Why Is It So Expensive to Build Stuff in America?
We're in the midst of a great affordability crisis. It's not just the inflation crisis. It's a greater cost crisis of the last few decades. Everything that matters most in life—health care, housing, e...
12 Sep 202353min
Fatherhood and What Americans Get Wrong About Major Life Changes
Derek is back, and ... he's a new dad! After several weeks of parental leave, he talks about what's surprised him about new fatherhood. Brad Stulberg, the health and science writer, returns to the sho...
6 Sep 202347min
Experts Predicted a Recession This Year. How Were They So Wrong?
Today’s show is about what I consider the biggest mystery of the U.S. economy. Last year, economic experts predicted a recession in 2023 with more confidence than they’ve predicted any recession in de...
8 Aug 202336min
Why Elite College Admissions Are Biased Toward the Superrich
Less than 1 percent of college students attend Ivy League colleges and equally selective schools, like Stanford and Duke. But these schools have an outsize influence on American life. Practically ever...
1 Aug 202350min
Oppenheimer: The Genius, the Film, and the Project That Changed the World
Richard Rhodes, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of 'The Making of the Atomic Bomb,' discusses the life of J. Robert Oppenheimer, the Manhattan Project, the history of nuclear weapons, and the new fi...
25 Jul 202356min
How Hollywood Drove Its Business Model Off a Cliff
The trouble brewing in the media and entertainment industry has become one of the most interesting—and truly perplexing—business stories in the world. How does everything seem so bad at the same time?...
19 Jul 20231h 1min
Americans Think the Economy Is Terrible. The Data Tell Another Story.
By many measures, this is one of the best times to find a job in decades. And by many measures, Americans are locked in a state of extreme glumness about the country. Jordan Weissmann, Washington edit...
11 Jul 202357min
How the Digital Workplace Broke Our Brains
Calvin Newport is a computer science professor at Georgetown University and the author of, among other books, 'Deep Work' and 'A World Without Email.' At the heart of so much of Newport’s work is this...
5 Jul 20231h 3min
