meta_pixel
Tapesearch Logo
Log in
Slate News

Slate Money | Money Talks: The Mighty Dollar

Slate News

Slate Podcasts

News, News Commentary, Politics

4.66K Ratings

🗓️ 18 March 2025

⏱️ 41 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

In this Money Talks: How does America assert its power globally? The short answer is money. For the long answer, Felix Salmon calls in authors Edward Fishman (Chokepoints) and Saleha Mohsin (Paper Soldiers) who both recently published books on the subject. They’ll discuss how the US dollar managed to become the world’s reserve asset, the ways it’s been weaponized in the past, and what that global status means under an “America First” president.  This episode is member-exclusive. Listen to it now by subscribing to Slate Plus. By joining, not only will you unlock weekly bonus episodes of Slate Money—you’ll also access ad-free listening across all your favorite Slate podcasts. You can subscribe directly from the Slate Money show page on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Or, visit slate.com/moneyplus to get access wherever you listen.  Podcast production by Jessamine Molli and Cheyna Roth. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

Hello and welcome to money talks from Slate Money. I'm Felix Salmon of Axios, and this is the show where we talk to super interesting people about super interesting things.

0:25.6

And one of the things that I have been thinking about and utterly failing to understand for many years now is this whole question of how America is asserting its power globally through methods other than, you know, invading people.

0:42.9

And this is kind of important right now in particular.

0:45.7

And I noticed that the lovely folks at Penguin Random House have no fewer than two books out at the same time on this.

0:52.1

So I thought I would invite both of the authors

0:54.5

on to try and explain what on earth is going on. So I am talking this week to Edward Fishman

1:02.3

and Sleha Mosin. It's all coming up on Money Talks from Slate. Money.

1:11.7

Ready to launch your business?

1:13.6

Get started with the commerce platform made for entrepreneurs.

1:16.8

Shopify is specially designed to help you start, run and grow your business

1:20.8

with easy customizable themes that let you build your brand.

1:24.4

Marketing tools that get your products out there.

1:26.7

Integrated shipping solutions

1:27.9

that actually save you time, from startups to scaleups, online, in person, and on the go.

1:34.0

Shopify is made for entrepreneurs like you. Sign up for your $1 a month trial at Shopify.com

1:39.7

slash setup. Eddie, who are you and what is your book? Well, thank you, Felix. It's great to be here today.

1:48.1

So my book is called Choke Points, American Power, in the Age of Economic Warfare. It came out on

1:54.0

February 25th. And the goal here is really to tell the story of the rise of what I call the age of

2:00.3

economic warfare, in which sanctions,

2:02.8

tariffs, and export controls have become the primary way that great powers compete with one

2:07.2

another. This is true, not just of the United States, but also China, Russia, the EU, Japan. It's

2:13.8

just the way that great power competition is playing out. And so my goal was really to explain how this era came to be,

...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Slate Podcasts, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Slate Podcasts and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.

Copyright © Tapesearch 2025.