50: 'Hamilton' -- From Smash Musical to Economics Syllabus

and welcome back to the Bloomberg Benchmark Podcast. It's Thursday, August eleven. I'm Scott landman and Economics editor at Bloomberg News in Washington, and I'm Daniel Moss, Executive editor for Global Economics it Bloomberg in New York. Now, Dan, I've been away from the show for the last couple of weeks, and I just I was listening to them and they were practically downers talking about how useless sports stadiums are for economic development, the legacy of slavery in Brazil. What

was going on? Yeah, you'd think we've never heard of Michael Phelps. I thought that the pace on slavery in Brazil, given the Olympics and given the swings and roundabouts of Brazilian economics and politics, might have resonated. I guess I was wrong. Anyway, I did think they were really interesting, but today we're going to go for something lighter. Hamilton's has become a massive smash hit on Broadway since it opened just about a year ago, and it recently won

eleven Tony Awards, including Best Musical. There was something that it was nominated twice in the same category for like the actors and things like that, but it couldn't even win those twice obviously. Anyway, now it's about to make waves across the rest of the country. In late September, premiers in Chicago for an open ended run. Then in sen it'll start showing in London, and also began a tour around the United States. Right here in d C. They're doing their best to squeeze the most demand out

of a limited supply of tickets. Uh, if you want to be guaranteed to see Hamilton's at the Kennedy Center in you actually need to buy two full seasons worth of subscriptions to see the other shows there. And there are people who are going to do that. Plenty of people personally, I haven't seen the show yet, but I've listened to the soundtrack many times. Dan, have you? I was just confessing with Matt earlier, I have not seen it. Well.

Even my two daughters, who are two and four years old, asked to hear the songs in the car and can even recite some of the lyrics. But what makes it so great It takes the biography of the first Treasury Secretary and sets it to hip hop. The songs are not only catchy, but they sometimes take fairly complicated economic and financial concepts and boil them down to really creative songs.

And joining us today to talk about it is Matt Rosy, and economics professor at Susquehanna Universe City in central Pennsylvania. Matt made the track all the way to New York to be on our podcast and see some Broadway shows with his family. So Matt, thanks so much for being with us today. Now, thank you for having me. Matt. How many of your students had actually heard of Alexander Hamilton's prior to this buzzy eruption with the Broadway show. Well, I didn't do a poll, but I suspect most of

them had heard the name. Now, how many knew what he did? That would have been a much smaller number. So how are you incorporating Hamilton's into your lessons and using a Broadway production to, you know, teach people about his role in the country and the structure of the place. Sure, what, I love to use songs usually before class, sometimes during class as a break to help illustrate economic concepts in general.

And for Hamilton's the musical, it has it has to have about a dozen songs that when you listen to the songs illustrate economic concepts incredibly well. And of course, I mean it's become a number one you know, it's coome a best selling album. So it's the kind of thing when students here economics within Hamilton's right, they want to keep singing. These are the types of songs where

people will sing over and over. And my hope with introducing songs to help teach economics and Hamilton's included, is that they're singing over and over, then all of a sudden they start to get the economic concept over and over and it helps the students learn economics easier, better and make it more fun. All right, let's hold that thought for a moment and listen to some music. What we're about to hear is one of my favorite songs from Hamilton's and probably the one with the most specific

lyrics about finance and economics. It's called Cabinet Battle number one. So let's hear a little clip. This is actually going to be uh, the actor playing Thomas Jefferson rapping. Oh, but Hamilton's forgets. This plan would have the government assume state debts. Now place your bets as to who that benefits the very seat of government where Hamilton, So, Matt,

let's break that down. What is he talking about. It's discussing the federal government assuming the state's debts, uh, and really establishing the what was kind of the precursor to the Federal Reserve at the time, establishing a national bank for the first time in this country. And that was of course very controversial as you had at that time. You have individuals and states that really wanted to be the United States, but it's the state governments that are

the primary drivers of the economy. Whereas you have others like Hamilton's, um, you know, Jefferson's on the state government side. You have others like Alexander Hamilton's who wanted more a stronger national government, and we're, you know, in the process, we're thinking, in order to do this, let's, uh, you know, let's form the national bank. Let's let's actually run a national debt, and which today, you know, the national debt they were talking about running pales compared to the date

days that. But at the time, of course, it was very controversial to run some national debt as the idea that it would make, you know, would make America seem more credible on the national stage and would actually encourage international trade. From this perspective, the development of a national economy looks like it was inevitable. But what you're saying, and what the song's implying is it wasn't necessarily so sure, there were plenty of people who did not want who

would have rather had it be. Each individual state kind of controls their own destiny or controls their own economy more than a nationally controlled economy. And in post two thousand a night, the term bailout is a toxic term, is the song. And as I said, I haven't seen the music, but does the song kind of imply bail out of the state's probably not a good thing. One so forth, and so I think there, I certainly think

there's some implications for there. There's also the line, um, you know, the this plan as an outrageous demand and it's too many damn pages for any man to understand. And the moment I heard that line, the first thing I thought of was that we have people in Congress and the Senate who have passed you know, who have passed the stimulus bills or paths, who are who voted for the Affordable Care Act or you know, Obamacare as

it's known. Without well admitting I didn't read the plan, and so when I saw that, I thought the lyrics were incredibly relevant to a lot of the problems that we do see today, or at least a lot of the issues that are coming up today. How would you work this specifically into your class lessons? And what specific

concepts which would you use for this? So for this one, if I'm teaching, um so for monetary you know, if I'm teaching about the Federal Reserve, often I'll put this song in ahead of time, and largely for this particular song, and I'll have to um admit I have not taught macro economics since I have had this song at my disposal. What I would probably do is I don't know how

much I would integrate it in and of itself. Now I do have discussion questions on my on the website I helped create Broadway Economics dot Com that professors could use towards this. But what where I really like to use the music is kind of do the lesson, but then either play the songs before or after to have people realize, you know, these these are issues. These these issues don't have to be dry and dullsues are exciting, right.

I mean, if you listen to Cabinet Battle number one, it's like it's a party, you know, ladies and gentlemen. You could have been anywhere in the whole world, but you're in New York and we're gonna have a cabinet meeting, and you know, it's as riot as event. It's all. It's exciting and everybody's thrilled to be there, and it's a rap battle. And usually for music, I'll play pre class music, Um before the students will show up, I'll

cue the music to start. Let's say Cabinet Battles about a three minute song about three minutes before class starts. I will begin the music. So the downside some students don't see that, But the upside is it doesn't actually take any class time. And then we asked discussion questions, Okay, we just heard this great song, Where where where? What are the economic ideas we just saw in this song? So how many of your students and how much of

the audience actually knows what the Federals of is? For example, if they're taking the class, they've they've certainly heard it by the time I get to them. It's a good question. As far as I pull them ahead of time, I think most of the students will have at least heard of the Federal Reserve. Well, they know what their roles

are coming in as eighteen and nineteen year old. Probably less than a quarter kind of know what the Federal Reserve is doing prior to taking Principles of macro Economics class. So really, what you're trying to do here is convey to your students that an economy and the development of economic policy it's a living, breathing thing. It's not preordained. There are people making these decisions. They're bringing their own perspective, they're shaped by their own histories. That that would be

histories with a small age. Uh, And it's not some giant preordained, very sort of dry conspiracy. If I get nothing else out of doing the songs, I really want my students to think economics is fun. If students come out of economics thinking this was a great subject, this is entertaining. And yes, you know the whole idea of

the history. Maybe I thought that we just evolved and it was just preordained we would be here, as you mentioned, No, this wasn't preordained, right, these were There were pretty epic battles between Jefferson and Hamilton's and throughout the you know, and if when once you start to think about that, you can realize, okay, maybe we're hearing about this one, but what other battles happened throughout our history that caused

us to be the way? I mean, the Federal Reserve didn't start until the early twentieth century, right, This central bank actually existed for a while, and then it's time expired, and it wasn't renewed for a period of time, and then it was renewed again. And it wasn't until the Federal Reserve that we've had one that's now stuck for for about a hundred years, like I'm trying to I think it was nine. But there's still but there's popular opposition or maybe skepticism or at least or some movement

to change the structure of the Federal Reserve system. It's been been kind of ossified the way it is for for for its hundred year history. And you do here skepticism on both sides of the political I think it's structure is also fought. Are you saying that's just the way it's characterized, characterized in some way but but in some ways that but the geographic regions of the FED

are certainly ossified. And even Janet Yelling herself said, if it were created today, you probably have different regional boundaries form for the FED districts. And you know there is that skepticism of of central money creation that continues in certain political corners to this day, right, Yeah, I mean major presidential candidate. I believe it's Rand Paul who you know his book was? Was it? It was either Rand or Ron Paul? I can't remember. At the top, my

dad wrote the book. His dad the son and his son continued the tradition. The book's titled End the fed right, Yeah, And I mean it's an issue there, you know, it's it's an issue where you actually get some in the Republican Party and some in the Democratic Party who would like to see the Federal Reserve either eliminated or modified, or maybe they just don't understand. It's a big entity and they don't understand what it's doing. And you know,

because of that, there's a skepticism for it. All right, let's hold this thought as we pause for a break from our sponsor. Brought to you by stage Summit Live, the virtual conference that provides all the highlights at Stage Summit from the convenience of your desk. Celebrity entrepreneurs, Incifle workshops absolutely free. Register at stage Summit live stream dot com. Let's go back to the music for a minute and

play another song. This is a clip from a song called Satisfied and what You're what you'll hear singing or rapping if you will, is is the woman who plays Angelica Skyler singing. She's the sister of Hamilton's love interest Eliza. So here we go. I'm gonna grow in the world in which my only job is the very rich. My father has no son, so I'm a one who has the social fly. I'm the oldest and the widdy in the gap has been to New York City, is Andy

and Alexander. So, Matt, you say that this actually illustrates a key concept in economics, what would you say? Yeah, I actually think this is there's kind of two concepts

that this song illustrates incredibly well. And that's the idea of tradeoffs and the idea of an opportunity costs, which are two of the more central ideas trying to teach right at the beginning of well an economics education, right and when I teach principles of macroeconomics, really in the first week, we're hammering on you know what what what what does it mean to have trade offs for for an introductory you know, for an incoming first year, second

year or a second year student. Often they haven't thought about this um the trade offs in this song, naturally, Angelica Skyler is thinking through Well, she sees Alexander Hamilton's and instantly there's an attraction and likes him and talks to him and thinks this guy is amazing and is fascinated by him, but realizes he's poor and she's mentioning in the song her job is to marry rich, and there's also that Alexander might want. Part of what might

be attractive about her. You know why she might be attractive to Alexander is that she has a lot of money. And there's a third The third line mentions how her sister also likes Alexander, and her sister would say it's okay, but you know, Angelica says what she'd be lying when she says that her sister would be happy if she was with Alexander. And at the end of the song, it seems pretty clear she thinks she made the right decision, but it really really pains her. And that's a great idea.

The opportunity cost of choosing to be with Alexander would have been not marrying Rich right and hurting her sister marriage. The ultimate economic institution. Ultimate economic instituall I mean in family that's coming right. Offs to come in, and certainly the trade off you're trading off your happiness in one way,

um for money. You're trading off your sister's happiness for money. UM. It's just a fantastic song that shows tradeoffs on a on a high stakes decision that's not monetary, and a lot of the tradeoffs in life are high stakes, right, I mean, do you get a cancer, you know, if you're diagnosed with a disease, do you go get cancer treatment? Right? I mean these are there are high stakes tradeoff decisions

people have on a daily basis. And this song, with a lot of emotion and power, I think, really captures trade offs and opportunity costs. You address this a little bit a few minutes ago. Is the concept of a trade off in economics and the development of economic policy something that's alien to your students when they first come to you. Certainly all students have experienced tradeoffs, but I think a lot of them will miss the idea that

there are tradeoffs when they're thinking about various policies. They might not realize. And you'll see this both on like the political spectrum. It's inevitable that politics comes up now and you teach the introductory level economics, it's more what we call positive and analysis. It really doesn't delve into the political um, the normative what should we do? But

it's kind of natural. I mean, you're starting to talk about the ideas of you know, minimum wages or tax increases or tax cuts, the tradeoffs come in, and a lot of individuals will come in with their political ideas thinking, well, whatever side i've heard, there must be no downside to this particular policy, and we'll never have to cut a deal to get it. I ever have to cut a deal to get a cuff, of course. Yeah, and so there's well, I think they've all experienced that, the idea

that it happens in politics. I do agree to summits foreign and so I think part of the job is that I have when teaching economics is to help make the student understand. Look, these are everywhere. You've experienced them your whole life, Right, You've had to figure out what you wanted to do for the afternoon. Do you want to go work perhaps and earn a few dollars, or do you want to go out and have fun and you'll spend money and have less money the next day?

Or you know what particular class do you want to take? There's trade offs for that or I mean all of the decisions in life, there's particular trade offs. They've they've experienced them. The ideas then okay, let's carry that over. Those those don't just magically go away in the world

of politics and the world of economic decision making. Does it trouble you that they come to you without this saints that they're compromises to be made to get your policy, whatever it is, enacted, and that they have to do try it off. Does that say something, say something you know troubling about society today. I don't know that I'd go quite that far. I do. I mean, would I

love if everybody had that? Yeah? I would. I would like if they had that they're taking you know, I look back at myself and would I at eighteen have have of course, yeah, yeah, But I really don't think I would have. It's part of the learning process. So I don't find it troubling. And what I tell the students when they struggle with any particular topic, if if they understood everything in the book already, there's no need for the class, right. Part of my job is to

help to help them understand. And so I don't know that I find it as as troubling as some others might find it. My hope is as far as having maximum impact. If we have individuals who come in and don't understand trade offs, and I'm able to help some people get oh yeah, there are trade offs. There's trade offs everywhere, and they come out of the class thinking that I'll think I did a pretty good job. Matt.

Can you tell us anymore about your Broadway Economics website and which other songs or shows outside of Hamilton's you liked for a teaching economics. Oh? Absolutely, So it's on Broadway Economics dot com. I think it's about forty five or so songs from different shows and you could see the songs that's got the links to the lyrics, and it also has discussion questions if educators want to use

these in their classes. The Broadway songs are fantastic for teaching economic concept because Broadway musicals tell stories, and a lot of the a lot of the stories are about economic issues. So, for example, one of the shows I'm seeing this afternoon is Fiddler on the Roof If I were a rich man, I think is a fantastic song as far as teaching economic concepts. The initial you know, you hear the title and you think, oh, yeah, that

has to deal with economy. Mix of course he's talking about what happens if he's rich, But there's actually this is one of my favorite songs to use because if you peel it back a layer, there's much more to it. Uh, Teva is singing um about I think it's Teva. It's the character's name, is singing about being rich from his perspective in I believe it's nineteen o five Russia, and to Teva, being rich would mean having lots of farm animals, having two sets of stairs, and having a wife with

a proper double chin. As he's saying, you know, a well fed wife, that's being rich. You know, that's that's a rich person in Teva's world. So, I mean, I'm going to Fiddler today and I'm thinking to myself, I mean, we are beyond anything Teva could have imagined in terms of rich And I think there's a powerful message about economic growth there in the economic growth that's occurred in

the past hundred years or hundred and fifty years. In many countries we all lived like Teva to three four years ago, not all, but of the world's population, there's still many parts of the world today that are incredibly poor. What is brought parts of the world to live so to be so incredibly wealthy, And that there's a story there that helps illustrate, helps kind of prime students for a lesson on economic growth. So that's one of my

favorite songs. And some of the same concepts are in Hamilton's Who Came From you know, as an immigrant from the Caribbean, and you get a lot of that kind of stuff. Oh yeah, yeah, and that show as well. Yeah. The first line from the song, right, um, how does the bastard, orphan son of a whore, um, you know, become a hero and a scholar? Right? That's fantastic ten dollar founding father without a father. I really like using that song in terms of kind of making students think, um,

I think through various issues. There's a number of songs that would illustrate ideas of economic competition. Another show that's on UM that's on Broadway right now is Something Rotten and that show has a song called a Musical, which is kind of a big show stopping number, but it's

a nice idea. It's a nice introduction to kind of innovation and how firms might innovate because they are trying to figure out what the next best thing when theater should be and this is in UM around six hundred in England, and they come up with the idea of well, let's do a musical and all of the ideas and why this would be an innovative, innovative process, and it's a it's a great song in terms of illustrating the idea that the way that people become better off, A

big chunk of it is when entrepreneurs come up with these ideas for a product we didn't know would make our lives better off, but they make our lives better off. And so that's a very it's a fun song. You know. Once again, part of what makes this work so well is the songs are fun, and the students enjoy them and they want to listen to them over and over. And while they do that, hopefully they the songs, you know,

the economic concepts resonate with them. Well, maybe I'll look into spinning off a separate Benchmark podcast on Broadway musicals and and economics because it's Matt. You make it sound like a really fascinating subject and and I really appreciate you coming in to talk with us about it today. Now, thanks for thanks for having me. This has been a blast. So Dan, are you ready to go out and see Hamilton's yet? If I could afford it? But you know, if I were a rich Man, but I think I

might enroll in your class. How about that? Hey, the more of the merrier, All right, well, thanks again, Matt. Benchmark will be back next week and until then you can find us on the Bloomberg terminal and Bloomberg dot com, as well as on iTunes, hocket casts, and Stitcher. And while you're there, take a minute to rate and review the show so more listeners can find us and let

us know what you thought of the show. You can talk to and follow us on Twitter at Daniel Moss DC and at Scott Landon and our guest is at at Matthew Rosy and at Broadway eCOM. See you next week. Brought to you by Sage Summit Live, the virtual conference that provides all the highlights of Sage Summit from the convenience of your desk. Celebrity entrepreneurs, inciple workshops absolutely free. Register at Sage Summit live stream dot com.