Should we just call the Inflation Reduction Act the “Climate Bill”?

Make Me Smart

Marketplace

News, Business

4.6 • 5.4K Ratings

🗓️ 18 August 2022

⏱️ 17 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

We’re still getting your questions about the newly passed Inflation Reduction Act, and we’ll try to answer them! Like, why is it called the Inflation Reduction Act and what is it actually going to do about inflation? Kimberly and Kai share some insight on that and field a few more questions, like where are we going to get all the water needed to make more semiconductors in the United States? And how do you measure productivity in an economy that doesn’t make as many widgets as it used to?

Here’s everything we talked about today:

“What the Inflation Reduction Act does and doesn’t do about rising prices” from NPR
“Water shortages loom over future semiconductor fabs in Arizona” from The Verge
Overview of BLS Productivity Statistics from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics
“The Rise of the Worker Productivity Score” from The New York Times
Measuring productivity in service industries from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics
“Can a Hot but Smaller Labor Market Keep Making Gains in Participation?” from the Hamilton Project

If you have more questions about the Inflation Reduction Act or anything else, send them our way. We’re at [email protected] or leave a voice message at 508-U-B-SMART.

Transcript

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0:00.0	It's gonna be great!
0:02.3	We can go ahead and start.
0:04.6	Oh, we're gonna start. Must mean Charleston. Yeah. Maybe it's Jay.
0:08.5	No, no, no, no. Everybody welcome back to make me smart. Where we make the day make sense no matter who is pushing the buttons downtown. I'm Kai Rizdal.
0:16.2	And I'm Kimberly Adams. Thank you for joining us on What Do You Want to Know Wednesday?
0:20.7	The day in the week where we answer listener questions and there are a bunch of good ones this week.
0:25.9	There are some good ones. I should be clear by the way the engineers at Marketplace. They do more than just push buttons.
0:30.9	They should tell you. I need to give them their do. Yes.
0:34.3	If you have a question by the way about the economy or business or technology, email us. Make me smart at Marketplace.org.
0:39.8	It leaves a voicemail if you like. Our number is 508. You be smart and here we go. I guess right?
0:46.4	Yeah, our first question.
0:48.7	Hi, Kai. Kimberly. This is Clint from Austin and I have a question about the installation reduction act.
0:55.2	We keep talking about the climate aspects of it and all the positive things that it's doing to fight climate change.
1:00.8	But I didn't really hear a lot about what it was doing to fight inflation or if it is doing anything.
1:06.0	So I'm just curious was that name, you know, not the best name for it. Should we call it the climate bill?
1:12.0	Why did we call it the inflation reduction?
1:15.0	Help me. We smart. Thank you.
1:18.0	Clint. Clint. Clint.
1:20.0	Yeah. So let's remember that this bill and its original formulation was called the Buildback Better Act.
1:27.6	And then after much trials and tribulation in Washington, DC, it came to be known as the Buildback Mansion bill because they were trying to please do you mention?
1:37.0	And then there was yes and no negotiations and then ta-da.
1:40.0	Joe Manston and Chuck Schumer came out with this agreement that there was going to be some progress on the Democratic agenda as put forth by the president, but they were going to call it the inflation reduction act.
	...

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