Matt, Dara, and German use this week’s episode to explore the infrastructure bill before Congress. They focus on broadband access for rural and urban America and explore the purpose of the money being set aside for Amtrak. Parallels between the two emerge both in the need for connecting Americans and in the pitfalls facing this country if we fail to make progress. This week’s white paper is a study of a methodology for predicting recessions based on individuals' expectations of their own employment status and perception of the economy rather than a scientific dissection of impersonal macro data sets.

Resources:

“What’s in the new infrastructure bill — and why it’s a big deal” by German Lopez (Vox; Aug 10, 2021)

White Paper: “The Economics of Walking About and Predicting Unemployment” by David G. Blanchflower & Alex Bryson (NBER; August 2021)

Hosts:

Matt Yglesias (@mattyglesias), Slowboring.com

Dara Lind (@DLind), Immigration Reporter, ProPublica

German Lopez (@germanrlopez), Senior Correspondent, Vox

Credits:

Ness Smith-Savedoff, Producer & Engineer

Erikk Geannikis, Producer, Talk Podcasts

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