Jacob Goldstein
Jacob Goldstein is an NPR correspondent and co-host of the Planet Money podcast. He is the author of the book Money: The True Story of a Made-Up Thing.
Goldstein's interest in technology and the changing nature of work has led him to stories on UPS, the Luddites and the history of light. His aversion to paying retail has led him to stories on Costco, Spirit Airlines and index funds.
He also contributed to the Planet Money T-shirt and oil projects, and to an episode of This American Life that asked: What is money? Ira Glass called it "the most stoner question" ever posed on the show.
Before coming to NPR, Goldstein was a staff writer at the Wall Street Journal, the Miami Herald, and the Bozeman Daily Chronicle. He has also written for the New York Times Magazine. He has a bachelor's degree in English from Stanford and a master's in journalism from Columbia.
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Megan McArdle spent years in a doomed relationship. The reason, she says: She fell victim to a common economic fallacy. Our Planet Money team has a love story with an economic idea at its heart.
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Hernando de Soto wanted to figure out why his country, Peru, was stuck in poverty. His answer transformed poor countries around the world.
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Not all debt collectors work at banks or big, corporate agencies. Many work at small, storefront shops. At least one worked in a former karate studio.
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What the fine print in my policy says about how insurance works.
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A new SuperPAC aims to reduce the influence of big money in politics — and it's starting by raising millions of dollars, in part from wealthy donors.
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A typical UPS truck now has hundreds of sensors on it. That's changing the way UPS drivers work — and it foreshadows changes coming for workers throughout the economy.
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Over the past 50 years, both the way the federal government spends money and what the government spends money on has changed a lot.
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See average hourly wages and how many jobs have been lost (or gained) in health care, manufacturing and other big industries.
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Earlier this year, the percentage of Americans who are working or looking for work fell to its lowest level since 1979.
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The share of $100s held outside the U.S. has been rising for decades. That's good news for the U.S. economy.