Economics Without the Jargon: Stop Showing Me the Chart. Explain What It Means.

Open X, LinkedIn or any financial feed and you will find them everywhere:

Charts.

Curves.

Inflation indexes.

Bond yields.

PMIs.

Spreads.

Real rates.

Technical indicators.

And often a short sentence underneath:

“This is extremely important.”

But there is a question I think we should ask much more often:

Important to whom?

And another one:

Who actually understands what the chart is saying?

The problem is not economics. The problem is communication.

I have nothing against charts.

I have nothing against economists.

I have nothing against technical analysis.

Professionals need all of these things.

A portfolio manager needs detailed data.

A central bank economist needs sophisticated models.

An investment bank needs research.

A professional investor has Bloomberg, databases, research departments and analytical tools.

They already know how to get the information.

They are not the audience I am talking about.

I am talking about everybody else.

The person who wants to understand why his BMW is more expensive.

Why gasoline costs more.

Why beef is expensive.

Why American farmers are paying more for fertilizer.

Why a war in Iran can affect the price of energy in Florida.

Why China matters.

Why tariffs eventually reach consumers.

That person does not need another complicated chart.

That person needs an explanation.

The Education Gap Matters

There is another reason why economic communication should become simpler.

The United States is a highly educated country, but education and numerical skills are not evenly distributed.

The OECD’s 2023 Survey of Adult Skills found that 28% of American adults aged 16–65 scored at Level 1 or below in literacy.

Even more relevant for economic communication, 34% scored at Level 1 or below in numeracy. At Level 1, adults can perform basic calculations and find a single piece of information in a table or chart, but may struggle when a problem requires several steps. (OECD Education GPS⁠)

That does not mean that one-third of Americans cannot read a chart.

That would be an irresponsible interpretation.

It means that complicated numerical information cannot simply be thrown at the public and assumed to be understood.

And educational attainment makes a significant difference.

Among Americans aged 25–65, the OECD found that adults with tertiary education scored 46 points higher in literacy than those with upper-secondary education, while those with upper-secondary education scored another 57 points higher than people with less than upper-secondary education. (OECD⁠)

This is precisely why economic communication matters.

The audience is not a room full of economists.

It is society.

And Who Is Actually On Social Media?

Here we need to be careful.

There is no credible statistic showing that “the majority of people who comment on economic posts have low education.”

But the available evidence tells us something equally important.

Social-media audiences are not the same as professional economic audiences.

Pew Research’s 2025 survey of 5,022 U.S. adults found substantial differences in platform use by education.

For example, X was used by:

• 16% of adults with high school education or less;

• 23% of those with some college;

• 24% of college graduates.

TikTok showed a different pattern:

• 40% among those with high school or less;

• 42% among those with some college;

• 29% among college graduates.

Reddit showed the opposite pattern:

• 15% among those with high school or less;

• 28% among those with some college;

• 37% among college graduates. (Pew Research Center⁠)

The lesson is not that less-educated Americans use social media more.

The lesson is:

economic influencers are speaking to a heterogeneous public, much of which does not have the education or professional tools of an economist.

That should influence how they communicate.

The Strange Psychology of Economic Social Media

There is another phenomenon that deserves attention.

Many people follow economic influencers partly because they want to look like they understand economics.

They repost the chart.

They put it on their profile.

They add a comment.

Perhaps they understand it.

Perhaps they don’t.

But the chart itself creates a feeling of sophistication.

It says:

“I follow economics.”

And sometimes the real purpose of the post is not to understand the economy at all.

It is to demonstrate that the person is sophisticated enough to understand it.

A complicated graph can therefore become a form of social status.

The more complicated the chart, the more intelligent the poster appears.

But complexity is not proof of intelligence.

Sometimes it is simply complexity.

What If We Did the Opposite?

What if economic communication started with ordinary questions?

For example:

How much more does a top BMW cost today than it did in 2023?

That is a much more interesting question than:

“What happened to German luxury-auto pricing elasticity under tariff uncertainty?”

The answer is simple.

The U.S. MSRP of the 2023 BMW 760i xDrive was $113,600 before destination charges. The 2026 model has an MSRP of approximately $126,250.

That is an increase of approximately:

$12,650

or:

+11.1%

The important question is not simply the number.

It is:

Why?

Tariffs can increase the cost of imported vehicles and components.

Labor costs change.

Materials change.

Technology becomes more expensive.

Exchange rates matter.

Manufacturers change pricing strategies.

And companies can choose to absorb some costs instead of passing all of them to customers.

Trump’s 25% automobile tariff therefore does not mean that a BMW automatically becomes 25% more expensive.

That distinction is precisely what a good economic explanation should teach.

Mercedes Tells a Similar Story

Now take the Mercedes-Maybach S 680.

The 2023 U.S. MSRP was approximately $230,050.

The 2026 model is listed at approximately $244,400.

That means an increase of:

$14,350

or approximately:

+6.2%

Again, I would not claim that Trump caused exactly 6.2% of that increase.

That would be bad economics.

The comparison simply tells us that the list price of a top-of-the-range Mercedes has increased significantly since 2023.

Then we ask why.

Inflation.

Production costs.

Technology.

Exchange rates.

Tariffs.

Supply chains.

Corporate pricing.

Demand.

The interesting part is the explanation.

Not the chart.

Then Came the Iran War

Now introduce another shock.

Energy.

The Iran war is economically important because energy is not an isolated product.

Oil affects transportation.

Transportation affects food.

Energy affects agriculture.

Energy affects manufacturing.

Energy affects logistics.

And therefore energy can eventually affect almost everything.

The simplest explanation is:

war → supply risk → energy prices → transportation and production costs → consumer prices.

You do not need an economics degree to understand that.

And you should not need one.

Gasoline Is the Perfect Example

Gasoline is perhaps the easiest economic indicator for an ordinary American to understand.

If oil becomes more expensive because the market is worried about supply disruptions caused by war, gasoline can become more expensive.

The question is simply:

How much?

That is where data matters.

The chart should support the explanation.

It should not replace it.

The Agricultural Story Is Even More Interesting

Now consider American farmers.

This is where the effects of trade policy and war become much more complicated.

Farmers need fertilizer.

The United States imports important quantities of fertilizer and fertilizer components.

If international supply becomes more expensive or disrupted, American farmers can face higher input costs.

The Iran war adds another energy shock.

Recent reporting from the U.S. farm belt has highlighted elevated fertilizer and diesel costs, putting additional pressure on farmers ahead of harvest. Diesel normally represents several percentage points of production costs for major crops, while fertilizer is one of the largest variable inputs.

The economic chain is easy to understand:

trade restrictions and war → more expensive energy and fertilizer → higher farming costs → pressure on agricultural prices.

And then:

higher farming costs → pressure on food prices.

This is exactly the kind of economic phenomenon that deserves explanation.

Not because it is simple.

But because it is complex and important.

Beef Is Another Perfect Example

American beef prices are close to the opposite of a simple “Trump caused inflation” story.

The U.S. cattle herd has been severely reduced.

That means less domestic supply.

At the same time, consumer demand remains strong.

That combination pushes prices higher.

Ground beef reached around $6.69 per pound in December 2025, according to figures cited by the White House, a record level for the BLS series.

Then came an extraordinary policy response.

In August 2026, Trump announced a temporary plan to allow up to 300,000 metric tons of additional ground-beef imports over 90 days at reduced tariff rates, specifically because American consumers were paying too much.

Think about the simplicity of the economic story:

There is not enough cheap beef.

So the government wants to allow more foreign beef into the country.

More supply could mean lower prices.

That is economics.

No 40-page report is required to understand the basic mechanism.

This Is What Economic Communication Should Look Like

Imagine two posts.

Post A

“U.S. agricultural inflation is being driven by a combination of fertilizer price persistence, energy-cost pass-through and global supply-chain disruptions.”

Technically respectable.

But what does the ordinary reader learn?

Very little.

Post B

“American farmers are paying more for fertilizer and fuel. Fertilizer and fuel are necessary to produce food. When production becomes more expensive, farmers need higher selling prices simply to protect their margins. That pressure can eventually reach consumers.”

Same phenomenon.

Much easier to understand.

That is the point.

Professionals Already Have the Tools

This is perhaps the most important distinction.

A professional economist does not need an influencer on X to explain what a yield curve is.

A portfolio manager does not need someone to show him that the dollar moved 2%.

A hedge fund does not need an influencer to tell it that oil futures have risen.

They have the data.

They have Bloomberg.

They have research departments.

They have analysts.

They have models.

They have access to the information.

The real opportunity is elsewhere.

It is the person who does not have those tools.

The entrepreneur.

The employee.

The small investor.

The consumer.

The farmer.

The business owner.

The person who simply wants to understand what is happening to the world.

That is the audience that deserves better economic communication.

The Chart Should Be the Evidence — Not the Performance

A chart is useful when it answers a question.

For example:

How much did the BMW 760i increase between 2023 and 2026?

Approximately 11%.

The chart makes that immediately visible.

Perfect.

But then we need the explanation.

Why did it happen?

Because several forces interact:

• inflation;

• production costs;

• technology;

• exchange rates;

• tariffs;

• supply chains;

• corporate pricing decisions;

• demand.

The chart tells us what happened.

The writer should tell us why.

That is the division of labor.

China Is Another Example

China is often discussed in an unnecessarily complicated way.

Hundreds of charts.

Industrial production.

PMIs.

Credit impulse.

Property investment.

Exports.

Fixed-asset investment.

It is all useful.

But the ordinary reader wants to know:

Is China still growing?

Is China still becoming more competitive?

Is China still exporting huge quantities of goods?

Will Chinese companies continue to challenge American and European companies?

What does China’s development mean for the rest of the world?

Those are the questions.

The answer can be complex.

The explanation does not have to be.

China has serious problems.

Its property market has struggled.

Its demographics are difficult.

Its economy is changing.

But China remains a huge industrial power, a major exporter and an increasingly important technological competitor.

That is the story.

Then use the charts to support it.

Not the other way around.

Complexity Is Not the Same as Intelligence

There is a strange psychological effect on social media.

People often assume:

If I cannot understand it, it must be sophisticated.

Not necessarily.

Sometimes it is sophisticated.

Sometimes it is badly explained.

Sometimes it is simply unnecessary.

And sometimes complexity is being used to establish credibility.

The ultimate test should be different.

Ask the economist:

Can you explain this to someone who has never studied economics?

If the answer is yes, that demonstrates real understanding.

If the answer is no, perhaps the problem is not the audience.

Perhaps the explanation needs work.

The Future of Economic Communication

The world is becoming more complicated.

China is changing.

Trade wars are changing supply chains.

Tariffs affect prices.

The Iran war affects energy.

Energy affects transportation.

Fertilizer affects farmers.

Farm costs affect food.

Interest rates affect housing.

Technology affects jobs.

These are complicated systems.

But people do not need complicated explanations of every component.

They need someone to connect the dots.

This happened.

This is why.

This is who is affected.

This is what it means for you.

That should be the standard.

Explain Complex Phenomena Simply

I do not believe the future of economic communication is more jargon.

I believe it is better explanation.

The professional already has the tools.

The economist already has the data.

The investor already has the research.

The value of a public economic writer is therefore not to reproduce another professional terminal on social media.

The value is to take something complicated and make it understandable.

A BMW becoming 11% more expensive.

A Mercedes-Maybach becoming 6.2% more expensive.

Gasoline becoming more expensive because of an energy shock.

Farmers paying more for fertilizer and fuel.

Beef becoming expensive because the cattle supply is tight.

China continuing to matter despite its problems.

These are economic stories.

They are also stories about real life.

And perhaps that is where economic communication should return.

Not: “Look at my chart.”

But:

“Let me explain what is happening.”

Because the purpose of economics is not to make complicated things look complicated.

The purpose is to make complicated things understandable.

Roberto Balbino — CEO, Fintech SBB.