New Economics Podcast

It’s one of the biggest contradictions in British politics. Across the country, baby boomers who own a house cheer as the value of their property rises. Meanwhile their millennial children watch on in horror, as owning their own home increasingly falls out of their reach. Politicians talk about building more homes but very few of them talk about directly reducing house prices. If house prices are too high for people to be able to buy houses, how can we bring them down? And can we do it without upsetting homeowners and crashing the economy? Ayeisha Thomas-Smith is joined by Joe Beswick, who leads on housing for the New Economics Foundation, and housing campaigner Beth Stratford, a PhD researcher at the University of Leeds. Enjoying the show? Tweet us your comments and questions @NEF! Produced by James Shield and Huw Jordan. The award-winning Weekly Economics Podcast is brought to you by the New Economics Foundation – the UK's only people powered think tank. Find out more at www.neweconomics.org

Universities up and down the country have been shutting down as lecturers have walked out, arguing that the changes to their pension schemes could leave them thousands of pounds a year worse off in retirement. If you don’t know the difference between your defined benefits and your defined contributions, getting your head round the issues can feel like doing an economics PhD before you’ve done your 101. So this week we’re breaking down what the university strikes are all about, and what they tell us about everyone else’s pensions too. Ayeisha Thomas-Smith speaks to two striking lecturers: Nadine El-Enany, co-director of the Centre for Research on Race and Law at Birkbeck, and SOAS Senate chair Meera Sabaratnam. They are joined by writer and researcher Christine Berry, who is also a postgraduate student at Sheffield University. Enjoying the show? Tweet us your comments and questions @NEF! Produced by James Shield and Huw Jordan. Music: Podington Bear, licenced under Creative Commons. The award-winning Weekly Economics Podcast is brought to you by the New Economics Foundation – the UK's only people powered think tank. Find out more at www.neweconomics.org

As the Guardian's US correspondent, Gary Younge documented America’s social and economic challenges, the role of race in the country’s politics, and the deadly consequences of US gun laws. Now the Guardian’s editor-at-large, Gary took an unusual approach to covering the 2016 presidential election, reporting from one small town in Indiana, called Muncie, nicknamed ‘Middletown, America’. In this week's podcast, Ayeisha Thomas-Smith asks Gary about Middletown today. Can it help explain a US election result that few people predicted? And do we have ‘Middletowns’ in the UK that can help us understand our own political upheaval? Enjoying the show? Tweet us your comments and questions @NEF! Produced by James Shield and Huw Jordan. Music: Podington Bear and Jahzzar, licenced under Creative Commons. The award-winning Weekly Economics Podcast is brought to you by the New Economics Foundation – the UK's only people powered think tank. Find out more at www.neweconomics.org

Technology is transforming the world of money. Or at least that’s what the Bitcoin junkies would have you believe. They say digital currencies have arrived and are about to revolutionise the way we buy things. But recent downturns in their prices have led some to wonder whether digital currencies have fuelled a dangerous speculative bubble that needs to be curbed by regulators. Is the Bitcoin boom over? Or was it just the start for digital currencies? This week, Ayeisha Thomas-Smith is joined by Carl Miller from Demos, Fran Boait from Positive Money, and Duncan McCann from NEF. Enjoying the show? Tweet us your comments and questions @NEF! Produced by James Shield and Huw Jordan. Music: A Life in Pictures by David Hilowitz, licenced under Creative Commons. The award-winning Weekly Economics Podcast is brought to you by the New Economics Foundation – the UK's only people powered think tank. Find out more at www.neweconomics.org

There's been a panic in the stock markets in recent weeks after the Dow Jones plunged more than 1000 points on a single Monday in the first week of February. When the stock market plunges should we all be worried? Or does it only affect those wealthy enough to be trading? This week, Ayeisha Thomas-Smith is joined by Frank van Lerven, NEF economist, and Anna Isaac, economics correspondent at The Telegraph. Enjoying the show? Tweet us your comments and questions @NEF! Produced by James Shield and Huw Jordan. The award-winning Weekly Economics Podcast is brought to you by the New Economics Foundation – the UK's only people powered think tank. Find out more at www.neweconomics.org

Brexit dominates the news agenda. But with all the talk of the single market, impact assessments and trade deals, it sometimes feels as if this debate is only happening in the comment pages of newspapers, or the corridors of Westminster. What happened to the people? The Weekly Economics Podcast is back with a special episode: a discussion we recorded live in London at the end of 2017, between political theorist Maurice Glasman, activist Ruth Ibegbuna, and the academic Rob Ford. The question journalist Mary Riddell put to them was: where are the people in the Brexit debate? Plus: Ayeisha Thomas-Smith gives an update on CabFair, our plan to create an ethical alternative to Uber. Enjoying the show? Tweet us your comments and questions @NEF! Produced by James Shield and Huw Jordan. Music this week is by Simon Mathewson and Podington Bear. The award-winning Weekly Economics Podcast is brought to you by the New Economics Foundation – the UK's only people powered think tank. Find out more at www.neweconomics.org

Chancellor Philip Hammond got out his red box out again last week, to let us know how the country's finances are – or aren't – holding up, and what the Government's going to be doing with its money this year. The headlines were mixed, so what should our take-away be? Will the Chancellor's proposals be enough to make our economy "fit for the future"? And with Brexit looming, is the Government doing enough to deal with the country's economic problems? This week, David Powell is joined by Kate Bell, Head of Economic and Social Affairs at the Trades Union Congress, and Miatta Fahnbulleh, the new CEO of the New Economics Foundation. Enjoying the show? Tweet us your comments and questions @NEF! Produced by James Shield and Huw Jordan. The award-winning Weekly Economics Podcast is brought to you by the New Economics Foundation – the UK's only people powered think tank. Find out more at www.neweconomics.org

Pro-Brexit campaigners have argued leaving the EU means Britain can "take control" of its fisheries. But what does Brexit really mean for fishing communities, and for the future of our fish stocks? This week, Ayeisha Thomas-Smith is joined by Fernanda Balata, Senior Programme Lead for Coastal Economies at the New Economics Foundation, Griffin Carpenter, NEF Senior Researcher, and James Wilson, a mussel farmer in Bangor, North Wales. We also ask NEF Principal Director for Policy and Advocacy Andrew Pendleton for his predictions and expectations of this week's budget. Enjoying the show? Tweet us your comments and questions @NEF! Produced by James Shield and Huw Jordan. This week's music: Dolphin by Candlegravity http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Candlegravity/Dolphin/ Fishing by David Szesztay http://freemusicarchive.org/music/David_Szesztay/Acoustic_Guitar/Fishing Lilywhite by Podington Bear http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Podington_Bear/Background/Lilywhite The award-winning Weekly Economics Podcast is brought to you by the New Economics Foundation – the UK's only people powered think tank. Find out more at www.neweconomics.org

The single market. The customs union. Making a deal with the EU or leaving on WTO terms. There’s a lot of jargon to contend with when we’re discussing the economics of Brexit. Sometimes it feels like we get so caught up in pretending we know what it all means that we forget to talk about the impact it’s going to have on people’s everyday lives. When we leave the EU, will some people lose their jobs? Will the things we buy become more expensive? Will businesses do better or worse under new trading rules? This week, Ayeisha Thomas-Smith is joined by Annie Quick, Subject Lead for Inequality at the New Economics Foundation and Sam Lowe, who leads on trade and Brexit at Friends of the Earth. — Enjoying the show? Tweet us your comments and questions @NEF! — Produced by James Shield and Huw Jordan. The award-winning Weekly Economics Podcast is brought to you by the New Economics Foundation – the UK's only people powered think tank. Find out more at www.neweconomics.org

Politicians and economists have increasingly been talking about the risks of a future where robots make all of our jobs obsolete. But is that future already upon us? And in the meantime, are big companies using technology to create 21st century workhouses with bad conditions and even worse pay? In this episode from the archives, Stefan Baskerville, NEF’s Principal Director for Unions and Business, joins podcast regulars Alice Martin and Annie Quick to tackle the big issues – and the threat of robots revolting… — Enjoying the show? Tweet us your comments and questions @NEF! To find out more about how we're working to build a fairer alternative to Uber and to support our Crowdfunder, click here: http://bit.ly/2y9DISw — Produced by James Shield and Huw Jordan. The award-winning Weekly Economics Podcast is brought to you by the New Economics Foundation – the UK's only people powered think tank. Find out more at www.neweconomics.org