In Episode Zero of Power and Consequences, Gary Gensler and I (Simon Johnson) introduce ourselves, explain why we are launching this podcast, and elaborate on how it is related to our course, Public Policy and the Private Sector, currently running at MIT Sloan.
Here are some readings related to the episode, including items to which we refer directly (the CEPR publications) and useful background material (on the Overton Window). We’ll use this substack to provide similar links for all episodes.
The Economics of the Second Trump Administration, Gary Gensler, Simon Johnson, Ugo Panizza, & Beatrice Weder di Mauro, CEPR VoxEU, December 4, 2025, second (!) edition.
The Second Trump Administration: Consequences for the ‘Rest of Us’, Gary Gensler, Simon Johnson, Ugo Panizza, & Beatrice Weder di Mauro, CEPR VoxEU, December 8, 2025.
A Brief Explanation of the Overton Window, Joseph Lehman, Mackinac Center, 2017.
We recorded this episode early on Friday, February 20th. Since that time, there have been several significant shifts — on tariffs and on TSA PreCheck/Global Entry. We’ll provide updated reactions in this newsletter and in future podcasts.
As mentioned in the podcast, we would like to express our thanks and appreciation to our co-editors Beatrice Weder di Mauro and Ugo Panizza, as well as Tessa Ogden and everyone else at the Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR), including the 50+ authors and amazing team we worked with to produce two editions of The Economics of the Second Trump Administration in 2025. We would also like to emphasize that all the views expressed in this newsletter (as in the podcast) are those of Gary and Simon alone - we are not here representing any organizations or any other individuals.
