4.5 million households in the U.S. have solar panels on their homes. Most of those customers are happy with it – their electricity bills haveRead More »Rooftop solar's dark side

Planet Money Summer School is back for eight weeks. Join as we travel back in time to find the origins of our economic way ofRead More »Summer School 1: An Economic History of the World

We often hear that air travel is worse than it’s ever been. Gone are the days when airplanes touted piano bars and meat carving stationsRead More »How flying got so bad (or did it?)

At the core of most of the electronics we use today are some very tiny, very powerful chips. Semiconductor chips. And they are mighty: theyRead More »The two companies driving the modern economy

We wade into the heated debate over immigrants’ impact on the labor market. When the number of workers in a city increases, does that takeRead More »Do immigrants really take jobs and lower wages?

When the vape brand Juul first hit the market back in 2015, e-cigarettes were in a kind of regulatory limbo. At the time, the rulesRead More »The Vapes of Wrath

We’ve lived amongst Elon Musk headlines for so long now that it’s easy to forget just how much he sounds like a sci-fi character. HeRead More »Why is everyone talking about Musk's money?

There’s a behind the scenes industry that helps big brands decide questions like: How big should a bag of chips be? What’s the right sizeRead More »What's with all the tiny soda cans? And other grocery store mysteries, solved.

Graphite is sort of the one-hit wonder of minerals. And that hit? Pencils. Everyone loves to talk about pencils when it comes to graphite. IfRead More »Bringing a tariff to a graphite fight

Most economic textbooks will tell you that there can be real dangers in running up a big national debt. A major concern is how theRead More »How much national debt is too much?

For thousands of years, getting light was a huge hassle. You had to make candles from scratch. This is not as romantic as it sounds.Read More »The history of light (classic)

There is a constant arms race between law enforcement and criminals, especially when it comes to technology. For years, law enforcement has been frustrated withRead More »How the FBI's fake cell phone company put criminals into real jail cells