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Fresh Air

Confused By The U.S. Economy? You're Not Alone

Fresh Air

NPR

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4.434.4K Ratings

🗓️ 22 October 2025

⏱️ 47 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

How are changing tariffs, the AI boom, immigration policies and uncertainty in employment and the stock market impacting the economy? Zanny Minton Beddoes, editor-in-chief of The Economist, explains.

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Transcript

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0:00.0

In the U.S., national security news can feel far away from daily life.

0:05.0

Distant wars, murky conflicts, diplomacy behind closed doors.

0:09.0

On our new show, Sources and Methods. NPR reporters on the ground bring you stories of real people, helping you understand why distant events matter here at home.

0:19.1

Listen to sources and methods on the NPR app or wherever you get your podcasts.

0:24.1

This is fresh air. I'm Terry Gross.

0:26.9

President Trump's immigration policies, his tariffs, enabling doge to fire or lay off tens of thousands of federal workers, are all creating an environment of financial uncertainty.

0:38.9

It's rattling consumers, as well as many businesses, investors, and global leaders,

0:44.4

and yet the stock market has remained high. Why? To explain the impact of these policies and

0:50.2

proposals, with an extra portion of uncertainty caused by the government shutdown, we invited

0:55.8

the editor-in-chief of the economist Zanny Minton Betoes to join us. She is also the host of The Insider,

1:02.4

The Economist's New Streaming Show. She previously was the publication's business editor and

1:08.0

economics editor and as a former economist for the International Monetary Fund.

1:13.1

We recorded our interview yesterday. Sandy Mittenbettos, welcome back to fresh air. Of all the

1:19.3

financial moves, Trump and his administration have been making, is there any one thing that you find

1:24.8

most confounding or most impactful? Well, first of all, it's very nice to

1:31.6

join you again. That's a hard one to answer because what is remarkable is that in the face of a

1:36.6

lot of shocks, some positive, many negative, the economy is doing remarkably well. And the stock

1:42.2

market is doing remarkably well. And I think that the sort of

1:45.1

simple way to explain that is that on the one hand, we have a number of policy shocks. And I would

1:52.3

put the president's immigration policy right at the top and his tariff policy right at the top.

1:57.9

And we can talk about both of those. But also generally the

2:01.0

uncertainty that surrounds what President Trump does. You know, he is very pro-business on one

...

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