Americans are told Social Security is in trouble because there are more retirees and fewer workers to support them. But that story leaves out a major part of the problem: how much income now sits outside the system that funds Social Security. Roosevelt Institute’s Rey Fuentes joins Nick and Goldy to explain how rising inequality, stagnant wages, and an outdated payroll-tax structure helped create Social Security’s looming shortfall — and why benefit cuts are far from inevitable. Plus, Nick puts forward a different way to think about fixing the system — one that starts with a basic question: why should some kinds of income count toward Social Security while others don’t?
Browse Episodes
Profit, Power, and the Crisis of the Common Good (with Sen. Chris Murphy)
Why do so many Americans feel powerless, lonely, and disconnected — and what does that have to do with our economy?
Senator Chris Murphy joins Nick and Goldy to discuss his new book, Crisis of the Common Good, which makes the case that America’s political crisis is inseparable from a deeper collapse of power, connection, and shared purpose.
They dig into the “cult of profit,” Market Humanism, AI, scarcity, corruption, and the limits of an economy organized around efficiency and extraction. It’s a conversation about what happens when profit becomes the highest measure of success, and what it would mean to build an economy rooted in dignity, connection, and the common good.
Chains of Command: How Franchising Turned Control Without Responsibility Into a Business Model (with Brian Callaci)
When you walk into a McDonald’s, it looks like one company. But legally, the person making your fries probably doesn’t work for McDonald’s at all. Brian Callaci, Chief Economist at the Open Markets Institute and author of Chains of Command, joins Nick and Goldy to explain how franchising became a blueprint for corporate control without responsibility — shifting risk, liability, and labor costs onto franchisees and workers while profits flow upward.