Special Edition: Is the Economy Getting Better or Worse?
The NewsWorthy
Erica Mandy
4.7 • 1.3K Ratings
🗓️ 20 December 2025
⏱️ 19 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
For a lot of Americans right now, the economy feels uncertain. There's a lot of noise and politics around what's happening, but what does the data actually show?
In this episode, Moody's Analytics Chief Economist Mark Zandi breaks down where the U.S. economy really stands, from the job market and inflation to Federal Reserve decisions, trade policy, and the growing role of AI. He explains what matters most for everyday Americans and what he's watching closely as we head into 2026.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Today is Saturday, December 20th. For a lot of Americans right now, the economy feels uncertain. |
| 0:06.2 | There just seems to be a lot of noise and politics about the economic situation. So what does the |
| 0:11.2 | data really show? What should we really be paying attention to? And how close are we to a turning |
| 0:16.1 | point, one way or the other? My guest today is someone who spends his career answering those |
| 0:20.3 | questions. Mark Zandi is the who spends his career answering those questions. |
| 0:21.3 | Mark Zandi is the chief economist at Moody's Analytics and one of the most widely cited economic |
| 0:25.7 | voices in the country. In this conversation, we discuss the data and what it looks like in real |
| 0:29.9 | life, from the job market and inflation to things like AI, trade policy, and Fed decisions. |
| 0:35.4 | We talk about what it all means for everyday Americans and what he's |
| 0:38.2 | watching closely as we head into 2026. Welcome, welcome to the Newsworthy special edition Saturday |
| 0:45.9 | when we sit down with a different expert or celebrity every Saturday to talk about something in the |
| 0:50.0 | news. Don't forget to tune in every Monday through Friday for our regular episodes where we provide |
| 0:54.5 | all the day's news in 10 minutes. I'm Erica Mandy. It's now time for today's special edition |
| 0:59.3 | Saturday. Mark Zandi, thank you so much for joining us here on The Newsworthy. |
| 1:06.1 | Erica, it's so good to be with you. Thanks for having me on. Can you describe the state of the economy right now, |
| 1:11.8 | just big picture? The economy's growing, but it's a very fragile growth. We can see the growth in GDP. |
| 1:18.6 | That's the value of all things that we produce. That's growing about 2% after inflation, |
| 1:22.8 | which is okay, but it's not enough to absorb all the folks in the labor force. |
| 1:27.9 | The labor market is struggling. |
| 1:29.9 | We're not creating any jobs and certainly haven't been since earlier in the year since in the wake of liberation day when the president announced reciprocal tariffs on lots of different countries. |
| 1:40.1 | Unemployment has pushed up. |
| 1:41.5 | So, you know, the economy is okay. It's not in recession. It is expanding, |
... |
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