The David McWilliams Podcast

Epizódy

• Is AI About to Crash the Global Economy? 16.07.2026 40min

  History says yes. We rewind to 1873, when a stock market wobble in Vienna triggered a global railway crash that took down banks, empires and 80% of world lending in a matter of months, and ask whether we're staring straight at a rerun. AI spending is now bigger than the entire US defence budget, the same handful of companies are quietly funding each other in a circle, and China is quietly open-sourcing the whole thing to undercut Silicon Valley. If it pops, it'll pop between now and October. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
• Mbappé vs Le Pen: The Battle for France 14.07.2026 42min

  On this 14th of July, as Les Bleus face Spain in the semi-final, France is heading into a political crisis that could reshape Europe because where France goes, Europe usually follows. We dig into why Marine Le Pen is now the favourite for the presidency, why the French football team has become her loudest critic, and, with France on the brink, why a World Cup win might yet influence politics in a way that few sporting achievements have ever done before. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
• England V Norway: A Tale of Two Oil Discoveries? 09.07.2026 41min

  Norway turned North Sea oil into $2 trillion in the bank. Britain turned it into tax cuts, unemployment cheques and a housing bubble. We unpack the tale of two oil finds, why one country nailed it and the other blew it, and what it says about how nations really make, and lose, their fortunes. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
• Alexander Hamilton: How a Caribbean Orphan Built America 07.07.2026 38min

  250 years on, we ask the question: would America even exist without Alexander Hamilton? We tell the story of the French-speaking outsider who created the dollar, faced down the states, and set the world's biggest economy in motion, before being murdered in one of history's strangest duels. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
• Ireland's Silent Sell Off and the Employee Ownership Solution 06.07.2026 31min

  Every day that the Irish Financial Service Centre is open, they're selling an Irish business into foreign ownership. Since 2018, overseas acquirers have spent over €100 billion buying up Irish companies. I'm joined by Alan Coleman to look at why this is happening. We look at employee ownership trusts as a solution already working in the UK and Canada, the tax barriers holding it back in Ireland, and the surprising historical Irish precedent for the idea. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
• The Death of the American Dream 02.07.2026 32min

  SpaceX just IPO'd, surged, and torched billions of small investors. It's the new American economy. From prediction markets to crypto to day-trading teens, we look at how the US quietly turned itself into the world's biggest casino, and why young Americans are gambling because they've given up on working. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
• The Man Who Broke the Global Economy 30.06.2026 41min

  Alan Greenspan just died at 100, and he might be the most consequential person of the last 30 years that nobody talks about. We unpack the wild story of the jazz clarinettist turned Fed chairman, the Ayn Rand cult he came from, the "Greenspan Put" that quietly rigged Wall Street, and why his fingerprints are all over Ireland's 2008 crash. Plus a strange historical twist: was Alan Greenspan related to the Jewish teenager whose shooting triggered Kristallnacht? Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
• Why Did Brazil Never Make It? 24.06.2026 35min

  The country of the future has been stuck in the future for 100 years. We dig into Brazil's wild economic story; slavery, the secret "whitening" immigration policy that sent millions of Italians south, and why Brazilian football carries the weight of a whole nation's identity. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
• The EU Is Cracking 23.06.2026 40min

  Europe just got overtaken, and it knows it. From a bar in Brussels, we unpack the ancient fault line tearing the EU apart, why China's rise has spooked the continent more than anyone admits, and why the "European way of life" might already be slipping away. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
• World Cup Series: Haiti 18.06.2026 44min

  Haiti just qualified for its first World Cup in 50 years, and they come from the poorest country in the Americas, a place where gangs run the capital and the average person earns $45 a month. We trace how the world's first successful slave revolution ended up here: French gunboats, a 120-year debt, ecological collapse, and an island where one half (the Dominican Republic) is racing ahead while the other is forgotten.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
• Could Canada Have A Brexit Moment? 16.06.2026 42min

  Mark Carney is being hailed as the new leader of the free world. While he's facing down Trump abroad, his real headache is at home, Alberta, Canada's Texas, is gearing up for a referendum that could split the country in two. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
• Inside the World Cup's Narco State 11.06.2026 40min

  We head down Mexico way to unpack the country hosting the World Cup, a $1.8 trillion economy living side by side with one of the most powerful criminal networks on earth. Drugs, guns, avocados, and the politics tying Trump and Sheinbaum together whether they like it or not. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
• Why Social Democracies Win World Cups 09.06.2026 40min

  The FT's Simon Kuper joins us to kick off our World Cup series, on why tiny social democracies keep producing the best football teams, why FIFA is laundering reputations for dictators, and why this tournament will say more about geopolitics than any leaders' summit this year. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
• The Coming Water Crisis 04.06.2026 29min

  Forget oil. The real fight is over the world's most precious and least understood commodity; water. We're joined by Paul O'Callaghan of BlueTech Research to explain why two billion people still can't get safe drinking water, why Saudi Arabia is quietly draining Colorado, and why Ireland's biggest strategic advantage might just be the rain we love to complain about. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
• Why Trump Is About to Come for Ireland 02.06.2026 41min

  Made in Kinsale, sold in America, the Ozempic boom is making Ireland rich and dangerously exposed. We unpack how three companies now pay nearly half our corporate tax, and what happens when Trump finally notices. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
• How Trump Could Kill the Dollar 28.05.2026 48min

  Monetary historian Brendan Greeley explains why the dollar's power has nothing to do with the Fed, why crypto is just a bank in disguise, and why politicising the dollar might be the fastest way to end its reign as the world's reserve currency. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
• Why Nobody's Having Babies Anymore 26.05.2026 50min

  Birth rates are collapsing, not just in rich countries, but everywhere from Mexico to Tunisia. The FT's John Burn-Murdoch joins us to unpack the surprising culprit, why young people aren't just having fewer kids, they're not even coupling up, and what it means for the future of work, wealth,  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
• Britain Is Broke 21.05.2026 36min

  Britain is running out of money, in a currency it prints itself. We unpack the gilt market panic, Starmer's impossible bind, and why the UK is starting to look more like 1970s Italy than the country that invented modern finance. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
• Immigration: What's The Plan? 19.05.2026 44min

  No policy. No plan. No housing. Sinead O'Sullivan is back to explain why Ireland took in more immigrants per head than any country in Europe, and why the middle class is about to feel what the working class has been shouting about for years. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
• China Is Winning, Trump Doesn't Know It Yet 14.05.2026 39min

  China is winning, and Trump doesn't know it yet. As the two leaders sit down in Beijing today, we explain why the Chinese think America is an empire in decline, and why they might be right. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.