Planet Money

By NPR

Business

What's Planet Money about?

The economy explained. Imagine you could call up a friend and say, "Meet me at the bar and tell me what's going on with the economy." Now imagine that's actually a fun evening.

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LAST EPISODE

#933: Find The Helium

08.16.2019

You need helium to launch rockets into space. It's also essential for MRI machines and cellphones. But the world is running short on helium. So we're going looking for more.

Planet Money episodes:

08.16.2019 #933: Find The Helium You need helium to launch rockets into space. It's also essential for MRI machines and cellphones. But the world is running short on helium. So we're going looking for more.
08.14.2019 #616: How Solar Got Cheap Solar energy used to be a fantasy. Then it arrived, but was too expensive for most people to afford. Now it's cheap. Here's how it happened.
08.09.2019 #932: Deep Learning With The Elephants Counting elephants is key to saving them. But in the rainforest, they're hard to spot. One scientist is listening for them instead, with the help of artificial intelligence.
08.07.2019 #931: The IT Guy Vs. The Con Artist Felipe was an IT professional looking for a new gig. Then a notorious con artist offered him a job. Felipe took the job — and tried to con the con man.
08.03.2019 #930: Twins Scientists have been studying twins for a long time, trying to figure out how much of human behavior is influenced by the environment, and how much of it is in our genes.
07.31.2019 #598: That Time We Shorted America, Part Two We shorted America, taking a bet against its entire stock market. Today, we find out the results, and revisit the very first person to short a stock back in the 17th century.
07.26.2019 #597: That Time We Shorted America, Part One Today on the show, we ignore the advice of some very smart people and bet against something people love.
07.24.2019 #929: Could A Wealth Tax Work? Elizabeth Warren wants to tackle inequality by taxing the wealth of the mega-rich ($50-million-or-more rich). Wealth taxes failed in Europe. Can they work in the U.S.?
07.19.2019 #928: Hong Kong The Hong Kong protests tap into a complex history between China and the West. It's a story of isolationism, opium wars, and the rise of capitalism.
07.18.2019 #927: The Indicator In The House One state, two very different stories: Why Huntington Beach won't build new homes during a housing shortage, and what private firefighters say about their industry and inequality.
07.13.2019 #926: So, Should We Recycle? Recycling in America is on life support. Some towns aren't even picking it up anymore. And it might be a good thing for the planet.
07.10.2019 #925: A Mob Boss, A Garbage Boat and Why We Recycle In 1987, an Alabama man made a deal with the mob. He ended up with 3,186 tons of trash no landfill would take. It was the accidental birth of recycling in the U.S.
07.05.2019 #924: Stuck In China's Panopticon The Chinese government is using face recognition, DNA samples and more to track the Uighur population. Americans — some unknowingly — have helped build this surveillance state.
07.03.2019 #752: Eagles vs. Chickens Picture an organic farm, with thousands of free-range chickens roaming on open land. Now picture it from the vantage of a soaring bald eagle. It's an all-you-can-eat buffet.
06.28.2019 #923: Good Teachers, Bad Deal Thousands of teachers got grants from the Department of Education to help pay for college. Then, some of those same teachers found out they owed thousands of dollars in debt.
06.27.2019 #922: The Cost of Getting Your Money Back It's easy to reverse transactions on credit cards. But Venmo is a different story. A woman who accidentally sent $1,500 to a complete stranger found this out the hard way.
06.21.2019 #921: Tales From The Parking Lot What can you do when your car is booted in a private parking lot? Is that even legal? Can Uber drivers cause surge pricing? When do parking tickets become a civil rights issue?
06.19.2019 #920: What Should We Be Worried About? Things are looking up in the economy, but there's still plenty to worry about: Corporate debt, the trade war, and worry itself.
06.14.2019 #919: Are Cities Overrated? Moving to the big city used to provide an escalator to a more prosperous life, even if you didn't have a college degree. But now economists are wondering: Are cities overrated?
06.12.2019 #590: The Planet Money Workout Barely workout? Gyms like it that way. They're one of a few businesses that benefit from low attendance. Economics explains why gyms encourage members to commit, but not too much.
06.07.2019 #918: The Day Of Two Noons In the 1800s, every town had its own "local time," which was not only confusing, but sometimes dangerous. So railroads implemented the standardized time we have today.
06.05.2019 #651: The Salmon Taboo People in Japan never ate raw salmon. Then Norway had a salmon surplus—and persuaded Japanese sushi eaters to try something new.
05.31.2019 #917: Quit Threat! The unemployment rate in the U.S. is just 3.6%. Many people think we are at, or near, full employment. For the first time in a long while, power is shifting toward workers.
05.29.2019 #916: The Whistleblower Whisperer Jordan Thomas represents Wall Street whistleblowers in some of the biggest SEC cases against banks. In addition to protecting their secrets, he's also kept some of his own.
05.24.2019 #915: How To Meddle In An Election David Goldstein decides to copy Cambridge Analytica and run an experiment on actual voters during the 2017 Alabama special election.
05.23.2019 #914: Trump and Deutsche, A Long Affair After Donald Trump's companies declared four bankruptcies, several major banks stopped loaning him money. But Deutsche Bank didn't.
05.18.2019 #913: Counting The Homeless From renting hotels to a jobs report-like census in the night, we look at ways communities are helping the homeless.
05.15.2019 #407: A Mathematician, The Last Supper, And The Birth Of Accounting The story of Luca Pacioli, who brought double-entry bookkeeping to the masses, transforming accounting and businesses around the world.
05.10.2019 #912: How Uncle Jamie Broke Jeopardy How James Holzhauer built on the strategies of Ken Jennings, Roger Craig, and Monica Thieu, to crack the game show Jeopardy.
05.08.2019 #911: You Asked The Listener Question Hotline What's the cost of being tall? Are people less productive when the weather is bad? Why is vanilla so expensive? Answers to those questions and more.
05.03.2019 #910: Economics, Sexism, Data Alice Wu's undergraduate senior thesis on gender bias on the Econ Job Rumors forum sparked a movement to address sexism in the field of economics.
05.01.2019 #416: Why The Price of Coke Didn't Change For 70 years For 70 years, the price of a bottle of Coca-Cola stayed a nickel. Why? The answer includes a half a million vending machines and a 7.5 cent coin.
04.27.2019 #909: Dollar Stores Vs Lettuce Every six hours a new dollar store opens in the U.S. Are they killing grocery stores?
04.24.2019 #908: I Am Not A Robot The remarkable story of the online "CAPTCHA" tests we've all taken to prove that we're not robots.
04.19.2019 #907: Two Spring Indicators The Indicator from Planet Money explores trade wars, peanuts, hurricanes, and happiness.
04.17.2019 #644: How Much Does This Cow Weigh? We wanted to understand an eerie phenomenon that drives everything from the stock market to the price of orange juice. So we asked you to guess the weight of a cow.
04.12.2019 #906: The Chicago Boys, Part II How a ruthless dictator, and a bunch of economists known as the Chicago Boys, took Chile from socialism to capitalism.
04.11.2019 #905: The Chicago Boys, Part I In the late 1950s and early '60s a handful of Chilean students went to study economics at the University of Chicago. What they learned changed their country.
04.06.2019 #904: Joke Theft Copyrighting comedy is expensive. So comedians have devised an informal system of sanctions to protect their jokes from theft. Sometimes it works.
04.04.2019 #760: Tax Hero Joe Bankman, professor at Stanford, figured out a way to make filing your taxes easy and painless. Then the tax lobby found out about it.
03.29.2019 #903: A New Way To Pay For College Some colleges are offering students a new way to pay. It's not a scholarship. It's not a loan. It's more like the students are selling stock in themselves.
03.28.2019 #902: The Phoebus Cartel The story behind two sneaky forces that drive us to buy more products, more often: Planned obsolescence and psychological obsolescence.
03.22.2019 #901: Bad Cops Are Expensive There's an industry of people working to eliminate bad police behavior. They're not activists or protestors. They're insurers.
03.20.2019 #189: Why A Dead Shark Costs $12 Million Today's show is about the fickle market for art. What makes a dead shark cost $12 million, and a photo of steel wool that looks like a tornado cost only $1,265?
03.15.2019 #900: The Stolen Company When an American company named ABRO learns their goods are being counterfeited in China, they start their own trade war.
03.13.2019 #724: Cat Scam The internet was supposed to get rid of middlemen--but instead they are taking over the global economy.
03.08.2019 #899: Mexico Fights The Fuel Pirates Thieves are stealing billions of dollars worth of gasoline in Mexico. The President is taking drastic action to cut them off, and it comes at a serious cost. Content warning: Audio of deadly pipeline explosion.
03.07.2019 #785: The Starbury The story of an NBA All-Star and an experiment: To make a desirable basketball shoe cheap enough for anyone.
03.02.2019 #898: Happy Fed Independence Day The story of the day the Federal Reserve got its independence and the fight—an actual physical fight—to keep it.
02.28.2019 #897: New Orleans Vs. Airbnb Airbnb has changed New Orleans. And now landlords and preservationists are fighting over the future of the city.

Older episodes

Planet Money

What's Planet Money about?

Download our free app to listen on your phone

Planet Money episodes:

#933: Find The Helium

#616: How Solar Got Cheap

#932: Deep Learning With The Elephants

#931: The IT Guy Vs. The Con Artist

#930: Twins

#598: That Time We Shorted America, Part Two

#597: That Time We Shorted America, Part One

#929: Could A Wealth Tax Work?

#928: Hong Kong

#927: The Indicator In The House

#926: So, Should We Recycle?

#925: A Mob Boss, A Garbage Boat and Why We Recycle

#924: Stuck In China's Panopticon

#752: Eagles vs. Chickens

#923: Good Teachers, Bad Deal

#922: The Cost of Getting Your Money Back

#921: Tales From The Parking Lot

#920: What Should We Be Worried About?

#919: Are Cities Overrated?

#590: The Planet Money Workout

#918: The Day Of Two Noons

#651: The Salmon Taboo

#917: Quit Threat!

#916: The Whistleblower Whisperer

#915: How To Meddle In An Election

#914: Trump and Deutsche, A Long Affair

#913: Counting The Homeless

#407: A Mathematician, The Last Supper, And The Birth Of Accounting

#912: How Uncle Jamie Broke Jeopardy

#911: You Asked The Listener Question Hotline

#910: Economics, Sexism, Data

#416: Why The Price of Coke Didn't Change For 70 years

#909: Dollar Stores Vs Lettuce

#908: I Am Not A Robot

#907: Two Spring Indicators

#644: How Much Does This Cow Weigh?

#906: The Chicago Boys, Part II

#905: The Chicago Boys, Part I

#904: Joke Theft

#760: Tax Hero

#903: A New Way To Pay For College

#902: The Phoebus Cartel

#901: Bad Cops Are Expensive

#189: Why A Dead Shark Costs $12 Million

#900: The Stolen Company

#724: Cat Scam

#899: Mexico Fights The Fuel Pirates

#785: The Starbury

#898: Happy Fed Independence Day

#897: New Orleans Vs. Airbnb

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