The Indicator from Planet Money - Why the publishing industry is hot (and bothered) for romance

Once relegated to supermarket aisles, romance books are now mainstream. And authors, an often-maligned group within publishing, have found greater commercial success than many writers in other genres. On today's episode of Love Week, our series on the business of romance, we find out how romance novelists rode the e-book wave and networked with each other to achieve their happily-for-now status in the industry.

Read more by Christine Larson, Priscilla Oliveras and Natalie CaƱa.

Thanks to Grant-Lee Phillips for our theme song and Kaitlin Brito for artwork.

Related listening:
It's Love Week! How the TV holiday rom-com got so successful (Apple / Spotify)
Rufaro Faith's 'Let the Games Begin' is a rom-com set in the Olympic village

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The Indicator from Planet Money - It’s Love Week! How the TV holiday rom-com got so successful

Welcome to Love Week on the Indicator, our weeklong series exploring the business and economic side of romance. On today's show, we fire up the gas logs and pour a mug of cocoa to discuss the made-for-TV rom-com machine, and how television executives learned to mass produce seasonal romance.

Special thanks to Grant-Lee Phillips for our Love Week theme song and Kaitlin Brito for episode artwork.

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More or Less: Behind the Stats - Nobel prize: Why are some countries so much richer than others?

The question of why some countries are rich and some poor has been described as the most important question in economics.

Perhaps that is why the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences awarded the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics to Daron Acemoglu, Simon Johnson and James Robinson for their work on the importance of institutions in the economic fortunes of nation states.

Tim Harford explains the economic theory that underpins their award.

Presenter: Charlotte McDonald Reporter: Tim Harford Producer: Bethan Ashmead Latham Series producer: Tom Colls Production co-ordinator: Katie Morrison Sound mix: Giles Aspen Editor: Richard Vadon

The Indicator from Planet Money - Reversing shrinkflation (via potato chips) and other indicators

It's ... Indicators of the Week! It's that time of week where we look at the most intriguing indicators from this last week of economic and business news.

On today's episode: NHPR's Nate Hegyi, host of the podcast Outside/In, joins us to talk natural disaster loans, election prediction markets and ... potato chips?

Related Episodes:
What's with all the tiny soda cans? And other grocery store mysteries, solved.
A market to bet on the future

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The Indicator from Planet Money - Rebranding ‘the world’s most dangerous private army’

When the leader of the Wagner group, Yevgeny Prigozhin died in an exploding plane widely attributed to Russian President Vladimir Putin, it wasn't clear what would happen. Today, why the Wagner Group has been called the world's most dangerous private army, its relationship with Russia and how its business model creates a blueprint for others to follow.

Related episodes:
Not your typical army: how the Wagner Group operates (Apple / Spotify)
How the 'shadow fleet' helps Russia skirt sanctions (Apple / Spotify)

For sponsor-free episodes of The Indicator from Planet Money, subscribe to Planet Money+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org.

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The Indicator from Planet Money - Can the yield curve still predict recessions?

Two years ago, the yield curve inverted. That means short-term interest rates on Treasury bonds were unusually higher than long-term interest rates. When that's happened in the past, a recession has come. In fact, the inverted yield curve has predicted every recession since 1969 ... until now. Today, are we saying goodbye to the inverted yield curve's flawless record?

Related episodes:
The inverted yield curve is screaming RECESSION (Apple / Spotify)
Yield curve jitters
Two Yield Curve Indicators

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