Plain English with Derek Thompson

Lately, it feels like we’re surrounded by systems and industries that aren’t working the way they should. There's an oil shortage, and a baby formula shortage, and a used car shortage, and a microchip shortage. Now, here comes the airline industry shortage. This past weekend, thousands of flights were cancelled because airlines didn't have enough pilots, grounds crew, or planes. People were strand...

Expensive energy is an economic, psychological, and political scourge. Nominally, gas prices are at a record high. Adjusted for inflation, they could break the all-time record if they rise just another 35 cents. We should be desperately curious to solve this problem; so, that’s what this episode is all about. Today’s guest is Skanda Amarnath, the executive director at Employ America, which has qui...

Most news is all about the immediate present. For instance, everything that is happening in the economy right now could be a historical anecdote in five years. But sometimes, norms change—and they stay changed for decades. I think the remote work revolution is just that sort of a paradigm shift. Here's a stat that should blow your mind: Office occupancy across the U.S. is still just 43 percent of...

This is a huge week for economic and finance news. On Wednesday afternoon, the Federal Reserve raised interest rates by 0.75 percentage points, its biggest move since 1994. Derek breaks down what this means for your wallet and the future of the economy. Then he brings on The New York Times' Kevin Roose for a conversation about the end of the "everything boom." For the last decade-plus, just about...

Inflation is the story that everybody keeps missing. In 2020, many people didn't expect inflation to rise. Wrong. In 2021, many expected inflation to be brief or "transitory." Wrong. Last month, many expected inflation to peak. wrong. In May, inflation reached its highest level in more than four decades. But there’s a bigger story to tell here. What are the subtler inflation numbers telling us abo...

Today’s episode is about two California elections and the message they sent to the rest of the country. In San Francisco, progressive district attorney Chesa Boudin was recalled by voters after years of complaints about the rise of disorder, shoplifting, and homelessness in the city. In Los Angeles, Republican-turned-Democrat billionaire Rick Caruso had a strong showing running as a crimefighter i...

Welcome to Curiosity Corner! In our first ever all-mailbag episode, Derek answers a Republican’s question about gun control, explains how American companies became so political, revisits a controversial Amber Heard episode, and explains how the podcast comes together. Finally, in response to a couple that requested a wedding-day video, Derek veers out of the news lane and offers some relationship...

The Texas school shooting is part of a grisly ritual in American life. A tragedy, followed by mourning, followed by inaction, followed by several months, followed by another tragedy. What can be done? What WILL be done? This episode isn’t about false hope. It’s about information. The New York Times’s German Lopez, who has been reporting on guns and gun control policy for many years, joins the podc...

It's our first Curiosity Corner podcast! We asked you to tell us what questions you wanted us to answer, and a lot of you had the same thought on your mind: housing. In this podcast, we answer: What's going on with the U.S. housing market? Is this a bubble? Is it bursting? Why are homes in America so expensive? Why are we so bad at building houses? Why is there so much homelessness in America's ri...

It's the trial of the century—kind of. The legal showdown between Johnny Depp and Amber Heard has captivated the country, and Derek is a bit confused. Why is everybody talking about this miserable celebrity relationship? Why are so many people obsessed with demonizing Amber Heard? Producer Devon Manze explains to Derek why she thinks the trial has conquered the news cycle, and The Atlantic's Kaitl...

America's infant formula shortage is very strange and very embarrassing. Nationwide, more than 40 percent of formula is out of stock, and in many states, like Texas and Tennessee, more than half of it is gone. What's going on? The immediate cause is the shutdown of a Michigan plant. But shutdowns and recalls happen all the time, and they rarely cause a national crisis like this. Economist Scott Li...

Crypto crashes, rate hikes, recession, fears, and inflation prints: The U.S. economy is in a very bizarre place right now, and Derek needs help explaining it. Michael Batnick and Ben Carlson of Ritholz Wealth Management are back on the pod to reconvene the economic roundtable. We play a game of "Finish the Sentence": The single most shocking stock market stat is …? The long-term bull case for cryp...

The stock market is absolutely gross right now. Everything is down, except (as loyal listeners know) the CATAN portfolio. Crypto has cratered, growth stocks have been ravaged, and hedge funds are imploding. Why is this happening? Is this Dot-Com Bubble 2.0? And what does it mean for the future of the U.S. economy, investing, and tech? Investor, entrepreneur, and podcaster Jason Calacanis joins the...

This might sound like a hot take but it's not: In 50 years, when historians look back on the crazy 2020s, they might point to advances in artificial intelligence as the most important long-term development of our time. We are building machines that can mimic human language, human creativity, and human thought. What will that mean for the future of work, morality, and economics? The bestselling aut...

Sometimes, people ask “why study history?” How about this: American history is the weapon being used to strike down Roe Vs Wade. In the leaked draft of the Supreme Court decision that would overturn Roe, conservative Justice Samuel Alito writes that Roe invented a right to abortion that cannot be found in early American history. Is he right? And what’s the true history of abortion in America? That...

The Supreme Court is poised to end the era of Roe. In a leaked draft of a majority opinion, Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito struck down Roe v. Wade, the 1973 ruling that guaranteed constitutional protections of abortion rights. What would happen to abortion rights in its absence? Which states would shutter their clinics? Which states might expand protections? How does the growth of nationwide a...

Morgan Housel, author of 'The Psychology of Money' and a partner at Collaborative Fund, joins the show to play stock doctor and diagnose what's killing tech stocks. Then we debate the odds of an imminent recession and talk about how China's bizarre year could weigh on U.S. growth. Finally, we go through all the good reasons and the not-so-good reasons for cancelling student debt. Host: Derek Thomp...

This week we have the NFL draft, which is an annual exercise in failure. Every year, some NFL team makes a disastrous quarterback decision but also overlooks a potential star. Why is it so damn hard to predict QB play in football? Are scouts stupid, or is the future just unknowable, or is hiring fundamentally chaotic, or is there something specific about quarterbacking that makes it uniquely diffi...

What can save Netflix? Who killed CNN+? What the hell is going on between Disney and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis? It's a big media hellscape roundup. Rich Greenfield, general partner at LightShed Ventures, forecasts a rocky future for streaming. Nick Papantonis, a reporter for WFTV in Orlando, explains that Florida's war against Disney might have some surprising collateral damage. Host: Derek Th...

Charlie Warzel, author of the Galaxy Brain newsletter at The Atlantic, joins to talk about what Elon Musk will do to Twitter and how his acquisition could change media, tech, and politics. Host: Derek Thompson Guest: Charlie Warzel Producer: Devon Manze Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The United States is experiencing an extreme teenage mental-health crisis. It is one of the most troubling and fascinating social phenomena in the country today. From 2009 to 2021, the share of American high-school students who say they feel “persistent feelings of sadness or hopelessness” rose from 26 percent to 44 percent, according to a new CDC study. This is the highest level of teenage sadnes...

The White House has a big youth problem. Since the day of his inauguration, Joe Biden’s approval has declined by about 7 points among Americans over 50—and by an astonishing 19 points among Americans under 35. The pollster and politics writer Kristen Soltis Anderson joins the show to talk about Biden's eroding approval among young people and what it means for November. Then she and Derek talk abou...

What’s happening in China’s largest and richest city right now is quite unbelievable. Shanghai is now several weeks into a government lockdown to stop the spread of COVID variants. In a metro with roughly the population of the state of Texas, residents cannot go outside. They cannot walk to grocery stores or pharmacies to pick up essential medicine. If they test positive for COVID, they are remove...

Well, that escalated quickly. Days after Elon Musk become the single largest individual shareholder of Twitter, he has offered to buy the company and take it private. Wait, what? Derek welcomes Stratechery writer Ben Thompson (no relation) to break down the news. Ben explains why Twitter is one of the most important companies in the world, why it's so undervalued, and what Musk could do with it pr...

On today's show, we start with Ten Good Minutes on the extremely funny and very chaotic saga of Elon Musk vs. Twitter. Last week, Musk bought enough Twitter shares to become the company's largest individual shareholder. Then, Twitter announced that Musk would become a board member. Then, Musk tweeted a bunch of embarrassing things about Twitter, suggesting the platform was "dying" and that its hea...