Words & Numbers

This week, we address listener questions from our earlier episode on the Fed. We also make incorrect predictions about whether the September cut in interest rates. Get Your Copy of Cooperation and Coercion Now! http://www.cooperationandcoercion.com See More Ant and James! http://www.wordsandnumbers.org Show Your Support for Words & Numbers at Patreon https://www.patreon.com/wordsandnumbers Quick Hits https://www.theguardian.com/technology/article/2024/sep/08/goodbye-tinder-hello-strava-have-hobby-apps-become-the-new-social-networks Foolishness of the Week https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/companies/chase-bank-says-it-is-aware-of-viral-glitch-inviting-people-to-commit-check-fraud/ar-AA1pW1OW?ocid=BingNewsSerp Words & Numbers Backstage https://www.facebook.com/groups/130029457649243/ More James at Smoke & Stories https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLjILow4-ZJpBV-NnmSusZJ_vCuzKUJ4Ig More Ant on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/antonydavies Let Us Know What You Think mailto:wordsandnumberspodcast@g

The idea of an unrealized capital gains tax gains momentum every election season of late. This week, we take a look at what it is and why even the middle class should be very afraid. Foolishness of the Week: 07:34 Main episode: 11:12 Get Your Copy of Cooperation and Coercion Now! http://www.cooperationandcoercion.com See More Ant and James! http://www.wordsandnumbers.org Show Your Support for Words & Numbers at Patreon https://www.patreon.com/wordsandnumbers Quick Hits https://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/people-seen-as-wise-share-these-characteristics-all-over-the-world/ Foolishness of the Week https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/article/2024/aug/30/elon-musk-wealth-power Words & Numbers Backstage https://www.facebook.com/groups/130029457649243/ More James at Smoke & Stories https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLjILow4-ZJpBV-NnmSusZJ_vCuzKUJ4Ig More Ant on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/antonydavies Let Us Know What You Think mailto:wordsandnumberspodcast@gmail.com Antony Davies on Twitter

Episode 395: The Fed What does the Fed do and how does it do it? Foolishness of the Week: 06:38 Main episode: 08:51 Get Your Copy of Cooperation and Coercion Now! http://www.cooperationandcoercion.com See More Ant and James! http://www.wordsandnumbers.org Show Your Support for Words & Numbers at Patreon https://www.patreon.com/wordsandnumbers Quick Hits https://apnews.com/article/harris-walz-apostrophe-possessive-grammar-967c0bbefc09be6c804588daabed7ec9 Foolishness of the Week https://apnews.com/article/benjamin-benji-cranford-thomson-mayor-alcohol-inmates-8a60ee1ca581a6a219cd29cc273f2758 Words & Numbers Backstage https://www.facebook.com/groups/130029457649243/ More James at Smoke & Stories https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLjILow4-ZJpBV-NnmSusZJ_vCuzKUJ4Ig More Ant on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/antonydavies Let Us Know What You Think mailto:wordsandnumberspodcast@gmail.com Antony Davies on Twitter https://twitter.com/antonydavies James R. Harrigan on Twitter https://twitter.com/Jame

Episode 394: Candidates’ Attitudes Unfortunately, when it comes to elections, often a smile is all it takes. Foolishness of the Week: 06:55 Main episode: 11:32 Get Your Copy of Cooperation and Coercion Now! http://www.cooperationandcoercion.com See More Ant and James! http://www.wordsandnumbers.org Show Your Support for Words & Numbers at Patreon https://www.patreon.com/wordsandnumbers Quick Hits https://www.complex.com/life/a/backwoodsaltar/donald-trump-says-he-doesnt-want-pronouns Foolishness of the Week https://apnews.com/article/kamala-harris-price-gouging-ban-inflation-65dc8844bb41159d76886f752b6cab28 https://www.foxnews.com/media/cracks-wall-media-praise-harris-multiple-outlets-eviscerate-vp-over-price-control-plan Words & Numbers Backstage https://www.facebook.com/groups/130029457649243/ More James at Smoke & Stories https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLjILow4-ZJpBV-NnmSusZJ_vCuzKUJ4Ig More Ant on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/antonydavies Let Us Know What You Think mailto:wordsand

This is a conversation James and I had concerning various topics in economics and current events. Get Your Copy of Cooperation and Coercion Now! http://www.cooperationandcoercion.com Show Your Support for Words & Numbers at Patreon https://www.patreon.com/wordsandnumbers The School of Ireland https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ByBussFxezk Join the Conversation Words & Numbers Backstage https://www.facebook.com/groups/130029457649243/ Let Us Know What You Think mailto:wordsandnumberspodcast@gmail.com Antony Davies on Twitter https://twitter.com/antonydavies James R. Harrigan on Twitter https://twitter.com/JamesRHarrigan

Get Your Copy of Cooperation and Coercion Now! http://www.cooperationandcoercion.com See More Ant and James! http://www.wordsandnumbers.org Show Your Support for Words & Numbers at Patreon https://www.patreon.com/wordsandnumbers Quick Hits https://colombiaone.com/2024/08/05/brazilian-prison-replaces-guard-dogs-with-geese/#:~:text=At%20the%20S%C3%A3o%20Pedro%20de,with%20a%20group%20of%20geese https://www.independent.co.uk/tech/friend-ai-artificial-intelligence-new-b2590345.html https://www.independent.co.uk/tech/friend-ai-artificial-intelligence-b2588853.html Foolishness of the Week https://www.nbcnews.com/news/rcna165147 Words & Numbers Backstage https://www.facebook.com/groups/130029457649243/ More James at Smoke & Stories https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLjILow4-ZJpBV-NnmSusZJ_vCuzKUJ4Ig More Ant on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/antonydavies Let Us Know What You Think mailto:wordsandnumberspodcast@gmail.com Antony Davies on Twitter https://twitter.com/antonydavies James R. Harrigan on

This week James shares some first-hand experience with the magic that comes out of modern health care. Foolishness of the Week: 10:22 Main episode: 12:43 Get Your Copy of Cooperation and Coercion Now! http://www.cooperationandcoercion.com See More Ant and James! http://www.wordsandnumbers.org Show Your Support for Words & Numbers at Patreon https://www.patreon.com/wordsandnumbers Quick Hits https://www.cybertruckownersclub.com/forum/threads/raccoon-damages-cybertruck-bed-vault-tonneau-cover.20349/ Foolishness of the Week https://www.dailydot.com/debug/nullbulge-hackers-leak-disney-slack-hack/ Words & Numbers Backstage https://www.facebook.com/groups/130029457649243/ More James at Smoke & Stories https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLjILow4-ZJpBV-NnmSusZJ_vCuzKUJ4Ig More Ant on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/antonydavies Let Us Know What You Think mailto:wordsandnumberspodcast@gmail.com Antony Davies on Twitter https://twitter.com/antonydavies James R. Harrigan on Twitter https://twitter.com

James is recovering from surgery this week, so we offer you this special episode on personal finance so as to not to leave you sad and alone on Words & Numbers Wednesday!

Are we in a recession? Americans say we are. The data say we aren’t. Who’s right? Foolishness of the Week: 05:30 Main episode: 10:50 Get Your Copy of Cooperation and Coercion Now! http://www.cooperationandcoercion.com See More Ant and James! http://www.wordsandnumbers.org Show Your Support for Words & Numbers at Patreon https://www.patreon.com/wordsandnumbers Quick Hits https://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/michael-bloomberg-donates-1-billion-to-provide-free-tuition-for-future-doctors-at-johns-hopkins/ https://apnews.com/general-news-4db3fb7fa202234b220c803626464a3f https://www.philanthropyroundtable.org/resource/seven-stories-of-donor-intent-violations-in-higher-education-giving/ Foolishness of the Week https://www.dailydot.com/debug/nullbulge-hackers-leak-disney-slack-hack/ Words & Numbers Backstage https://www.facebook.com/groups/130029457649243/ More James at Smoke & Stories https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLjILow4-ZJpBV-NnmSusZJ_vCuzKUJ4Ig More Ant on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/antony

Supply chain insider Mikhail Razner joins us again for what has come to be an annual update on the state of supply chains. Want to know why your boysenberry pie is more expensive? Listen in! Foolishness of the Week: 10:24 Main episode: 13:20 Get Your Copy of Cooperation and Coercion Now! http://www.cooperationandcoercion.com See More Ant and James! http://www.wordsandnumbers.org Show Your Support for Words & Numbers at Patreon https://www.patreon.com/wordsandnumbers Quick Hits https://www.economist.com/finance-and-economics/2024/06/06/why-global-gdp-might-be-7trn-bigger-than-everyone-thought https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(PPP) https://www.cia.gov/the-world-factbook/field/gdp-official-exchange-rate/ https://x.com/POTUS/status/1808470746559123953 Foolishness of the Week https://www.newschannel5.com/news/newschannel-5-investigates/state-of-tennessee-tells-u-s-navy-veteran-hes-not-an-american-citizen-and-cancels-his-drivers-license Words & Numbers Backstage https://www.facebook

Get Your Copy of Cooperation and Coercion Now! http://www.cooperationandcoercion.com See More Ant and James! http://www.wordsandnumbers.org Show Your Support for Words & Numbers at Patreon https://www.patreon.com/wordsandnumbers Topic of the Week Clark Neily on Amazon https://www.amazon.com/stores/author/B00EJKBKOC Words & Numbers Backstage https://www.facebook.com/groups/130029457649243/ More James at Smoke & Stories https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLjILow4-ZJpBV-NnmSusZJ_vCuzKUJ4Ig More Ant on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/antonydavies Let Us Know What You Think mailto:wordsandnumberspodcast@gmail.com Antony Davies on Twitter https://twitter.com/antonydavies James R. Harrigan on Twitter https://twitter.com/JamesRHarrigan #AntonyDavies #JamesRHarrigan #WordsAndNumbers #economics #government #politics #policy #libertarian #classicalliberal #podcast #educational

Foolishness of the Week: 05:13 Main episode: 12:18 Get Your Copy of Cooperation and Coercion Now! http://www.cooperationandcoercion.com See More Ant and James! http://www.wordsandnumbers.org Show Your Support for Words & Numbers at Patreon https://www.patreon.com/wordsandnumbers Quick Hits https://viewfromthewing.com/hertz-nightmare-customer-fined-436-before-they-even-rented-the-car/comment-page-1/ https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/cars/2022/03/04/rental-car-consumer-rights/9365841002/ https://www.thedrive.com/news/hertz-is-charging-tesla-model-3-renter-277-fee-for-gas-wont-back-down https://viewfromthewing.com/divine-retribution-or-corporate-policy-hertz-imposes-biblical-ban-on-a-customers-descendants/ https://www.investopedia.com/nearly-1-in-4-generation-x-workers-say-they-wont-retire-survey-shows-8666276 Foolishness of the Week https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/rcna158268 https://thehill.com/opinion/civil-rights/4684714-louisiana-wants-the-ten-commandments-in-schools-but-which-version/ Topic of

Many of our listeners, and at least one of our hosts, are avid gamers, so it's natural that we'd come around to this topic eventually. Gaming companies are known to employ economists (often game theorists) to help design games because economists understand how to think about how people behave when their unlimited desires collide with their limited abilities. Games are nothing more than artificial environments in which these very real behaviors play out. Foolishness of the Week: 10:06 Main episode: 17:27 Get Your Copy of Cooperation and Coercion Now! http://www.cooperationandcoercion.com See More Ant and James! http://www.wordsandnumbers.org Show Your Support for Words & Numbers at Patreon https://www.patreon.com/wordsandnumbers Quick Hits https://moneywise.com/retirement/average-american-says-their-time-is-worth-240 https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LES1252881500Q https://www.axios.com/2024/06/15/double-haters-biden-trump-favorability https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/4723719-lara-trump-vows-to-pr

Canada’s central bank cut its interest rate. The European central bank cut its interest rate. But the Fed continues to hold its interest rate high. This will create a cascade of effects - some good, some bad, depending on who you are. Foolishness of the Week: 09:43 Main episode: 13:11 Get Your Copy of Cooperation and Coercion Now! http://www.cooperationandcoercion.com See More Ant and James! http://www.wordsandnumbers.org Show Your Support for Words & Numbers at Patreon https://www.patreon.com/wordsandnumbers Quick Hits https://www.newsweek.com/larry-hogan-chances-flipping-maryland-senate-1898953 https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/may/22/poll-economy-recession-biden https://dnyuz.com/2024/06/09/is-your-driving-being-secretly-scored/ Foolishness of the Week https://www.huffpost.com/entry/brit-hume-stupid-lara-trump_n_665e73a6e4b022af97dd51cf Words & Numbers Backstage https://www.facebook.com/groups/130029457649243/ More James at Smoke & Stories https://www.youtube.com/playlist?li

If people who call for reparations for slavery want to be taken seriously, they must take their own arguments seriously first. And that requires bringing to bear the same scrutiny and law that we currently apply to any case in which someone is seeking to be made whole following the actions of another. Foolishness of the Week: 11:57 Main episode: 15:01 Get Your Copy of Cooperation and Coercion Now! http://www.cooperationandcoercion.com See More Ant and James! http://www.wordsandnumbers.org Show Your Support for Words & Numbers at Patreon https://www.patreon.com/wordsandnumbers Quick Hits https://www.thestreet.com/lifestyle/travel/this-new-rideshare-company-is-packing-heat-and-drawing-customers https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/markets/ar-BB1ntRiK https://www.notus.org/2024-election/small-dollar-donations https://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2024/06/02/chase_oliver_the_new_socially_liberal_face_of_the_libertarian_party_151037.html   Foolishness of the Week https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-tiktok

We’ve argued before that the value of a college degree was questionable. That was before covid. Since then, the value proposition has deteriorated markedly. Foolishness of the Week: 05:15 Main episode: 07:07 Get Your Copy of Cooperation and Coercion Now! http://www.cooperationandcoercion.com See More Ant and James! http://www.wordsandnumbers.org Show Your Support for Words & Numbers at Patreon https://www.patreon.com/wordsandnumbers Quick Hits https://cwbchicago.com/2024/05/chicago-fake-robbery-visa-scam.html https://www.malwarebytes.com/blog/news/2024/05/microsoft-ai-recall-feature-records-everything-secures-far-less Foolishness of the Week https://news.sky.com/story/mexico-fire-breather-fights-off-marauding-mariachis-in-turf-war-over-tips-13141041 Topic of the Week https://www.pewresearch.org/social-trends/2024/05/23/is-college-worth-it-2/ Words & Numbers Backstage https://www.facebook.com/groups/130029457649243/ More James at Smoke & Stories https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLjILow4-Z

The annual gross interest on the debt exceeded $1 trillion for the first time in history. Years ago, we warned that the combination of on-going deficits and inevitably higher interest rates would give us exactly what we have now. Foolishness of the Week: 08:16 Main episode: 09:31 Get Your Copy of Cooperation and Coercion Now! http://www.cooperationandcoercion.com See More Ant and James! http://www.wordsandnumbers.org Show Your Support for Words & Numbers at Patreon https://www.patreon.com/wordsandnumbers Quick Hits https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jared_Bernstein https://youtu.be/p5qTFd6PJ0k?si=iB2LjscjaCQW4nk3&t=216 https://x.com/walterolson/status/1792007573463261516/photo/1 Foolishness of the Week https://www.live5news.com/2024/05/17/man-is-moving-his-entire-house-12-feet-comply-with-zoning-rules/ Topic of the Week https://www.visualcapitalist.com/u-s-debt-interest-payments-reach-1-trillion/ Words & Numbers Backstage https://www.facebook.com/groups/130029457649243/ More James at Smoke & Stor

A generation or two ago, people wrung their hands over the population explosion. What will happen, they said, when we finally have too many people! It turns out that, not only was overpopulation not a problem, underpopulation has become one. Foolishness of the Week: 8:25 Main episode: 14:19 Get Your Copy of Cooperation and Coercion Now! http://www.cooperationandcoercion.com See More Ant and James! http://www.wordsandnumbers.org Show Your Support for Words & Numbers at Patreon https://www.patreon.com/wordsandnumbers Quick Hits https://www.yourtango.com/news/bumble-founder-says-future-ai-dating Foolishness of the Week https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jared_Bernstein https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2024/05/03/biden_economic_advisor_jared_bernstein.html Topic of the Week https://www.msn.com/en-us/health/other/ar-BB1mhbxT Words & Numbers Backstage https://www.facebook.com/groups/130029457649243/ More James at Smoke & Stories https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLjILow4-ZJpBV-NnmSusZJ_vCuzKUJ4

Foolishness of the Week: 11:09 Main episode: 16:35 Get Your Copy of Cooperation and Coercion Now! http://www.cooperationandcoercion.com See More Ant and James! http://www.wordsandnumbers.org Show Your Support for Words & Numbers at Patreon https://www.patreon.com/wordsandnumbers Quick Hits https://twitter.com/amyklobuchar/status/1786794183312748959 Foolishness of the Week https://www.the-express.com/news/us-news/136485/america-civil-war-five-years-poll Topic of the Week https://www.federalreserve.gov/econres/scf/dataviz/scf/chart/#series:Net_Worth;demographic:all;population:1;units:median;range:1989,2022 https://www.statista.com/statistics/617390/us-millionaire-households/ https://www.ramseysolutions.com/retirement/how-many-millionaires-actually-inherited-their-wealth Words & Numbers Backstage https://www.facebook.com/groups/130029457649243/ More James at Smoke & Stories https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLjILow4-ZJpBV-NnmSusZJ_vCuzKUJ4Ig More Ant on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/antony

Clark Neily joins us again this week. This time, we’re talking about how we have come to muddle the separation of powers among the three branches of government. As Congress has largely fallen asleep at the wheel, the executive branch has come to play the roles of all three branches, all by itself. Foolishness of the Week: 04:46 Main episode: 05:49 Get Your Copy of Cooperation and Coercion Now! http://www.cooperationandcoercion.com See More Ant and James! http://www.wordsandnumbers.org Show Your Support for Words & Numbers at Patreon https://www.patreon.com/wordsandnumbers Quick Hits https://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/3932145-energy-dept-to-ban-sale-of-some-light-bulbs-heres-why/ https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13359223/kristi-noem-vp-killing-dog-trump.html Foolishness of the Week https://nypost.com/2024/04/26/us-news/ai-priest-defrocked-by-developer-after-taking-confessions-like-real-priest/ Topic of the Week Clark Neily https://www.amazon.com/stores/Clark-M.-Neily-III/author/B00EJ