Inflation and the Profit-Price Spiral

This episode is packed with your best economic ideas from around the world and a penguin interview. It all comes together in this final session of Summer School 2026.Pack your parka, we’re headed to Antarctica. The continent nobody owns, but everyone benefits from and plenty of e ...  Show more

There’s a room where the fates of retail products are decided. Will they make it onto the shelves of the big box stores? Usually the rest of us can’t get inside the room where decisions are made – until now! Today on the show, we pitch the Planet Money game, Sell Me a Sasquatch, ...  Show more

The traditional explanation of inflation is simple: too much money chasing too few goods. But some experts are now wondering if companies’ aggressive pursuit of profit is driving up inflation as well. This episode was produced by Miles Bryan, edited by Matt Collette, fact-checked ...  Show more

Inflation happens for a lot of reasons that can be hard for even economists to fully grasp. But — as we learned this spring in an episode we’re rerunning today — there’s also a more straightforward reason prices keep going up: greedy corporations are using inflation as an excuse ...  Show more

The debate over inflation was center stage this week and although the current environment is a far cry from the 1970s, rising prices could mean complications for both companies and central banks.

It’s been a long time since anyone in America or Europe had to think seriously about inflation. But the highest U.S. numbers since 2009 have rattled financial markets and critics of President Joe Biden are warning that his big spending could trigger a full-blown 70s-style price s ...  Show more