Planet Money

How to make a BOOK into a bestseller

In the world of commercial publishing, there are few crowning achievements more coveted than a place on the New York Times Best Seller List. But how does a book actually …

May 02, 2026 · 46m

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Spirit Airlines and the future of cheap flights

It’s way more than fuel costs that pushed Spirit Airlines to the brink of liquidation and led President Trump to muse about “buying” them. Many low cost airlines are struggling …

Apr 29, 2026 · 25m

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Battlefield rare earths: How the U.S. lost to China

At one point in history, one U.S. company monopolized the rare earths industry. Then China took over the industry. Can the U.S. bring it back? Rare earths are critical to …

Apr 24, 2026 · 34m

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Live: Anthropic co-founder on AI and jobs

We talk with Anthropic co-founder Jack Clark and Chief Economist at Redfin Daryl Fairweather about two of the biggest issues of our time: AI and housing. We have been crisscrossing …

Apr 22, 2026 · 29m

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Do prediction market bettors make anything better?

Have you noticed a lot of young people getting into antenna-maxxing as alpha? Or, maybe searching for any bit of copium after they fat-fingered and got rinsed? Or maybe they …

Apr 18, 2026 · 32m

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How to get through the Strait of Hormuz

The United States has been at war with Iran since February 28th. And for a month and a half, Iran’s main leverage over the U.S. has been their control over …

Apr 14, 2026 · 18m

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BOOKstore Economics

How do bookstores choose the books they stock, and how does that affect what customers read? It may not seem like it, but every shelf in a bookstore is a …

Apr 10, 2026 · 40m

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A pro-worker experiment in private equity

Live event info and tickets here. If your company got bought by a private equity firm, how would you feel? Maybe a little nervous? You might find yourself wondering if …

Apr 08, 2026 · 25m

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Reese’s heir vs. chocolate skimpflation

Live event info and tickets here. When ingredient costs skyrocket, companies have three basic options: They can raise their prices (a sort of product-specific inflation), shrink the size of the …

Apr 04, 2026 · 33m

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Dark times for Cuba’s economic experiment

Live event info and tickets here. For more than 60 years, Cuba has survived on two seemingly contradictory economic strategies: leaning on friendly communist and socialist countries, and flirting with …

Apr 02, 2026 · 27m

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The skyscrapers that NIMBYs and zoning couldn't stop

LIVE SHOW TOUR INFO HERE. New stories, live tapings, special guests, book signings and more. What would you build on a piece of land when all the normal rules go …

Mar 28, 2026 · 22m

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Our BOOK vs. the global supply chain

When you come across a book at a yard sale or a bookstore, you might pay more attention to the words between the covers than the physical form of the …

Mar 26, 2026 · 46m

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Inside a BOOK auction

In the age of TikTok and Polymarket, it can be easy to overlook the humble book. But books are one of the most influential technologies ever invented. From “The Wealth …

Mar 21, 2026 · 43m

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The little pet fish that saved a town in the Amazon

The cardinal tetra is one of the most popular pet fish in the world. They look like little red and blue sequins. You've almost certainly seen them at the pet …

Mar 18, 2026 · 33m

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Chef vs. Robot

Robby the chef has lots of endearing qualities. He can make over 5000 dishes, he’s a consistent cook, and he’s never late for work. But he’s not a human. It …

Mar 13, 2026 · 25m

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The laws of the office revisited

Live event info and tickets here. If something is going wrong in your workplace, there's probably a law that explains why. Meetings always seem long, and never end early? There’s …

Mar 11, 2026 · 29m

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Planet Money vs. the NBA’s tanking problem

What do we want from sports? The very best athletes competing as hard as they know how, putting all their effort and training and natural ability to the test against …

Mar 06, 2026 · 30m

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The Business of Heated Rivalry

Heated Rivalry , the steamy hockey romance show, was made for about $2 million per episode. That is remarkably cheap for an hour-long drama. Today on the show, a conversation …

Mar 04, 2026 · 27m

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Don't hate the replicator, hate the game

The world of science has been stuck in an existential crisis over whether we actually know the things we thought we knew. Re-running an old study today doesn't always yield …

Feb 27, 2026 · 36m

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The ICE hiring boom

Live event info and tickets here . ICE is scaling up, with rapid new hiring. So we ask, has training new officers changed? At what cost? Also, the Trump administration …

Feb 25, 2026 · 18m

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The Supreme Court struck down a bunch of Trump's tariffs. Now what?

Live event info and tickets here. The Supreme Court has spoken. Those big, sweeping tariffs that President Trump imposed early last year? They’re illegal. On today’s show: Why were those …

Feb 21, 2026 · 25m

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How to get what Greenland has, with permission

Book tour and ticket info here. Greenland has said it is not for sale. Denmark has said it can’t even legally sell Greenland. And at a security conference in Munich …

Feb 18, 2026 · 27m

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Betty Boop, Excel Olympics, Penny-isms: Our 2026 Valentines

Book tour event details and ticket info here . An iconic cartoon character liberated from copyright, journalism from the world of competitive spreadsheeting, a controversial piece of US currency. Each …

Feb 13, 2026 · 31m

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The Invention Invention

Book tour tickets and details here . Today, the story of three inventions. The first, the sewing machine, was created by a selfish and ambitious inventor who wanted all the …

Feb 11, 2026 · 30m

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Iran, protests, and sanctions

Book tour tickets and details here . The recent protests in Iran are about so many things. Human rights, corruption, freedom. But this time – they are also motivated by …

Feb 07, 2026 · 33m

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Riding with the repo man (update)

Planet Money book tour ticket info and dates here . A record number of Americans with poor or just okay credit are behind on their car payments. And once last …

Feb 04, 2026 · 29m

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Can Trump make buying a home more affordable?

Book tour dates and ticket info here . Housing is too expensive. Everyone knows this. Democrats know that talking about it plays well with voters. And now – in a …

Jan 31, 2026 · 27m

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Can transforming neighborhoods help kids escape poverty?

In the 1990s, Congress created HOPE VI, a program that demolished old public housing projects and replaced them with more up-to-date ones. But the program went further than just improving …

Jan 28, 2026 · 27m

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A trip to the magic mushroom megachurch

Book tour dates and ticket info here . Just as every market has its first movers, every religion has its martyrs — the people willing to risk everything for what …

Jan 24, 2026 · 31m

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BOARD GAMES 3: What’s in a name?

Planet Money has teamed up with the company Exploding Kittens to make a board game inspired by the legendary economics paper The Market for Lemons. We’ve decided we want a …

Jan 22, 2026 · 36m

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Chevron, Venezuela and the Paradox of Plenty

Venezuela and Chevron have perhaps one of the strangest partnerships … ever? Chevron, one of the world’s most famous and profitable oil corporations, has for decades, been plugging away in …

Jan 17, 2026 · 33m

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