Prices have been rising for pretty much everything these days. And for some, it’s raising the cost of making friends as more folks turn to paid activities like art classes and happy hours to socialize. We’ll get into it. And, we’ll explain the latest scandal that’s left the Supreme Court in a bind. Plus, we’ll weigh in on Chuck E. Cheese animatronics and bridesmaid debt during a round of Half Full/Half Empty!
Here’s everything we talked about today:
- “Supreme Court Justice Alito’s House Displayed a ‘Stop the Steal’ Flag After Jan. 6” from The New York Times
- “Want to Make a New Friend? How Much Money Have You Got?” from The Wall Street Journal
- “Watching the NFL This Season? You’ll Need at Least 5 Streaming Services” from How-To Geek
- “Chuck E. Cheese saying goodbye to animatronic band” from CBS News
- “The Bridesmaids Going Into Debt for Their Friends’ Weddings” from The Cut
- “Mindy Kaling Shares Her Simple but Important Advice for The Office Spinoff’s New Cast: ‘I Was Not Professional'” from People
- “The days of free refills may be over” from Marketplace
- “It was a classic rap beef. Then Drake revived Tupac with AI and Congress got involved” from NPR
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Make Me Smart May 17, 2024 Transcript
Note: Marketplace podcasts are meant to be heard, with emphasis, tone and audio elements a transcript can’t capture. Transcripts are generated using a combination of automated software and human transcribers, and may contain errors. Please check the corresponding audio before quoting it.
Jay Siebold
Ready to go, gang?
Kai Ryssdal
Yeah. Are people asking why I’m not in the chat?
Kimberly Adams
Yeah. Well, they said Kimberly’s accounted for. Where’s Kai? And I was like, Kai can see the chat.
Kai Ryssdal
Oh yeah. I’m here. I can see the chat. I’m the quiet type. Hey everybody, I’m Kai Ryssdal. Welcome back to Make Me Smart, where we make today make sense. Friday, 17 May is the day.
Kimberly Adams
It is, and I’m Kimberly Adams. Thank you for joining us on the podcast and on the YouTube livestream for everyone hopping in there. It is Friday. Thank goodness. And so, that means it’s time for our weekly happy hour episode, Economics on Tap.
Kai Ryssdal
So, I’m just reading the chat. Why don’t I do the chair dance? I don’t dance. Do people not even know me? It’s like nobody even listens. I don’t dance. Jesus.
Kimberly Adams
They don’t pay enough attention.
Kai Ryssdal
Okay, so we’ll do what we usually do on a Friday, which is news, take a break and then play game. Before we do that though, we will talk drinks. I’m having coffee as promised in, I guess it’s over here. Sorry. In my Pewabic mug. This is my wife’s Pewabic mug. I got the dark blue one. She’s got the light blue one for whatever random reason.
Kimberly Adams
It’s very pretty.
Kai Ryssdal
Yeah, I love these mugs. They’re fabulous. If you’re in Detroit, go buy Pewabic. It’s amazing. They have great stuff. And this is not an endorsement or a plug. Just go because they have great stuff. Alright, anyway, what do you what are you drinking? What are you having?
Kimberly Adams
I am drinking sparkling water in a very fancy Target champagne flute leftover from when I went to steeplechase a couple of weekends ago. And we tried to be real like fancy like, pinkies up and everything. So, we had real glassware, which was from Target, but you know for the win. But it’s got sparkling water. And some time ago, one of our wonderful listeners sent me a bunch of tonics. These Sweet Haven tonics, and they come in a bunch of different flavors. And their mixers are like shrubs for mixing with cocktails and other things. And so, this is lemon basil and lavender. And so, I’ve got that mixed in with the sparkling water, and it’s lovely and refreshing and nice. And yeah, I just don’t know. I didn’t feel like drinking today. So.
Kai Ryssdal
Fair enough. I hear you, especially as you’re getting up at 3:30 in the morning to do that to do that CSPAN thing. Okay, to the to the chat. Let’s see there’s a peach bellini from flipping out. A little shout out to my heritage here from Chuck Clangneck. Happy Constitution Day. For those of you who are Norwegian today. Otherwise, let’s see.
Kimberly Adams
I’m sorry. Rachel in Philly is having Diet Pepsi with pizza, which is great. Bob is having generic wine red in my “I drink, and I know things glass.” I was so close to buying one of those Game of Thrones glasses where it’s like “I drink, and I know things.” I was so close to getting one of those.
Kai Ryssdal
I did not know that was a Game of Thrones thing. No, I watched Game of Thrones.
Kimberly Adams
Tyrion Lannister. Remember he used to say, “I drink, and I know things.”
Kai Ryssdal
True. True. True.
Kimberly Adams
Yes. Yes. Fair. Okay, what else? Simple pink Moscato that Stacy Hill is having. Manistee’s IPA North Channel Brewing Company from Manistee, Michigan that Daniel Ramirez is drinking.
Kai Ryssdal
Go Blue.
Kimberly Adams
Yeah, okay. Wow, that’s adventurous. So, what are you reading? Kai, what’s your news fix?
Kai Ryssdal
Oh, man. I thought you meant when I was reading reading, and I’m like, well, I’m in the middle of volume one of Rick Atkinson’s trilogy on the Revolutionary War, but that’s not what you meant.
Kimberly Adams
Oh, interesting though. How is it?
Kai Ryssdal
I’m rereading it because it’s so good. He’s so good. He’s so good. And I’m rereading it because I’m waiting for the second volume to come out. Anyway, that’s a whole different thing. I can’t get over, and because I was just listening to another podcast that others in this podcast audience may listen to. I can’t let go of that Sam Alito story. How in the days after January 6, in front of Justice Alito’s house, was an American flag hanging upside down, which came in that era of this country’s recent past to be known as this stop the steal flag. And I can’t get over it for two reasons. Number one, just on the damn merits. Are you kidding? But also, I truly love that he threw his wife under the bus. And he said, well, Mrs. Alito was offended by the neighbors, and that’s how she was feeling, so she put up this flag and I’m like, really, Sam? Come on, man.
Kimberly Adams
Yeah. I mean, I think though, it’s going to be another example of how much Congress has its hands tied on this issue because we’ve seen example after example of what looked to be pretty clear ethics violations that for lesser justices, as an in lesser courts, would definitely have repercussions. But are not in this case because it’s the Supreme Court. And I’ve yet to see the check on the balance.
Kai Ryssdal
Yeah, what’s really interesting about this being the Supreme Court, right? Is that there is a school of thought out there espoused by some of the justices themselves and some other right leaning legal scholars who say that Congress has no authority over the court in in these matters. And that’s just who we talked about this, right. That’s just baloney. It’s just absolute garbage. The fact of the matter is, the Congress won’t. Let me rephrase that. Republicans in the Congress will not take a stand on this. And that, to me is insanity. But this story, I mean, how much more do we need to hear and see about this? How much more?
Kimberly Adams
Well, and we were talking about funding for the Supreme Court yesterday. That’s really the last remaining lever that Congress seems to have in this. Because if they pass a law that says, you know, the Supreme Court has to have an ethics policy, the Supreme Court will probably overturn it. It’s unconstitutional.
Kai Ryssdal
Oh, let’s have that fight. Don’t you want to have that fight, though? Come on.
Kimberly Adams
Absolutely. Sure. I’d love to see it play out. But in meantime, what Congress can do is adjust the funding. And that’s, you know, the power of the purse is indeed a power. And people want a rodent update.
Kai Ryssdal
Oh, so Teddy, our rat guy is here. I’ve got a rat guy. Because when you live in 110-year-old house, you have a rat guy. We’re literally on a first name basis. He’s every three months. He says a couple of things. Number one, since his last inspection, there have been a number of breaches. that’s what he says, in our perimeter. That’s what he says. In other words, holes in the house that had developed because it’s 110-year-old house. So, he’s fixing those. He’s going to bait the traps again and move some around. And also, he is confident, and I didn’t ask him why because I had come do this podcast. He’s confident that whatever’s getting in and keeping us up at 3:20 in the morning, the critter was there again last night at 3:10. I don’t know what it is about three o’clock hour. It’s not staying but is leaving and coming back. So, we’re going to go with that.
Kimberly Adams
I feel like we should take bets. I think raccoon. Do you have raccoons in California?
Kai Ryssdal
I think so. Yes, we have raccoons in California. I don’t know. Our history here is rats. Rats know this house, and they liked this house because they’ve been coming here for 110 years. It just sounded to me bigger. But what the hell do I know?
Kimberly Adams
Yeah. Yeah. When I moved into my place, I was trying to clean, and I moved some appliances out of the way and found many dead and desiccated rodents underneath my fridge and dishwasher and stove. And it was very disturbing, and I called the exterminator in. And he said to me, so you know, highway 395 in DC, and I was like, yeah. So, you know how from 395 you can get to Virginia to Maryland or to DC from the same highway and I was like, yeah. Here’s like your kitchen is highway 395.
Kai Ryssdal
Oh, man. Wow. That’s a bummer. That’s a bummer.
Kimberly Adams
He said, from your kitchen, they are going everywhere else in your house, and it is the hub of all of the activity. And so, I did a great number of things to address the situation, and I have not, knock on wood, seen any rodents since but man, it was mildly traumatizing.
Kai Ryssdal
Just because you’re not seeing them doesn’t mean they’re not there. Very quick shout out to the Princess Bride, from why am I mister? Yeah, go ahead. Sorry.
Kimberly Adams
I did hear something in the wall, and I got one of those things that you plug in, and it puts out the noise that like makes them stay away and that seemed to deal with it.
Kai Ryssdal
Oh, that’s good. That’s good. Very quick shout out to the Princess Bride here from why am I mister in the chat, R-O-U-S, rodents of unusual size. All right, what’s your news? What do you got?
Kimberly Adams
I have two news items. The quick one is sports related. And I’m going to make it quick, so that I don’t accidentally say something that makes me sound stupid because sports related. But I saw this very interesting story about if you’re trying to watch the NFL season this year, you have to subscribe to at least five different streaming services in order to get all these games. And so, I found this on How-To-Geek.com randomly. And so, it said: “The NFL is officially all-in on streaming services that negatively affects fans. For example, last season, the only way to watch the Bills vs. the Chargers in December 2023 was to subscribe to NBCs Peacock streaming services. Making matters worse, the NFL doubled down and put the prime time playoff game between the Dolphins and the Chiefs behind Peacock,” depending on the package. And then, let’s see. “For the upcoming 2024-2025 NFL season, Peacock will again exclusively air the season opener, and likely others later in the year. Then, Thursday Night Football airs on Amazon Prime video.” Then, “Netflix plus, ESPN+ will host and air an undecided exclusive as well.” And NFL games on Christmas Day will only be on Netflix and all together, they are saying in order to get all of these together to do everything. It’s going to be hundreds of dollars’ worth of subscriptions if you actually want to watch all the NFL games, which is wild to me.
Kai Ryssdal
Yep. Yep. It’s amazeballs. I mean to be to be clear, a lot of NFL games are still on regular broadcast television. But the whole streaming thing, and the amount of money you got to spend to get these sports is a lot.
Kimberly Adams
Well, which is funny, because I was listening. I think it was on Tech this week. They were talking about how advertising revenue is switching to streaming, but one of the few remaining places, and I’ve done some reporting on this as well for political advertising, that you can get a large, concentrated audience is live sports, right? And now even that’s fracturing, which is making it kind of hard for advertisers. Okay, other things that are expensive. And I guess it’s kind of related to sports, is making friends. There’s a really interesting story in The Wall Street Journal about how it has become significantly more expensive if you want to make new friends. So, making friends as an adult is hard anyway. But as The Wall Street Journal reports, more people are relying on gym membership, art classes, and other paid activities to develop friendships. And all of those things are getting more expensive. And if you want to meet your friends for drinks, that’s getting more expensive. If you want to go out to eat, that’s getting more expensive. And if you talk about the amount of time it takes to make a friend and they’ve actually calculated this, it’s something like 200 hours or whatever. You know, and boats. And you know, if you have all of these hours that you have to spend hanging out with somebody new, and all of those things are getting more expensive, price tag goes up, which I just thought was a very interesting way to look at it. They’ve got charts on the increase in prices in alcoholic beverages food, movie theaters, concerts, club memberships, lessons, and instructions. And overall, in general. I will say that when I was doing my 40 skills for 40 thing last year, I definitely found that there were people who were probably more casual acquaintances at the beginning of that process that I now hang out with way more because over the course of the year, they kept joining me for things. And we ended up spending more time together. And sure enough, hanging out more made us closer friends, but it came with a cost because anybody who looked at that list, there was a cost associated with it. So, I just thought that was interesting.
Kai Ryssdal
Yeah, totally fascinating. Totally fascinating, and it is very, very hard to make friends as an adult. That’s a fact. All right, done with the news. Quick break, and then Half Full/Half Empty. But before we go. Look, I’m just going to say it. We need money. You guys are reading those stories about media. You’re reading all the stories about everything else. We need your help. So, this weekend only, shrinking the minimum donation to get our new Shrinkflation mini tote bag just for all y’all. $10 more to get this super popular thank-you gift and do your part to keep our newsroom going strong. And while you’re on the donation form, mini pencils. Here’s a big pencil. We’ve got mini pencils. Check it out.
Kimberly Adams
Look, donations of any size whatsoever make a difference because it all does help. Individual gifts really are the most important and sustainable part of our budget because we can plan on it, especially you know, if you’re giving monthly and revenues are declining across the industry. And so, those monthly checks or credit card contributions or whatever, they all really do make a difference. So, if you can chip in $10 or more right now, you will get that Shrinkflation mini tote bag. And you will also know that you’ve done your part to help everyone get smarter about the economy. But you can only get the discount if you go to marketplace.org/givesmart, or you can follow the link in the show notes.
Kai Ryssdal
We’re coming right back.
Kimberly Adams
Okay, we are back, and it is time to play a round of Half Full/Half Empty hosted by our very own Drew Jostad.
Drew Jostad
All right, Chuck E. Cheeses has announced they are getting rid of the animatronic band by the end of this year. Are you half full or half empty?
Kimberly Adams
All the way full.
Kai Ryssdal
Could not be more full. Could not be more full. Chuck E. Cheese is hell. Full stop. Unless you think that it’s just me. So, Diantha Parker, one of Marketplace’s editors was visiting this week. And she was in the control room when I did that final item. She literally stood up and threw her hands in the air like Rocky. And she was like, yes! Yes! Whatever. So yeah, all the way full. All the damn way.
Drew Jostad
Are you half full or half empty on going into debt for a friend’s wedding?
Kimberly Adams
I saw this story. Basically, somebody shared it in our now reading channel on Slack. And it was about how weddings are, well, weddings are expensive. But now, people who want big weddings are sort of signing their friends up to be groomsmen or bridesmaids or whatever the gender-neutral term for being in a wedding is. And without checking in with people about how much they can afford, or then shaming them when they can’t do it or like just booking stuff and sending Venmo requests. And I just think that’s so mean to do. And is the stuff to make you not have any friends after your wedding. Attendant. Thank you everyone for pointing that out. Wedding attendant. That is the gender-neutral term, and I love it. Thanks. I appreciate that. So, in terms, all the way empty. I had a couple of different weddings when I got married, didn’t have attendance at any of them. And people were grateful. And it’s like, especially if you’re asking people to travel and stuff like, just don’t do it and like or make it reasonable. Or budget for it in the wedding if it’s important to you. Like I don’t know, man. I don’t like it.
Kai Ryssdal
Yep, totally hard pass.
Kimberly Adams
Oh, somebody reminded me Reema had a podcast about this. Expat Mike pointed out about a friend suing another friend for the wedding for not attending. Right.
Kai Ryssdal
Oh, wow. Wow. Wow.
Kimberly Adams
Yeah, it can get vicious good.
Kai Ryssdal
Yeah, totally.
Drew Jostad
All right. There’s a new spin off series of “The Office” in production this summer for Peacock. Are you half full or half empty?
Kai Ryssdal
I never got “The Office.” It never did it for me, so take it or leave it. Look and I’m a big John Krasinski fan, Steve Carell, you know, but I never got that show, so I’m half empty.
Kimberly Adams
I’m neutral. I don’t really care. I’m going to say half empty because I’d like some new things, please.
Kai Ryssdal
Totally fair. Totally fair.
Drew Jostad
All right. This next story is a story that Janet Nguyen had on marketplace.org, which is McDonald’s will be phasing out self-serve soda machines by 2032, and customers are noticing similar things at Wegmans and Panera, other places. Are you half full or half empty?
Kai Ryssdal
Sorry, by 2032?
Drew Jostad
Yep, they have a while they to do it apparently. They have a lot of limitations.
Kai Ryssdal
It’s going to take them eight years to do this. Well. Yeah, I guess they do. I don’t know. Half empty. I don’t care. I don’t know.
Drew Jostad
Free refills going away.
Kimberly Adams
Yeah. I mean, we could talk about what sodas do to our bodies and to our health and things like that. So, half full. Why not?
Kai Ryssdal
There you go.
Kimberly Adams
As she sits here and drinks the bubbly drink with sweetener.
Kai Ryssdal
Yeah, that’s different. That’s different.
Drew Jostad
All right. We got the poll.
Kai Ryssdal
We got the poll. Okay. All right. So, those of you who are live as it were. All 270 of you. Chime in, peeps.
Drew Jostad
All right, a new song recently released by Drake features a computer synthesized verse from Tupac Shakur. Are you half full or half empty on using AI to resurrect dead celebrities?
Kimberly Adams
I totally thought this was going to be something on the Drake vs. Kendrick Lamar beef, but okay.
Kai Ryssdal
Me too. Me too. Which I am not equipped to weigh on, by the way.
Drew Jostad
It was part of the beef.
Kimberly Adams
Neither am I. AI to resurrect dead celebrities? You know, I did see another article in the Wall Street Journal today about using AI to resurrect some of the oral arguments from Brown versus Board of Education.
Kai Ryssdal
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I saw that. Totally interesting. Creepy but interesting,
Kimberly Adams
So cool. Because basically, the Supreme Court started recording audio of the proceedings, I think something in 1955. And so, just barely missed Brown versus Board of Education in 1954, which is the famous separate but separate is inherently unequal case for folks who need a reminder. And so, what they did was they had all this audio of the justices, you know, involved, and the people involved, but they had voice actors read the transcript, so that they had the proper intonation and pacing. And then they ran it through the AI with the voice generation, so that it matched. So cool. And so, it’s one of these uses of AI I’m like, this is good. This is going to make learning about this much more rich for people and especially young people who consume media in that way. So, in that case, and yeah. Tamra Haynes says it kind of how I think it, “that’s history that we don’t have access to. Resurrecting dead celebrities is unnecessary when we have audio recordings of them.” Yeah, you know. I mean, yes, you could argue that Tupac probably would have made a lot more music and would have had a lot more things to say if he had lived, but it’s not like we have nothing of his unlike these other folks. I think we had a clip in our Thursday show the other day about a rap artist, I think it was FKA Twigs, who was saying that, you know, this is her voice. This is her identity. This is her music, and she’s so careful with how she makes these decisions about what she wants to do with her work. And so, it’s like, yeah, leave it alone. And, you know, yeah. Kevin Flanagan, it’s also about art versus historic record. Sarah Zeitz, the Beatles did it well, but it was more about just finishing up what was already made. Yeah, I think that’s a good point, too. Yeah. Finishing up what is already made is one thing, but just kind of making something up because you feel it. I don’t know. Leave them alone.
Kai Ryssdal
Yeah, I think that’s right. I think along with the history part of this, it’s a matter of civic education, right? To hear those arguments and it’s of value, which is not to say that art and artists are not of value, but it’s a different deal, right? It’s a different bar, I think. Totally interesting. Yeah, I guess we gave the answer, didn’t we? Should we see what the poll says?
Kimberly Adams
Yeah. Let’s see what the poll says. All right. Oh, Tammy Palmer. Good point. The Nat King Cole duet was great. That was magical. True. All right. Half empty 86%.
Kai Ryssdal
Also, because it was her dad as opposed to. Right? I mean, if she chose, you know, somebody else would have a different deal. I think.
Kimberly Adams
Yeah, very true. Okay, so half empty 86%, half full 13%, 166 votes. I’m half empty on this. So, yeah. That is it for us today. Thank you everyone for joining us. We will be back on Monday. If you have a question or a comment for us, you can leave that for us in a voicemail at the number 508-U-B-SMART or you can email us at makemesmart@marketplace.org.
Kai Ryssdal
Jay Siebold, ladies and gentlemen. Make Me Smart is produced by Courtney Bergsieker. Today’s episode was engineered by Jay Siebold. Our intern is Thalia Menchaca.
Kimberly Adams
The team behind our Friday game is Emily Macune, Jamila Huxtable and Antoinette Brock. Marissa Cabrera is our senior producer. Bridget Bodnar is the director of podcasts. And Francesca Levy is the executive director of Digital and On-Demand. Yep. Another one in the books or in the digital archives feeding into the AI scraping and whatever Google’s generation is going to make of us.
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