international transactions

Michael Lewis joins Sean Illing to discuss his new book about Sam Bankman-Fried, Going Infinite: The Rise and Fall of a New Tycoon. They talk about the FTX crash, what Lewis learned while shadowing Bankman-Fried, and what SBF’s rise and fall says about us and our financial systems. Host: Sean Illing (@seanilling), host, The Gray Area Guest: Michael Lewis, author, Going Infinite: The Rise and Fall of a New Tycoon References:  Going Infinite: The Rise and Fall of a New Tycoon by Michael Lewis (W.W. Norton & Company, 2023) The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine by Michael Lewis (W.W. Norton & Company, 2010) The Blind Side: Evolution of a Game by Michael Lewis (W.W. Norton & Company, 2007) Moneyball: The Art of Winning An Unfair Game by Michael Lewis (W.W. Norton & Company, 2004) Liar’s Poker by Michael Lewis (W.W. Norton & Company, 1989) “Sam Bankman-Fried tries to explain himself” by Kelsey Piper (Vox, Nov. 2022) Enjoyed this episode? Rate The Gray Area ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ and leave a review on Apple Podcasts. Subscribe for free. Be the first to hear the next episode of The Gray Area by subscribing in your favorite podcast app. Support The Gray Area by making a financial contribution to Vox! bit.ly/givepodcasts This episode was made by:  Engineer: Patrick Boyd Deputy Editorial Director, Vox Talk: A.M. Hall Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Since the end of World War 2 the US dollar has been world reserve currency, this means international transactions are overwhelmingly done in US dollars. This gives the US some key economic advantages. Naturally China wants to make its currency the world reserve currency, and as the second largest economy it makes some sense. Enjoyed this? Comment below! 💬 ⭑ Subscribe to Economics Explained on YouTube 👉 https://bit.ly/sub2ee

Eric Holder was attorney general during the first six years of Barack Obama’s presidency, and there are days when it feels like he’s the attorney general of Obama’s post-presidency, too. Holder chairs the National Democratic Redistricting Committee, a cause close enough to Obama’s heart that the ex-president recently folded his Organizing for America operation into it. Holder calls the project “a partisan effort for good government,” a line rich with both the promise and problems of Obamaism. The NDRC doesn’t want to build a redistricting operation to match the GOP’s machine, they want to take redistricting out of the hands of politicians altogether. But critics worry that their organizing will work in blue states, fail in red states, and lead to Democrats unilaterally disarming in the redistricting wars. In this conversation, Holder lays out his strategy to end redistricting and answers his critics. We discuss whether there’s still the possibility of a Supreme Court ruling on the subject, and what tools Democrats have in red states. We also revisit Holder’s famous “nation of cowards” speech on race, and discuss whether more bankers should’ve been sent to jail during the financial crisis. Enjoy! Book Recommendations: An Unfinished Life: John F. Kennedy, 1917 - 1963 by Robert Dallek The Collected Poems of Langston Hughes by Langston Hughes 1944: FDR and the Year That Changed History by Jay Winik  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Yascha Mounk’s new book, The People vs. Democracy: Why Our Freedom Is in Danger and How to Save It, is perhaps the year’s scariest read. In it, Mounk argues that “liberal democracy, the unique mix of individual rights and popular rule that has long characterized most governments in North America and Western Europe, is coming apart at its seams. In its stead, we are seeing the rise of illiberal democracy, or democracy without rights, and undemocratic liberalism, or rights without democracy.” It’s an excellent book. But reading it left me wondering: Was America really such a textbook liberal democracy before? I have no qualms with Mounk’s concerns about our present, but as I've dived deeper into the declinist literature on American democracy, I have come to wonder whether it relies on an overly nostalgic view of our past. So I had Mounk — this podcast’s first three-peat guest! — back on the show to argue his case. We discuss whether America was really a democracy in the 20th century, if voters prefer institutions they can control over those they can’t, whether Trump’s illiberalism reflects broader currents in American society, the ways racial progress has long destabilized American politics, and what the currents of today portend for our future. I recognize the positions I take in this episode may come back to haunt me when Trump fires Robert Mueller and Congress names him sun-god and confirms Michael Cohen as attorney general. But I think for all of us wrapped up in this era, it’s important to question our assumptions, and to contextualize this period within America’s real history rather than our imagined past. And Yascha, who is perhaps the most persuasive champion of the case for alarm, was the perfect guest with which to do it. As always, you can email me with feedback, thoughts, and guest ideas at ezrakleinshow@vox.com.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In this episode we talk about how to accept money on the internet including the ups of Stripe, the downs of PayPal.

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Show Notes

• Apollo
• React Apollo
• GraphCool
• Stripe
• PayPal
• Braintree
• Stripe Docs
• HTML5 Autocomplete Types
• Stripe Radar
• Royal Bank PayPal WorkAround
• Stripe Atlas
• Transferwise
• Stripe Bitcoin

Sick Picks

• ChefSteps
• What Cha Tea

Shameless Plugs

• Wes' Courses
• Level UP Tutorials Youtube
• How to GraphQL

Twitter

• Wes Bos
• Scott Tolinski
• Syntax