It must be something about getting older, but I have become less and less entertained by music on my iPod lately and more and more entertained by podcasts. It started with a few sports ones, then moved on to shows like NPR’s This American Life, and then moved to politically motivated shows like HBO’s Real Time With Bill Maher, then on to my newest favorite, which I’ll mention later. TAL is a cool hipster kinda show where they pick a theme every week and tell stories about that theme, usually in the form of the “everyman”. It’s a pretty interesting and entertaining show most of the time, but not something that one could say that they gained much intellectually from.
A few months ago, I was walking the dog, and fired up the topic of the week, “Giant Pool of Money“, a special hour long podcast explaining exactly what had happened to cause the crippling housing market bubble burst and who was responsible for it. I was mesmerized by the entire story, which was told in a narrative style, but with the added bonus of bringing in the perspectives of those people who were hit hardest by the phenomenon. It was completely fascinating to hear exactly why and what happened, from a global perspective, and it really opened my mind up to wonder about our global economy. I am by no means an economist or even know much about complicated financial matters, so it took me by complete surprise that I enjoyed this podcast. Anyway, if you are at all interested why we are at where we are at, I suggest you spend the 99 cents and purchase it from iTunes. I also would suggest subscribing to the podcast. If you subscribe, you get the current week’s podcast for free every week. Free is good!
But back to the point I was trying to make – this episode of TAL was so popular it quickly became the most downloaded podcast of the history of the show, and it actually ended up spinning off another radio show/podcast called Planet Money. I can safely say that I am stupidly addicted to listening to these guys tell me stories and educate me on World Economics. From learning about the banking crisis to China funding our economy to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, this is just a great piece of work by the folks at NPR. I never thought I would look forward to a weekly economics lesson, but I certainly do now.
If you are interested, stop by the show’s podcast home page, or search for it in iTunes. You won’t be disappointed. Scared, maybe, when you find out what a financial mess we are still headed towards, but not disappointed.
