The American Compass Podcast

Globalization and deindustrialization have brought with them a sense among American workers that the good jobs they could once count on have disappeared. As family-supporting careers evaporate, service jobs with lower pay and unpredictable hours take their place in many communities across the country.

Zeynep Ton, professor of practice at MIT’s Sloan School of Management, joins Oren to discuss what a better future of work could look like. The two talk through what a “good job” means today, in a world where frontline service-sector work dominates U.S. employment. Plus, they unpack why stability, career growth, and supportive pay for the jobs that already exist—rather than a focus on training for the “jobs of the future”—is vital to supporting America’s workers.

Further reading:

• “Building a Strong U.S. Middle Class Requires High-Productivity, High-Dignity Service Jobs,” by Zeynep Ton

The Trump administration’s new trade policy toward China has revealed just how deeply enmeshed major American corporations are with our chief geopolitical rival. Apple’s story is perhaps the most dramatic.

Patrick McGee, author of Apple in China and San Francisco correspondent for the Financial Times, joins Oren to discuss how Apple, like so many other nominally American companies, is constrained by the rules, regulations, and industrial preferences of the Chinese Communist Party. They break down how China dominates its peer competitors, the way multinational corporations sleepwalked into the present crisis, and the possibility of America breaking China’s industrial chokehold.

Further reading:

• Apple in China: The Capture of the World's Greatest Company by Patrick McGee
• Trade with Communists Should Be Uncertain by Oren Cass
• Disfavored Nation by Mark DiPlacido, Chris Griswold, and Trevor Jones

The second Trump administration has spurred a wave of domestic industrial investment and a recognition that making things in America matters. But what does that look like from the factory floor?

Chris Power, founder and CEO of Hadrian, joins Oren to discuss how his company is helping lead reindustrialization efforts here in the United States. He explains the revolutionary technologies Hadrian uses to compete at scale with foreign firms and highlights just how different the manufacturing jobs of today are compared to what many think of as “factory work.” Finally, he and Oren talk through ways policymakers can support the domestic industrial startups we need to return America to its place as the world’s leading technological and industrial power.

Further reading:

• The Techno-Industrial Policy Playbook, published this week by American Compass, FAI, IFP, and NAIA
• Not By Tariff Alone by Chris Griswold 
• What An Enduring Industrial Policy Requires by Charles Yang 
• Tear Down this Paper Wall by Christopher Koopman and Josh T. Smith 

What should conservatives make of the first 100 days of Trump’s second term? Rachel Bovard, vice president of programs at the Conservative Partnership Institute, joins Oren to discuss how to measure an unconventional administration’s early successes, what to make of DOGE, and where the administration should direct its efforts to capitalize on its public mandate.

Plus, they discuss one major change that all conservatives should celebrate: a better approach to antitrust enforcement, led by Andrew Ferguson and Mark Meador at the FTC and Gail Slater at DOJ.

Further reading:

• “Break ’em Up” by Rachel Bovard
• “Antitrust’s Conservative Future” by FTC Commissioner Mark Meador

How has the American media gone from the days of Walter Cronkite to open hostility toward the president and his party?

Mark Halperin, editor-in-chief of 2Way and host of the new program "Next Up" on the Megyn Kelly network, joins guest host and managing editor Drew Holden for a conversation about the state of the U.S. media. They discuss why the media so often gets the story wrong about President Trump, why the press refused to cover former President Biden's decline, and the incentive structure behind mainstream media's institutional descent into a liberal echo chamber. Plus, the two place bets on whether the media has any hope of internal reform.

If you’ve spent time on social media or watched cable news recently, you’ve almost certainly encountered some of globalization’s staunchest defenders, trotting out their favorite arguments against tariffs.

On today’s episode, Mark DiPlacido, American Compass policy advisor, joins Oren to break down the worst of these arguments and share some handy responses for your next important meeting, debate in the office break room, or cocktail party. After spending the past couple weeks on the media circuit, Mark and Oren run through some of their favorites: Should you need a PhD to discuss economics? Does the trade deficit really not matter? These are only the tip of the bad-take iceberg.

For more, check out our tariffs symposium, "After Liberation Day."

The congressman who introduced the bill to implement President Trump’s 10% global tariff wasn’t a member of his own party, but a conservative Democrat from a Trump-won district in Maine.

Congressman Jared Golden (D-ME), the sponsor of the BUILT USA Act, which would set the 10% global rate, joined Oren to talk about why Congress needs to permanently codify the new trade policy. To spur long-term investment in American industry and lift its workers, Golden and Cass agree, requires a policy with more sticking power than an executive order. Congressman Golden also explains his path to championing this issue, why so many of his constituents in Northern Maine support Trump’s recent move, and whether it’s possible for tariffs to become a bipartisan issue once again.

For decades, American men have been in crisis. Globalization has caused millions of jobs to disappear, divorce rates have increased, life expectancy has decreased, and deaths of despair have skyrocketed in many working-class communities.

Amber Lapp, research fellow at the Institute for Family Studies and stay-at-home mom, began talking to her neighbors in her working-class community in southwestern Ohio over a decade ago to try to get to the bottom of it. She joins Oren to share the real stories of America’s missing men, and discuss why she felt called to leave Manhattan and move to Ohio to better understand working-class life in America. The two dive into the value of getting to know your neighbors in an atomized age and what can be done to begin to reverse this crisis.

Further reading:

• “America's Missing Men” by Amber Lapp

The “China Shock”—triggered by the country’s entry into the World Trade Organization—devastated America’s heartland, causing a sudden exodus of manufacturing jobs and disrupting the communities that depended on them. Promoters of globalization promised “better” jobs would take their place. Nearly 25 years later, has that happened?

David Autor, professor of economics at MIT and co-author of the famous “China Shock” paper, joins Oren to talk about the effects of free trade on America’s working class. They also examine Autor’s latest paper, which highlights that the new jobs in the hardest-hit communities often don’t provide the pay or stability that the jobs outsourced by globalization did—and, even worse, that many former workers lack access to these jobs altogether. Plus, they explore the rise of automation in manufacturing and the implications of AI for American workers.

Further reading:

• "Places versus People: The Ins and Outs of Labor Market Adjustment to Globalization" by David Autor, David Dorn, et al. 
• "The China Shock: Learning from Labor Market Adjustment to Large Changes in Trade" by David Autor, David Dorn, and Gordon Hanson

The “abundance agenda” has taken the policy world by storm recently, led by Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson, who advocate for prioritizing the supply side and removing barriers to building our productive capacity.

This week, Ezra joins Oren to make the case for how the theory could be put into practice. In this wide-ranging conversation, the two explore the sclerosis that has held back blue cities like New York and San Francisco, potential political roadblocks to implementing the agenda, and where conservatives can find common cause with it. Plus, they debate whether the Democratic Party can be the flagship of abundance while prioritizing the climate change movement.