Is A Stradivarius Just A Violin?
The Stradivarius violin gets its name from master craftsman Antonio Stradivari. When he died in 1737, his secrets died with him: No one has ever been able to duplicate the sound of the violins or...
View ArticleOn The Internet, A Penny Is Nothing To Sneeze At
Copyright 2018 NPR. To see more, visit RENEE MONTAGNE, HOST: Our Planet Money team this week is taking a look at the lowly penny. People discard pennies in bowls by cash registers. They walk by them on...
View ArticleVolatility Index Indicates Wall Street Is Bored
Copyright 2018 NPR. To see more, visit DAVID GREENE, HOST: It's official, Wall Street is bored. Wall Street being Wall Street, there is, of course, a number that measures such things. It's called the...
View ArticleEveryone Goes To The Store To Get Milk. So Why's It Way In The Back?
Copyright 2018 NPR. To see more, visit RENEE MONTAGNE, HOST: Milk is one of the most popular items in a supermarket. And yet, it is often found at the very back of the store. One theory is that stores...
View ArticleTypewriters, Underwater Hotels And Picturephones: The Future, As Seen From 1964
The 1964 World's Fair showcased jet packs and new miracles of science. There was an entire house made of Formica. You could wipe it clean with a sponge! The people who put the fair together tried to...
View ArticleHow College Students Battled Textbook Publishers To A Draw, In 3 Graphs
College textbooks are expensive. You probably already know this. A new biology or economics book can cost $300. And prices have been soaring, doubling over the past decade, growing faster than the...
View ArticleThe Spicy History Of Short Selling Stocks
Copyright 2018 NPR. To see more, visit ROBERT SIEGEL, HOST: Our Planet Money team is exploring the world of short selling. Shorting a stock is the opposite of buying a stock. Instead of profiting when...
View ArticleBakers And The Birth Of The Minimum Wage
Copyright 2018 NPR. To see more, visit AUDIE CORNISH, HOST: On January 1, 20 states raise their minimum wage and several states have additional increases planned in the coming months. Yesterday, we...
View ArticleGreek Finance Minister Gets A Chance To Fix Beleaguered Economy
Copyright 2018 NPR. To see more, visit LINDA WERTHEIMER, HOST: There is a high-stakes international battle going on right now. On one side is Greece, on the other side, basically the rest of Europe....
View ArticleCEO Describes What It's Like When Investors Bet Against You
The online furniture company Wayfair is now one of the most shorted stocks. Our Planet Money team talks to its CEO about what it's like to be running a company when some investors are betting on your...
View Article'We Built A Robot That Types': The Man Behind Computerized Stock Trading
Copyright 2018 NPR. To see more, visit ROBERT SIEGEL, HOST: The U.S. government wants to extradite a stock trader from the U.K. The U.S. says his activities helped trigger the flash crash of 2010....
View ArticleCasinos Switch Out Slot Machines For Games Of Skill
Copyright 2018 NPR. To see more, visit MELISSA BLOCK, HOST: As if they didn't have enough already, casinos are looking for new ways to make money. Rather than focusing on games of chance like roulette...
View ArticleCasinos Trading Slot Machines For Games Requiring Skill
Copyright 2018 NPR. To see more, visit ARUN RATH, HOST: As if they didn't have enough, casinos are always looking for new ways to make money. Now, rather than focusing on traditional games of chance...
View ArticleDoctors Plan Database On Cancer Drugs, Showing Effectiveness And Cost
Copyright 2018 NPR. To see more, visit STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: Now we have the story of information you get from your doctor as well as information you do not. DAVID GREENE, HOST: A good doctor is a...
View ArticleKeynes Predicted We Would Be Working 15-Hour Weeks. Why Was He So Wrong?
Copyright 2018 NPR. To see more, visit MELISSA BLOCK, HOST: The economist John Maynard Keynes once wrote an essay titled "Economic Possibilities For Our Grandchildren." It was 1930. And in the essay,...
View ArticleMassive Pacific Trade Agreement Ignores One Huge Tariff: Currency Manipulation
Copyright 2018 NPR. To see more, visit AUDIE CORNISH, HOST: Members of Congress - or at least some of their staff are busy reading the 6,000 pages of one of the largest international trade deals ever -...
View ArticleBoom Town Presses Pause Amid Dramatic Drop In Oil Prices
Copyright 2018 NPR. To see more, visit KELLY MCEVERS, HOST: In the past year and a half, the price of oil has fallen dramatically, from over a hundred dollars a barrel to less than $40 a barrel. That...
View ArticleHow Managing Money Creates Huge Profits For The Federal Reserve
Copyright 2018 NPR. To see more, visit AUDIE CORNISH, HOST: Most parts of the government cost money to run, lots of money. But there's one government institution which consistently makes a very large...
View ArticleLibrary for Kids Goes Online
The Internet Archive and the University of Maryland launch such a library, and it's free to anyone with an Internet connection. Kids helped design the library, and they had final say on the books....
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