475. Why Does the Richest Country in the Worl...

Existing drugs can sometimes be repurposed to treat rare diseases. But making that match can be hard — and the financial incentives are weak. Guest host Steve Levitt tries to solve the puzzle. SOURCES: Chris Snyder, professor of economics at Dartmouth College. David Fajgenbaum, c ...  Show more

When Richard Thaler first published Nudge, the world was just starting to believe in his brand of behavioral economics. In this 2021 episode, we ask: How has nudge theory held up in the face of a global financial meltdown, a pandemic, and other existential crises? SOURCES:Richard ...  Show more

“Wealth is the paramount indicator of economic prosperity and well-being,” says the economist Darrick Hamilton. He’s right. Policy analysis tends to focus on income, but it is wealth that often determines whether we can send our kids to college, pay for an illness, quit a job, ...

The high poverty rate among children was long seen as an enduring fact of American life. But a recent analysis has shown that the number of young people growing up poor has fallen dramatically in the past few decades.

The reasons for the improvement are complicated, but ...

Consumer sentiment reports reflect a universal truth: Lower income households feel the punch of inflation worse than wealthy households. But affordable housing — and lack thereof — is one issue that brings Americans together, across the wealth divide. Plus, Christopher Bass tells ...  Show more

Guest-hosted by Julia Carpenter: The United States is one of the wealthiest countries in the world. But when it comes to support for parents and families, we lag behind many of our peers. We have relatively high infant- and maternal-mortality rates and no national parental-leave ...  Show more