Economists On Screen, Episode 3: Aaron Sorkin

The Indicator is in Atlanta this week, at the American Economic Association annual conference. So you, dear listener, get a little extra screen time. All this week, we're looking at the ways in which economists are portrayed in television series and in the movies.

Today, we look at the work of screenwriter Aaron Sorkin, who is not the kind to shrink away from grasping the nettle of economic explanation. In the TV show The West Wing, President Jed Bartlet is a Nobel Prize-winning economist. In one memorable rapid-fire exchange between the president and his staff, Sorkin attempts to lay out the ups and downs of free trade.

A few years later, Sorkin tried his hand at The Glass-Steagall Act. In the show, The Newsroom, economics professor Dr. Sloan Sabbith gives a thumbnail history of Glass-Steagall and argues that its repeal played a pivotal role in the financial crisis.

Today Cardiff and Stacey discuss these shows and the way they deal with these economic concepts.

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