A run for cover: LA’s fires and insurance
The Intelligence from The Economist
The Economist
4.5 • 3.7K Ratings
🗓️ 13 January 2025
⏱️ 27 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Among the lessons emerging from California’s devastating fires is the idea that insurers cannot price risk on past data: the climate-change future is already here. Pete Hegseth, Donald Trump’s pick for defence secretary, has some misguided notions about women on the battlefield (10:10). And examining children’s literature: should it be all sugar and spice—or more real-world, where not everything’s nice (19:28)?
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This Intelligence podcast is sponsored by Salesforce. What if the workforce had no limits? |
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| 0:33.1 | The Economist |
| 0:34.4 | Hello and welcome. The Economist. |
| 0:43.4 | Hello and welcome to the intelligence from The Economist. |
| 0:45.0 | I'm your host, Jason Palmer. |
| 0:50.1 | Every weekday, we provide a fresh perspective on the events shaping your world. Donald Trump's pick for Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has some strong opinions when it comes to women in the military. |
| 1:03.1 | Our correspondent argues that in many ways he is, in a word, wrong. |
| 1:09.8 | And we take a look at children's literature and the merits and demerits of sugar-coding stories |
| 1:15.8 | through the centuries. |
| 1:17.3 | After all, the classic ending and they lived happily ever after often used to be, and if |
| 1:22.8 | they haven't died, they're still alive. |
| 1:31.3 | Thank you. died, they're still alive. First up, though. It's been sort of nightmarish here in Los Angeles. |
| 2:02.0 | Erin Braun is the economist's West Coast correspondent. |
| 2:05.8 | Everyone's constantly checking an app to make sure they don't have to evacuate, |
| 2:10.6 | looking at the sky to see how much smoke there is and where the wind is blowing. |
| 2:16.9 | This weekend I went out to Altadina, which is one of the neighborhoods that has been destroyed by one of the fires. |
| 2:23.3 | And I went out there with Henry Tricks, one of my colleagues at The Economist. |
... |
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