How One Consequence Of The Government Shutdown May Mess Up More Than You Think

The NPR Politics Podcast

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Politics, Daily News, News

4.5 • 24.9K Ratings

🗓️ 15 October 2025

⏱️ 16 minutes

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Summary

One task the federal government does a lot of is gathering data -- on prices, on the job market, and on a bunch of other things. When the government is shut down, those data aren't getting collected, and economic policy decisions based on those data aren't getting made with the full picture. We discuss why this aspect of the government shutdown has a broader impact than you might think.

This episode: political correspondent Ashley Lopez, White House correspondent Danielle Kurtzleben, and senior economic correspondent Scott Horsley.

This podcast was produced and edited by Casey Morell & Bria Suggs.

Our executive producer is Muthoni Muturi.

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Transcript

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0:39.0	Hi, this is Maya Kel Abrams in Los Angeles, California. I'm about to head out to the sunset
0:45.5	strip to see the premiere of my dance installation piece on a billboard screen. This episode was
0:52.2	recorded at 106 p.m. Eastern Time on Wednesday, October 15th, 2025.
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1:27.4	Hey there, it's the NPR Politics Podcast. I'm Ashley Lopez. I cover politics. I'm Danielle
1:32.0	Kurtzleben. I cover the White House. And NPR's chief economics correspondent, Scott Horsley, is with us today. Hi, Scott.
1:38.8	Hi. Great to be with y'all. And Scott is joining us because we want to talk about the economy, specifically what we know and what we don't about the country's economic health given the government shutdown.
1:50.7	Scott, the federal government has to come up with a lot of economic data over the course of a year.
	...

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