Are we in an AI bubble? That’s the $35 trillion dollar question right now as the stock market soars higher and higher. The problem is that bubbles are famously hard to spot. But some economists say...
The Afro is one of the most iconic hairstyles of the last century. And one of its main ingredients was a hair product – Afro Sheen. But Afro Sheen did so much more than make Black afros shine. It w...
We’ve been checking in on the economic conditions in Venezuela for about a decade now. In response to the U.S. strike and the capture of Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro this weekend, we’re re-s...
2025 is finally over. It was a wild year for the U.S. economy. Tariffs transformed global trading, consumer sentiment hit near-historic lows, and stocks hit dramatic new heights! So … which of thes...
With the year coming to a close, we're sharing our most popular Planet Money bonus episode of 2025! As U.S. trade with China exploded in the early 2000's, American manufacturing began to shriv...
Most stories keep going even after we set down our microphones and the music fades up. That's why, at the end of each year, we look back and we take stock. We call this tradition "The Rest of ...
On the eve of Netflix shoveling a fourish-hour chunk of Stranger Things onto Christmas Day, we visit the past, present, and future of binge-dropped television shows. The strategy of releasing ...
As a country, we are spending more to get data centers up and running than we spent to build the entire interstate highway system. (Yes, that’s inflation-adjusted.) With tech companies spending hun...
Welcome to the inaugural Planet Money Pop Culture Draft! In today's episode (a Planet Money+ episode we’re releasing into the main feed) we're gonna go back to the year 1999. Three hosts, Kenny Mal...
In 2008, Chicago’s budget was in a bad place. The city needed money. One way to raise money was to increase property taxes, but what politician wants to do that? So instead, Mayor Richard M. Daley’...
From nuclear fission to GPS to the internet, it’s common knowledge that many of the most resource intensive technologies of the last century got their start as military R&D projects in governme...
A few years ago, the Jamaican government started making an unusual financial bet. It went to investors around the world asking if they'd like to wager on the chances a major hurricane would hit the...
Vote for us in NPR’s People’s Choice Awards: npr.org/peopleschoice AI is already reshaping how people find work. Fewer entry-level jobs, robot recruiters, and ever-changing new skill requireme...
Taylor Swift reaches new heights with her latest album, which is both divisive and record-breaking. And it’s fueled by an elaborate series of business choices that propel profits but also chart num...
Givewell is a nonprofit organization that gives money to “save or improve the most lives per dollar.” Part of their whole thing is a rigorous research process with copious and specific datapoints. ...
Wherever consumer sentiment goes, consumer spending usually goes too. They’re like buddies that do everything together. Consumer sentiment wants a hair cut, its buddy consumer spending does too.But...
Tariffs. They’ve been announced, unannounced, re-announced, raised and lowered. It’s an on-going saga with billions at stake!On today’s episode, we run full-on at the twisty, turny drama of life wi...
Last month, during the longest government shutdown in U.S. history, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent announced that the United States had offered to functionally loan Argentina $20 billion. Despite...
(Note: A version of this episode originally ran in 2022.)Every time you shop online and make it to the checkout screen, you see those colorful pastel buttons at the bottom. Affirm. Klarna. Afterpay...
When people in Maine prisons started getting laptops to use in their cells for online classes and homework, it sparked this new idea. Could they have laptops in their cells to work remotely for rea...
