Is it ‘economic Halloween’ in the US? with political economist Mark Blyth

Masters of Scale

WaitWhat

Entrepreneurship, Business, Management, Reid Hoffman, Mindset, Diversity & Inclusion, Jeff Berman, Bob Safian, Startups

4.6 • 4.4K Ratings

🗓️ 12 August 2025

⏱️ 42 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Zoom out from continuing tariff turmoil and Trump’s recent attacks on the Fed and the Bureau of Labor Statistics, and you’ll see a broader new economic order is forming. Political economist and Brown University professor Mark Blyth joins Rapid Response to reveal why outdated models still underpin much of our economic understanding, and what we still misunderstand – and underestimate – about China. Blyth also shares why the Democrats struggle to craft an engaging story about the economy, why it's so hard to predict a recession, and what Brown's recent settlement with the Trump Administration tells us about higher education's need to pivot from its reliance on federal funding.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Hey listeners, we're launching a new Masters of Scale survey, and we'd love your input.
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0:25.6	JustWorks is the human resources platform that knows your employees are more than just employees. They're your people.
0:33.7	People like the show producer on the East Coast who's constantly juggling schedules schedules, studio bookings, and last-minute edits before an episode drops, and sometimes, as a question about payroll, that they need an answer to right away.
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0:59.5	your people.
1:00.6	To learn more, go to justworks.com.
1:03.6	JustWorks for your people.
1:08.6	The old systems run its course.
1:11.4	When you basically start saying we're not producing any climate data anymore and we're going to make up the jobs numbers, that's deeply troubling.
1:19.0	Because you can't price things.
1:20.9	The whole purpose of markets is pricing.
1:23.4	No information, no prices, bad.
1:26.4	So this makes as much sense as a fish in a private hedge.
1:29.3	But that's what it is.
1:30.4	You make it sound fun, but like it's hard, you know?
1:34.4	I can make a house of horror sound fun.
1:37.3	And in many ways it is.
1:38.9	That's why we love Halloween.
	...

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