SPEAKER_03: This is Planet Money from NPR. Here at Planet Money and the sister show that I co-host, The Indicator, we are like one
big podcast family. And like a lot of families around the holidays, we sometimes have our disagreements.
SPEAKER_07: Now how do we settle our disagreements? Well at The Indicator, we air them out publicly in a friendly game show competition.
SPEAKER_08: That's right, it is time for Family Feud. Hello and welcome to Planet Money, I'm Waylon Wong. Today I am competing head to head with Planet Money hosts Kenny Malone and Jeff Guo. We have two rounds in today's show. First, what was The Indicator of 2023?
The thing that when we look back at the economy years from now, we will say that's what this
year was all about. And second, what will be The Indicator of 2024? We try to predict what will define the economy in the coming year. This is where legacy is made Waylon, I am very excited to make my mark. Here we go. History in the making. Jeff, you ready? I'm ready for a rematch. Did you lose? I think we both lost to Sarah last year. Ah, I'm glad we didn't invite her back. Excellent. Here are the rules. Each of us prepared something for our Indicator of the Year.
SPEAKER_07: We will each make our case in 60 seconds or less.
SPEAKER_08: And in the end, you the listener will vote on who had the best indicator of 2023 and
SPEAKER_08: who you think has the best prediction of the indicator of 2024.
SPEAKER_08:
Coming up on the 2023 half of the show, we've got Kenny Malone on Consumer Sentiment, Jeff Guo on a soft landing, and me, your indomitable host Waylon Wong and the housing market right after the break. This message comes from Apple Card.
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SPEAKER_00: Jeff, you're up first. All right. All right. Who's going to set the timer? Oh, I got it. I got it right here. I've been told there's a very aggressive buzzer at the end of this, Jeff, so just be worried. Oh, no. I hate loud noises. It's going to upset my cats. All right. All right.
SPEAKER_03: Okay. Deep breath. Okay. So I would argue that the thing we will all remember 2023 for is the saga of the soft
landing. Will the Fed be able to bring down inflation without triggering a recession or will the whole economy descend into a crisis? That was the main storyline of 2023. Kept us in suspense the whole year. Remember every month waiting for the new inflation numbers. Remember all of our debates about the Phillips curve, the yield curve, and that weird month
SPEAKER_08: when everyone seemed like they were an expert on the job openings and labor turnover survey?
SPEAKER_07: It was all so, so stressful and I'm not just speaking as an economics reporter, but also
SPEAKER_07: as a regular citizen who does not want the economy to collapse.
SPEAKER_06:
But can I say in hindsight, I maybe kind of enjoyed it because the whole year kind of
SPEAKER_06: reminded me of a rom-com, the whole will they or won't they situation between the Fed and
the soft landing. And just like a rom-com, it looks like we're going to have that happy ending, I think. I hope. Hopefully. Hey, Jeff! Five seconds to spare. Anything else you want to say? No, I got nothing. I can't breathe. What's the title of your rom-com? Will they or won't they? Ooh. Ooh. Just tell people what it's about. Every rom-com is about will they or won't they. How about A Soft Place to Land? Oh, that's good.
And it's like just in time for Christmas. Will the big city J. Powell make it in time? It's good. It's got hallmarks of hallmark.
It's good. I love Jeff's assumption that we were all furiously debating the Phillips curve this
year. I feel like we had different years. We had slightly different years. We were! Well, I actually would not mind going next because Jeff has kind of keyed me up nicely. Ooh.
If that's okay?
Yes, absolutely.
SPEAKER_07: Now, I'm not the official host, Waylon, but I would love to say 60 seconds on the clock.
SPEAKER_06: It's always been like a dream of mine, game show style.
SPEAKER_08: Is that okay? You go for it, yeah. Because I want you to have this before we crush your dreams of like not choosing your
SPEAKER_08: indicator as the indicator of the year.
SPEAKER_06: All right. Well, no, the people choose. The people choose, Waylon.
SPEAKER_08: Okay. 60 seconds on the clock, please.
SPEAKER_07: And it's the economy stupid. That is the famous formula for why people vote the way they do.
SPEAKER_08: But I am here to say no. It's what people feel about the economy.
And you know, for decades, this distinction did not matter.
SPEAKER_07:
The 2023 produced a historic split between, frankly, surprisingly good economic numbers
SPEAKER_08: and surprisingly bad economic sentiment numbers.
SPEAKER_07: And if you look at the econ data, it does increasingly seem, as Jeff said, like we've
SPEAKER_08: threaded a needle and steered the economy through a pandemic and a recession and a spike in inflation to a soft landing where inflation gets wrangled without crashing into another
SPEAKER_07: recession.
SPEAKER_07: And yet our economic vibes are not reflecting this.
It really seems like this disconnect will end up shaping the world in the upcoming elections, of course, but but also in the lessons our policymakers draw from the last three years. And so I nominate as my indicator of the year consumer sentiment.
Thank you. I have three more seconds. I just like to thank everyone. Nope. Boo. That is loud. Well, I think you have teed up my indicator quite nicely because as no, as we've covered consumer sentiment, this negative consumer sentiment, I think was largely driven by what's going on with my indicator. So if we could get 60 seconds on the clock, I will commence.
All right. For my indicator of 2023, I would like to direct you to America's best cultural barometer, which is the most recent season of Stelling Sunset. This is the Netflix reality series about luxury real estate agents in Los Angeles. Things are moving pretty slow in the market right now. This is Mary Fitzgerald, one of the agents on the show.
SPEAKER_07: You don't have as many buyers out there trying to buy.
SPEAKER_08: We don't have as many sellers willing to sell. I think every agent has to really get out there and hustle. That's right. Even the super rich are having trouble in 2023's housing market. Mortgage rates went up to 8 percent this year. So aspiring buyers couldn't afford a home and existing homeowners didn't want to sell. Mater.com says existing home sales are on track to have their worst year since 1995.
So borrowing from Mary's language, I think the two of you will really have to hustle if you want to beat my indicator of the year. The lousy housing market. Well done, Waylon. Is incredibly on brand that Waylon somehow managed to get reality TV into this.
SPEAKER_09: I am very impressed.
SPEAKER_09: I just want to point out, there's something very interesting psychologically that's going on here where I would argue the 2023 was like a rom-com. Kenny, you're arguing it's basically like, I don't know, like a Greek tragedy.
SPEAKER_08: It's a Fincher movie. Okay, sure. It's Gone Girl. And Waylon just thinks it's one of those reality shows we all had to watch when the writer's strike happened. Yeah, you're not wrong. Well, I would have watched Stelling Sunset even without the writer's strike. We know, we know. Coming up after the break, more indicators to feud over.
SPEAKER_07:
What will define 2024? Our Planet Money indicator family feud returns after this break.
SPEAKER_06:
Hey, it's Erica Barris. Before we get back to the show, a bit of year-end reflection. In 2023, Planet Money followed the wild arc of inflation of interest rates.
SPEAKER_06: We brought you a series about AI and an episode produced by AI, and we served up another extremely
SPEAKER_08: infotaining season of Planet Money Summer School.
SPEAKER_06: Of course, we have big plans for lots more cool stuff like that in 2024, but that stuff
SPEAKER_08:
will not be possible without your help. This is where we want to say a big thank you to our Planet Money Plus supporters and anyone
SPEAKER_03: listening who already donates to public media. And to anyone out there who isn't a supporter yet, right now is the time to get behind the NPR network, especially with the big election year coming up.
So please join NPR Plus at plus.npr.org or make a tax-deductible donation now at donate.npr.org
SPEAKER_03:
slash money.
And thanks.
All right, now we're going to look into our crystal balls to figure out which economic forces could shape the year ahead.
SPEAKER_02: Same rules as before, we'll each make our case in 60 seconds or less. And in the end, you, the listener, will vote on who you think made the best case for the economic indicator of 2024. Kenny Malone, you're up first. All right. So I've got a magic eight ball here. Oh, I see. I see a person of the year Time magazine cover and a Nobel Prize speech and a host on Saturday
Night Live. And they're all Jerome Powell? Yes. 2024 will be the year of J-PAL and the Fed and interest rates. After the Fed's most recent meeting, J-PAL said, quote, you better believe we're slashing those rates next year, suckers. He didn't say that. He would never say that. What he did say is, quote, there's a general expectation that this will be a topic for us looking ahead. That is a bomb by Fed standards.
SPEAKER_04: The Fed, of course, central bank for all banks. So whatever interest rates it sets ripple through the whole banking system. And if the Fed really does start cutting next year, it's possible we would also start to see downward pressure on rates for car loans and credit cards and mortgages. And oh, what's this? Oh, magic eight ball showing a ticker tape parade. Jerome Powell, he's on a float. We're celebrating the soft landing defeat of inflation. This is why interest rates will be the indicator of the year for 2024. Wow. There it is. Thank you very much. It's perfectly timed.
Just like Jerome Powell's interest rate reductions. I do want to stop the emails. I understand how a magic eight ball actually works. You ask it a question. You can say don't send me those emails. I understand. It's fine. You can get custom ones. You don't know that I didn't get this made as a custom eight ball. Of course, you would have a custom eight ball of all people. I would love a custom magic eight ball.
I think who's next? Jeff, Jeffrey Guo. You are up. All right. 60 seconds on the clock. You ready for this? Let's do this. You're on.
Okay.
So I think that the leading economic story of 2024 will be Bidenomics. And when I say Bidenomics, which let's be honest is kind of a vague term, I'm really referring specifically to one kind of radical idea that the president has really embraced.
SPEAKER_08: We've talked about it a lot on these shows. It's called industrial policy. It's all about the government being hands on promoting certain industries, supporting certain types of businesses like manufacturing and just generally being more proactive about shaping the economy. Like the CHIPS Act of 2022, which is going to spend almost $300 billion toward boosting the semiconductor industry or the inflation reduction act, which is going to spend like
SPEAKER_07:
$400 billion helping Americans transition to greener energy sources.
Yada, yada, yada. These are big spending programs that needed a couple of years to get off the ground. And in 2024, which of course is a presidential election year, the big question will be whether Biden's big swings, his big attempts to implement industrial policy, whether we will start seeing any benefits finally show up in the economy. Jeff. Very well time. I feel like there's lots of policy. I think Jeff might be getting the most words per second in on this. I'm very curious. I'm very curious for people listening at like speed and a half or double speed how this is all playing. And I didn't even do high school debate guys.
Is Bidenomics an indicator? Like what? I just want to, I mean, I'm not trying to put my finger on the scale or anything, but I'm just saying when you think about indicator of the year, Jeff's just named like a proper noun and it's like, what is that? It's like, is that a number? Is it like, whatever. No big deal. Your indicator was Jerome Powell. It's a no, no, no. It was interest rates. It was interest rates. It just happened to be framed around Jerome Powell. You know, I am very intrigued by Bidenomics. I think that's a good pick, but I think mine is better.
SPEAKER_06: I think mine drills down a little bit more specifically within Bidenomics and is thus
SPEAKER_06: the superior indicator for 2024. The clock isn't running and you're making your case.
SPEAKER_07: This is not fair. Okay. All right. Let's put 60 seconds on the clock and then I will formally make my pitch.
SPEAKER_07: My pick for indicator of 2024 is junk fees.
SPEAKER_08: I mean, forget industrial policy around semiconductors or green technology.
SPEAKER_07: The Biden administration is going after surprise fees that get tacked onto everything from
concert tickets to banking services.
SPEAKER_06: Right now, there are pending proposals from multiple agencies to go after junk fees. I am talking about the Federal Trade Commission, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the Federal Communications Commission, even the Department of Transportation. The Biden administration is getting petty. I mean that in the most literal sense, going after these small inconveniences that add up to billions of dollars in some cases. As a very petty person myself, this speaks to me. And if these proposed rules get finalized, consumers, that's you and me, could potentially see lower late fees for credit cards or fewer add-ons at car dealerships.
Less junk in 2024. That is my pitch. Weilin Wong for 2024. I feel like that's her pitch, America. Much I was going to say, much like all of these agencies, Weilin is making a populist pitch here. I know how to play to the crowd. It's like running for high school class president. I'm fine. I don't feel threatened by this. It's okay. Are you just saying that, Kenny, because you don't have a slogan of your own? I'm saying I've given people mental images of Jerome Powell on magazine covers and on
SPEAKER_08: parade floats. And if that's not enough, then I will put my microphone down forever.
SPEAKER_07: That's not a promise. I can't do that. I can't afford to do that. And that's where you, the audience, comes in.
SPEAKER_08:
SPEAKER_07: Email us with your votes for the Indicators of last year and next year at indicator at
npr.org and put Family Feud in the subject line.
The choice is yours. Holes close on Sunday, December 31st, and we will announce the winners on the Indicators
SPEAKER_06: January 5th episode. Wait, do we get a prize for this?
SPEAKER_07: You get to be not a loser, I think is it. That's it. Thrill.
SPEAKER_08: I feel like it's off brand for us not to have a monetary incentive. I'm just going to say out loud to the powers that be. Coming up on Planet Money, it's the rest of the story where we check in for updates from
SPEAKER_07: some of the most memorable people we've had on the show, like the data detective seeking
SPEAKER_08: to uncover the truth in academic research or the Hollywood strike captain trying to
pull off one last job. Listen for all that and more next week on Planet Money. This episode was produced by Julia Ritchie and Willa Rubin. It was engineered by Valentina Rodriguez Sanchez. Fact checking by Sierra Juarez. Kicking canon edits the Indicator and Alex Goldmark is Planet Money's executive producer. I'm Weilin Wang. This is NPR. Thanks for listening. Isn't Family Feud about families feuding against other families, not families? Yeah. It's not about an intra-family. Other families, that's correct. It's an inter-family, not intra-family. This is an intra-family. It's like Romeo and Juliet, not King Lear. It's like Family Feud, but forget everything you've ever known about the TV show Family Feud.
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