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Marketplace

Marketplace Business News Podcast
Kai Ryssdal
Latest Episode

03/05/2018: Making sense of Trump’s new tariffs

Mar 5, 2018

Episodes 2291 - 2300 of 5795

  • What do you say about a week where the president of the United States, without any indication that the decision had been thought through by policy experts, announces trade tariffs that leave basically every constituent part of the global economy going, “Wait, what?” Here, we call it Friday. We’ll talk about President Donald Trump’s steel and aluminum tariff announcement, his tweet about trade wars being “good and easy to win,” and what Canada, our biggest importer of those metals, thinks about all this. Plus: The Oscars are this weekend, and it’s one of the biggest moments yet for #MeToo. But let’s turn our attention to another industry, finance, where women arrived at the workplace in the ’80s and ’90s to find terrible harassment. 

  • Domestic steel producers are being undercut by cheap imports.
    Brian Bull

    In retrospect, we should have seen these steel and aluminum tariffs coming. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin mentioned “reciprocal free trade,” in our interview earlier this week, and President Donald Trump said something similar today. Tariffs are a complicated macro-economic topic anytime, especially when they’re a surprise. We’ll start the show by catching you up, then look at how our allies might or might not respond. Tariffs go both ways, you know. Plus: How many cup holders is too many?

  • There are a whole lot of threads to pull from the national conversation we’re having about gun violence. President Donald Trump did one of those televised meetings with congressional leaders at the White House today. Dick’s Sporting Goods said it’ll stop selling assault-style rifles in its stores. But in some cases, the political and economic threads get crossed. Delta Airlines and the state of Georgia is one of those cases. The lieutenant governor and other politicians there are offering the airline a tax break to cut ties with the NRA. That’s where we’re starting today. Plus: A possible future for post-coal coal towns and Pizza Hut’s new rule as the NFL’s official slice.

  • 02/27/2018: A conversation with Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin

    Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin faced a boisterous crowd while in conversation with Kai on stage at the Burkle Center for International Relations at UCLA last night. We’re bringing you that chat in two parts on today’s show, and we cover a lot of ground: Russian sanctions, trade deals, Dodd-Frank and more. Plus: Student real estate is hot right now: investment nearly tripled from 2014 to 2016 and it’s still going strong. We’ll take a closer look. Plus: Whether you call it “chain migration” or “family reunification,” the argument for reducing it goes like this: A single legal immigrant can quickly and easily bring in a nearly unlimited number of relatives, who then create a drain on the economy. But there’s very little that’s quick and easy about it.

  • US President Donald Trump walks to Marine One prior to departing from the South Lawn of the White House in Washington, DC, January 5, 2018, as he travels for a weekend with Republican lawmakers at Camp David in Maryland.
    SAUL LOEB/AFP/Getty Images

    Organized labor was on the docket at the Supreme Court of the United States today in a case called Janus v. AFSCME, the Association of Federal, State, County and Municipal Employees. It’s one of the biggest public employees union in the country, and at issue is whether public-sector unions can charge what are called “fair-share fees” to workers who aren’t dues-paying members of the union. We’ll start today’s show by getting you caught up, because this case has implications far beyond the workplace. Then: What happens if the Trump administration keeps pulling the country back from global engagements? We’ll look at the world economy, post-America. Plus, a little pizza party.

  • 02/23/2018: The NRA’s brand trouble
    NICHOLAS KAMM/AFP/Getty Images

    The National Rifle Association is losing business ties in the wake of the school shooting in Parkland, Florida, last week. SimpliSafe, Met Life, Enterprise and a handful of other companies have said they’re done with the group. It’s a powerful brand, and companies tend to want to align themselves with a such a big group of passionate potential customers. But in the wake of a tragedy, the calculation looks a little different. That’s where we’re starting today. Then: A new investigation from Politico says before raising the minimum wage, we’d do well to make sure current wage laws are being enforced. Plus, as always, we’ll talk about the week in business news on the Weekly Wrap.

  • Steven Mnuchin walks into Trump Tower on December 12, 2016 in New York City. He is President-elect Donald Trump's nominee for treasury secretary.
 
    Spencer Platt/Getty Images

    Here we are, 10 years after the American financial system imploded, and something amazing has happened. President Donald Trump came into office saying he would “do a big number” on the “disaster” that was Dodd-Frank, but now his administration is keeping key parts of the legislation, like the rule letting the government liquidate a failing financial firm in a crisis. And you know what? Banks seem OK with that. We’ll explain. Then: We spent some time last year talking about how the president can affect stock prices with a tweet, but he’s not the only one. Snap shares dropped 6 percent today after Kylie Jenner said she hardly uses Snapchat anymore. What’s that say about the company’s business model? Plus, the economics of TV’s reboot frenzy.

  • That’s the word(s) of the day according to the Federal Reserve, which released the minutes from its last meeting this afternoon. Along with that momentum, the Fed said the initial bump the economy’s gonna get from the tax cuts might be bigger than originally expected. The White House released its own economic report too, and we’ll start off the show by explaining it all. Then, the latest on Twitter and Facebook’s fight against bots. Plus: We’re back in Erie for our series The Big Promise.

  • It’s not often we take you deep into the underbelly of the American bond market, but today’s your lucky day. The federal government kicked off a big couple of days in the Treasury market this morning. It sold almost $180 billion worth of short-term bonds, and in all there will be just over a quarter trillion dollars in new government debt by the end of the week, four billion more than the government raised in the same offering last month. That’s where we’re starting today, with a glimpse into the economic future. Then: PayPal and Square banned gun sales from their services years ago. Would credit cards ever do the same? What about banks? Plus, another trip to Erie for our series The Big Promise.

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About the show

Hosted by Kai Ryssdal, our leading business news radio program and podcast is about providing context on the economic news of the day. Through stories, conversations and newsworthy developments, we help listeners understand the economic world around them. Marketplace makes sense of the economy for everyone, no econ degree or finance background required. Marketplace doesn’t just report on the numbers, we take it deeper, adding context to what’s happening in the stock market and how macroeconomic policy can affect you and your business. Monday through Friday, our team speaks with a wide range of industry professionals — from small business owners to Fortune 500 CEOs, Marketplace breaks down complex topics related to business and the economy without industry jargon and over-complicated explanations.

Kai Ryssdal has led the program since 2005 and has hosted the program from China, the Middle East and dozens of cities across the United States. As a leading public media voice, Kai has been a trusted broadcaster for two decades and received an Emmy for investigative journalism on a PBS FRONTLINE documentary about money in politics called “Big Sky, Big Money.” He has appeared often on CNN, CNBC and CBS news. His written work has been featured in The New York Times and The Atlantic.

Produced and distributed by American Public Media (APM) our popular business news podcasts are available worldwide on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and RSS Feeds and any place else where you get your podcasts.

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