Episode 859: You Asked For Even More

By Sally Helm,

Kenny Malone, Sarah Gonzalez, Stacey Vanek Smith, Bryant Urstadt

Published August 10, 2018 at 3:22 PM EDT

Every morning, we open our inboxes and find... your questions. Dozens of questions. Like, where does the money from a tariff go? What would happen to the economy if literally no one was unemployed? And why do RV dealerships have so many RV's?

Today on the show, we dig through all those questions and answer some our favorites. We do the math to figure out the cost of having life vests on airplanes, and try to determine whether they are worth it. We learn about a uncommon way of paying for an apartment in South Korea.

For you, dear listeners, we even touch a tariff.

Music: "Future Satisfaction," "Cowboy Casanovas," "Simple And Pure," "Butterfly Boots," "Still About U" and "French Quarter Boogaloo."

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Sally Helm

Sally Helm reports and produces for Planet Money. She has covered wildfire investigation in California, Islamic Finance in Michigan, the mystery of declining productivity growth, and holograms. Helm is a graduate of the Transom Story Workshop and of Yale University. Before coming to work at NPR, she helped start an after-school creative writing program in Sitka, Alaska. She is originally from Los Angeles, California.

See stories by Sally Helm

Kenny Malone

Kenny Malone is a correspondent for NPR's Planet Money podcast. Before that, he was a reporter for WNYC's Only Human podcast. Before that, he was a reporter for Miami's WLRN. And before that, he was a reporter for his friend T.C.'s homemade newspaper, Neighborhood News.

See stories by Kenny Malone

Sarah Gonzalez

Sarah Gonzalez is a host and reporter with Planet Money, NPR's award-winning podcast that finds creative, entertaining ways to make sense of the big, complicated forces that move our economy. She joined the team in April 2018.

Stacey Vanek Smith

Stacey Vanek Smith is the co-host of NPR's The Indicator from Planet Money. She's also a correspondent for Planet Money, where she covers business and economics. In this role, Smith has followed economic stories down the muddy back roads of Oklahoma to buy 100 barrels of oil; she's traveled to Pune, India, to track down the man who pitched the country's dramatic currency devaluation to the prime minister; and she's spoken with a North Korean woman who made a small fortune smuggling artificial sweetener in from China.

See stories by Stacey Vanek Smith

Bryant Urstadt

Bryant Urstadt is the editor of Planet Money, NPR's podcast about economics. Planet Money specializes in taking complicated subjects, finding the people at the center of them, and turning their stories into entertaining narratives. He is part of the team which won a Peabody for reporting on the fake bank accounts scandal at Wells Fargo.

See stories by Bryant Urstadt