))
Very Serious is a weekly conversation with top political commentators, columnists and policymakers, focused on how events in the news relate to major, long-standing controversies in politics, economics and culture. Host Josh Barro is joined by a rotating set of regular guests to work out the ideas behind the arguments on topics serious and not-so-serious. It’s a great conversation across ideological lines that will leave you entertained, enlightened, and maybe even persuaded. www.joshbarro.com
…
continue reading
How are state and local governments faring post-COVID? It's a pretty different picture than what we're seeing with the federal budget deficit. States enjoyed generous federal aid and surprisingly strong tax collections during the pandemic. In 2021, state governments were flush — sometimes, they even made responsible choices, making deposits into th…
…
continue reading
We are back with Peter Suderman’s semi-annual visit to the Very Serious podcast! Getting ready for spring, Peter and I talked about best practices for muddling fresh fruit into cocktails. We talked about Peter’s philosophy of the 41-bottle bar, about his favorite non-alcoholic cocktails, and about why he has no use for vodka. We also talked about “…
…
continue reading
We’re back with another episode of the Very Serious podcast, and this episode has a friend of the show: Prof. Jason Furman, who teaches economics at Harvard. Or, as Jason put it to me, he’s a bit of a foul-weather friend of the show: Jason: Inflation does fluctuate a bit. Sometimes it looks a little bit better — during those times, you don't have m…
…
continue reading
There was no national “Red Wave” in last November’s elections, but there sure was one in New York. Republicans won a clean sweep on Long Island, even washing George Santos into Congress. They lost Asian and Hispanic support in New York City, turning swathes of Brooklyn red and Queens purple. I invited progressive journalist Ross Barkan to talk abou…
…
continue reading
A few weeks back, I wrote about the ethic of homeownership, and how I think it is unlikely to be dislodged from American society. If we’re going to improve our housing policy and ensure more adequate supply, we’re going to have to work with that ethic, not against it. And I think that’s a feasible thing to do. That piece was a response to an articl…
…
continue reading
Tim Lee is the author of Full Stack Economics and one of my favorite reads on business and the economy. He’s also a parent to three children under the age of seven, and a major reason he quit his full-time journalism job to go independent — even though he knew it would reduce his income — was so he could maintain a flexible schedule and be more ava…
…
continue reading
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.joshbarro.com Retired professional poker player Annie Duke says quitting well — promptly realizing when your efforts aren’t working and redirecting resources to something more likely to be effective — is a badly underrated virtue. In this episode and in her new book Quit, Annie share…
…
continue reading
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit www.joshbarro.com Peter Suderman is back by popular demand to talk about cocktails for fall. We talk about Negroni variations, the right sour drinks for sweater weather, best practices for hot and room-temperature cocktails (yes, that's a thing), and Peter's recipe for homemade Pumpkin S…
…
continue reading
This week's episode of Very Serious contains some un-bleeped profanity. Have you noticed that advice columns are everywhere now? Have you noticed that most of the questions are fake, and yet you cannot stop reading them? Why? My friend Ben Dreyfuss has been getting into the advice business himself, taking the questions from popular advice columns a…
…
continue reading
Remember the Joe Biden and Barack Obama friendship bracelets from the 2020 campaign? That — and the whole Obama-Biden bromance meme — was cringe, and it was also an oversimplification of a much more interesting story. Gabriel Debenedetti, national correspondent for New York magazine, talks with me about their two-decade relationship that has shaped…
…
continue reading
“I think remote work really is a general purpose technology… It's more comparable to electrification. It's more comparable to the invention of the internal combustion engine or automobiles or something like that in the way that it's going to ripple through everything and it's going to have these longstanding big impacts." This week, I talk with Ada…
…
continue reading
Lis Smith is a veteran Democratic communications consultant, best known as communications director for the Pete Buttigieg presidential campaign. Her 'more is more' instinct about engaging with the media was an essential component of the strategy to bring Mayor Pete out of nowhere and turn him into a major contender for the 2020 Democratic president…
…
continue reading
Nearly five months into Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Western governments have a problem: despite international sanctions and rebukes for Russia's actions, the world's reliance (especially Europe's) on Russian energy is sustaining Russia's invasion of Ukraine. The world is already feeling the effects of the invasion on energy prices, and now Europe…
…
continue reading
A lot of things aren’t working quite like they’re supposed to these days, and air travel is a prime example. Travelers are getting increasingly unreliable airline operations with more flights delayed and canceled, and a more chaotic experience at the airport even when flights go on time — at a moment when fares are very expensive and still rising. …
…
continue reading
Financial economist Allison Schrager says you can't have nice things anymore — or at least, you can't have all of them, not in this interest rate environment. After 40 years of falling interest rates, they're sharply rising again, and those higher rates force more discipline on everyone: not just consumers, but businesses and governments, all of wh…
…
continue reading
What happened on January 6 (and in the lead-up to it, with Donald Trump trying to steal the election) was very important. But I have been very bearish on the usefulness of talking to the public more about it — it happened right in front of our faces, it’s not a top priority for persuadable voters, and more time spent marinating on it can simply dis…
…
continue reading
Dear readers, Due to the holiday weekend, this week’s schedule for Very Serious is out of order. The podcast is out today, there will be a regular issue tomorrow, and a special Fire Island edition of the Mayonnaise Clinic will be coming on Friday. One striking fact about three-term New York mayor Ed Koch’s life in the closet — the subject of a rece…
…
continue reading
Elon Musk, the world's richest man, doesn't just behave in ways that run afoul of regulators. He does things most CEOs don't because they think it would cost them business relationships, and therefore money. JP Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon wouldn't Tweet that he has "funding secured" to take JP Morgan private at $169 per share, especially if he didn't ac…
…
continue reading
Questions about identifying and matching talent underlie a lot of political and economic discussions in our society. Are we admitting the right people to universities? Giving them the right training? Preventing labor market discrimination? Setting policies around work and family that make it possible for people (especially mothers of young children…
…
continue reading
It's been a tumultuous decade for news media. Publications have been upended financially by technological shifts, and they face employee and subscriber pressure to become more openly ideological. The result is a media that's more siloed, more preachy, and more financially precarious. What can be done to restore trust, build sustainable businesses, …
…
continue reading
Federal Reserve Chair Jay Powell says he thinks there's a good chance for a "soft-ish" landing: taming inflation without pushing the economy into recession. But how difficult will that be? Economist Jason Furman joins Josh to talk about this challenge and what might be needed if the Fed’s rate hikes over the next few months prove to be far from eno…
…
continue reading
Dear readers, I know, I said yesterday that today’s cocktail post was only going to be for paying subscribers. But this is the first edition of the podcast where we’re actually pushing the audio through Substack’s pipes. We’re still kicking the tires on that system — and for boring technical reasons, we couldn’t find a good way to paywall the text …
…
continue reading
In early 2020, we were told the COVID crisis was supposed to cause a housing price crash. State government budget crises. The eviction of 30 million or more Americans. A "she-cession." None of these problems came to pass -- instead, we got a rapid recovery of GDP and employment, state budgets in surplus, and a huge spurt of inflation few people exp…
…
continue reading
The war in Ukraine has added urgency to Europe’s efforts to end its dependency on Russian natural gas. In the US, a shift toward efficiency and renewables is important for both geopolitical and environmental reasons. So, how can we do it? How much natural gas can we export to Europe? How can we reinforce our electrical grids and power them with non…
…
continue reading
Disaster management hasn’t been a bright spot for Western governments lately. So, how can we do better? Juliette Kayyem, former assistant secretary of homeland security, says we need to “fail safer,” with more focus on mitigating the disasters that happen instead of believing we can stop them from happening at all. She joined Josh to talk about les…
…
continue reading
It’s the other big global crisis right now: China faces a new COVID surge, and it’s responding with lockdowns that will worsen global shortages and inflation. China has other troubles, too: a bursting real estate bubble, and a geopolitical partner – Russia – that’s waging a war of choice and roiling global energy markets. With China’s economic and …
…
continue reading
It’s an All the Presidents’ Lawyers reunion with Josh and attorney Ken White! Josh and Ken discuss the implosion of the Manhattan DA investigation into Donald Trump’s financial statements. Did DA Alvin Bragg lose his nerve, or was this a weak case he was wise to drop? Plus, Josh and Ken talk defamation: There’s been a lot of lying and litigation ab…
…
continue reading
From German re-armament to the Iran deal to China's eyes on Taiwan, Russia's war on Ukraine is setting off big changes around the world. What do these shifts mean for America's interests? Can we get Saudi Arabia to help with the global oil crunch? Is it time for rapprochement with Venezuela? And what will Russia's stamina for this war be if China g…
…
continue reading
Children are necessarily central to our politics. Their lives are highly regulated by the state, which ensures (among other things) that they are educated rather than employed, that they are supported by their parents or someone else if their parents are unable. The other authority in children’s lives is, of course, their parents. A liberal society…
…
continue reading
Personality is a key determinant of life success, and we all have opinions about other people’s personalities, but can we change our own? Olga Khazan, science writer for The Atlantic, set out to change her personality in three months – more extroverted, more agreeable, less neurotic. She talked with Josh about her experience and the psychological r…
…
continue reading
Inflation is the highest it’s been in decades. Why? Economist Jason Furman talks with Josh Barro about where inflation comes from, and what we've misunderstood about it in the past. Fixes to the supply chain or to COVID aren’t likely to do much about it, and Jason tells us why. Plus: what the Federal Reserve can and should do to tame inflation, and…
…
continue reading
David Leonhardt, author of The Morning newsletter from the New York Times, is one of the most influential writers on COVID and COVID policy. He talks with Josh about how he synthesizes expert views for a broad audience, how to help people weigh costs and benefits, and the future of COVID response after Omicron. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and…
…
continue reading
Matt Yglesias joins Josh to make the case for popularism – the idea that politicians win by doing popular things and talking about them. Sounds obvious, right? Well, it’s controversial, and besides, figuring out what’s popular isn’t always easy. Matt has specific ideas for Joe Biden to be popular. Plus, Matt revisits his endorsement of Bernie Sande…
…
continue reading
Two years into the COVID pandemic, the relationship between experts and the public is frayed. There is blame to go around. Josh talks with experts on expertise Tom Nichols and Lanhee Chen about what experts are for, how expertise has been misused and misunderstood, and how politicians can best combine expert opinion with value judgments to make pol…
…
continue reading
If your friends have ever struggled to choose a place to go to dinner, you know people aren’t always very good at accessing and articulating their preferences. This also matters in politics – how do you get voters to tell you what they feel about the issues and which ones they really care about, when they may not really know? Pollsters Kristen Solt…
…
continue reading
It’s a question you hear a lot during COVID: How do you balance the economy with people’s well-being? But the economy is part of people’s well-being. On this week’s show, Josh talks with Elizabeth Bruenig of the Atlantic and Megan McArdle from the Washington Post about what COVID has taught us about what makes a good economy for the people. They di…
…
continue reading
A new, weekly podcast from Josh Barro launching January 14! See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.joshbarro.com/subscribeتوسط Josh Barro
…
continue reading
