The Bruenigs

The gang is back, this time with a discussion of the birth of their second child, which thankfully coincided with copious amount of CNN viewing in the hospital, keeping the gang up to date on the latest and greatest in American politics, which is also discussed, including Bidencare and Symone Sanders's CNN meltdown.

The gang is back. They talk about: 1. The Last Czars on Netflix 2. The Democratic Establishment's new war against the AOC quartet and Saikat Chakrabarti in particular 3. The last half of the episode is an interview with Ryan Grim about his new book "We've Got People" available here: https://strongarmpress.com/catalog/weve-got-people/

Matt is here with a solo episode where he tackles a philosophical tension that runs through much socialist thinking and posting: how can socialism be both individually liberating while also relying on collective control and ownership? This winding (don't call it rambling) episode covers many topics including Distributism, Jeffersonians, Rawls's property-owning democracy, and various socialist tendencies. And most importantly, it offers a real solution to the conundrum.

Does the Earned Income Tax Credit suck. Or is it actually good? And if it does suck, precisely why does it suck? These are the questions the expert panel get into.

Special Guest Donté Stallworth by Elizabeth and Matt Bruenig

The Bruenigs Interview the Gravel Teens by Elizabeth and Matt Bruenig

So many questions, including why Matt was kicked off his college debate team market socialism v. planning, dealing with isolation, relationship conflict, and so on and so on.

The gang talk about Lil Nas X's unjust ejection from the country charts, the hilarious Mueller report, and Pete's gayness. Articles referenced https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2019/03/pete-buttigieg-gay-diversity-white-male-candidate.html https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-features/lil-nas-x-old-town-road-810844/

The gang is back.

The wacky twosome answer your relationship-related questions in this valentine's special. They also talk hot topics, including Ilhan Omar, and close with a flourish about the late great Lyndon LaRouche (may he RIP).

Matt is here with a solo ep (dual ep releasing soon) about one of his great wonk irritations: policies that seem to have a big impact only because they take advantage of quirks in the way we measure certain things like poverty and wealth inequality. These policies achieve great "success" defined as getting a certain statistic to move a lot but actually do not meaningfully address the bigger evil -- the reduction of material deprivation in the case of the Earned Income Tax Credit and the wealth difference between the black and white community in the case of baby bonds.

The dynamic duo discuss the interesting philosophical and policy questions that flow from the fact that some people (disproportionately women) prefer to be stay-at-home parents. Is this a preference that should be respected and with benefit systems built around it or is it a preference that should be discarded as patriarchal? If you do build a benefit system around it, how should you do so? These become important questions when talking about paid leave and child care policy and were both questions Matt had to confront when writing his Family Fun Pack paper.

The gang (mostly Matt, apologies in advance) talk about Elizabeth Warren's book The Two-Income Trap. As with most things, the book errs in not recognizing the superiority of the welfare state in solving the problems identified.

The crew commemorate the anniversary of Josh TPM's porn tweet, talk about liberal paranoia ramping up around the election, and Sawhill's modest proposal to reduce poverty by giving poor woman IUDs, which the NYT gave new life this month.

In this rare solo episode, Matt outlines his whole vision of what's the chief problem with capitalism and how best to tackle it. He starts with a discussion of capital's share and wealth ownership and then turns towards his neo-Hilferdingist vision of exploiting finance capital to socialize the means of production. It's truly wonderful listening.