Marketplace for Monday, Jan. 7, 2008

Segments From This Episode

• Lenders get tougher with businesses

  by Jill Barshay

  Many companies took out big loans before the economic downturn and are running into trouble on their payments. Now, as they're crawling back to their lenders asking for help, the lenders are playing tough. Jill Barshay reports.

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• A new wave of after-Christmas sales

  by Jeremy Hobson

  Rather than returning their unwanted Christmas gifts to stores, more Americans are heading to the Internet to sell them. Experts say today could be the biggest day of the year for online reselling. Jeremy Hobson reports.

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• Rush-hour pricing? Let’s just do it

  by Marketplace Staff

  New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg has proposed charging motorists a fee to drive in Manhattan's central business district at peak hours. Commentator Tyler Cowen says such "congestion pricing" on the roads could solve a lot of other problems, too.

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• What, exactly, is the middle class?

  by Kai Ryssdal

  In recent weeks, presidential candidates have shifted their emphasis toward traditional middle-class issues such as health care and the economy. Kai Ryssdal talks with Jim Kessler, founder of the think tank Third Way, about who makes up the middle class today.

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• Should colleges sell an athlete’s image?

  by Ethan Lindsey

  

  The National Collegiate Athletic Association has strict rules banning a school from profiting off a student-athlete's name or image. But those rules could change under a proposal currently being discussed by the organization. Ethan Lindsey reports.

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• Cars, electronics making sweet music

  by Bob Moon

  At the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, there's a special emphasis this year on cars and all the fun electronics being built for the road. But Marketplace's Bob Moon found out that plenty of electronic gadgets-on-wheels are already here.

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• Bush acknowledges economic ‘anxiety’

  by Nancy Marshall-Genzer

  President Bush said in a speech today Americans are becoming anxious over economic indicators that are "increasingly mixed." Nancy Marshall Genzer talks with Kai Ryssdal about the president's more sober tone and the proposed credit bailouts percolating on Capitol Hill.

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