It’s arguably the most important number in the US economy: the federal funds rate, better known simply as the Federal Reserve’s “interest rate.” The Fed picks a rate eight times a year, which dictates how easy it is for consumers and businesses to borrow money for entrepreneurship, home buying, credit cards, and more. But Susan Collins, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston — the first woman of color to lead any regional federal reserve bank — says the Fed’s job goes way beyond setting interest rates. On today’s episode, she talks about traveling across New England to meet families struggling with the high cost of housing and child care, and how their stories influence decisions made by the nation’s central bank. Email us at [email protected].

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What if your doctor were a computer program? With recent quantum leaps in artificial intelligence, that’s now a possibility in our lifetime. The use of AI in medicine is expanding rapidly, bringing the potential for incredible innovations – such as unprecedented access to specialized medical knowledge for rural areas – as well as big risks, like unregulated bots entrusted with too much power. Today’s guests, Zak Kohane and Carey Goldberg, have just published a book together, called “The AI Revolution in Medicine: GPT-4 and Beyond.” Zak is a computer scientist, a practicing endocrinologist, and chair of the Department of Biomedical Informatics at Harvard Medical School. Carey is a longtime health and science journalist who’s reported for The Boston Globe, The New York Times, WBUR, and Bloomberg. Email us at [email protected].

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The US-China relationship seems to grow more contentious every day, with spying, hacking, economic warfare, and high-stakes military exercises in the Pacific. It almost feels like we’re sliding toward a Cold War with China — if we’re not in one already. Few know this story better than investigative reporter David Barboza, who spent 12 years in China for The New York Times, focusing on business. He witnessed China's astonishing economic expansion and growing sway in the world. Today, David is co-founder and CEO of The Wire, a digital news and data platform focused on China and its ties to the global economy. Find us online at globe.com/opinion.

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Joan Donovan first saw extremism up close more than 20 years ago as the vocalist of a punk band in the Boston underground scene — when she got punched in the face by a neo-Nazi. Today, Joan is a sociologist at Harvard who studies disinformation and how it colors American society, including the outsized influence that white supremacists and other fringe groups hold in online forums and social media. With the 2024 presidential cycle already begun, what can the public — and the media — do to combat disinformation and limit the reach of bad actors? Find us online at globe.com/opinion.

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Since the founding of the Republic, Greater Boston has been a center of American thought, culture, politics, innovation, and science. On Say More, longtime Boston Globe columnist Shirley Leung builds on that grand tradition by bringing you intimate conversations with the doers and thinkers behind the biggest ideas and debates of our time. Find us online at bostonglobe.com/opinion.

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