hassabis's career - from chess prodigy to video game programmer to the architect of some of the most consequential AI breakthroughs of the last decade. Then turns to a sharper, more urgent question: what can AI actually be trusted to get right, and where does it quietly, confidently fail?What You'll Learn:[00:32:01] The $1.3 million check Demis Hassabis turned down — and why he chose to study computer science instead of cashing in on his teenage video game fortune[00:33:00] Why AI was considered a dead field as recently as 2012 — and how Hassabis convinced Peter Thiel to fund a company built on a technology that, at the time, couldn't do much of anything[00:34:05] What "agentic AI" actually means — and how DeepMind's early systems learned to master Atari games through pure trial and error, years before "agentic" became a buzzword[00:35:08] Reinforcement learning vs. deep learning, explained simply — the difference between an AI that learns from reading and one that learns from doing[00:43:56] How neural networks actually work — a plain-language breakdown of "weights," layers, and how a system tweaks itself toward a correct answer through millions of small adjustments[00:41:00] Why AI is fundamentally inductive, not deductive — and why that distinction explains both its remarkable strengths and its most dangerous blind spots[01:04:57] How AlphaFold's protein-folding breakthrough connects directly to disease research — including new frontiers in understanding conditions like Parkinson's[01:05:59] Inside Isomorphic Labs — Hassabis's newest venture, aimed at using AI to dramatically accelerate (not replace) the drug discovery pipeline[01:16:00] Why AI tools are getting deterministic financial questions wrong — Larry's own real-world tests show major AI models disagreeing wildly on life insurance needs, optimal savings, and Roth conversion strategy, even though these problems have one mathematically correct answer[01:12:43] What this means for the future of work — a candid exchange on AI adoption timelines, productivity's "jagged edge," and whether human labor markets have time to adjustFeatured Guest:Sebastian Mallaby is an award-winning journalist and author of six books, including the New York Times bestseller The Infinity Machine: How an AI Pioneer Reshaped the Future, as well as The Power Law: Venture Capital and the Making of the New Future and More Money Than God. A former correspondent for The Economist and longtime member of the Washington Post editorial board. He co-hosts the podcast The Spillover with Rebecca Patterson of the Council on Foreign Relations.

What if everything you've been told about the new Iran deal — and what "winning" the war even meant — is built on a comparison that doesn't hold up, and a strategic outcome that's the opposite of what most commentators are claiming?A 14-point memorandum is about to be signed in Switzerland, and the headlines are already calling it weaker than the 2015 Obama-era nuclear deal that Trump once tore apart. But according to Adam Garfinkle - veteran foreign policy analyst, former editor of The American Interest, and author of the forthcoming book The Age of Spectacle - that comparison is fundamentally misleading. The real story is stranger, more consequential, and far more relevant to your daily life than a nuclear negotiation: it's about what happens to a society that has stopped reading, stopped distinguishing fantasy from fact, and is now heading into midterm elections where the rules themselves may not hold.In this episode, Alex Kotlikoff sits down with Garfinkle to unpack the actual strategic outcome of the Iran conflict, why the regime may have emerged stronger rather than weaker, and how a deeper cultural shift (one Garfinkle has spent a career studying) is reshaping American democracy itself.[00:02:22] Why comparing this new Iran deal to the 2015 JCPOA is misleading — the contexts are not remotely the same, and treating them as equivalent distorts the real picture[00:06:39] How the Iranian nuclear program was actually crippled — not in the recent skirmishes, but in the "12-day war" of June 2025[00:09:13] The unintended consequence of targeting Iran's senior leadership — how the strikes may have produced a more nationalistic, more competent, and more entrenched regime rather than a weaker one[00:10:39] The psychological effect on ordinary Iranians — why surviving a massive US-Israeli attack has pushed many toward resignation rather than rebellion, delaying any hope of internal regime change[00:13:01] The "balance of interests vs. balance of power" principle — why raw military superiority doesn't determine outcomes, and how this echoes a lesson from Vietnam[00:29:00] Introducing "The Age of Spectacle" — Garfinkle's framework for understanding how digital technology is replacing shared reality with personalized fantasy[00:34:01] The "first post-literate American war" — how declining literacy has fundamentally changed the way Americans understand conflict, politics, and the world around them[00:40:28] The literacy statistic that explains a lot more than you'd think — an estimated 50-60% of American adults read at a sixth-grade level or below[01:04:00] What could happen to the 2026 midterms — the scenarios Garfinkle considers most plausible, including legal challenges to majority-minority districts and pressure campaigns at the local level[01:05:05] A possible fix already proven at the state level — how California depoliticized redistricting, and why Garfinkle supports a constitutional amendment banning gerrymandering nationwideAdam Garfinkle is a veteran international affairs analyst and writer, formerly the founding editor of The American Interest and a longtime contributor to U.S. foreign policy discourse. He publishes regularly on Substack at The Raspberry Patch, where he has written extensively on the Iran conflict since its outset. His forthcoming book, The Age of Spectacle, examines how communications technology has reshaped American political consciousness from the Korean War to the present day.The Raspberry Patch — Adam Garfinkle's Substack, including his ongoing series of essays on the Iran warThe Age of Spectacle — Garfinkle's forthcoming book on media, technology, and the erosion of shared reality (publication details pending)"Why Elite College Students Can't Read Whole Books" — referenced Atlantic article by Rose Horowitch on declining literacy among university studentsWhat You'll Learn in This EpisodeFeatured GuestResources Mentioned

What if the system designed to protect your health in retirement was actually engineered (from the inside) to profit from keeping you confused, underserved, and locked out of the care you've already paid for?You've spent decades paying into Medicare. You've done everything right. And yet, as you approach the years when healthcare matters most, the system greeting you on the other side is riddled with hidden traps, gaming, and a funding crisis that Washington refuses to look at directly.In this episode, Professor Kotlikoff talks with his Boston University colleague Dr. Randy Ellis, one of the world's foremost health economists and the architect of the very risk-adjustment formula that determines how much the government pays your Medicare Advantage plan. He literally built it. And he's saying it's being exploited in ways that are costing taxpayers $83 billion a year, with your care hanging in the balance.Time Stamped Learnings:[8:27] Why Medicare Advantage plans are paid billions more than they should be, and how insurance companies game the diagnostic coding system to pocket the difference[9:00] The "cherry-picking" crisis nobody in Washington wants to admit: how private health plans are specifically designed to attract healthy enrollees and quietly push sick ones back into traditional Medicare[10:24] Why the formula running your Medicare payments is 30 years old (built in the 1990s, implemented in 2002, and barely updated since) while insurance companies have decades of new data and technology to exploit every loophole[23:00] What Europe is doing right, and why countries like the Netherlands, Germany, and Belgium are delivering better health outcomes at nearly half the cost per GDP[41:14] The age-65 cliff that's trapping older Americans in jobs they don't want, just to hold onto insurance before Medicare kicks in, and a smarter way to phase that transition[39:16]The Ellis Plan: a bold, practical reimagining of how America could restructure its entire healthcare system (without starting a political war)[48:38] Why your kids and grandkids are the ones who will ultimately pay for every year we delay fixing this, and what the math actually looks like[54:46] The risk adjustment fix that could make insurance companies actually want to enroll sick people AND save Medicare billions in the processFeatured GuestDr. Randy Ellis is a Professor of Economics at Boston University, Past President of the American Society of Health Economists, and author of more than 150 academic papers and reports. With over 11,000 Google Scholar citations, he is best known for developing the HCC Risk Adjustment Formula — the model used to calculate Medicare Advantage (Part C), Medicare Part D, and Obamacare marketplace payments. His current research, developed alongside collaborator Dr. Arlene Ash, proposes a modernized risk adjustment framework that could save the Medicare program $83 billion annually.What You Walk Away WithAmerica spends over 18% of its GDP on healthcare, and is on a trajectory toward 20%. Sweden spends 11% and ranks 4th in the world for health outcomes. We rank 21st. This is policy failure compounded by decades of inaction, gaming, and a political culture too proud to look abroad for better answers. If you're approaching Medicare age, actively enrolled, or simply trying to understand why your premiums keep rising faster than inflation — this conversation is essential listening.

Can Israel reverse its political and social trajectory as elections approach amid ongoing wars and rising international isolation? Economics Matters co-host, Alex Kotlikoff, reunites with Israel's most influential and consequential economist, Eytan Sheshinski, to discuss Benjamin Netanyahu’s long tenure and the impact of his right-wing coalition. The discussion ranges over Israeli domestic policy, geopolitics, the Iran war, and the upcoming Israeli election. Additional talking points include:Polling that shows a narrow opposition edge that would end Netanyahu's 17-year run as Prime MinisterThe impact of prolonged conflict on hostages and society.A brain drain of about 80,000 people since October Economic strains from reservist mobilizationRising debt and deficitsGrowing official and unofficial boycotts affecting academia and Israel’s global standing. Israel-US relations, shifts in American Jewish and Democratic support, and campus antisemitism debatesPreventing Iran from acquiring nuclear weaponsHopes for regional change tied to government change.Time Stamps:00:00 Eytan's history and professional background01:27 Elections and Netanyahu03:02 Coalition and Ultra Orthodox10:54 Judicial Reform Protests12:45 Smotrich Ben Gvir Explained17:27 Cultural Decline Brain Drain21:37 War Economy and Boycotts28:28 Rightward Shift and History33:10 US Jewry and Campus Politics41:05 Iran War and Nuclear Threat47:40 Global Outlook US China NATO49:41 Closing Thoughts and Farewell

Andrew Fesiak rejoins Economics Matters with reassuring news about the war in Ukraine. As I'm traveling in Europe until early June, my son and occasional co-host, Alex, interviews Andrew.  This is Andrew's 6th appearance on Economics Matters. He is, as ever, fully up-to-date on what's happening for real in Ukraine. Indeed, our military and everyone in the Administration, particularly the President, would do well to watch this podcast. Ukraine, it seems, is acquiring more and better cards than Russia and doing so at an accelerating pace. Where and when this will end is largely in Putin's court. But, as Andrew points out, and which the Wall Street Journal confirmed the next day, Ukrainian drones and missiles are hitting Russia everywhere that Putin looks. And, as he looks, he realizes he can't hold the regular May Day parade, i.e., with scores of tanks, missiles, and other military equipment. Doing so risks their parade-time destruction. Imagine the message that would send to the World. Hence, as Andrew predicted and the Journal has since confirmed, May Day in Russia will be an equipment-less parade  -- one that's as short as possible, permitting Putin to dive back into his bunker in record time. Andrew is Senior Consultant at Black Trident Defense and Security Group. He’s an expert on Ukrainian and Russian relations, politics, history, culture, and the ongoing war. Andrew has lived in Ukraine for decades, having emigrated from Canada. His grandparents and parents were Ukrainian (as was one of my grandfathers). 

This will be of interest to anyone who seeks more money, less risk, and a better life. Wade Pfau is one of our country’s truly exceptional thought leaders when it comes to personal finance. He holds a PhD in economics from Princeton as well as the CFA and RICP® designations. Wade is a professor of practice in the Retirement Income Certified Professional® (RICP®) Program at The American College of Financial Services.Wade asked me to use my company’s MaxiFi Planner software to illustrate economics-based financial planning. Whether you are new to economics’ prescriptions for handling your financial life or have been applying its prescriptions for years, you’ll find this presentation of interest.

Forget what Wall Street says, risky investing is an option, not a starting point when it comes to your financial plan. No investment is perfectly safe and Economics Matters does not provide investment or any other form of financial, tax, or insurance advice. What this blog and podcast do is discuss options. Because TIPS -- Treasury Inflation Protected Securities -- are U.S. Treasury bonds, but ones that are protected against inflation, they are, arguably, the safest asset on the planet. As I write, the 30-year TIP is yield north of 2.6 percent real. That's very high historically speaking. TIPS yields on shorter maturity are also unusally high. Yes, Uncle Sam could default on his debt, but there are many moves he can take to get his fiscal house in order short of default -- something that would destroy all financial assets. Given this, given the high yields on TIPS, given the stock market's high volatility, this may be the time to lock in future real income. Kevin Esler returns on Economics Matters for his third appearance to walk us through his remarkable and totally free tool -- tipsladder.com. For those who haven't used tipsladder.com, this episode will show you everything you need to know to build your own ladder. For those who have used tipsladder.com, this podcast will be a refresher, but also show you tipsladder.com's latest features. Kevin is a retiree from Australia with an extensive background in software and technology, which he leveraged into a series of top software engineering jobs at a range of leading companies including IBM, HP, and Disney Plus. After moving to the US he settled into a series of roles that saw him specializing in evolving technology and software development. Kevin is uniquely positioned as an authority due to his multifaceted expertise in tech and finance, particularly in understanding and managing investment strategies involving Treasury Inflation-Protected Securities (TIPS).

John Campbell has made major contributions to the fields of macroeconomics and finance, solved a number of critical problems in both fields, and received all manner of fully deserved top awards in economics and finance. Grab a copy of his outstanding new, co-authored book, Fixed. It will turn your stomach, but keep you safe from Wall Street's terrible financial predation.  He is the Morton L. and Carole S. Olshan Professor of Economics at Harvard University, where he has taught since 1994.Campbell delivered the Ely Lecture to the American Economic Association in 2016 and served as President of the American Finance Association in 2005. He is a Research Associate and former Director of the Program in Asset Pricing at the National Bureau of Economic Research, a Fellow of the Econometric Society and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, a Corresponding Fellow of the British Academy and Honorary Fellow of Corpus Christi College, Oxford, and holds honorary doctorates from BI Norwegian Business School, the University of Maastricht, the University of Paris Dauphine, and Copenhagen Business School. Campbell co-founded and serves on the board of Arrowstreet Capital, LP, a Boston-based quantitative asset management company. 

World-Renowned, Fantastic Economist, and Former CEA Chair, Gregory Mankiw, Discusses his Career, the Iraq War, Trump Policy and Advisers, and His Top Research HitsGreg may be the world's most influential economist as millions of students, in the US and abroad, have studied introductory economics and intermediate macroeconomics using his leading text books. He's also been a major US policy player, including serving as Chair of the President's Council of Economic Advisers under Present George W. Bush. But Greg's greatest contributions have been to macroeconomics. One of his early hits explains that the relatively small costs of individual firms adjusting their prices can lead to slow micro adjustment and remarkably major macroeconomic problems, including exacerbating business cycles.  A second major contribution concerns the degree to which households are cash-flow constrained and, as a result, make the economy far more volatile. A third article tests and partially rejects the Solow Model, a central model of national saving. A fourth shows, paradoxically, that competition in the face of monopoly can be inefficient.  A fifth helps explain stock market volatility. A sixth helps understand the dynamics of inflation and unemployment based on slow acquisition of information of price setters. Greg describes these contributions as part of our wide ranging, fascinating conversation.  Gregory Mankiw's BioN. Gregory Mankiw is the Robert M. Beren Professor of Economics at Harvard University. As a student, Greg studied economics at Princeton University and MIT. As a teacher, he has taught macroeconomics, microeconomics, statistics, and principles of economics. Professor Mankiw is a prolific writer and a regular participant in academic and policy debates. His research includes work on price adjustment, consumer behavior, financial markets, monetary and fiscal policy, and economic growth. His published articles have appeared in academic journals, such as the American Economic Review, Journal of Political Economy, and Quarterly Journal of Economics, and in more widely accessible forums, such as The New York Times, The Washington Post, and The Wall Street Journal.He has written two popular textbooks—the intermediate-level textbook Macroeconomics (Worth Publishers) and the introductory textbook Principles of Economics (Cengage Learning). Principles of Economics has sold over four million copies and has been translated into twenty languages. In addition to his teaching, research, and writing, Professor Mankiw has been a research associate of the National Bureau of Economic Research, an adviser to the Congressional Budget Office and the Federal Reserve Banks of Boston and New York, and a member of the ETS test development committee for the advanced placement exam in economics. From 2003 to 2005 he served as Chairman of the President's Council of Economic Advisers. Disclaimer --  Any opinions expressed Economics Matters' posts are those of the authors and guests. These are not the opinions of Boston University or Economic Security Planning, Inc. 

Glenn is an absolutely brilliant economist and a public intellectual extraordinaire. In addition, Glenn is the pioneer of podcasting by academic economists. Glenn's remarkable podcast -- The Glenn Show -- debuted in 2008. In this episode of Economics Matters -- the Podcast, I ask Glenn to talk about the Glenn Show, including the topics and guests he's had during the show's now almost two-decade run. But as you'll hear/see, Glenn also uses this occasion to vigorously convey his long-held positions on race relations and the path to improving them. In particular, he makes a very strong case that Black America cannot expect White America to improve its position in society. As Glenn puts it, "No one is coming to the rescue." This is a marvelous podcast from a person who has dedicated a major part of his life to providing a national, politically incorrect conversation on issues of pressing concern, no matter their sensitivity. Glenn's Short Bio:Glenn C. Loury, Merton P. Stoltz Professor Emeritus of Social Sciences, Professor Emeritus of Economics, and Professor Emeritus of International and Public Affairs, is an academic economist who has made scholarly contributions to the fields of welfare economics, income distribution, game theory, industrial organization, and natural resource economics. He is also a prominent social critic and public intellectual, having published over 200 articles in journals of public affairs in the U.S. and abroad on the issues of racial inequality and social policy. A Fellow of the Econometric Society, a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and a past Vice President of the American Economics Association, Prof. Loury has been a visiting scholar at Oxford, Tel Aviv University, the University of Stockholm, the Delhi School of Economics, the Institute for the Human Sciences in Vienna, and the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton. He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and was for many years a contributing editor at The New Republic magazine.The Glenn Show is a podcast and video series hosted by economist Glenn Loury, a professor at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island.  Glenn, a self-described Black conservative, provides heterodox perspectives critiquing both progressive and conservative extremes. The show is rated right-center biased but high in credibility for its analysis grounded in real eventsIt features in-depth conversations with guests from academia, journalism, and public affairs, focusing on race, inequality, economics, politics, and social issues. Episodes often include regular discussions with linguist John McWhorter on race and politics, alongside solo commentary and live Q&A sessions. Recent topics have covered U.S. foreign policy, identity politics, free speech, and events like ICE incidents or Epstein files. The show is available on Substack (glennloury.substack.com), Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, and Bloggingheads.tv, with weekly updates and paid subscriber exclusives like early episodes and bonus content. It originated on Bloggingheads and continues through Loury's independent platform.

Martin Wolf is Chief Economics Commentator at the Financial Times, London. He was awarded Commander of the British Empire in 2000 "for services to financial journalism". This is Martin's third appearance on Economics Matters -- the Podcast. Martin's 2023 book, The Crisis of Democratic Capitalism, warned that liberal democracy was in recession, with authoritarianism on the rise. Two years later his dark vision has become America's reality. In this riveting interview, Martin spells out just how quickly our Shining City on the Hill is becoming a dark and foreboding dungeon with our great leader closely following the footsteps of history's megalomaniacs. Don't miss this opportunity to hear from the world's best informed and impressively clairvoyant global and political economist.  Martin is simply brilliant in both the British and American meanings of that word. 

Are we about to have another financial meltdown or at least a major crash? Is this the time to get liquid and stay poised to buy low rather than lose high? Please let one of the world's top financial guru's, John Rutledge, provide his deeply informed sense of the current financial system. John focuses on times the economy is out of wack -- far from equilibrium is his language.  He is Chief Investment Strategist and a member of the Investment Committee at Safanad, a global principal investment firm in New York, London, and Dubai. He is Economics Contributor for CNBC, and Senior Research Fellow at Claremont Graduate University where he teaches and chairs dissertations in the economics and finance PhD program. He sits on a number of boards of directors for public and private companies.John's Extraordinary ResumeOne of the architects of the Reagan Economic plan and has advised the Bush administration on both tax policy and the reconstruction of Iraq. Honorary Professor at the Chinese Academy of Sciences. He is Chairman of Tara’s Kids, a non-profit organization that builds libraries for schools in remote villages in China and Tibet. After tours of duty in both academics and government policy, he has started, run, chaired, owned and harvested dozens of companies, and has managed money in marketable securities, private equity, and real estate.Too many more accolades to list...

President Trump's interest is largely self interest. According to The NY Times, he has personally pocketed $1.4 billion over the past 12 months. While not stuffing his pockets and those of his family, he has transformed our "shining city upon a hill" into a quasi-fascist state, sold out our allies, upended the rule of law, deployed a private army that murders American citizens in broad daylight, orchestrated political witch hunts, and abrogated our civil liberties, including, of late, the right to bear arms. Whether we'll have a fair and free election in November is anyone's guess. How much of Trump's behavior is dictated by Putin, an inner demon, mental illness, or avarice, no one can say. But the world no longer respects America. It fears and despises America. And it is realigning away from America at a rapid rate. I've invited Anders Åslund back to Economics Matters -- the Podcast to assess the damage, and its perilous implications. Per Anders Åslund is a Swedish economist and former Senior Fellow at the Atlantic Council. He is also a chairman of the International Advisory Council at the Center for Social and Economic Research (CASE). His work focuses on economic transition from centrally planned to market economies. Åslund served as an economic adviser to the governments of Kyrgyzstan, Russia, and Ukraine and from 2003 was director of the Russian and Eurasian Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Åslund was an advocate of early, comprehensive, and radical economic reforms in Russia and Eastern Europe.[1] He worked at the Peterson Institute for International Economics from 2006 to 2015. In 2013, neoconservative David Frum wrote that "Anders Aslund at the Peterson Institute is one of the world's leading experts on the collapse of the planned Soviet economy." From 2010 to 2013 and again in 2022 he contributed to The Moscow Times, an independent English-language newspaper; he is also a long-time contributor to the Kyiv Post.[3]

Paulo Nogueira Batista is one of Brazil’s most prominent, influential, and instrumental economists. Paulo was vice president of the New Development Bank, established by the BRICS in Shanghai, from 2015 to 2017, and Executive Director at the IMF for Brazil and 10 other countries in Washington, from 2007 through 2015.  Paulo, as you'll hear/see, and as his bio clearly documents, is a sober, sophisticated, accomplished global intellectual, actor, and statesman -- someone who thinks deeply and carefully before he speaks. Hence, when he pens a column entitled, "Brazil is Running an Existential Risk," which I reposted in Economics Matters last week, about Brazil's need to obtain nuclear weapons, it's time to sit up and listen.  Take a read of Paulo's column and ponder the meaning of his quote of Clemenceau, “The United States is the first to pass from barbarism to decadence without knowing civilization.” Then watch/listen to this extraordinary podcast. 

Ciff Winston is back on Economics Matters. He's also just out with an impressive new book -- Market Corrections NotGovernment Interventions: A Path to Improve the US Economy. The book is a devastating critique of government policy failures -- policies that the private sector had to ultimately overcome or sidestep. Cliff joins us precisely one year after our podcast on Biden's infrastructure bill, which was passed with great fanfare, but started slow and then ran into Trump executive orders or disorders, depending on your perspective. This is an extraordinary, evidenced-based exposé of the market’s innovative power to creatively destroy market failures, including those engineered and entrenched by both ‘regulators’ and ‘reformists.’ This is surely the most important government policy book yet written.Here's the skinny on Cliff.   Clifford Winston, a nonresident senior fellow in the Brookings Institution’s Economic Studies program, has been with Brookings since 1984. Winston has also been co-editor of the annual microeconomics edition of Brookings Papers on Economic Activity. Prior to his fellowship at Brookings, he was an associate professor in the Transportation Systems Division of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Department of Civil Engineering. The author of numerous books and articles, Winston has published “Market Corrections Not Government Interventions: A Path to Improve the U.S. Economy” (2025); “Reforming Occupational Licensing in the U.S.: Reducing Social Costs and Increasing Social Benefits in the Legal, Medical, and Financial Services Professions” editor (2024); “Revitalizing a Nation: Competition and Innovation in the U.S. Transportation Industry” with Jia Yan and Associates (2024); “Gaining Ground: Markets Helping Government” (2021); “Trouble at the Bar: An Economics Perspective on the Legal Profession and Proposals For Reform” with David Burk and Jia Yan (2021); “Autonomous Vehicles: The Road to Economic Growth?” with Quentin Karpilow (2020); “First Thing We Do, Let’s Deregulate All the Lawyers,” with Robert Crandall and Vikram Maheshri (2011); “Last Exit: Privatization and Deregulation of the U.S. Transportation System” (2010); “Government Failure versus Market Failure” (2006); “Deregulation of Network Industries: What’s Next?” with Sam Peltzman (2000); “Essays in Transportation Economics and Policy: A Handbook in Honor of John R. Meyer,” with Jose A. Gomez-Ibanez and William B. Tye (1999); “Alternate Route: Toward Efficient Urban Transportation,” with Chad Shirley (1998); “The Evolution of the Airline Industry,” with Steven A. Morrison (1995); “The Economic Effects of Surface Freight Deregulation,” with Thomas M. Corsi, Curtis M. Grimm, and Carol A. Evans (1990); “Road Work: A New Highway Pricing and Investment Policy,” with Kenneth A. Small and Carol Evans (1989); “Liability: Perspectives and Policy,” with Robert E. Litan (1988); “Blind Intersection? Policy and the Automobile Industry,” co-author (1987); and “The Economic Effects of Airline Deregulation,” with Steven Morrison (1986). His articles have appeared in such journals as the American Economic Review, Econometrica, Review of Economics and Statistics, Journal of Economic Literature, Bell Journal of Economics, and the Rand Journal of Economics. Dr. Winston received his A.B. in economics from the University of California at Berkeley in 1974, his M.Sc. from the London School of Economics in 1975, and his Ph.D. in economics from U.C. Berkeley in 1979.

Innovation is the hot sauce of economic progress. Trevor Chandler is one of the hottest inventors on the planet. Whether it's inventing Covid detection masks, AI-driven portable disease-detection machines, or robotic AI-guided robotic sensors, Trevor is a whirlwind of discovery and practical implementation. Join me in this fascinating and highly entertaining interview with Trevor Chandler. You'll meet his robots, learn about Mask Zero -- the future of pandemic protection, which I previously discussed with Trevor's extraordinary business partner, Adam Pener, and find yourself at the frontier of Artificial General Intelligence (AGI), if not Artificial Super Intelligence (ASI). Trevor's patents may well represent not just the hot, but the secret sauce to achieving AGI and ASI.

John Llewellyn, Lehman's Former Chief Economist, Head of Independent-Economics, and Leading Global Analyst,Talks Today's and Tomorrow's Geoeconomics and GeopoliticsJohn, as you'll quickly learn from this terrific podcast, has seen more and knows more about the global economy, regional economies, and geopolitics than virtually all of the world's top finance and economics ministers as well as treasury secretaries. John founded Independent-Economics after Lehman's bankruptcy and his internal warnings went unheeded. Prior to working at Lehman, John spent two decades at the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) in Paris where he was, first, Head of International Forecasting and Policy Analysis and then Chef de Cabinet to the Secretary-General. His OECD positing came after a decade-long professorship in economics at the University of Cambridge where he was a Fellow of St. John’s College. John holds an undergraduate degree from the Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand and a doctorate in economics from the University of Oxford. He has published widely.

Dan is the Wayne Perry Professor of Taxation at NYU Law School, is a graduate of Princeton University and Yale Law School. Before entering law teaching, he spent three years each in private practice, and at the Joint Congressional Committee on Taxation, where he worked on the Tax Reform Act of 1986. In 1987, Shaviro began his teaching career at the University of Chicago Law School, and he moved to NYU in 1995. In 2023, he received the National Tax Association’s Daniel M. Holland Medal, recognizing lifetime achievement in, and outstanding contributions to, public finance.Shaviro’s scholarly work mainly focuses on tax policy and other fiscal policy, along with inequality and the intersections between law, literature, and social science. His books include Bonfires of the American Dream in American Rhetoric, Literature, and Film (2022), Fixing U.S. International Taxation (2014), Decoding the U.S. Corporate Tax (2009), and Do Deficits Matter? (1997). He has also published a novel, Getting It (2010), and a memoir, Now Is Now and Then Is Then.At NYU School of Law Shaviro teaches various tax and other courses, including a scholarly colloquium on tax policy and public finance.

With the leading ten AI companies comprising one third of the value of the S&P and none showing a profit plus the threat they pose to our jobs, let alone humanity, we best keep careful track of the industry. My former graduate student, Seth Benzell, is one of our nation's top AI experts. Seth discusses AI's so-called scaling law, the problem of too little data to fit the industry's parameters mystically being cured by double descent, and the bitter lesson. Seth also talks us through how much money AI can save and, therefore, make by replacing humans in accomplishing existing tasks.Seth is an assistant professor of Management Science at the Argyros School of Business and Economics at Chapman University. He's a Digital Fellow at the MIT Initiative on the Digital Economy as well as a Digital Fellow at the Stanford HAI Digital Economy LabHe received a B.A. in economics and a B.S. in physics and mathematics from Tulane University before earning his economics PhD at Boston University. Seth's website is https://www.sethgbenzell.com/. He works on the economics of digitalization, including automation, networks, and information systems. Seth and his co-host, Andrey Fradkin have a terrific podcast, called Justified Posteriors, that focuses on AI. 

Orlando Patterson is simply mesmerizing. We all take "freedom" for granted. But Orlando has studied what it is and isn't -- now and across the millenia. The result of this immensely deep as well as deeply fascinating scholarship is a sober take on what we take for granted -- that freedom is clear cut, fundamental, universal, and here to stay. Orlando sets us straight, not based on opinion but based on decades of profoundly insightful research. Please share this podcast to any and all -- blue, red, and purple. "The Land of the Free and the Brave" is not something to take for granted -- certainly not now when our individual and collective freedoms are subject to daily erosion. In this regard, it is worth recalling these words from President Kennedy.The most powerful single force in the world today is neither Communism nor Capitalism, neither the H-bomb nor the guided missile -- it is man's eternal desire to be free and independent.A public intellectual, Professor Patterson was, for eight years, Special Advisor for Social policy and development to Prime Minister Michael Manley of Jamaica. He was a founding member of Cultural Survival, one of the leading advocacy groups for the rights of indigenous peoples, and was for several years a board member of Freedom House, a major civic organization for the promotion of freedom and democracy around the world. More recently he has chaired the Commission for the Transformation of Education in Jamaicabased in the Office of Prime Minister Andrew Holness of Jamaica. The author of three novels, he has published widely in journals of opinion and the national press, especially the New York Times, where he was a guest columnist for several weeks. His columns have also appeared in Time Magazine, Newsweek, The Wall Street Journal, The Boston Globe, The Jamaica Gleaner, The Public Interest, The New Republic, and The Washington Post.He is the recipient of many awards, including the National Book Award for Non-Fiction which he won in 1991 for his book on freedom; the Distinguished Contribution to Scholarship Award of the American Sociological Association; the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award for Lifetime Achievement in Literature, the Barry Prize of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and the Hegel Prize from the city of Stuttgart, Germany He holds honorary degrees from several universities, including Yale, London University, the University of Chicago, U.C.L.A. and La Trobe University in Australia. He was awarded both the Order of Distinction and the Order of Merit by the Government of Jamaica. the nation’s third highest national honor. Professor Patterson has been a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences since 1991 and of the American Academy of Science and Letters since its founding in 2024.Orlando Patterson, a historical and comparative sociologist, is the John Cowles Professor of Sociology at Harvard University. He previously held faculty appointments at the University of the West Indies, and the London School of Economics where he received his Ph.D. His academic interests include the origin, culture and practices of freedom; the comparative study of slavery and ethno-racial relations; and the cultural sociology of poverty and underdevelopment with special reference to the Caribbean and African Americans. He has also written on the cultural sociology of sports. Professor Patterson is the author of numerous academic papers and 10 major academic books including, Slavery and Social Death (1982/2018); Freedom in the Making of Western Culture (1991); The Cultural Matrix: Understanding Black Youth (2015); The Confounding Island: Jamaica and the Postcolonial Condition (2019); The Paradox of Freedom: A Biographical Dialog (2023); and Enslavement: Past and Present (2025)

I'm not a big fan of investment advisors. Economics teaches us that not everyone can beat the market. Yet, there are tens of thousands advisors out there who will tell you that they and they alone have the secret sauce. Actually, economics teaches us that no one can beat the market unless they have inside information. But economics also tells us how to keep the market from beating you -- by taking risk, but limiting your downside, diversifying, and following your brain, not your emotions in making investment decisions. Fred has decades of experience valuing roughly 10,000 companies. He also knows that markets can go nuts. Today, a third of the value of the S&P comprises 10 AI companies who have yet to make a profit. So, is an S&P index really diversified? Not so clear. It may simply be everyone’s green dream. Or not. Fred is back to help us better hedge our bets in a time of national, global, and technological upheaval the likes of which we didn’t see in 1929 when things went poof simply because everyone collectively decided they were going poof. In short, we don’t need crazy to go crazy. Fred is pure shelter from the storm - real and imagined. So watch/listen to Fred and pull up the song by you know who on YouTube! Fred has over 40 years of investment and corporate finance experience, as a portfolio manager, a private equity investor and an investment banker. Fred's clients have included Staples (where he was a founding investor); Advanced Micro Devices; Forest Laboratories; ULTA Beauty; Tractor Supply; Berlitz International; Rexnord; Fairchild Industries; Plantronics; and numerous others. Fred is also a highly experienced private equity investor, having invested in more than 80 private companies. Fred received his A.B, cum laude from Harvard College and his MBA with Distinction from Harvard Business School.Prior to founding Lane Generational in September 2020, Fred was Senior Vice President, Investments at Raymond James & Associates, Inc. from October 2014 to September 2020 and also served as Vice Chairman, Investment Banking from May 2009 to October 2014. Fred was Chairman, CEO and Founder of the investment banking firm Lane, Berry & Co. International, LLC (which was acquired by Raymond James in May 2009) from January 2002 through January 2013. Prior to that, Fred was a Managing Director and Principal of Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette Securities Corporation (DLJ). Fred joined DLJ in 1976 and was instrumental in the growth of DLJ's investment banking business. He also served as Co-Head of the Mergers and Acquisitions Department at DLJ and as Managing Director – Senior Advisor of Credit Suisse First Boston upon CSFB's acquisition of DLJ in 2000.

Steve Laffey is a true American rages-to-riches success story. But Steve took the biblical saying, "to those who have much is owed," fully to heart. After a highly successful career in banking, Steve returned to run for mayor in his birthplace -- Cranston, Rhode Island, taking it from bankruptcy to solvency and growth. His remarkable story is conveyed in this Wikipedia entry. This is Steve's 4th appearance on Economics Matters -- the Podcast. Steve is an expert on America's problems. His film, Fixing America, which he made after serving two terms as mayor of Cranston, is a must see. And stevelaffey.com is a must visit. Steve tells it like it is and his survey of President Trump's first nine months -- its damage to our international standing, to our rule of law, to our civility, to our economy, and to our comity -- holds no bars. What we need is not to make America great again. What we need is to make America America again. Steve Laffey reminds us of just what that means and looks like. 

I've been a huge fan of Holman Jenkins for years. His columns are deeply insightful and fun -- skewering the left and the right in equal measure. I found our conversation remarkably calming. Holman is a true student of history, so when he says this too will pass, it's particularly reassuring. Many columnists come and go. But Holman has been writing for and guiding the editorial page of the Wall Street Journal for a third of a century. That tenure is a remarkable tribute to both Holman and the Journal. Please listen/watch this premier American journalist. He's truly one of a kind. Holman's Bio Holman W. Jenkins Jr. is a member of the editorial board of The Wall Street Journal. He writes the twice-weekly “Business World” column that appears on the paper's op-ed page on Wednesdays and Saturdays.Mr. Jenkins joined the Journal in May 1992 as a writer for the editorial page in New York. In February 1994, he moved to Hong Kong as editor of The Asian Wall Street Journal's editorial page. He returned to the domestic Journal in December 1995 as a member of the paper's editorial board and was based in San Francisco. Mr. Jenkins won a 1997 Gerald Loeb Award for distinguished business and financial coverage.Born in Philadelphia, Mr. Jenkins received a bachelor's degree from Hobart and William Smith Colleges and a master's degree in journalism from Northwestern University. He was a 1991 journalism fellow at the University of Michigan.

President Trump's on again, off again tariff mania is, well, choose your adjective. From one day to the next, imported products, be they pharmaceuticals, kitchen cabinets, lumber, or foreign movies, are being tariffed at massive rates. Brazilian products are facing 50 percent tariffs because Brazil isn't treating recently convicted former Brazilian President, Bolsonaro, to the President's liking, and other countries are now locked into a high tariff for the conceivable future. Cambodia, for example, is facing a permanent 19 percent tariff on selling products to the U.S. A good country-by-country list of tariffs now in place, scheduled, or threatened is available here. What impacts are the imposed tariffs, the announced tariffs, and the potential tariffs having on importers? What legal liabilities are importers facing thanks to tariff uncertainty. Will Trump's tariff policy, actual and potential, expand or undermine US manufacturing? To address these questions, I invited one of our top trade specialists, attorney Irene Chen, to join me on Economics Matters -- the Podcast. Irene represents and counsels foreign producers and U.S. importers in international trade matters through her law firm, VCL Law, LLP. As her bio bio details, Irene has had extensive experience working for the U.S. International Trade Commission and the U.S. Department of Commerce. Get ready to learn the not so good, the bad, and the ugly about current tariff policy and how it is impacting real companies in real time. 

Andrew Fesiak rejoins me on Economics Matters. He addresses these questions and more: Is Russia winning? Is Ukraine Short on Manpower? Is Trump selling out Ukraine and NATO by deed, if not word? Can Ukraine even up the sides with its new Flamingo cruise missile? What did the US refusal to join other NATO members in shooting down the Russian drone incursion in Poland tell us? Is Ukraine now exporting drones? Is Russia testing NATO's response to air incursions to demonstrate that the US is no longer a real part of NATO? Is Russia gearing up to attack the Baltics? How will the war end? Andrew is Senior Consultant at Black Trident Defense and Security Group. He's an expert on Ukrainian and Russian relations, politics, history, culture, and the ongoing war. Andrew has lived in Ukraine for decades, having emigrated from Canada. His grandparents and parents were Ukrainian. This is Andrew's 5th appearance on Economics Matters -- the Podcast. His analysis of the military and political situation have been dead on. If you want the facts on the ground, including Trump's mounting acts of betrayal, all packaged in mellifluous words of support, this podcast is for you.

Back in May, Moody's joined the other two major U.S. debt-rating companies, S&P Global Ratings and Fitch Group, in downgrading US government debt. No surprise. Federal debt was close to 30 percent of GDP a quarter Century back. Today it's close to 100 percent and projected to exceed 150 percent by mid Century. No one is better positioned to discuss our nation's fiscal condition than David Levey. David spent almost 19 years servicing as Managing Director and Co-Head of the Sovereign Ratings Unit of Moody's Investors Service. Indeed, David is arguably the father of sovereign risk rating having developed country-credit analysis at Moody's. When David retired, he was credited by Moody's as having rated the official obligations of over 100 countries across the world. In addition, David has been involved in rating a host of foreign and domestic industry- and company-specific securities. David holds a BA in Economics from the University of Chicago and a PhD in Economics from Harvard University. Before joining Moody's, he taught at Yale, the New School for Social Research, and Wayne State University. He also served as Senior Economics Writer for BusinessWeek, Country Risk Manager for Wells Fargo, and President of his own risk-evaluation consulting company. David's had a long career sizing up failing states. The US is not a failing state, but is, it seems, working overtime to join that club. Please listen as one of our few remaining grownups in the room explains what our politicians know, but won't say -- our country is going broke hand over fist, with serious implications for how we all should you invest your money.  

Peter Coy has been writing about economics for decades -- for the Associated Press, BusinessWeek, Bloomberg, and the New York Times. Peter is currently a freelance columnist. His terrific substack is petercoy.substack.com. I consider Peter our nation's top economics journalist. Unlike almost all other economics commentators, Peter does his homework. He reads academic economists' writings extensively. He reads them carefully, no matter how opaque, theoretical, or deep in the statistical weeds. And he immediately and fully comprehends their arguments, which is no small feat, even for a well-trained, top, PhD, let alone a BA in history (from Cornell). Peter was my guest on Economics Matters in February 2024. Here's the interview. In today's podcast, we switched sides. Peter interview me -- about retirement mistakes, economics versus conventional (aka Wall Street's) financial planning, Social Security's Ponzi-scheme method of finance, how to fix Social Security for good, and our nation's overall fiscal insolvency, in which Social Security plays a major part. 

Ignazio Visco is a superb economist and central banker. He should be everyone's choice for the next President of the European Central Bank. Italy has a bad economic rap among those with a cursory knowledge of its fiscal condition and financial system. In fact, it's ranked as the most fiscally sustainable of all major EU countries and has one of the world's safest banking systems. The former is thanks to relatively small off-the-books pension, healthcare, and other off-the-books liabilities. The latter is largely due to Ignazio's 12-year leadership of the Italian Central Bank. Ignazio has had an amazing career. He received his PhD in economics from the University of Pennsylvania, joined the Bank of Italy as a junior economist, quickly became Head of the Bank's Research Department, was named Chief Economist of the OECD, and then appointed Governor of the Bank of Italy. He has served on the boards of the ECB, the ESRB, the BIS, the FSB, the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank, the International Monetary Fund, and the InterAmerican Development Bank. There are few people on the planet with Ignazio wealth of international economic exposure, expertise, and knowledge. Please do listen/watch this episode of Economics Matters -- the Podcast. It's terrific. 

This podcast is not to be missed. Greg Clark is a brilliant economic historian with a remarkable, fact-based take on the role of genetics in economic evolution. Genetics is, of course, a dangerous word when used to discuss humans and their success. But genetics, indeed, simply the ability to live longer and procreate better, can make a major difference over the long sweep of economic history. It can also become a marker and sustainer of social status not because of DNA, but cross-generational genetic connections as in "Of course we are going to admit X to Oxbridge. The last ten generations of X's attended Oxbridge." Clark, whose grandfathers were migrants to Scotland from Ireland, was born in Bellshill, Scotland. He attended Holy Cross High School in Hamilton. In 1974 he and fellow pupil Paul Fitzpatrick won the Scottish Daily Express schools debating competition. He earned a BA degree in economics and philosophy at King's College, Cambridge in 1979 and a PhD in economics at Harvard University in 1985. His thesis was supervised by Barry Eichengreen, Jeffrey G. Williamson, and Stephen Marglin. He became an assistant professor at Stanford University from 1985 to 1989 and at the University of Michigan from 1989 to 1990. He moved to the University of California, Davis and became associate professor in 1990 and professor of economics in 1996. He was formerly (until 2013) chair of the economics department at the University of California, Davis and became a distinguished professor emeritus there since 2018. Between 2017 and 2020, Clark was a visiting professor in economic history at the London School of Economics. In 2023, he became the Danish National Research Council professor of economics at the University of Southern Denmark. Clark's areas of research are long-term economic growth, the wealth of nations, the economic history of The Industrial Revolution, England and India, and social mobility. He is also a visiting professor in the Economic History Department at The London School of Economics and a Distinguished Professor Emeritus at the University of California, Davis.

I met Bill Raduchel as a grad student at Harvard. He was then and remains today a rare combination of pure genius and utter humility. My interactions with Bill were limited. But I instinctively realized he was some form of economics, software, and computer god rolled into a lovely person who could teach you about those subjects or anything  else of interest. I met up again with Bill two years back and, gee, nothing had changed. I was awestruck then. I'm awestruck now. When I heard he'd written an autobiography of his amazing career, I lept at the chance to share Bill with followers of Economics Matters -- the Podcast.  Bill's book, which you can purchase here, is entitled: The Bleeding Edge -- My Six Decades at the Forefront of the Tech Revolution (from Scott McNealy to Steve Jobs to Steve Case to Steve Ballmer and Other Titans of Technology) Here's the Wiki description of Bill. Dr. William J. Raduchel is an independent director, angel investor and strategic advisor. He was a professor of economics at Harvard for ten years, and an assistant dean at Harvard and Radcliffe. He has been an executive at Ruckus Network, Sun Microsystems, AOL Time Warner, Xerox Corporation, and McGraw-Hill. He also serves on boards for the Salvation Army and STEP (National Academy of Sciences).“Bill Raduchel is a pioneer of the digital revolution. The deeply instructive stories in this book are much more than a compulsively readable personal history. They’re a master class in how to succeed in the business of technology.”—Eric Schmidt, former CEO, Google, and co-author of The New Digital Age“For more than half a century, Bill Raduchel has been the Zelig of the tech world—somehow involved in nearly everything and knowing everyone. This book should be required reading for anyone thinking about a career in tech.”—Steve Case, cofounder and former CEO, AOL, and author of the New York Times bestseller The Third Wave“Bill has been my thesis advisor, dorm advisor, economics professor, mentor, CXO, friend, and co-worker since 1973. At Sun for over a decade, he helped us take revenue from $1 billion to $14 billion. He steered us through a financial crisis in 1989 and was in the middle of every major deal and innovation. The Bleeding Edge gives a perspective on management and change that is unique. He was there. He lived and helped formulate it.”—Scott McNealy,co-founder and former CEO, Sun Microsystems“I hired Bill to advise the Daily Mail and General Trust because of his long experience in technology and media. As this book shows, he’s also a shrewd judge of people and the systems that make companies successful.”—Jonathan Harmsworth,4th Viscount Rothermere and chairman of Daily Mail and General Trust“Few in the tech world are as accomplished and as deeply embedded in its firmament as Bill Raduchel. The Bleeding Edge is more than just a memoir—it’s a mini-MBA, a computer science degree, and a front-row-seat history of the digital revolution all rolled into one must-read book.” —Christopher A. Smith,author of Privacy Pandemic and digital security expertBut the real story of Bill Raduchel is summarized by these blurbs of his book and their authors.      

When it comes to personal finance journalism, Richard is simply as good as it gets. After I read Richard's Next Avenue column, What the Heck is Going On at Social Security, I realized it was beyond time to have him on Economics Matters -- the Podcast.  Richard Eisenberg is an “unretired” writer, editor, podcaster and author. He writes “The View From Unretirement” for MarketWatch, biweekly articles about Medicare on Fortune.com and pieces for Next Avenue and AARP about money and work for people over 50. He co-hosts the  and runs the NYU Summer Publishing Institute Digital Media Strategies program. He was formerly Managing Editor of PBS’ Next Avenue site, Executive Editor of Money for 19 years, and Special Projects Director of Good Housekeeping. He wrote How to Avoid a Midlife Financial Crisis and The Money Book of Personal Finance. He is a graduate of the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University. Richard Eisenberg is a writer, editor and podcaster specializing in personal finances, older adults and aging. He "unretired" in January 2022 when he left his job as Managing Editor and Editor of the Money and Work & Purpose channels of Next Avenue, the PBS site for people 50+. He was part of Next Avenue's launch team in 2011. Previously, he served as Executive Editor of Money Magazine, Front Page Finance Editor of Yahoo! and Special Projects.Director/Money Editor of Good Housekeeping. Richard currently co-hosts the Friends Talk Money Podcast (with my co-author, Terry Savage, and the equally amazing, Pam Kreuger), which focuses on personal finances for people 50+ and teaches a MasterClass in Unretirement at NYU. He is author of the books "Howto Avoid a Midlife Financial Crisis" and "The Money Book of Personal Finance" and served as Director of the NYU Summer Publishing Institute's Digital Media Strategy program for three years. Richard graduated from Northwestern University's Medill School of Journalism and lives in New Jersey. Here's a terrific recent column by Richard on whether you should let AI give you personal financial advice. For a host of outstanding MarketWatch columns by Richard, click here. And here's a link to a wealth of additional columns by Richard posted at Muckrack. Finally, check out Richard's columns and podcasts for Next Avenue here. 

Back in January 2023, Peter Fox Penner appeared on Economics Matters -- the Podcast to discuss his fabulous book,  Power After Carbon, Building a Clean Resilient Grid. Peter, who studied engineering in college and economics at the University of Chicago, where he earned a PhD, is surely among the most knowledge people in the country on America's energy system. He's back in this fascinating podcast to discuss a new study be co-authored with The Brattle Group. Its title is Affordability, Rates, and Clean Capital Efficiency: A Path for the Power Industry's Turbulent Next Decade.Power is a huge issue for all of us. Will AI data centers drive up electricity demand, prices, and carbon emissions? Peter's joint study looks at what's coming on both the demand and supply sides. But it also also shows how we can meet our exploding power needs largely by improving energy-capital efficiency. Please enjoy this timely presentation that's as relevant to climate deniers as it is to climate advocates. We are, for better and worse, all in the same boat. Peter explains in crystal clear terms both the rapids ahead and how to avoid them. Peter received a B.S. in engineering from the University of Illinois and a Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Chicago. During the Clinton Administration, Peter worked closely with Vice President Al Gore's team, serving first as a senior official at the U.S. Department of Energy and then in the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. Before and after working for the federal government, Peter was engaged in economic and energy consulting. This included serving for over two decades as Principal and Chair of The Brattle Group, one of our nation's premier consulting firms. Peter left the Brattle Group to found and direct Boston University's Institute for Sustainable Energy and served as a Professor of Practice at BU's Questrom School of Business. Peter is currently a Partner and Chief Impact Officer of Energy Impact Partners, one of the world's largest dedicated clean energy private equity fund groups. He also serves as Senior Advisor to The Brattle Group, as a member of the Global Leadership Council of the World Resources Institute, and as an Advisory Board member of Mobility Impact Partners.  Peter's is a frequent speaker on energy topics and the author of numerous published articles and books. Peter's research has been widely cited, including in one Supreme Court decision. It spans electric power strategy, regulation, and governance, energy and climate policy, sustainable finance, and the relationships between public and private economic activity.

Jean Chatzky is one of America's leading personal finance journalists and authors. Jean and I are long-time buds. I'm delighted to have her on Economics Matters -- the Podcast. Jean is in the midst of an extraordinary career. After graduating from the University of Pennsylvania with a B.A. in English, Jean did equity research for Dean Witter and then moved into financial journalism -- first with Working Woman, then Forbes, then Smart Money (as Senior Editor), then Money Magazine as well as Finance Editor and Reporter for NBC's The Today Show, and now AARP's Personal Financial Ambassador. (Go to AARP.org to read Jean's columns.) As if this career, interspersed with appearances on Ophra, Live with Kelly and Regis, and the View and writing for Cosmopolitan, Parents, and Seventeen, weren't enough, Jean has authored 14 books on personal finance -- one better than the next. But, hold on. Jean's real claim to fame is hermoney.com. Jean launched HerMoney in 2018 -- a multimedia company changing the relationships women have with money — inspired by her weekly podcast, HerMoney with Jean Chatzky.Please view this special interview with Jean, particularly if you are a woman. Jean has been helping this half of our population with their special financial needs, skills, and advantages for years. As the podcast makes clear, Jean Chatsky is one of our nation's most important financial resources. But so are financial journalists, in general. I've been honored to interview of Who's Who of these special financial coaches. The full list includes Scott Burns, Terry Savage, Allan Roth, Allison Schrager, Liz Weston, Phil Moeller, Paul Solman, Mary Beth Franklin, Kerry Pecter, Rob Berger, Robert Powell, Nancy Lloyd, John Mauldin, Kerry Hanon, and Richard Eisenberg. These 15 podcasts plus over 100 more are yours for the free hearing/viewing by clicking here.

As Senator Ernst sweetly reminded us, we're all going to die. But not all of us will be prepared financially to die. Thinking about the afterlife is rather unpleasant for most of us. Yes, there's heaven to look forward to. But who knows if we'll make it. There's lots of religions, different from our own, that are convinced that we'll be rejected before we even apply. So, we put off planning for the end game and then put it off some more. Trouble is, game over can occur when you least expect or deserve it. And when you pass, you'll be passing on an estate, perhaps tiny, perhaps huge. But unless you do proper estate planning, what you leave may not go to the people you wish or in the form you wish. The morbid moral here is that we all need to do estate planning and, indeed, do it on a routine basis as our finances change. There are a zillion estate attorneys out there to assist you. But it's critical to know the score before engaging anyone. This is why I invited Alan Gassman to talk about estate planning, particularly the value of trusts. Alan, as his bio copied below attests, is a big deal in the field of estate planning. He has a terrific estate, tax, and business law firm, has built outstanding software that handles all manner of estate issues, and is one of the most respected and acclaimed estate attorneys in the country. Do listen to this exciting -- yes, the end game is full of excitement -- discussion with Alan Gassman. He's a magnetic speaker and chock full of essential information and advice. 

Economics PhD, CFP, President of Lyon Financial Planning, Jay Abolofia shows you how to do estate planning using MaxiFi Planner's new spending cap and other unique features. If you're a MaxiFi Planner user, you already know and trust Jay. Jay provides bi-monthly MaxiFi office hours and uses MaxiFi in his own financial planning practice. Jay also provides a terrific co-piloting service for MaxiFi users who like to have a true expert review their use of the tool. Jay is one of the best teachers I've yet encountered and I've met thousands. This podcast is typical of his ability to convey important information in clear, concise, and actionable terms. Please listen/watch Jay and I discuss MaxiFi's new estate planning capacities. This discussion is NOT about trust, wills, probate, living wills, powers of attorney, or any of other legal estate issues. Nor are we focused on reducing federal or state estate taxes. This podcast is about what we all do -- rich or poor, namely plan, either explicitly or by default, to leave assets to our heirs. Whether you have a billion dollars or are living on the margin, you have assets, be it just a house, a car, or furniture that you'll be passing on if you pass. MaxiFi shows you your contingent estates -- what you'll bequeath depending on when you die. Many MaxiFi users have significant means -- so many resources that they aren't able or interested in spending everything they spend on a safe basis. MaxiFi's new spending limit lets them tell the program not to spend beyond what they wish in any future year. By setting the spending cap or using other features in the tool that Jay describes, well-off and, indeed, all users can see the trade off between spending more on themselves and leaving more for their heirs.

I've known Larry Leamer forever thanks to my close friendship with Larry's recently departed, economist extraordinaire, brother -- Edward Leamer. Ed wasn't bowled over by any economist. But he was in awe of Larry, years before Larry became one of our nation's leading biographers. Much of Larry's work focuses on the rich and scandalous. Warhol's Muses certainty meets that bill. The book, which is fresh off the press, is Larry's umpteenth. The list includes Capote’s Women, Madness Under the Royal Palms, Mar-A-Lago -- Inside the Gates of Power, The Kennedy Women, King of the Night -- the Life of Johnny Carson, and, well, here's the now-outdated Wiki list. I copy below Penguin-Random House's careful description of the book. But, as you'll hear in the podcast, Larry raises a darker question than whether Warhol was a deeply evil person. He questions whether the art world fell for the NFT-artist of the day, specifically whether Warhol's oeuvre, including the $195 million The Blue Shot Marilyn, constitutes works of art or the art of self-perpetuating, financial fabrication.   From the jacket of Warhol's Muses by Laurence Leamer “Now and then, someone would accuse me of being evil,” Andy Warhol confessed, “of letting people destroy themselves while I watched, just so I could film them.” Obsessed with celebrity, the silver-wigged artistic icon created an ever-evolving entourage of stunning women he dubbed his “Superstars”—Baby Jane Holzer, Edie Sedgwick, Nico, Ultra Violet, Viva, Brigid Berlin, Ingrid Superstar, International Velvet, Mary Woronov, and Candy Darling. He gave several of them new names and manipulated their beauty and talent for his art and social status with no regard for their safety, their dignity, or their lives.  In Warhol’s Muses, bestselling biographer Laurence Leamer shines a spotlight on the complex women who inspired and starred in Warhol’s legendary underground films—The Chelsea Girls, The Nude Restaurant, and Blue Movie, among others. Drawn by the siren call of Manhattan life in the sixties, they each left their protected enclaves and ventured to a new world, Warhol’s famed Factory, having no sense that they would never be able to return to their old homes and familiar ways again. Sex was casual, drugs were ubiquitous, parties were wild, and to Warhol, everyone was transient, temporary, and replaceable. It was a dangerous game he played with the women around him, and on a warm June day in 1968, someone entered the Factory and shot him, changing his life forever. Warhol’s Muses explores the lives of ten endlessly intriguing women, transports us to a turbulent and transformative era, and uncovers the life and work of one of the most legendary artists of all time."

This is Fred's third appearance on Economics Matters -- the Podcast. I wanted to get Fred back on asap as part of my ongoing quest to keep people financially safe. Fred is the Founder and Managing Member of Lane Generational LLC, an independent registered investment advisor headquartered in Boston (www.lanegenerational.com). Lane Generational provides investment management services on a discretionary basis to individuals, families, trusts, foundations and institutions. Full disclosure. My wife and I are investors in Fred's fund. But I have no financial relationship of any kind with Fred. I'm not a financial advisor and am certainly not recommending any investments of any kind, including Fred's. This is an educational podcast. For investment advice, please consult with an investment professional. The market is down roughly 4 percent since President Trump took office on January 20th. But since then, it's experienced dramatic volatility with the "fear index" - the VIX -- rising, apart from COVID, to its highest value since the Great Recession. This week the Dow rose 1000 points in one day on the "good" news that rather than tariffing China at embargo-level rates, we've "paused" them at 30 percent. This means Mattel will be able to keep selling Barbie dolls, which are made in China, albeit at a far higher price. To be clear, a 30 percent tariff is astronomical. Even  Google's AI gets this right. Yes, a 30 percent tariff can be considered astronomical, especially when compared to average global tariff rates and historical tariffs. Thus, most Americans with children will now be able to afford, say, 15 Barbies rather than the usual 30. That means Mattel will lay off perhaps a quarter rather than all of its salesforce. In short, we're not out of the dark. We're out of the pitch black. The U.S. market is partially benefiting from the potential lack of competition. But who knows where it will go once investors wake up and realize that, from a tariff perspective, it's likely the Great Depression all over again. How should anyone invest in this climate? That's the key question I asked Fred who is one of the most informed and savvy investors around. Don't take it from me. Take it from CNBC and other major media outlets who routinely invite Fred to comment on markets, the economy, and policy. Here's a brief bio.  Fred has over 40 years of investment and corporate finance experience, as a portfolio manager, a private equity investor and an investment banker. Fred's clients have included Staples (where he was a founding investor); Advanced Micro Devices; Forest Laboratories; ULTA Beauty; Tractor Supply; Berlitz International; Rexnord; Fairchild Industries; Plantronics; and numerous others. Fred is also a highly experienced private equity investor, having invested in more than 80 private companies. Fred received his A.B, cum laude from Harvard College and his MBA with Distinction from Harvard Business School.Prior to founding Lane Generational in September 2020, Fred was Senior Vice President, Investments at Raymond James & Associates, Inc. from October 2014 to September 2020 and also served as Vice Chairman, Investment Banking from May 2009 to October 2014. Fred was Chairman, CEO and Founder of the investment banking firm Lane, Berry & Co. International, LLC (which was acquired by Raymond James in May 2009) from January 2002 through January 2013. Prior to that, Fred was a Managing Director and Principal of Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette Securities Corporation (DLJ). Fred joined DLJ in 1976 and was instrumental in the growth of DLJ's investment banking business. He also served as Co-Head of the Mergers and Acquisitions Department at DLJ and as Managing Director – Senior Advisor of Credit Suisse First Boston upon CSFB's acquisition of DLJ in 2000. 

I'm just delighted to have Anders Åslund on Economics Matters -- the Podcast. I met Anders in the late 1990s when he asked me to go with him to Russia to discuss pension and other economic reforms with the Russian government. At the time, Anders was working for the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. He is now Senior Fellow at the Atlantic Council. This was a period of great hope for Russia, making it the first of many fascinating consulting and research (with the Gaidar Institute) trips to Russia. But the best part of returning to Russia (which my great grandfather had escaped on a stolen horse!) was meeting Anders, who is both a marvelous economist and extremely well informed about the global economy and geopolitics. Please listen to/watch this podcast to learn Anders assessment of the future of Ukraine, what's driving President Trump's policy, and his scary assessment of the world economy. 

Mark and Kara are a 50-50 combination of Top Gun and The Right Stuff. Mark was chosen by the Airforce to fly the U-2 Spy Plane -- at 72,000 feet, in a space suit to keep from compressing to a raison. Kara was picked to fly the Airforce's enormous C-5 cargo plane -- large enough to hold five trailways buses. Mark was Kara's flight instructor years before they accidentally reconnected and ended up getting married. After leaving the Airforce, the two started flying for United. Mark still does, while Kara trains Airforce pilots to fly large military drones. Mark and Kara are avid users of my company's MaxiFi Planner software, which is how we connected. Nicer people you won't meet. And they make "Thank you for your Service" as large an understatement as it gets. They also remind us why we feel safe entrusting pilots. They are that rarest of breed -- people on whom we can really count. Please listen/watch this video to get simply fascinating, insider information on aviation, both military and commercial. Kara and Mark are starting to work with my company -- providing office hours to newbie users of MaxiFi, doing demos for financial advisers, and, shortly, offering concierge financial planning for clients who want real pilots in the cockpit.