Evolving Money: The Regulation Revolution (Sponsored Content)

Just as it took the British government a century to catch up to Jonathan Swift’s innovative person-to-person loan program, the U.S. government has been slow to react to crypto, creating bureaucratic and legal hurdles to growth in the industry. But with a new administration and a new Congress, the i…

Listen Now: Beak Capitalism from Odd Lots

In this limited series, Odd Lots explains some of the thorniest issues facing the US economy through the medium of … chicken. Chicken occupies a unique position in the US diet, but issues facing the poultry industry illustrate wider points about the development of the US economy and the decisions b…

Spain: A Time-Tested Model for Economic Security

For the last seven weeks, we’ve gone around the world to see how the pandemic led to more or less economic equality. There were some pleasant surprises and some devastating stories. In the season finale, we ask: what about the next crisis? How do we ensure more stability and security when something…

Singapore: Who Gets to Be Crazy Rich?

Singapore's carefully controlled housing market has been a key factor in its economic success over the last 60 years. But when the pandemic ushered in the city's worst-ever recession, property prices continued to rise, leading a younger generation to worry if it can match the social mobility enjoye…

Mexico: Choosing the Economy Over Life

Mexico’s handling of the pandemic has been largely driven by its president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, and his desire to keep the economy open. That’s meant few restrictions and a “return to normal” even before vaccines. The approach hasn’t come without costs, particularly to the country’s health…

Hawaii: When a Billionaire Buys Your Hometown

One of the defining trends of the pandemic has been the creation of extreme wealth at the very top. This week on The Pay Check we take a look at the booming fortunes of the world’s growing billionaire class through one man: Larry Ellison. (Net worth, give or take $90 billion.) Ellison co-founded th…

India: Why Did Working Women Disappear?

Even before the pandemic, the proportion of women in India's workforce was falling. Covid made it so much worse. This episode of The Pay Check looks at where India's working women went during the pandemic, why they haven't come back to the workforce, and why that's a blow to the country's broader e…

Kenya: The Lost Girls

An increase in teen pregnancies in Kenya is part of a shadow pandemic that ripped through developing nations during Covid, setting women’s progress back generations. In this episode of The Pay Check, journalist Jill Filipovic visits a dance school in Nairobi, Kenya that’s fighting to help girls man…

U.S.: Where Cash Made All the Difference

When the Covid-19 pandemic started, many people expected inequality to get worse in the U.S. But at least for the bottom 50% of Americans, something surprising happened: Many of the least advantaged boosted their wealth. To start to understand why, we look to cash payments. No-strings-attached mone…

Brazil: The Cautionary Tale

This season on the Pay Check, we're going to seven different countries to see how a global pandemic shifted the balance between the richest and the poorest people -- and affected everyone in between. In this first episode, Host Rebecca Greenfield and reporter Ben Steverman discuss how the effects o…