What’s Your Problem?
We’re sharing another podcast we think you’ll enjoy, The Big Short Companion from Against the Rules, hosted by fellow Pushkin podcast host Michael Lewis. The Big Short is now 15 years old and to mark the occasion, Lewis narrated a new audiobook version of The Big Short and is looking back on how the 2008 financial crisis still affects the world today. To make sense of Wall Street’s hangover from the crash described in The Big Short, Lewis calls up Matt Levine, author of the Money Stuff newsletter for Bloomberg Opinion. He’s also a former investment banker who was working at Goldman Sachs during the market crisis of 2008. He and Lewis talk about Bitcoin, bank regulation, and new forms of risk-taking—all ways Wall Street has changed since the crisis.
Find The Big Short Companion from Against the Rules (00:45) on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your Podcasts.
Find The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine (00:10) on Apple Books or wherever you get your audiobooks.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Lifetime Terms, Lifetime Bans, and the Return of Roaring Kitty from Risky Business
This week on Risky Business, Nate and Maria discuss whether Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor should retire, the perils of sports betting among professional athletes, and what the return of Roaring Kitty means for traditional…
When the Robots Take Over… from Cautionary Tales
Tim Harford is joined by Jacob Goldstein to answer your questions. Does winning the lottery make you unhappy? Is Bitcoin bad for the economy? When does correlation imply causation? And what will Tim and Jacob…
Making Palm Oil Without Palm Trees
Palm oil is a cheap and remarkably versatile vegetable oil. It’s in a ton of products, from food to cosmetics, detergent, and chewing gum. But producing so much palm oil is really bad for the…
Fighting Cancer with CRISPR
Last year, the FDA approved a treatment for sickle cell disease using a revolutionary new gene editing technology called CRISPR. Rachel Haurwitz conducted pioneering research on CRISPR as a graduate student. Now she’s the co-founder…
How to Start 40 Companies (and Counting)
Robert Langer has co-founded dozens of companies, holds over a thousand patents, and is a pioneering figure in drug delivery and tissue engineering. Robert has solved a lot of problems, and is working on many…
The Cutting Edge of Energy Storage: Rust
Mateo Jaramillo is the co-founder and CEO of Form Energy. Mateo’s problem is this: How do you build batteries that can provide affordable backup power to the grid for days at a time? As it…
The First Pig to Human Kidney Transplant
This March, doctors successfully transplanted a pig kidney into a person for the first time in history. Mike Curtis is the CEO of eGenesis, the company that raised the pig whose kidney was used for…
Designing a Drone That Delivers
Imagine picking up your phone and ordering something from Walmart. Fifteen minutes later, a drone hovers over your yard, lowers your order down to you, and zips away. Adam Woodworth wants this to be so…
How Do Psychedelics Work?
Psychedelics are going mainstream. The FDA has approved ketamine for certain patients with depression, and may soon approve MDMA for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). But a fundamental question remains unclear: How do psychedelics work? Gul…
Building Boundary-Breaking Balloons
Kai Marshland is the co-founder and chief product officer at WindBorne Systems. Kai’s problem is this: How do you build weather balloons that can stay in the air for months at a time, and pair…