August 15, 2025· 29 min

Lots More With Skanda Amarnath on This Moment in Macro

Orality
Model
78%
Oral-dominant (speeches, podcasts, storytelling)

Speaker Breakdown

HostJoe Weisenthal(1,008 words)
M:29%
HostTracy Alloway(1,596 words)
M:94%
GuestSkanda Amarnath(3,319 words)
M:27%

Oral Indicators

Agonistic28%
clearly, insane, very
Engagement60%
you, our, your
Memory Aids100%
listen, now, so
Repetition100%
like (98x), it's (52x), think (48x)
Parallelism60%
So why would I pay for stuff I..., So here's why I'm so confused ..., And then if someone said, look...
Sound Patterns80%
60 question(s), alliteration: "markets move", alliteration: "barclays brief"
Formulaic Phrases5%
you know what, i mean

Literate Indicators

Hedging11%
could, quite, probably
Passive Voice9%
be crimped, be seen, be distorted
Abstract Nouns21%
investment, information, volatility
Subordination9%
because, accordingly, while
Sentence Length31%
Avg: 12.7 words/sentence
Word Complexity48%
investment, analyze, anticipate
Academic Markers0%
Impersonal Style40%
448 personal pronouns found
Descriptive Style100%
monthly, carefully, exactly

Description

Right now, you could make a good argument that inflation is still too hot, and that with the stock market booming, and the unemployment rate at 4.2%, that it's crazy to think about cutting rates. You could also argue that much of the economy is stalling, that the pace of job growth has slowed dramatically, and that with housing in the tank, we need lower rates. Then on top of this situation, layer in the fact that we have this weird bifurcated economy, with the AI sector growing like gangbusters. And then add onto that the attacks on the independence of the Federal Reserve coming from the Trump administration. And furthermore, trade policy is still a moving target. To make sense of this complicated time — and to look ahead to next week's Jackson Hole conference — we speak with Skanda Amarnath, the executive director of Employ America. Only Bloomberg.com subscribers can get the Odd Lots newsletter in their inbox — now delivered every weekday — plus unlimited access to the site and app. Subscribe at bloomberg.com/subscriptions/oddlots See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.