The Economics Show
Financial Times
The Economics Show with Soumaya Keynes is a new weekly podcast from the Financial Times packed full of smart, digestible analysis and incisive conversation. Soumaya Keynes digs deep into the hottest topics in economics along with a cast of FT colleagues and special guests. Come for the big ideas, stay for the nerdery.
Soumaya Keynes is an economics columnist for the Financial Times. Prior to joining the FT she worked at The Economist for eight years as a staff writer, where as well as covering trade, the US economy and the UK economy she co-hosted the Money Talks podcast. She also co-founded the Trade Talks podcast.
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Top 10 The Economics Show Episodes
Goodpods has curated a list of the 10 best The Economics Show episodes, ranked by the number of listens and likes each episode have garnered from our listeners. If you are listening to The Economics Show for the first time, there's no better place to start than with one of these standout episodes. If you are a fan of the show, vote for your favorite The Economics Show episode by adding your comments to the episode page.
Can the WTO stay relevant? With Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala
The Economics Show
02/03/25 • 30 min
In an interview recorded before President Trump hit China, Mexico and Canada with steep tariffs that disrupt the global trading system, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, the director-general of the World Trade Organisation, speaks to the FT’s Senior Trade Writer, Alan Beattie, and defends her record and the WTO’s achievements. She outlines how she hopes to engage with the new US administration and how globalisation has been remarkably resilient despite shocks such as the Covid-19 pandemic and the rise of US protectionism in Trump's first term and under former president Joe Biden.
Alan writes the Trade Secrets newsletter. You can sign up here. He is on Bluesky at @alanbeattie.bsky.social.
Subscribe on Apple, Spotify, Pocket Casts or wherever you listen.
Presented by Alan Beattie. Produced by Laurence Knight. The editor is Bryant Urstadt. Manuela Saragosa is the executive producer. Audio mix and original music by Breen Turner. The FT’s head of audio is Cheryl Brumley.
Read a transcript of this episode on FT.com
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Rethinking income inequality, with Chris Giles
The Economics Show
08/05/24 • 31 min
A recently released research paper calls into question many of the assumptions about the rate at which income inequality has grown in the US over the past 75 years. Today on the show, Soumaya and the FT’s economics commentator, Chris Giles, discuss this bombshell report, and what it means for economists thinking about wealth and income in the US.
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Soumaya Keynes writes a column each week for the Financial Times. You can find it here
Subscribe to Soumaya's show on Apple, Spotify, Pocket Casts or wherever you listen.
Read a transcript of this episode on FT.com
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
What future for aid and development? With Minouche Shafik
The Economics Show
02/27/25 • 32 min
US President Donald Trump has frozen all foreign aid payments, while Elon Musk is putting America’s biggest development agency, USAID, “through the woodchipper”. Meanwhile, the UK government has just announced it will slash its aid budget from 0.5% to 0.3% of GDP. So are the days of generous programmes to promote health and education in the poorest nations now over? And should we fear that rising authoritarian powers, most notably China, are stepping into the breach with their own funds and parallel institutions? In an interview recorded just before the UK’s announcement, Alan Beattie speaks to economist Minouche Shafik, who is a veteran of the international development scene. She has worked at the World Bank, IMF, and the UK’s Department for International Development. And she is not optimistic.
Alan writes the Trade Secrets newsletter. You can sign up here. He is on Bluesky at @alanbeattie.bsky.social.
Subscribe on Apple, Spotify, Pocket Casts or wherever you listen.
Presented by Alan Beattie. Produced by Laurence Knight. Manuela Saragosa is the executive producer. Audio mix and original music by Breen Turner. The FT’s head of audio is Cheryl Brumley.
Read a transcript of this episode on FT.com
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
03/03/25 • 31 min
The world economy is emitting carbon dioxide faster than ever before, meaning our planet is heating up faster than ever before. Martin Wolf speaks to someone who has spent much of the past two decades at the forefront of the climate debate. Lord Adair Turner chairs the Energy Transitions Commission, a think-tank focused on climate mitigation, and was previously the first chair of the UK government’s committee on climate change in 2008-12. While he fears that US President Donald Trump will act as a drag anchor on international progress in cutting emissions, he believes the EU and China can strike a deal to help the whole world transition to cheap renewable energy.
Martin Wolf is chief economics commentator at the Financial Times. You can find his column here
Subscribe to The Economics Show on Apple, Spotify, Pocket Casts or wherever you listen.
Presented by Martin Wolf. Produced by Laurence Knight. Manuela Saragosa is the executive producer. Audio mix and original music by Breen Turner. The FT’s head of audio is Cheryl Brumley.
Read a transcript of this episode on FT.com
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
How big a fiscal hole is the British government in? With Paul Johnson
The Economics Show
03/24/25 • 31 min
The UK’s Labour government had already inherited a tricky fiscal situation when it came to power last July. But since then, growth has stagnated, borrowing costs have risen, and now the government has committed to a big increase in defence spending. Where will the money come from? The FT’s Sam Fleming interviews Paul Johnson, the long-time director of the Institute for Fiscal Studies, an independent think-tank that has been adjudicating the UK’s public finances for more than half a century. As Britain’s Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves prepares to deliver her Spring Statement on Wednesday, should she break her government’s pledge not to raise personal taxes?
Sam Fleming is the FT’s economics editor. You can find his latest features and columns here.
Subscribe to The Economics show on Apple, Spotify, Pocket Casts or wherever you listen.
Read a transcript of this episode on FT.com
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Tariffs past, present and future. With Doug Irwin.
The Economics Show
01/20/25 • 43 min
Doug Irwin is a professor at Dartmouth College and the author of several books on trade. Today on The Economics Show, he joins the FT’s Senior Trade Writer Alan Beattie to discuss the history of tariffs in the US, and what that history might tell us about the next round of tariffs.
Alan writes the Trade Secrets newsletter. You can sign up here. He is on Bluesky at @alanbeattie.bsky.social.
Subscribe on Apple, Spotify, Pocket Casts or wherever you listen.
Read a transcript of this episode on FT.com
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Would Trump’s tariffs really be that bad? With Kimberly Clausing
The Economics Show
11/18/24 • 33 min
Trump is returning to office with many of the same policies that characterised his last term. And for economists, none looms larger than the prospect of significant new tariffs. But are tariffs really as destructive as feared? After all, the Biden administration maintained most of them and the economy has remained strong. Today on the show, we put the question to Kimberly Clausing, a professor at UCLA, and formerly lead economist in the Biden administration's Office for Tax Policy.
Soumaya Keynes writes a column each week for the Financial Times. You can find it here
Subscribe to Soumaya's show on Apple, Spotify, Pocket Casts or wherever you listen.
Read a transcript of this episode on FT.com
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Can Germany escape its economic doldrums? With Ulrike Malmendier
The Economics Show
03/31/25 • 32 min
For the past few years, Germany has begun to look like the ‘sick man of Europe’ again. Its economy has barely grown since 2019, while its famous manufacturing sector has shrivelled. But earlier this month, financial markets were buoyed by a vote in the German parliament to relax the constitutional limit on government borrowing, the so-called debt brake. It means that Germany’s likely new conservative-led coalition government will be free to borrow unlimited amounts to fund a defence sector build-up, and can also draw on a €500bn fund to spend on infrastructure over the next 10 years. But will more government spending be enough to address Germany’s structural economic problems? The FT’s Martin Sandbu speaks to economist Ulrike Malmendier of the University of California, Berkeley, who is a member of the German Council of Economics Experts, which evaluates the government’s economic policies.
Martin Sandbu writes a regular column for the Financial Times, which you can find here. It includes recent columns on Berlin’s about-turn on debt spending, and the economic choice facing Germany.
Subscribe on Apple, Spotify, Pocket Casts or wherever you listen.
Presented by Martin Sandbu. Produced by Laurence Knight. Manuela Saragosa is the executive producer. Audio mix and original music by Breen Turner. The FT’s head of audio is Cheryl Brumley.
Read a transcript of this episode on FT.com
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Are we getting inflation right? With Neel Kashkari
The Economics Show
06/03/24 • 25 min
Today on the show Soumaya Keynes talks about macroeconomic mistakes and the interest rate outlook with Neel Kashkari, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis. FT economics commentator Chris Giles joins them to discuss what the Fed got right and wrong about inflation, and Neel’s journey from dove to hawk.
Subscribe to Soumaya's show on Apple, Spotify, Pocket Casts or wherever you listen.
Soumaya Keynes writes a column each week for the Financial Times. You can find it here.
Read a transcript of this episode on FT.com
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Why do companies make terrible decisions? With Dan Davies
The Economics Show
03/17/25 • 32 min
Modern industrial economies were made possible by automation and mass production, but also by something similar going on inside the world of management. Where once all the decisions were made by an identifiable boss, now they are farmed out to rule books, bureaucracies and computer algorithms — and nobody is individually accountable for them. The FT’s Andrew Hill speaks to Dan Davies, economist and author of The Unaccountability Machine, who explains how the industrialisation of management decision-making was inevitable in our increasingly complex world but has had unforeseen consequences, such as “accountability sinks” and the rise of populist politicians. Nonetheless, there are solutions, including AI, the 1950s management theory of cybernetics and the return of the much-maligned middle manager.
Andrew Hill is senior business writer at the Financial Times and consulting editor at FT Live. You can find his latest features and columns here, and enjoy his Big Read on the woes of America’s industrial giants here.
Subscribe to The Economics Show on Apple, Spotify, Pocket Casts or wherever you listen.
Presented by Andrew Hill. Produced by Edith Rousselot and Laurence Knight. The editor is Bryant Urstadt. Manuela Saragosa is the executive producer. Audio mix and original music by Breen Turner. The FT’s head of audio is Cheryl Brumley.
Read a transcript of this episode on FT.com
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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FAQ
How many episodes does The Economics Show have?
The Economics Show currently has 54 episodes available.
What topics does The Economics Show cover?
The podcast is about News, Business News, Economist, Podcasts, Economics, Business and Economy.
What is the most popular episode on The Economics Show?
The episode title 'The Economics of Parenting, with Emily Oster' is the most popular.
What is the average episode length on The Economics Show?
The average episode length on The Economics Show is 32 minutes.
How often are episodes of The Economics Show released?
Episodes of The Economics Show are typically released every 6 days, 23 hours.
When was the first episode of The Economics Show?
The first episode of The Economics Show was released on May 14, 2024.
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