Adam Tooze on the Trump economy
An interview from Issue Fifteen
Each issue of The Drift has always featured an interview with a scholar, writer, artist, or activist we admire, helping us to reflect more synoptically on the moment than it’s possible to do in a single essay. For our fifth-anniversary edition, prepared in a moment that seems even more difficult to comprehend than usual, we spoke with five people instead of just one, revisiting conversations with several past interview subjects. Columbia historian and “Chartbook” author
, who first appeared in our pages in 2021, in Issue Four, agreed to guide us through the economic chaos Trump has unleashed so far. We talked with Tooze about tariffs, dolls, Japanese cars, ChatGPT, and more. Read the full interview online today — and check out our conversations with Wendy Brown, Nikhil Pal Singh, Eman Abdelhadi, and Olúfẹ́mi O. Táíwò, too.
“All Sticks, No Carrots” | Adam Tooze
The astonishing thing is that the president is actually willing to get on national TV and say, Yeah, this is the plan. Fewer dolls for Christmas; less stuff. You don’t need it.