Planet Money

By NPR

SHOW DESCRIPTION

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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	EPISODES LIST
		Antitrust 1: Standard Oil At the turn of the 20th century, Ida Tarbell investigated John D. Rockefeller's Standard Oil. What she discovered changed the economy of the United States.	02.15.2019
		#418: A Fake Bank For Money Laundering Run By The Government To catch drug traffickers, the U.S. government tried something it had never tried before. It set up and ran a fake offshore bank for money laundering. Fake name. Fake employees. Real drug money.	02.14.2019
		#893: Our Valentines 2019 We give a shout out to the stuff we've been obsessing over in the office — those stories that were so good, we wished we had thought of them ourselves.	02.08.2019
		#892: The Lost Plane In December, a commercial flight had to make an emergency landing in Iran. They discovered that landing there would be easy. Getting out – much, much harder.	02.07.2019
		#891: Who Won The Bet Over Bitcoin? Five years ago, two sides met on our show to make a bet about the future of bitcoin. Today, we announce the winner.	02.01.2019
		#825: Who Started The Wildfire? After a wildfire, teams of investigators start combing the wreckage for clues. Finding the cause means, maybe, finding someone to pay. But where's the line between a natural disaster and a human one?	01.30.2019
		#890: The Division Problem Today on the show, we take on one of life's most vexing problems: Sharing.	01.25.2019
		#688: Brilliant Vs. Boring John Bogle died last week. His creation — the index fund — changed investing. Today, how his invention set off a million dollar bet between some of the biggest brains on Wall Street, including Warren Buffett.	01.23.2019
		#889: The Pay-What-You-Want Experiment In 2010, Panera launched several pay-what-you-want cafes. On today's show: How this charitable experiment worked out.	01.18.2019
		#888: The First Shutdown In 1879, Congress and the President were locked in a battle over the rights of African-Americans. It led to the first government shutdown.	01.17.2019
		#887: You Asked For It, Yet Again On today's show we answer questions about silver dollars, Venmo, and Brexit. Why? Because you asked!	01.12.2019
		#690: All In We go inside a professional poker tournament, where some of the smartest betting takes place behind the scenes.	01.09.2019
		#886: The Price of a Hack Hackers are an expensive headache for companies. But there might be a simple economic fix.	01.04.2019
		#885: Do It For Your Country People are the engine that fuels an economy. But what happens when you start running out of people?	01.02.2019
		#884: The Rest Of The Story, Winter 2018 We check in on some stories we did this year to see what's changed. Find a full list of the episodes we referenced at our website, NPR.org/money.	12.28.2018
		#609: The Curse Of The Black Lotus How the card game "Magic: The Gathering" deflated a speculative bubble. You can support our show at donate.npr.org/planetmoney.	12.26.2018
		BONUS INDICATOR: The Calculator That Time Forgot Most products in this world are vulnerable to creative destruction: as new products are developed, they make old ones obsolete. But there are some exceptions — products that persist, resisting change while economic evolution continues without them. For instance: the graphing calculator. (This episode is from our other podcast, The Indicator from Planet Money. Subscribe to it wherever you get your podcasts.)	12.24.2018
		#883: A Very Planet Money Christmas Carol Charles Dickens wanted to pick a fight with economists. So he invented Ebenezer Scrooge. But did he get it all right? Also: If you want to support our show, head over to donate.npr.org/planetmoney. We appreciate it.	12.21.2018
		#882: Synthetic Reefer Madness How a professor invented a formula for synthesizing cannabinoids and unintentionally helped launch a drug revolution.	12.20.2018
		BONUS INDICATOR: The Measure Of A Tragedy Ricardo Hausmann, a Harvard-based Venezuelan economist, has constructed his own indicator, one that captures the horrifying scale of the economic catastrophe in Venezuela. (This episode is from our other podcast, The Indicator. Subscribe to it wherever you get your podcasts.)	12.17.2018
		#881: The Prisoners of the Trade War A truce in the U.S.-China trade war seemed close. The leaders of China and the United States were meeting to discuss a fix. And then arrests started. It got even more confusing, so today, we call up our man on the ground in Shanghai to make sense of it all. The key to understanding the latest turn in the trade war centers around a giant company most Americans haven't heard of called Huawei. Its rise traces the rise of China's economy and Chinese-style capitalism.	12.15.2018
		#539: What's A Penny Worth? We try to figure out what makes cents.	12.13.2018
		#880: Is Amazon Good For New York? It feels like all of New York City is arguing about Amazon's new office in Queens. But what do the people in Long Island City think?	12.07.2018
		#533: Why Car Safety Is A Trade Barrier The U.S. and Europe just can't agree on car safety standards. That puts car companies in a weird position, makes cars cost more and just seems kind of random and wasteful.	12.06.2018
		#879: The Secret Target Their plan was dangerous, risky, and extremely unpopular. But America copied them anyway. Today on the show: how a tiny country on the other side of the world changed how America runs its economy.	12.01.2018
		#468: Kid Rock Vs. The Scalpers We talk to Kid Rock about how he tried to cut scalpers out of the business — and still sell cheap tickets to his shows.	11.28.2018
		VIDEO: The Price Of Coke Stayed The Same For 70 Years — Why? For 70 years, a Coca-Cola cost a nickel. The price didn't change. How is that even possible? You can also watch the video here: https://youtu.be/Bcz0BJGEVUY	11.26.2018
		#878: Mugshots For Sale We go deep inside the market for online mugshots. Is it extortion? Or is it a First Amendment right?	11.23.2018
		#877: The Laws of The Office You get what you measure. Work expands to fill the time allotted. Who comes up with this stuff? And is it true?	11.21.2018
		VIDEO: Put A Chip On It A quick history of slow credit cards. This video also available here: https://youtu.be/2IksSNiEo2g	11.19.2018
		#699: Kansas City Vs. Kansas City A bunch of you asked why so many cities threw billions in tax breaks at Amazon. It reminded us of an episode we did in 2016.	11.17.2018
		#876: Patent Deception How World Patent Marketing stole nearly $26 million. And how the acting attorney general was involved.	11.15.2018
		VIDEO: A Grave Promise If you die in America, chances are the cemetery is going to promise to maintain your grave forever. Americans take this for granted, but it's a wacky, wild promise that we maybe should not be making. You can also watch this video here: https://youtu.be/xYDYDThuJe4	11.12.2018
		#875: Why Did The Cow Cross The Border? To take advantage of the surprising benefits provided by an interlocked economic system on the other side.	11.10.2018
		#874: Hot Dog Hail Mary The Falcons are trying something radical: Making their food cheaper. It could break stadium economics.	11.07.2018
		VIDEO: Inventing Price Tags For most of human history, you had to haggle over prices before you could buy something. Then came the idea of the price tag.	11.05.2018
		#873: The Seattle Experiment Seattle's radical solution to big money in politics: Flood elections with even more money.	11.02.2018
		#872: The Halloween Tapes Something spooky has been happening here at Planet Money.	10.31.2018
		Video: The Miracle Apple We're kicking off a quick season of our bonus video series, Planet Money Shorts. Watch how apples became brands, and started being more than delicious.	10.30.2018
		#871: Blacklisted In China China is trying a bold experiment to help people trust each other more: The social credit score. Will it work? Does it go too far?	10.26.2018
		#676: The First Lottery & How To Beat The Odds The first lottery was a royal affair with poems, golden flatware and invited criminals. Also, how someone won the lottery over and over.	10.23.2018
		#870: Trump vs. Red Tape President Trump promised to slash regulations. How has he done?	10.19.2018
		Episode 870: Trump vs. Red Tape President Trump promised to slash regulations. How has he done?	10.19.2018
		#453: What Causes What? We try to tell the difference between correlation and causation.	10.17.2018
		#869: The Student Loan Whistleblower Seth Frotman worked overseeing student loans for the government. He saw things that made him quit, and tell all.	10.12.2018
		#534: The History of Light (Nobel Edition) Bill Nordhaus just won the economics Nobel. In this show: He shows how history of light is the history of economic growth — of things getting faster, cheaper, and more efficient.	10.08.2018
		#868: Moneyland We follow writer Oliver Bullough as he explores how stolen money moves around the world, and what that might mean for democracies.	10.05.2018
		#680: Anatomy Of A Scam Ever seen one of those signs asking if you want to work from home? We find out what happens when you call.	10.03.2018
		#867: Special Report: Asylum Crackdown We tell the story of a massive crackdown on asylum fraud, and the fallout.	09.29.2018
		#866: Modern Monetary Theory We rethink everything we know about government spending, taxes, the nature of money... All of it.	09.27.2018

LAST EPISODE

Antitrust 1: Standard Oil

02.15.2019

At the turn of the 20th century, Ida Tarbell investigated John D. Rockefeller's Standard Oil. What she discovered changed the economy of the United States.