Category: Interviews

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | PocketCasts | Overcast | Stitcher | RSS

Mike talks with Bryan Caplan, Professor of Economics at George Mason University and a prolific and always interesting blogger for Econlog. He’s the author of multiple books, three of which Bryan and Mike have discussed on previous episodes: The Myth of the Rational Voter (interview), The Case Against Education (interview), and Open Borders (interview). Today they discuss Bryan’s latest book Labor Econ vs The World: Essays on the World’s Greatest Market.  

Topics Mike & Bryan discuss include:
– what labor economics is and why it stands against the world
– if politicians are irrational and wrong or rational and deceptive
– the problems with almost all government regulations
– how the minimum wage hurts workers (and everyone else)
– the largely illusory gender and race pay gap
– the questionable value of higher education (for most people)
– why open borders would be a good thing for America (and the world)

CBO Interactive Minimum Wage Modeling Tool

The Politics Guys on Facebook | Twitter

Listener support helps make The Politics Guys possible. If you’re interested in supporting the podcast, go to patreon.com/politicsguys or politicsguys.com/support. On Venmo, we’re @PoliticsGuys.

Powered by RedCircle

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | PocketCasts | Overcast | Stitcher | RSS

Mike talks with Glenn Hubbard, the Russell L. Carson Professor of Finance and Economics at the Columbia Business School. Professor Hubbard is the author of a number of highly regarded economics texts and he’s also served as the chairman of the US Council of Economic Advisers from 2001 through 2003. His latest book, and the topic of this conversation, is The Wall and the Bridge: Fear and Opportunity in Disruption’s Wake.

The Politics Guys on Facebook | Twitter

Listener support helps make The Politics Guys possible. If you’re interested in supporting the podcast, go to patreon.com/politicsguys or politicsguys.com/support. On Venmo, we’re @PoliticsGuys

Powered by RedCircle

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | PocketCasts | Overcast | Stitcher | RSS

Mike talks with Eric Posner, the Kirkland and Ellis Distinguished Service Professor of Law at the University of Chicago, about his latest book, How Antitrust Failed Workers. In this discussion, they cover:

– monopolies and monopsonies
– labor market concentration
– why there are so few labor-focused antitrust actions
– important differences between labor markets and product markets
– the use and abuse of non-compete and no poaching agreements
– how antitrust law can be used to help workers
– and lots more

The Politics Guys on Facebook | Twitter

Listener support helps make The Politics Guys possible. If you’re interested in supporting the podcast, go to patreon.com/politicsguys or politicsguys.com/support. On Venmo, we’re @PoliticsGuys 

Powered by RedCircle

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | PocketCasts | Overcast | Stitcher | RSS

In this special midweek episode Trey interviews author Seth David Radwell on his new book American Schism which is coming out this week. The pair discuss the major theme of his book: how the enlightenment informs contemporary American politics.

The Politics Guys on Facebook | Twitter

Listener support helps make The Politics Guys possible. If you’re interested in supporting the podcast, go to patreon.com/politicsguys or politicsguys.com/support.

Powered by RedCircle

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | PocketCasts | Overcast | Stitcher | RSS

Mike talks with Brown University political scientist James Morone about his latest book, Republic of Wrath: How American Politics Turned Tribal, from George Washington to Donald Trump.

Topics they cover include:

• the history of partisan conflict
• how our current conflicts are different
• states as “laboratories of authoritarianism
• the dirty little secret of bipartisanship
• recommendations for reform

The Politics Guys on Facebook | Twitter

Listener support helps make The Politics Guys possible. If you’re interested in supporting the podcast, go to patreon.com/politicsguys or politicsguys.com/support. On Venmo, we’re @PoliticsGuys 

Powered by RedCircle

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | PocketCasts | Overcast | Stitcher | RSS

Mike and Jay talk with Congressman Rob Wittman (R, VA-1), second ranking Republican on the House Armed Services Committee, about the growth in Chinese military strength (they now have the largest navy in the world), the threat posed by China to US interests, Taiwan, military spending, and more.

The Politics Guys on Facebook | Twitter

Listener support helps make The Politics Guys possible. If you’re interested in supporting the podcast, go to patreon.com/politicsguys or politicsguys.com/support. On Venmo, we’re @PoliticsGuys 

Powered by RedCircle

• how the 2016 election led Ricks back to ancient Greece & Rome
• why we should care about what a small number of Dead White Males thought
• the three big things the Founders were wrong about
• the influences of Washington, Adams, Jefferson, and Madison
• what the Founders would have thought about modern campaign finance
• why modern Americans shouldn’t panic
• the importance of waking up Congress
• whether we can (or should) return to the vision of the Founders

Powered by RedCircle

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | PocketCasts | Overcast | Stitcher | RSS

Mike talks with Dr. Brad Spellberg, chief medical officer at the Los Angeles County+ University of Southern California Medical Center and the associate dean for clinical affairs at the Keck School of Medicine at USC. Dr. Spellberg is also author of the recently released book Broken, Bankrupt, and Dying: How to Solve The Great American Healthcare Rip-Off which they discuss on this episode.

Topics Mike & Dr. Spellberg Cover Include:

• the very unsystematic nature of the American healthcare ‘system’
• how the US compares to other rich countries in healthcare access, cost, efficiency, and effectiveness
• where all the money goes in US healthcare spending
• the myth of lavishly overpaid US doctors
• the problem with ‘fee for service’ medicine
• medical bankruptcies
• the Affordable Care Act
• the importance of considering American culture in proposing healthcare ‘fixes’
• market-oriented healthcare reform proposals
• if progressives states like California can act on their own to reform healthcare

Mike’s New Podcast – Politics Makes Me Sick
The Politics Guys on Facebook | Twitter

Listener support helps make The Politics Guys possible. If you’re interested in supporting the, go to patreon.com/politicsguys or politicsguys.com/support.

Powered by RedCircle

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | PocketCasts | Overcast | Stitcher | RSS

Mike talks with David Litt who, from 2011 to 2016, was a speechwriter for President Obama. Mr. Litt is also the New York Times bestselling author of the book Thanks Obama: My Hopey, Changey White House Years. His latest book is Democracy in One Book or Less: How It Works, Why It Doesn’t, and Why Fixing It Is Easier Than You Think, which they discuss on this episode.

Topics Mike & David cover include:

• If Mitch McConnell’s “blatantly transactional” politics make him a good Majority Leader
• The legally disenfranchised -former felons and non-citizen immigrants
• The “unofficially disenfranchised”
• Discouraged voters
• Gerrymandering
• The (not so) Great Compromise
• Electoral College reform
• Why Democrats are so much more intent on changing the rules than Republicans

Follow David Litt on Twitter 

Be part of the discussion on the Politics Guys ‘BipartisanPolitics’ community on Reddit.

Join the conversation on The Politics Guys Facebook page.

Powered by RedCircle

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | PocketCasts | Overcast | Stitcher | RSS

Mike talks with Ohio State Supreme Court Justice Michael Donnelly about reforming the plea bargaining process, the Michael Flynn case and “legal fictions”, the Paul Manafort case and sentencing guidelines, why we need sentencing databases, and more.

• Truth or Consequences: Making the Case for Transparency and Reform in the Plea Negotiation Process (PDF)
• State Supreme Court rejects truth-in-sentencing rule
• Florida’s broken sentencing system

Be part of the discussion on the Politics Guys ‘BipartisanPolitics’ community on Reddit.

Listener support helps make The Politics Guys possible. If you’re interested in supporting the podcast, go to patreon.com/politicsguys or politicsguys.com/support.

Powered by RedCircle