Planet Money
NPR
Wanna see a trick? Give us any topic and we can tie it back to the economy. At Planet Money, we explore the forces that shape our lives and bring you along for the ride. Don't just understand the economy – understand the world.Wanna go deeper? Subscribe to Planet Money+ and get sponsor-free episodes of Planet Money, The Indicator, and Planet Money Summer School. Plus access to bonus content. It's a new way to support the show you love. Learn more at plus.npr.org/planetmoney
Episodes
Mentioned books
96 snips
May 9, 2026 • 29min
Diary of a WNBA negotiator
Alysha Clark, veteran WNBA forward and negotiator who kept a detailed bargaining journal, recounts the high-stakes CBA talks. She describes studying the 300-page contract, the league’s early hardships, and the pivot to revenue-share demands. The narrative covers marathon in-person negotiations, strategic bluffs, a strike authorization, and the final 20% shared-revenue breakthrough.
62 snips
May 6, 2026 • 29min
How we got free agents in baseball
A star center fielder is traded against his will and takes baseball to court. The story dives into the reserve clause, monopsony, and the league’s strange antitrust exemption. It follows a career-risking legal fight, a public relations battle, and the chain of events that finally opened the door to free agency.
227 snips
May 2, 2026 • 47min
How to make a BOOK into a bestseller
Laura McGrath, a Temple University professor who studies bestseller history, dives into the strange race for the New York Times list. They explore old publishing hoaxes, Jacqueline Susann’s sales tactics, lawsuits over list secrecy, bulk-buying schemes, and the wild effort to turn a new release into a chart-climbing hit.
188 snips
Apr 29, 2026 • 26min
Spirit Airlines and the future of cheap flights
Ben Baldanza, former Spirit Airlines CEO and ultra-low-cost travel evangelist, dives into the radical idea behind bare-bones flying. They get into unbundled fares, why people keep booking flights they complain about, and how big airlines copied the budget model. Then the story turns to Spirit’s decline, bailout chatter, and what cheaper travel could look like next.
149 snips
Apr 24, 2026 • 34min
Battlefield rare earths: How the U.S. lost to China
Mark Smith, former Molycorp CEO, and Emily Fang, NPR correspondent on China and supply chains, trace the rise and collapse of America’s rare earth business. They dig into Mountain Pass, China’s low-cost takeover, rare earths as a geopolitical weapon, Japan’s 2010 wake-up call, Molycorp’s risky comeback, and why Washington is now racing to rebuild the industry.
214 snips
Apr 22, 2026 • 30min
Live: Anthropic co-founder on AI and jobs
Jack Clark, Anthropic co-founder and AI policy commentator, and Daryl Fairweather, Redfin chief economist and behavioral economist, dig into two huge forces shaping daily life. Clark explores AI factories, coding automation, safety, and education for an AI future. Fairweather gets into surge pricing, hidden economists in apps, zoning reform, and why more housing can ease scarcity.
190 snips
Apr 18, 2026 • 32min
Do prediction market bettors make anything better?
A look at the boom in prediction markets and why they suddenly feel bigger than niche internet bets. It follows the legal maneuvering that helped one company expand into politics, sports, and culture. There is also a trip inside trading chats, plus the uneasy question of whether these markets inform the public or distort the future they price.
256 snips
Apr 14, 2026 • 19min
How to get through the Strait of Hormuz
Hamid Hosseini, an Iranian oil export spokesperson, explains how ships reportedly sought permission and paid crypto tolls to pass the Strait of Hormuz. Christian St. Clair, a comics production manager, follows delayed book shipments caught in the chaos. It’s a tense story of chokepoints, shipping risk, stranded vessels, and the global trade shakeup hanging on one narrow waterway.
230 snips
Apr 10, 2026 • 41min
BOOKstore Economics
Fisher Nash, a bookseller and buyer at Carmichael’s in Louisville, pulls back the curtain on how stores choose what makes the shelves. They get into bestseller table battles, 30-second title judgments, publisher codes and sales pitches, and how shelf placement can make or bury a book. There’s also the strange afterlife of unsold books, from bargain bins to the shredder.
87 snips
Apr 8, 2026 • 26min
A pro-worker experiment in private equity
Cindy Cordes, a manufacturing lead in Minnesota, recounts the shock of a buyout and a surprise payday years later. Pete Stavros, a KKR executive testing worker ownership, explains his long-running private equity experiment. They get into layoffs fears, why early attempts flopped, how better communication changed the rollout, and whether giving workers a stake can reshape the usual private equity story.
