AILSA CHANG, HOST:
Is the economy confusing to you? Like, you struggle to find your place in this big, complicated web of money and life that we're all in. Where did the term cost of living even come from? If all of this sounds like you, the people at NPR's Planet Money are here to help with their first ever book. That's right. It's called "Planet Money: A Guide To The Economic Forces That Shape Your Life." And here to give us a sneak peek is the ever-spectacular Planet Money cohost, Sarah Gonzalez. Hi, Sarah.
SARAH GONZALEZ, BYLINE: Hey, Ailsa.
CHANG: OK, so I was on Planet Money so long ago, it feels like now. And I don't remember...
GONZALEZ: We were cohosts together.
CHANG: I know.
GONZALEZ: We were cohosts together.
CHANG: It's so fun. But I don't remember us ever talking about making a book. So I'm a little jealous here. Tell me, what did you guys set out to do with this book? Like, what was the team's goal?
GONZALEZ: You know, you're credited in the book, Ailsa.
CHANG: I know. I saw that.
GONZALEZ: So many people have...
CHANG: I circled my name - just kidding (laughter).
GONZALEZ: So many hosts have contributed to making the Planet Money book. OK, so we really wanted to meet people, like, at every stage of life that they may be in - so work and career, love and family, saving and investing, leisure, retirement. At one point, we did toy with the book being, like, everything from birth to death. But then we were like, well, ending on death's, like, kind of a bummer.
CHANG: (Laughter).
GONZALEZ: Although, graveyard economics are fascinating.
CHANG: Yes.
GONZALEZ: So it was actually really hard to let that one go. But to give you a little bit of a sense of what is in the book - so this is from the family section. We explain things like how living next door to a doctor makes it more likely that you will become a doctor yourself. And in this chapter, we get into this, like, huge experiment that tested whether where you live shapes your economic destiny. And what happens when you take a bunch of people from, like, a low-income area and just, like, place them in a different city where there is a lot of upward mobility. So the answer, by the way, just to give you the answer is, that wouldn't actually do that much for you.
CHANG: Oh.
GONZALEZ: However, it will for your kids. And the younger they are when you move, the better for them. So the point in that chapter is kind of like policy can address poverty but mainly for kids.
CHANG: That is fascinating.
GONZALEZ: Yeah.
CHANG: Though, maybe the choice to move is not always available to people...
GONZALEZ: Of course.
CHANG: ...Even for their progeny. OK.
GONZALEZ: Of course.
CHANG: Well, of course, since this is Planet Money, I am guessing that there's also stuff in this book that doesn't immediately scream economics, but when you dig in, you can totally see economic implications, right?
GONZALEZ: Of course, I mean, that's our bread and butter...
CHANG: Yeah (laughter).
GONZALEZ: ...I think, and one of our signature moves on the show. OK, so one of my favorite things about this book is that we have all of these little side blurbs, which you can't really do in audio, right? Like, it's hard to go on a tangent when you're in the middle of a story. But we have all these little tangent side blurbs that add color, that add context to a particular section. So, like, the grocery store that ended the Cold War - that's a fun side blurb. But one of the side blurbs here is relationship advice from economists...
CHANG: What?
GONZALEZ: ...Which I love.
CHANG: Am I about to get relationship advice from an economist? Give me a break.
GONZALEZ: From, like, Nobel Prize-winning economists...
CHANG: OK.
GONZALEZ: ...Like, real advice.
CHANG: (Laughter).
GONZALEZ: Yeah, yeah, yeah. So there's things in here that's like, if you and your partner can't agree on which restaurants to go to, they've got this, like, great tip. It involves deploying a decoy restaurant, which sort...
CHANG: What?
GONZALEZ: ...Of borrows from, like, magazine subscription offer marketing kind of stuff. We get into the market for dating and matching people on dating apps, and how economists help design those markets, and why there's perverse incentives to design a...
CHANG: OK.
GONZALEZ: ...Better-matching market.
CHANG: Yeah. That's why I'm prejudiced against economists giving me dating advice because those apps are working against me.
GONZALEZ: I mean, if the app is too good at matching you, they lose a customer, right?
CHANG: Yeah.
GONZALEZ: So they got to just be good enough to keep you coming back.
CHANG: I don't want to keep coming back.
GONZALEZ: You want to find your forever love. Yeah...
CHANG: Yes, I do...
GONZALEZ: ...I understand.
CHANG: ...Please. OK, so knowing you guys, I bet you tucked all these little Easter eggs in this book for the superfans, but you're probably not going to tell me about those Easter eggs because that would ruin it, right?
GONZALEZ: Of course. Of course, we have Easter eggs in there. OK, but I can give you a couple of things that were, like, left on the cutting room floor that we did not do. I think that'll help give people a sense of the kind of book that we have created here. OK. So at one point, we wanted the book to be printed on the paper - or really the fabric - that U.S. money is printed on.
CHANG: Ooh.
GONZALEZ: Like a Planet Money book made on, like, U.S. currency fabric, right?
CHANG: (Laughter).
GONZALEZ: That's awesome. We seriously explored having the book smell like money...
CHANG: Ew.
GONZALEZ: ...Like a scratch-and-sniff situation.
CHANG: (Laughter).
GONZALEZ: We got real samples from China. There's some guy in the book world that is known as, like, the smeller, and he tells you if it smells like what you're intending. Turns out, it is really hard to replicate that, like, money smell.
CHANG: Interesting.
GONZALEZ: But those were, like - I think you get a sense of, like, the kind of book we have here, right? And then, the hosts of Planet Money - we recorded the audio book. So if you do want, like, the whole Planet Money experience, you can listen to all of us read you this book.
CHANG: Of course there's an audio book. And if you want to hear Sarah Gonzalez's enticing voice, go and get that audiobook. Sarah, thank you so much.
GONZALEZ: Oh, thank you, Ailsa.
CHANG: Sarah and the Planet Money team are going on tour to celebrate this book launch and share stories from the book onstage. I'm going to see all you guys here in LA next week. And you, audience, can find all the dates and cities at planetmoneybook.com. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by an NPR contractor. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.
