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The rise of private firefighting
Jan 13, 2025
Episode 1309

The rise of private firefighting

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About 45% of firefighters in the U.S. are privately employed.

As wildfires continue to burn in Los Angeles, some wealthy residents are shelling out thousands each day to hire private firefighters to protect their homes and businesses. But some argue that the market for these private crews diminishes public firefighting resources. We’ll get into it. And, renowned science fiction author Octavia Butler predicted many of our modern problems, including catastrophic wildfires. We’ll explain how looking to the past helped her write about the future. Plus, Kimberly gives us some advice for throwing better parties in 2025.

Here’s everything we talked about today:

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The team

Marissa Cabrera Senior Producer
Courtney Bergsieker Associate Producer