The Cash-for-Kids Study: Misread and Misrepresented
16 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
You might have heard recently that a years-long poverty study “found” that giving $333 monthly t...
The Case for Going Big on Paid Leave
09 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Paid family and medical leave is a confusing mess: only 27% of private-sector workers get paid leave...
Aren’t Free School Meals a Conservative's Dream Policy?
02 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Free breakfast and lunch for every public school student — an idea associated more with countries ...
Looking Beyond the Unemployment Rate
26 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The unemployment rate has been hovering around 4.2%. But in today’s highly unsettled economy, many...
GDP Was Never Going to Make You Happy
19 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Gross Domestic Product is the big dog of economic numbers. But this measure of the economy’s size ...
How to Actually Help Young Men Struggling in Our Economy
12 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The "boys and men crisis" conversation set in motion following the 2024 election is now shooting off...
What You Don’t Know About Poverty
05 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
About 11% of Americans have a household income that puts them below the official government threshol...
Q&A Part 2: Working Two Jobs, Incentives vs. Handouts, the Gold Standard, and Government ROI
31 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Economist Kathryn Edwards is back with more answers. In Part 2, she talks more about student loans, ...
Q&A Part 1: Tax Philosophy, Liberal vs. Conservative Economists, Marriage vs. Poverty and More
29 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In the first of two mailbag episodes, economist Kathryn Edwards answers questions from optimist list...
A Million Reasons to Raise the Minimum Wage
22 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour hasn’t been raised since the era of flip phones. Competi...
Collective Bargaining Without the Unionization Battles
15 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Labor unions’ public approval has been increasing since 2009, and is now at levels not seen since ...
The Tax We’re 99.93% Sure That You Will Never Pay
08 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The Estate Tax is one that half of Americans worry about, but that affects only the richest 0.07% af...
About That College Grad Who Can’t Find a Job…
01 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Newly minted college graduates are having a harder time landing that first job than in recent years....
Simple Immigration Economics: Bigger is Better
24 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
One in five workers in the United States was born in another country. Without them, the country’s ...
Work Requirements Don’t Work
17 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Here’s what work requirements rarely accomplish: Getting more people to work or lifting them out o...
The U.S. is in the Hole. Will We Stop Digging?
10 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The national debt is $36 trillion — a panic-inducing big number. So maybe it will help to understa...
College Rules! But Student Loans are a Hot Mess!
03 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The U.S. government makes student loans because our economy benefits enormously: Improved human capi...
OE Lightning Round: Kathryn Edwards Takes Your Economy Questions
27 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Kathryn Edwards answers listeners’ economic questions, with her co-host's stopwatch running. In un...
The Invisible Hand Doesn’t Want to Change Diapers
20 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Child care is exhibit A that not everything can be solved by private marketplaces. It is too expensi...
A Family Bill for a Shrinking U.S.
13 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The declining birth rate in the United States is often discussed not only as a major demographic shi...
Progress is a Long Game
06 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
What sparks progress? The right political conditions? Social pressure? Economic upheaval? In respons...
Paid Sick Days for Lady Gaga (and Everyone Else Too)
29 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In the category of low-hanging policy fruit, why won’t any politician pluck the ripe, juicy goodne...
AI Suggested Five Horrible Titles for This Episode
22 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
A recent article in the Washington Post proposed that U.S. labor data has just started to show the b...
Work Rules for the Modern World
15 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Never heard of the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938? It’s why there’s a minimum wage, overtime p...
Robin Loves a Tax Story
08 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The United States is more than 20 years into a tax experiment – an era of a cumulative $7 trillion...
Social Security Don’t Miss
01 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
What’s with the persistent narrative of Social Security's impending doom? Are the baby boomers dra...
Is This a Recession or Not?
28 Mar 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Wouldn’t it be funny if we launched a podcast called “Optimist Economy” at the very moment the...
An Elegy for the DEI Boogeyman
25 Mar 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Rapidly changed government and corporate policies mean the era of DEI is coming to a screeching halt...
All We've Tried is Nothing!
18 Mar 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Who are we and what in the world is an “optimist economy?”For our first show, we (economist Kath...
Welcome to Optimist Economy
17 Mar 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Here at Optimist Economy, we recognize that today’s economy isn’t great for a lot of Americans. ...