The Indicator from Planet Money

    A little show about big ideas. From the people who make Planet Money, The Indicator helps you make sense of what's happening today. It's a quick hit of insight into work, business, the economy, and everything else. Listen weekday afternoons.Try Planet Money+! a new way to support the show you love, get a sponsor-free feed of the podcast, *and* get access to bonus content. You'll also get access to The Indicator and Planet Money Summer School, both without interruptions. sign up at plus.npr.org/planetmoney

  • What's a moneyline bet anyway?

  • Why Netflix spent billions for WWE

  • The water mystery unfolding in the western U.S.

  • President Jimmy Carter's economic legacy

  • Why to look twice when your portfolio is doing well

  • The curious rise of novelty popcorn buckets (Encore)

  • Invest like a Congress member (Encore)

  • Half a billion people need reading glasses. Why can't they get them? (Encore)

  • How video games become more accessible (Encore)

  • How TV holiday rom-coms got so successful (Encore)

  • What indicators will 2025 bring?

  • Help us pick the indicator of the year!

  • Can empty-nesters boost housing affordability?

  • Trump's contradictory trade policies

  • Do job references matter?

  • There are a lot of billionaires in Trump's coming administration

  • Why the US economy is still the envy of the world

  • A supermarket beef, a quantum leap, and Christmas trees for cheap

  • An economist's role in the fall of Syria's government

  • The brewing recovery in Western North Carolina

  • The Tuna Bonds Scandal and the fishy business of hidden debt

  • How influence actually works

  • Men without college degrees aren't doing well

  • What a second Trump term could mean for SpaceX

  • What a difference a one-day strike makes

  • Boeing's biggest blunder? Financial engineering.

  • How Trump's tariffs plan might work

  • What's in your wallet? Ask the new Treasury Secretary

  • Trump's plans for the housing market

  • How big is the US housing shortage?

  • The most expensive banana in the world and other indicators

  • Bond vigilantes. Who they are, what they want, and how you'll know they're coming

  • How Magic Johnson's Starbucks created new neighborhood businesses

  • How to shop during a crisis

  • A fraught climate change conference, how are US home builders doing, and more

  • The Economics of Everyday Things: Pizza (Box) Time!

  • 23andMe's financial troubles, Paul vs. Tyson and Bitcoin to the moon

  • Who's powering nuclear energy's comeback?

  • Why the government's flood insurance program is underwater

  • Why this former banking regulator is writing kids books

  • What's a weather forecast worth?

  • Stocks jump, the temperamental peso, and other election aftermath indicators

  • The story behind Cuba's economic dysfunction

  • America's economy is the envy of the world. Will it stay that way?

  • Why Midwest crop farmers are having a logistics problem

  • Why the US government is buying more apples than ever before

  • Cool, cool, cooling jobs

  • The U.S. once banned Chinese immigrants — and it paid an economic price

  • What's missing in the immigration debate

  • What happens when Social Security runs out of money?

  • What looks like a bond and acts like a bond but isn't a bond?

  • An economist answers your questions on love

  • Trying to fix the dating app backlash

  • How American heiresses became Dollar Princesses

  • Why the publishing industry is hot (and bothered) for romance

  • It's Love Week! How the TV holiday rom-com got so successful

  • Reversing shrinkflation (via potato chips) and other indicators

  • Rebranding 'the world's most dangerous private army'

  • Can the yield curve still predict recessions?

  • Why are some nations richer?

  • The cost of living, lead pipe removal, and a more expensive Mega Millions

  • The trouble with water discounts

  • Half a billion people need reading glasses. Why can't they get them?

  • The year the music festival died

  • Why the name Taft-Hartley got airplay during the dockworkers' brief strike

  • Does unemployment whiplash mean recession?

  • Champagne. Neapolitan pizza. Now döner kebabs?

  • Are we about to lose TikTok? Like actually tho?

  • Is an American sovereign wealth fund such a bad idea?

  • Mail bag! Grad jobs, simplified branding and central bank independence

  • America's small GDP bump, China's big stimulus dispersal, and a Monkey King

  • What does the next era of Social Security look like?

  • Are pharmacy benefit managers driving up drug prices? (Update)

  • How to pass on a global media empire

  • Could you live without GPS? It's OK, the economy can't, either

  • The Fed cut rates ... now what? (featuring: Sasquatch)

  • What are Harris' economic plans?

  • What are Trump's economic plans?

  • Behind the Tiny Desk and other listener questions

  • Bad economics, smart politics

  • The return of Fyre Festival and other indicators

  • The DOJ's case against Apple

  • Overtourism ho! The Barcelona cruise dilemma

  • I will PAY YOU to take my natural gas

  • How Medicare fraud became Miami's vice

  • Why aren't more people taking on the trades?

  • How Pitbull got his name on a college football stadium

  • How Japan is trying to solve the problem of shrinking villages

  • Want to get ahead in youth sports? Try staying back a year.

  • Let's party like it's NVIDIA earnings report day!

  • The Olympian to influencer pipeline

  • How mortgage interest rates work (and why they're currently out of whack)

  • How China became solar royalty

  • A food fight over free school lunch

  • How much would you do this job for? And other indicators

  • Biden's beef with bad customer service

  • What is the deal with car rentals?

  • So, how's this No Tax On Tips thing gonna go?

  • Is endless vacation a scam?

  • Mortgage applications, China's housing and ... Carrie Bradshaw?

  • Why big banks aren't interested in your savings account

  • Should presidents have more of a say in interest rates?

  • The Denver basic income experiment

  • Beach reads with a side of economics

  • Google's monopoly, gold medals and gasping markets

  • You can't spell Olympics without IP

  • Is the UK open for business?

  • The debate at the heart of new electricity transmission

  • Markets have a bad case of the Mondays

  • Getting more men into so-called pink-collar jobs

  • Why the Olympics cost so much

  • Are both rents AND interest rates too dang high?

  • Test your knowledge of NVIDIA, ChatGPT and...Peppa Pig?

  • How insurance is affecting the cost of childcare

  • Peacock, potassium and other Paris Olympics Indicators

  • Is AI overrated?

  • Is AI underrated?

  • The curious rise of novelty popcorn buckets

  • Three Kamala Harris Indicators

  • Bankruptcy, basketball, and bringing the dollar down

  • Goodbye, Chevron. Hello, lawsuits!

  • The conservative roots behind the Chevron doctrine

  • Why the EU can regulate big tech faster

  • China's luxury liquor indicator

  • Greece allows a 6-day work week and other indicators

  • An asylum seeker's long road to a work permit

  • How much do presidents ACTUALLY influence the economy?

  • What military brats tell us about social mobility

  • The young trolls of Wall Street are growing up

  • One of the hottest jobs in AI right now: 'types-question guy'

  • The game theory that led to nuclear standoffs

  • The economic implications of Europe's jolt right

  • How the end of Roe is reshaping the medical workforce

  • Indicators of the Week: Debate Edition

  • Do polluters pay, or do they get paid?

  • What's going to happen to the Trump tax cuts?

  • Tracking the underground bike theft economy

  • The tower of NVIDIA

  • Boeing's woes, Bilt jilts, and the Indicator's stock rally

  • A captive market: The high price of prison phone calls

  • Invest like a Congress member

  • Spud spat

  • Oil gluts, Russian bucks, and Starbucks

  • Is Google search getting worse?

  • Has the Fed lost the dot plot?

  • Is the 'border crisis' actually a 'labor market crisis?'

  • Is chicken getting cheap? And other questions

  • Ghost jobs

  • Why California's high speed rail was always going to blow out

  • Why the U.S. helps pay for Israel's military

  • Common economic myths, debunked

  • Unveiling our mascot's new name and merch!

  • The cutest indicator in the world

  • Indicator Quiz: May Edition

  • Using anecdotes to predict recessions

  • Can dental therapists fill the gap in oral care?

  • How Red Lobster got cooked and other indicators

  • Why tariffs are SO back

  • How Fortnite brought Google to its knees

  • AI Tupac and the murky legality of digital necromancy

  • Building generational wealth in rural America

  • Trade wars and talent shortages

  • How the Dominican Republic became Latin America's economic superstar

  • The highs and lows of US rents

  • The "Winner Take All" problem

  • Is 'government crypto' a good idea?

  • A new gold rush and other indicators

  • Iceberg ahead for Social Security

  • Why Venezuela is no longer in freefall

  • Hazard maps: The curse of knowledge

  • How Colorado towns are trying to get some water certainty

  • Not too hot, not too cold: a 'Goldilocks' jobs report

  • Protesters want schools to divest from Israel. How would that work?

  • What a cabinet maker can teach us about interest rates

  • Is the federal debt REALLY that bad?

  • Taxing the final frontier

  • Video Game Industry Week: The Final Level

  • Work. Crunch. Repeat: Why gaming demands so much of its employees

  • The boom and bust of esports

  • Designing for disability: how video games become more accessible

  • Forever games: the economics of the live service model

  • Ticketmaster's dominance, Caitlin Clark's paycheck, and other indicators

  • Inside the epic fight over new banking regulations

  • Profiting off greater risk: the reinsurance game

  • What is a 'freedom economy'?

  • Why is insurance so expensive right now? And more listener questions

  • What Subway's foot-long cookie says about inflation

  • The IRS wants to do your taxes for free. Will it last?

  • Why the EU is investigating China's wind turbines

  • What do the royals do all day, anyway?

  • Why companies spin off

  • Do I need a four-year degree?

  • How the 'shadow fleet' helps Russia skirt sanctions

  • Can an old law bring down grocery prices?

  • The Indicator Quiz: Labor Edition

  • Can breaking the law be good for business?

  • Three ways consumers are feeling the pinch

  • Should schools be paying their college athletes?

  • Help Wanted at Boeing

  • Name our mascot. No, really.

  • The interest-ing world of interest rates

  • How ski resorts are (economically) adjusting to climate change

  • When does youth employment become child labor?

  • Tick tock for TikTok?

  • Can Europe fund its defense ambitions?

  • Biden's economic pitch for a second term

  • How are moving companies faring with high mortgage rates?

  • Are data breaches putting patients at risk?

  • What's behind Bitcoin's bullrun?

  • Is the financial media making us miserable about the economy?

  • Why wind techs are so in demand

  • How to get Russia to pay Ukraine

  • What would it take to fix retirement?

  • How the SEC's new rule could reveal more about a company's emissions

  • The growing industry of green burials

  • Wendy's pricing mind trick and other indicators of the week

  • Why Israel uses diaspora bonds

  • What the data reveal about U.S. labor unrest

  • How to make an ad memorable

  • Reddit's public Wall Street bet

  • An oil boom, a property slump and dental deflation

  • A Supreme Court case that could reshape social media

  • Why Capital One wants Discover

  • Could fake horns end illegal rhino poaching?

  • Chocolate, Lyft's typo and India's election bonds

  • Why banks are fighting changes to an anti-redlining program

  • How Egypt's military is dragging down its economy

  • How's your defense industry knowledge?

  • What's really happening with the Evergrande liquidation

  • A Swiftie Super Bowl, a stumbling bank, and other indicators

  • Why Saudi Arabia is building a new city in the desert

  • Is Wall Street's hottest trend finally over?

  • Did pandemic business support work?

  • Could cash payments ease recessions?

  • How local government is propping up the U.S. labor market

  • Why the FTC is cracking down on location data brokers

  • How to transform a war economy for peacetime

  • Can Just-In-Time handle a new era of war?

  • Are we overpaying for military equipment?

  • Tumbling Chinese stocks and rapid Chipotle hiring

  • How niche brands got into your local supermarket

  • A manifesto for feeding 8 billion people

  • Are we counting jobs right? We answer your listener questions

  • The tensions behind the sale of U.S. Steel

  • Walmart scams, expensive recycling, and overdraft fees

  • Five tips for understanding political polls this election season

  • The surprising leader in EVs

  • How the world economy could react to escalation in the Middle East

  • Offloading EVs, vacating offices and reaping windfalls

  • The lawsuit that could shake up the rental market

  • Why oil in Guyana could be a curse

  • Ad targeting gets into your medical file

  • Five reasons why Americans and economists can't agree on the economy

  • Higher wages, fewer temp workers and indicators of the year results

  • WTF is a bitcoin ETF?

  • What a pot of gumbo can teach us about disinflation

  • Red Sea tensions spell trouble for global supply chains

  • Chasing the American Dream at Outback Steakhouse (Classic)

  • 'Let's Get It On' ... in court (Update)

  • A lesson in Barbie labor economics (Classic)

  • The echo of the bison (Classic)

  • Predicting next year's economic storylines

  • The 'Yellowstone' effect on Montana

  • How economics can help you stick to your New Year's resolution

  • Coyote vs. Warner Bros. Discovery

  • Would-be weed merchants hit a 'grass ceiling'

  • The Indicator of the Year

  • What women want (to invest in)

  • The 'physics' behind potential interest rate cuts

  • Are the products in your shopping cart real?

  • A countdown to climate action

  • AI creates, transforms and destroys... jobs

  • The wheel's many reinventions

  • What can we learn from the year's most popular econ terms?

  • Americans don't like higher prices but they LOVE buying new things

  • Who can and cannot get weight-loss drugs

  • Endless shrimp and other indicators

  • Could SCOTUS outlaw wealth taxes?

  • Putting the 80/20 rule to the test

  • Oil prices and the Israel-Hamas war

  • Texas' new power grid problem

  • A salary to be grateful for, and other Thanksgiving indicators

  • How "dark defaults" could cost you

  • The messy human drama behind OpenAI

  • Prices fall, unemployment rises and Boomers have all the houses

  • How do cheap cell phone plans make money? And other questions

  • The evidence on school vouchers that'll please nobody

  • Xi and him

  • When a staple becomes a luxury

  • Actors back. Pandas gone. WeBankrupt.

  • A radical plan to fix Argentina's inflation

  • Bond. World's oldest living bond.

  • A bad economy can be good for your health

  • The spectacle of Sam Bankman-Fried's trial

  • Why everyone in the labor market is being picky

  • How the South is trying to win the EV race

  • Trying to solve the mystery of big bond yields

  • Are real estate agent fees a racket?

  • A finance fright fest

  • Europe vs. US economies... and a dime heist

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