First, Jerome Powell, chairman of the Federal Reserve, was for the chop; then he was safe. As elsewhere President Donald Trump’s flip-flopping (https://www.economist.com/leaders/2025/04/23/president-trumps-attacks-on-the-fed-are-not-over?utm_campaign=a.io&utm_medium=audio.podcast.np&utm_source=theintelligence&utm_content=discovery.content.anonymous.tr_shownotes_na-na_article&utm_term=sa.listeners) chips away at American credibility. After years of working from home, data make clear (https://www.economist.com/finance-and-economics/2025/04/21/unlike-everyone-else-americans-and-britons-still-shun-the-office?utm_campaign=a.io&utm_medium=audio.podcast.np&utm_source=theintelligence&utm_content=discovery.content.anonymous.tr_shownotes_na-na_article&utm_term=sa.listeners) which demographic likes to do more of it (10:40). And electric vehicles do pollute the air (https://www.economist.com/science-and-technology/2025/04/11/electric-vehicles-also-cause-air-pollution?utm_campaign=a.io&utm_medium=audio.podcast.np&utm_source=theintelligence&utm_content=discovery.content.anonymous.tr_shownotes_na-na_article&utm_term=sa.listeners)—just not from the tailpipe (17:19).
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