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Hanna Sanborn was a single mom with newborn twins, struggling to find affordable childcare. Her best friend, Bryer Rossi, was burned out at work and looking for a way out. One day, Hanna floated an idea to him: “What if you quit your job and took care of my babies?”
What started as a running joke between friends turned into a lifeline that changed their lives and the way they saw each other.
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The stock market has been a bit of a roller coaster over the past month. For stock investors who don't need their money now, perhaps it’s no big deal. But if you're eyeing retirement in the near term, what questions should you be asking yourself? We'll discuss with Pam Krueger, host of the PBS personal finance show, “MoneyTrack.” Plus: why Starbucks is letting an algorithm decide the order in which drinks get made.
But times are not normal. New data shows pending home sales are down year over year in most of the country, with the exception of the Midwest. Lack of affordability is a huge issue, but so is uncertainty about the future. Also: stock futures are pointing up this morning after rosy results from tech companies, and why President Donald Trump's tariff policy is the "greatest act of geopolitical self-harm" one political scientist has ever seen.
From the BBC World Service: After months of fraught negotiations, the U.S. has signed a deal with Kyiv to share profits from the future sale of Ukraine's mineral and energy reserves. Plus, Facebook's parent company says its users could face a "materially worse" experience after a major regulatory blow from the European Commission. We'll also visit a huge wholesale market to see how businesses in China are faring amid the trade war.
When President Jimmy Carter died late last year, the foundation that runs Wikipedia noticed something unusual: the flood of interest in the late president created a content bottleneck, slowing load times for about an hour.
Wikipedia is built to handle spikes in traffic like this, according to the Wikimedia Foundation, but it's also dealing with a surge of bots scraping the site to train AI models, and clogging up its servers in the process, the organization’s chief product and technology officer Selena Deckelmann told Marketplace’s Meghan McCarty Carino.
The latest GDP calculations and PCE index tell us the U.S. economy is doing … OK. Importantly, the data doesn’t point to stagflation. But the data was collected from January through March 2025, and at this point, March is old news. Also in this episode: American companies ramp up their spending on computers, Nike’s struggle to move sneaker manufacturing out of Asia is a cautionary tale and Texas becomes the biggest state to send public dollars to private schools through school choice vouchers.
The Commerce Department reported the U.S. economy contracted by 0.3% in the first quarter of this year. We’ll break down the GDP math formula and dig into what the latest report says about where the US economy may be headed. And, should businesses be transparent about the impact of tariffs on prices? A nixed plan from Amazon serves as a cautionary tale of the political risks. Plus, feeling stressed these days? Cow cuddling and bee therapy might help.
Here’s everything we talked about today:
-"Trump blames Biden after GDP shrinks in first quarter, says growth will 'take a while'" from CNBC
-"Businesses weigh how much to tell customers about tariffs' impact on price" from Marketplace
-"Trump-Bezos call sets stage for tense earnings report from Amazon" from CNBC
-"Trump vs. Amazon’s Brilliant Tariff Idea" from The Wall Street Journal
-"The Americans Fled Vietnam 50 Years Ago. I Visited the Buildings They Left Behind." from The New York Times
"Anxious about the world? Cow cuddling or bee buzzing might help ease your stress" from The Denver Post
Got a question for the hosts? Email makemesmart@marketplace.org or leave us a voicemail at 508-U-B-SMART.
Gross domestic product shrunk 0.3% from January to March — the first growthless quarter since the pandemic recovery in early 2022. The cause? All the buying up that businesses and consumers did to beat tariff-induced price increases. We'll parse the data. Plus, Stellantis suspends 2025 guidance, Amazon backs away from transparency about the cost of tariffs, and the United Kingdom clamps down on a tax loophole for the rich.
Amazon backtracked yesterday after reporting revealed the company was planning to display how much tariffs were raising prices on individual items and the White House angrily pushed back. Other companies, including Temu and Volkswagen, are being upfront with customers about tariffs’ impact on product prices. We'll hear more. Also on the show: factory activity falls in China, and a view of the economy before Donald Trump took office and 100 days into his second term.
From the BBC World Service: New data shows China's manufacturing activity took a sharp dip in April — a sign that the ongoing trade war with the U.S. is starting to bite. Then, President Donald Trump signed an executive order to slash import duties on car parts in a short-term move to help U/S/ automakers. Plus, the U.K. is scrapping a centuries-old tax perk that lets wealthy foreigners shield their global assets.