Episodes
Season 1 - 2023
You can access each episode in the current season below. If you are new to the site, then we suggest you begin at Episode 1 as the narrative is sequential and builds the complexity of the concepts and the story over the course of the season.
Season 1 has 12 episodes.
Season 2 will be start on May 24, 2024.
Episode 1 - The Smith Family watches the TV news
The Smiths turn on the morning finance report on TV and sparks fly within the household after Emma innocently asks: Where does the money come from?.
Kevin sets out on mission.
Episode 2 - Kevin confronts Ryan with the facts!
Kevin is late home from school because he has been reading a blog about money.
Armed with new information he confronts Ryan who loses it.
Episode 3 - Elizabeth does some arithmetic!
In her spare time, Elizabeth reads a blog post that Kevin mentioned.
She tries to engage Ryan about what she has learned and he is in denial.
Episode 4 - Chris turns up and talks money!
Bank analyst Chris turns up at the Smith's and Kevin asks for support.
Ryan asks who Ben Berstanke is, and reveals his ignorance.
Episode 5 - A trip to Kyoto!
The Smiths take a holiday to Japan to see Elizabeth's best mate Mariko.
Ryan is bored and can't get his head around government investment.
Episode 6 - Discussion at a local tea house in Kyoto!
Mariko and Elizabeth enjoy time at a local tea house and discuss Groupthink and how the standard economic commentary on TV is hard to counter because it appeals to our intuition as households.
Mariko challenges Elizabeth about Chris's previous affections.
Episode 7 - The Smith and Fujii families meet
Over a vegan lunch, the Smiths try to make sense of why fiscal deficits do not lead to higher interest rates.
Ryan confronts central banker Hiroshi Fujii about crowding out after he had heard Professor Noitawl talk about it.
Hiroshi lures Ryan into seeing why it cannot occur but Ryan is blind to his own logic.
Episode 8 - A garden walk and talk turns to money
The Smith and the Fujii families visit a famous Buddist temple in Kyoto and while strolling through the garden they start talking about money.
Hiroshi leads Ryan through a causal chain starting with fiscal deficits and ending in more private saving.
Ryan is getting a lesson in why financial crowding out - a major argument against the use of fiscal deficits - cannot be true in the real world.
Episode 9 - The Smiths are back home to a debt mountain
The Smith Family arrive home and Mark Harding the local taxi driver is at the airport to pick them up.
He tells Ryan that the latest news is that a debt mountain is crippling the nation and Ryan repeats what Professor Noitawl says that 'every man, woman and child is owed $40,000 each'.
Emma gets very excited and wants to know when she is going to get the cash!
Episode 10 - Ryan gets confused about intergenerational tax burdens
On the way home from the airport, the taxi driver tells the Smith's that they can now take the new tunnel, which was built with national government investment and will save them heaps of time, and provide other facilities (parks, etc) that benefit the whole family for years to come.
Ryan excitedly computes how easy it will be for him to get to work but cannot quite piece together the logic that Elizabeth and Kevin bring up that far from being a burden on future generations, the project will benefit everyone. He thinks taxes will have to rise and is confused as to who will pay.
Emma gets it right - "Now we will have a park to play in!"
Episode 11 - Things begin to click except for Ryan
In this episode, banker Chris sees through his promise to explain to Kevin how modern banks work
Ryan continually butts in, asserting his naive view of the economy that he acquired doing an undergrad course in economics as part of his engineering studies.
Elizabeth and Kevin start to understand how it all fits together but Ryan is resistant. Even little Emma displays innocent wisdom.
Episode 12 - The central bank has the power
In this episode, Chris ties to convince Elizabeth to leave Ryan - by SMS. Not the best move.
The scene then turns to the annual community party that is held in the local park as part of a national holiday.
The local band is playing and the tensions within the community start to reveal themselves. We also learn about the power of the central bank relative to the financial markets. We end Season 1 with George Jones being taken away by the police charged with financial fraud.
Next Episode: Season 2 will begin on May 24, 2024.
