Trump ways he wants to spend half a trillion more dollars on military spending, even as federal spending persists at Biden-Era levels and interest on the debt climbs ever upward.
This feud is little more than two factions within the Federal government fighting over how exactly to use the Fed’s many powers to inflate, exploit, and help fund an ever expanding federal government.
The current Washington tiff between Donald Trump and Jerome Powell is being reframed as Powell heroically defending the Fed’s “independence.” In truth, the Fed has always done the administration’s dirty work and pursued inflation when it might temporarily boost the economy.
You’ve heard it in the Chicago weather forecast time and time again: “cooler by the lake.” But how close to Lake Michigan do you need to be to feel that dip in the temperature? And why doesn’t Chicago get the same lake effect snow as Northwest Indiana? We look into the powerful force that is Lake Michigan.
Tim Harford investigates some of the numbers in the news. This week: A headline in the Mail says more than 100 private schools have closed since Labour came to power and ended the VAT exemption for private schools. Is that number right?
Is it true that when Covid hit the UK, a one-week delay in imposing lockdown led to 23,000 deaths?
Do 10 million families rely on X as their main source of news? That’s what government spokesperson Baroness Ruth Anderson said in the House of Lords, but is it correct?
s there really a “quiet revival” of Christian worship? Two YouGov polls found churchgoing had gone up by 50% between 2018 and 2024 in England and Wales. New polling data suggests otherwise.
If you’ve seen a number in the news you want the team on More or Less to have a look at, email moreorless@bbc.co.uk
Contributors:
Professor Sir David Spiegelhalter, Emeritus Professor of Statistics in the Statistical Laboratory, University of Cambridge
Professor Sir John Curtice, Senior Research Fellow at the National Centre for Social Research
Credits:
Presenter: Tim Harford
Reporters: Tom Colls and Nathan Gower
Producers: Charlotte McDonald and Lizzy McNeill
Production co-ordinator: Brenda Brown
Sound mix: Gareth Jones Editor: Richard Vadon
Economic decisions aren’t only driven by hard data. A compelling story can change economic behavior and outcomes. In today’s episode, we explore real-world examples of “narrative economics” like how the Suez Canal ended up getting built. And we ask: why do narratives sometimes matter more than truth or data?
"America, above all countries, was born in an explicitly libertarian revolution, a revolution against empire; against taxation, trade monopoly, and regulation; and against militarism and executive power."
Over the weekend, Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell said the Department of Justice served the Fed with grand jury subpoenas. Powell says it’s all a sham. But the stakes are unprecedented: A potential criminal indictment. Central bank independence. Today on the show, the administration’s case against the Fed. How did we get here? And what comes next?