Sarah Leeson

1 week ago | marketplace.org | Kai Ryssdal |Sarah Leeson

Currently, there are more than 3,000 billionaires in the world, and nearly one third of them are in the U.S. In the years between President Trump’s first and second inaugurations, 2016 to 2024, the wealth held by America’s billionaires more than doubled. And yet, these ultra-high-net-worth individuals are something of a mystery to most of us.

1 week ago | marketplace.org | Sarah Leeson

Perhaps unsurprisingly, married couples make up a majority of homebuyers, but the share of women looking to buy solo is on the rise. As of 2024, single women made up 20% of all buyers, and, for first-time buyers, that demographic jumped by 5% last year. Among that cohort is Kirsten Roehler, a first-time homeowner in Bailey, Colorado. She closed on her home in 2023. “I was lucky enough to have a really great realtor, and also a mortgage broker, and also my financial planner,” said Roehler.

2 weeks ago | marketplace.org | Kai Ryssdal |Sarah Leeson

There’s a lot of data collection going on these days in the name of figuring out where the labor force is at with the adoption of artificial intelligence at work. And based on current survey results, it’s all over the map. Somewhere between 20% and 40% of workers use AI, and between 5% and 40% of firms have adopted AI into the workplace. Those ranges are obviously huge, at least in part because the way that some industries use it is wildly different from how other areas of the workforce do.

2 weeks ago | marketplace.org | Kai Ryssdal |Sarah Leeson

On Friday, Moody's joined Fitch and S&P to downgrade the credit rating of the U.S.’s sovereign debt from AAA to AA1, a notch below the highest score, over concerns with the nation's rising debt and deficits. Nina Eichacker is a professor of economics at the University of Rhode Island. She joined “Marketplace” host Kai Ryssdal to talk about how bond markets are supposed to react when the chaos agent is the government itself. To hear their conversation, use the audio player above.

3 weeks ago | marketplace.org | Sarah Leeson

May 14, 2025“Even though I only live, like, 35 minutes away from the city, or 45 minutes by metro, it’s just a little inconvenient for people,” said William Craver in Herndon, Virginia. The median U.S. home price in the first quarter of 2025 was $416,900. It's actually a 1% decrease from the quarter before, but it still represents a 27% increase from just five years ago at the start of the pandemic.