Marketplace All-in-One

The Treasury Department is releasing a new report this morning with a set of strategies to bring more competition to the alcoholic beverage business with an eye toward making a double IPA, a local mezcal or glass of pinot cheaper. For anyone who perhaps improperly reaped the rewards of chaos-ridden state unemployment insurance systems … the government’s going to want you to give that money back, and they’ll be letting you know about it.

“Air rage” incidents are happening more and more these days as tension about face masks remains present, and there’s talk of putting the people who make the skies unfriendly on a no-fly list. A young couple in New York City was apprehended in a billion-dollar Bitcoin scheme. The BBC reports on Toyota’s challenges in dealing with the chip shortage despite its early preparation, as well as its position in the EV market.

From the BBC World Service: Profits at the Japanese carmaker dropped 21% in the fourth quarter. Now, the disruption means Toyota plans to make half a million fewer cars in the next year. Plus, the British parliament’s spending watchdog says Brexit has increased costs, paperwork and border delays. And, will Uganda benefit from a new deal with French and Chinese energy companies to develop some of its oil reserves?

The Academy Awards used to be the battleground between major Hollywood studios. It’s now increasingly a fight between streaming services. Netflix nabbed 27 Oscar nominations on Tuesday, the most of any studio. Marketplace’s Kimberly Adams speaks with Julia Alexander, a senior strategy analyst for Parrot Analytics. She says nominations for companies like Netflix and Amazon are a sure sign of the times.

Super Bowl weekend is almost here, and while the National Football League would probably like us to talk about the big game, we’re discussing its hiring practices.

Last week, the recently fired head coach of the Miami Dolphins, Brian Flores, filed a lawsuit against the NFL alleging, among other things, that it discriminates against Black coaches. Currently, there’s one Black head coach in the league.

The Rooney Rule was supposed to increase diversity within coaching staffs by requiring teams to interview at least one minority job candidate. But not much has changed in the two decades since that rule has been in place.

“People in other industries brought the Rooney Rule to their industries because they saw it in the NFL. And so if you have the place where the rule was essentially born falling down in the job with respect to implementing the rule, then there’s going to be less confidence in the rule elsewhere,” said N. Jeremi Duru, professor of sports law at American University and author of the book “Advancing the Ball: Race, Reformation, and the Quest for Equal Coaching Opportunity in the NFL.”

In the News Fix, we’ll stick with today’s sporty theme and talk about Olympic gold medalist skier Eileen Gu and how she’s managed to walk a political tightrope amid tensions between the U.S. and China. Also, we’re keeping an eye on the U.S.-Canadian border.

Later, a shoutout to Kimberly’s hometown and a special announcement about our Economics on Tap YouTube livestream.

Here’s everything we talked about today:

Inflation clocked in at a decades-high 7% in December. But inflation varies depending on where you’re located. Today, we’ll take a look at what inflation feels like for businesses and consumers in Atlanta, Detroit and San Francisco, as well as the sectors in which prices may be higher for longer. We’ll also travel to Istanbul to hear how Turkey’s staggering 36% inflation rate is fueling a tourism boom for visitors eyeing luxury living at low cost. Buckle up — it could be a steep and bumpy ride.

Google and Apple collaborated on exposure notification technology that individual states could use to build apps for contact tracing, but those apps have yet to establish themselves. There are a few reasons why it hasn’t happened. Jeffery Cleveland talks 10-year-yield, inflation and U.S. imports in our markets discussion. After President Biden met with German chancellor Olaf Scholtz, he said the U.S. could “bring an end” to the Nord Stream 2 natural gas pipeline.

Japanese conglomerate SoftBank has nixed the sale of British chip design firm Arm to U.S. chip manufacturer Nvidia. The deal would have been the largest in the semiconductor chip industry. The Biden administration is attempting to restore power to unions, which has been ebbing for several decades. Congress is looking into legislation that would alter how its members can trade stock.

From the BBC World Service: BP is the latest energy firm to report bumper profits, as it benefits from higher oil and natural gas prices, which have pushed up costs for households. Plus, the European Union unveils its “chips” plan, to spend billions boosting semiconductor manufacturing on the continent. And, India’s microblogging app Koo aims to go global.

The IRS announced on Monday it’s dropping a plan to require taxpayers to sign up for and use facial recognition software. The plan had been to require people to use a service provided by a third-party company, ID.me, to verify their identities to access documents or make payments online. It was already being rolled out for people who created new online accounts this year, and was going to kick in for existing accounts by this summer. The decision comes after backlash from advocates and lawmakers over privacy concerns. Tonya Riley, a privacy and cybersecurity reporter at CyberScoop, joins Marketplace’s Kimberly Adams to discuss.