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Marketplace Business News Podcast
Kai Ryssdal
Latest Episode

04/21/2017: Facts still matter

Apr 21, 2017

Episodes 2521 - 2530 of 5795

  • One of the most unpredictable French elections is being closely fought, with National Front leader Marine Le Pen promising to protect the electorate from globalization.
    Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images

    This has been a relatively low-key week in Washington, politics-wise. Congress has been on recess and the president has been in and out of town. Left behind have been staffers at agencies and offices that do the work that helps the government work, among them the Congressional Budget Office and its director, Keith Hall. The CBO and it analysis work were thrown in the spotlight during the recent healthcare debate and non-vote. We’ll talk with Hall about all of it. Then we’ll look at the state of politics in France, where the upcoming presidential election finds voters turning against the EU. Plus: Google, which makes billions from ad sales, is said to be considering an ad-blocking feature for its Chrome web browser.

  • Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg delivers the keynote address at Facebook's F8 Developer Conference Tuesday at McEnery Convention Center in San Jose, California.
    Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

    F8, Facebook’s annual conference for software developers, wraps up today. There’s usually a lot of ooh-ing and aah-ing over whatever it is that Mark Zuckerberg introduces. Not so this year. We talked with tech corespondent Molly Wood about reaction and the company’s augmented reality ambitions. Then, we travel to Janesville, Wisconsin, hometown of Speaker Paul Ryan and the site of an all-to-familiar American story. Plus, a conversation with 23andMe’s CEO about genetics and data.

  • 04/18/2017: Who is ‘Two Buck Chuck’?
    Wikimedia Commons

    President Trump was in the heart of American manufacturing territory today: Kenosha, Wisconsin. He gave a big speech and signed two executive orders: One directing the federal government to make good on his campaign promise to “buy American, hire American” and other concerning H1-B visas. Candidate Trump was no fan of the program, which allows American companies to bring in skilled foreign workers, but President Trump might have his hands tied. Plus, we’ll follow the money in the police body camera business. Competition is heating up, and there’s big money to be made on the back end. Then: You probably know “Two Buck Chuck” as the super-thrifty wine at your local Trader Joes. But Charles Shaw was a real guy, and he made good wine and made good money Napa before he lost it all.

  • A man walks past a television screen showing file footage of a North Korean missile launch, at a railway station in Seoul on April 5, 2017. Nuclear-armed North Korea fired a ballistic missile into the Sea of Japan on April 5, just ahead of a highly-anticipated China-US summit at which Pyongyangs accelerating atomic weapons programme is set to top the agenda.
    Jung Yeon-Je / Getty Images

    Things are heating up on the Korean peninsula, you may have heard. North Korea will reportedly test missiles weekly, and South Korea has doubled down on a missile defense system China finds threatening. Vice President Mike Pence said all options are on the table to contain North Korea’s nuclear weapons program. What, short of war, can the U.S. do? We’ll look into it, Then, Google Adobe have font makes Asian scripts consistent, and that’s a big deal. Plus: Why a former Chanel CEO purged her closet

  • 04/14/2017: Trump’s on-the-job economic crash course
    Win McNamee/Getty Images

    The economic policy of the United States today is substantially different than it was at the start of the week. President Trump has flipped on a bunch of stuff, and that’s a big deal. Has his “thinking evolved,” as politicians so often say? Or did he, um, just not know what he was talking about during the campaign? We’ll talk about it in the Weekly Wrap. Then: Americans are moving for work a lot less than they used to, and it’s not clear why. Plus, “Fate of the Furious” will probably dominate the box office this weekend, but it’s also Easter, so we’re going to look into the economics of faith-based films.

  • President Donald Trump walks out during a swearing in ceremony of White House senior staff in the East Room of the White House on January 22, 2017 in Washington, DC. 
    Andrew Harrer-Pool/Getty Images

    Noticed something different about President Trump these past couple days? He’s reversing his positions on some key economic issues. We’ll look at what might be the cause and the implications for the broader economy. Plus, Republicans and Democrats are testing the limits of how far outside money can take them in the race to replace HHS Secretary Tom Price. Cash is pouring into the Atlanta suburbs. Then, we take a break from the news to do a small business story at one of Kai’s favorite types of businesses: A craft brewery.

  • President Donald Trump speaking during a meeting about the federal budget in the Roosevelt Room at the White House in Washington, D.C. back in February.
    SAUL LOEB/AFP/Getty Images

    On a day when President Trump reversed his stance on China’s currency, Fed Chair Janet Yellen, NATO, the debt and a federal hiring freeze, we’re looking to comments from White House budget director Mick Mulvaney to clear up this White House’s economic policy. Then: malls are struggling, but outlet malls are thriving. Why? Plus, with all those vacancies in Trump’s executive branch, who’s actually running the government?

  • Tax preparers are taking advantage of those who receive Earned Income Tax Credit, according to some researchers.
    Scott Olson/Getty Images

    Both President Trump and Speaker Paul Ryan have promised tax is next on their agendas, but the schedule is pretty flexible. We’ll talk about what that could look like, plus the latest from United and Toshiba, and Rex Tillerson’s rocky road from oil exec to top diplomat. Plus, we do the numbers on how family income changed as more women entered the workforce. 

  • 04/10/2017: We won’t make a "fly the friendly skies" joke
    Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

    … But we are going to talk about the PR nightmare hitting United today, after videos of a passenger being forcibly removed from an overbooked flight went viral, and get to the bottom of why airlines sell too many seats in the first place. Plus, we’ll look at the slew of foreign carmakers reinvesting in American factories just as Washington contemplates tax reform. Then: Five years ago, our own David Brancaccio drove across the country without talking to a single human being. It was for a series all about how robots are taking jobs. This year, he hit the road again to figure out which jobs are “robot-proof,” and they’re not the ones you think.

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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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