There's a lot going on right now. Mounting economic inequality, threats to democracy, environmental disaster, the sour stench of chaos in the air.

I'm Brooke Gladstone, host of WNYC's On the Media. Want to understand the reasons and the meanings of the narratives that led us here and maybe how to head them off at the

past? That's on the media's specialty. Take a listen wherever you get your podcasts.

Tell you what, we've got just what you need on a Monday. Yep, a little macroeconomic analysis from American public media.

This is Marketplace.

In Los Angeles, I'm Kyle Rizdal.

It is Monday, today 22 June, good as it always is to have you along, everybody.

There is a lot going on out there right now.

Politics, of course, and always.

Foreign affairs and national security, definitely.

But as we say around these parts, do not sleep on the

economy. So we won't. Austin Gouldsby is the president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago.

Awesome. Welcome back to the program. Always good to have you on. Kai, thank you for having me back.

Let's start where we left off last time, which was October-ish of last year. Your general

throughline was that inflation was your big concern, the labor market, maybe not so much.

I guess I wonder if your thinking has changed at all.

Hasn't changed that much. I ended up, as you know, dissenting at the last meeting of the year

on those same grounds that I wanted to get

some more information to make me feel better about inflation before front-loading too many

rate cuts. I don't regret that dissent. I think we've continued to have a pretty stable

labor market and we've continued to be dealing with,

and it's not a surprise to anybody you look at the window of your car or go to the grocery store.

...