Jenn’s Reading Room · Database
What’s behind the tracker.
Every Economist show I follow gets one record here: what it tracks, where the numbers come from, whether it is live yet, and what I would build next.
This is the reference behind the podcast pages. A chart only goes up once I know what a show actually tracks and where the numbers come from.
Each show repeats something different: a quiz round, an economic indicator, a daily news story, a China note. They are not the same shape, so I track each one on its own terms.
Public pages may show source labels, counts, source paths, QA status, and public RSS links. They must not serialize subscriber-only audio URLs or expiring catalog tokens.
The shows
A row for each show.
Checks and Balance
WeeklyLive trackedWho wins the recurring closing quiz, on what topics, and how defensible is the evidence?
What repeats
Closing quiz round
What one row is
One row equals one Checks and Balance closing-quiz round with question, answer, participant guesses, correctness, and derived outcome.
Next to build
Attach transcript receipts and reviewer metadata to the highest-priority backfill rows.
Hosts
Charlotte Howard, Idrees Kahloon, John Prideaux
29 seeded episodes · 3 public-safe sources · 2 internal sources · 314/338 coverage records
Money Talks
WeeklyScoped, not builtWhich economic indicators recur, what direction do they point, and what real-world market story do they support?
What repeats
Indicators segment
What one row is
One row equals one indicators segment or one explicitly named metric inside a Money Talks episode.
Next to build
Implement the Money Talks indicator extractor using this narrow schema before building charts.
Hosts
Mike Bird, Alice Fulwood, Ethan Wu
29 seeded episodes · 2 public-safe sources
Boss Class
SeasonalMusing linkedWhich workplace-AI lessons are durable enough to support the AI at Work musing?
What repeats
Workplace-AI lesson
What one row is
One row equals one workplace-AI lesson or expert claim anchored to an episode or interview.
Next to build
Backfill lesson rows from the existing AI at Work musing before adding new Boss Class visuals.
Hosts
Andrew Palmer
11 seeded episodes · 2 public-safe sources
The Intelligence
DailyCatalogue onlyWhich global stories recur across the daily briefing, and which become durable themes?
What repeats
Daily story segment
What one row is
One row equals one story segment, not one full episode.
Next to build
Refresh the catalog before deciding whether this daily show is worth segment-level extraction.
Hosts
Jason Palmer, Rosie Blau
0 seeded episodes · 1 public-safe sources
Drum Tower
WeeklyCatalogue onlyWhich China themes recur across politics, economy, technology, culture, and foreign policy?
What repeats
China issue/topic row
What one row is
One row equals one issue/topic claim anchored to an episode, not one full show summary.
Next to build
Create a small seed of topic rows before building a China explorer.
Hosts
Jeremy Page, Sarah Wu
9 seeded episodes · 1 public-safe sources
The rule
What has to be true first.
A podcast dataset earns a row only when the recurring unit is defined, the comparison plane is honest, and the output feeds a named surface.
Do not compare unlike segments. Checks and Balance quiz rounds, Money Talks indicators, Boss Class AI-work lessons, and Drum Tower China-topic rows need separate schemas unless a later cross-show analysis explicitly normalizes them.
Every show clears these first
- 01Name the analytical question before collection.
- 02Name the surface the data will power.
- 03Define the recurring unit and comparable plane.
- 04Write the inclusion and exclusion rules.
- 05Choose the source hierarchy.
- 06List required fields and units.
- 07Keep raw transcript/audio evidence separate from extracted rows.
- 08Run a validator before public claims.
- 09Expose open coverage and verification gaps instead of smoothing them away.
Where it shows up
Which pages this feeds.
Anything I add here has to point at a page it is actually for, so the data does not pile up with nowhere to go.
| Surface | Role |
|---|---|
| Overview /musings/economist-podcasts | overview |
| Checks and Balance /musings/economist-podcasts/checks-and-balance | tracker |
| Money Talks /musings/economist-podcasts/money-talks | per show |
| The Intelligence /musings/economist-podcasts/the-intelligence | per show |
| Boss Class /musings/economist-podcasts/boss-class | per show |
| Drum Tower /musings/economist-podcasts/drum-tower | per show |
| Methodology /musings/economist-podcasts/methodology | methodology |
| Database /musings/economist-podcasts/database | database |
| AI at Work /musings/ai-at-work | companion musing |
The backlog
What is next to build.
The smallest next things worth building. P0 is do-first, down to P2.
Attach transcript receipts to quiz rows
The tracker has a large extracted archive, but verified status is blocked until rows carry transcript excerpts, timestamps, reviewer, and review date.
Next: Start from the highest-priority backfill candidates and merge evidence into `Quiz.evidence`.
data/economist-podcasts.ts
Close unknown catalog coverage
Every catalog episode needs an explicit tracked, no-quiz, needs-extraction, or blocked-source status.
Next: Classify the remaining catalog rows and preserve the status in `checksAndBalanceCoverageManual`.
data/economist-podcasts.ts
Implement Money Talks indicator extraction
Money Talks now has a scoped comparable plane, but the extractor is still a placeholder.
Next: Implement the indicator schema in `scripts/podcast-series/economist/money-talks/extract.mjs` before building charts.
scripts/podcast-series/economist/money-talks/extract.mjs
Backfill Boss Class lesson rows from AI at Work
Boss Class already links to a public musing, but the lesson database is not typed yet.
Next: Extract workplace-AI lessons from the musing and attach episode evidence.
data/economist-podcast-database.ts
Seed Drum Tower China-topic rows
The catalog exists, but issue rows are not yet normalized enough to power a China explorer.
Next: Create a 10-row pilot with topic, geography, actors, mechanism, and evidence.
data/economist-podcast-database.ts
Refresh The Intelligence catalog before segmenting
The daily show has no seeded episodes in the current typed data.
Next: Run a catalog refresh, then decide whether daily story segmentation is worth the extraction cost.
data/economist-podcasts.ts
Themes
What recurs across the shows.
Counts come from the episode summaries logged so far. They show where to look next, not conclusions.
Geopolitics & War
21 seeded episodes
Trade & Tariffs
8 seeded episodes
AI & Technology
20 seeded episodes
Markets & Finance
17 seeded episodes
US Domestic Politics
17 seeded episodes
Institutions & Gov
5 seeded episodes
Economics & Theory
10 seeded episodes
Social & Culture
7 seeded episodes
China
12 seeded episodes
Leadership & Work
6 seeded episodes
Last reviewed 2026-06-01. This is a personal reading tracker, not affiliated with The Economist.