I have some news: Receipts is now a podcast—and a newsletter.
If you’ve been reading my newsletter for a while, you know I have a mantra: Complexity rewards demagogues. The more opaque an issue is, the easier it is for grifters to exploit it for political or financial gain.
Politicians tell you tariffs don’t raise prices. They tell you tax cuts pay for themselves. They take credit when the stock market goes up, and find someone else to blame when grocery prices do. They make sweeping promises about jobs, housing, immigration, trade, crypto, the deficit, and your financial future.
Sometimes they’re right. Often they’re not.
Fortunately, we have the receipts.
That’s what I’ve tried to do with this newsletter: follow the money, look at the data, figure out whether the story we’re being told matches what’s actually happening, and make sure the facts are accessible to voters.
And now, I’m going to be doing a lot more of that on the new Receipts podcast.
I’ll be talking with economists, policymakers, journalists, business leaders, and other smart people who can help us understand some of the biggest economic and political questions of the moment. What are Trump’s policies actually doing to the economy? Why is everything so damn expensive? Who benefits from the decisions Washington makes? Who pays for them? And which supposedly Very Serious economic arguments fall apart once you look at the evidence?
We’ll talk tariffs and taxes, jobs and housing, markets and government spending, corporate power and corruption, immigration, crypto, and whatever other economic absurdity demands a forensic accounting that week.
The goal is not to make you an economist. (Unless you want to become one. In which case, Godspeed.)
It’s to make the economy a little less confusing—and make it a little harder for the people in power to get away with pretending the numbers say something they don’t.
In my latest episode, JVL and I cover the latest jobs numbers and some ideas Trump has for the national debt that should terrify everyone.
Follow the RECEIPTS podcast now to ensure you don’t miss an episode:
Thanks to everyone who has already started following the show since we broke out of the Bulwark Takes feed. Do me a favor—if you like the show, leave a review and ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ wherever you listen. Each review, like and share helps others to find the show.
I’ll see you again Tuesday for the next installment of Receipts.
—Catherine
