The economic ripple effects of the Baltimore bridge collapse

Make Me Smart April 4, 2024 Transcript

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Kimberly Adams 

We can get going if you like.

Amy Scott

Why not?

Kimberly Adams 

Why not indeed. Hello everybody, I’m Kimberly Adams. Welcome back to Make Me Smart, where we make today make sense.

Amy Scott 

And I am Amy Scott in for Kai Ryssdal. Thanks everybody for joining us on this Thursday, April 4.

Kimberly Adams 

Yeah, since it’s Thursday, it’s our show where we do some audio clips. And so, today we are going to listen back to some big news stories of this week, some a little bit further back, and we’ve got all these audio clips lined up for you.

Amy Scott 

Alright, so let’s hear the first one.

Scott Cowan

“If we lose cargo to other ports, it will take time to gain that cargo or different cargo back to take its place. It could turn a short-term problem into a long-term problem.”

Amy Scott 

So, that was Scott Cowan here in Baltimore, Maryland where I am. He’s the local president of the longshoreman’s union, and he was talking with Marketplace’s Stephanie Hughes for a story that ran yesterday on how the collapse of the Key Bridge is disrupting work for folks like the longshoremen who unload container ships. Maryland lawmakers are working on emergency legislation that would provide relief to workers affected by the accident. But I think what Scott Cowan is talking about is really interesting because Baltimore’s already losing traffic because of the blocked passage from the bridge to other ports on the East Coast. And some are worried that could be permanent. Baltimore, of course, is a huge place for importing and exporting goods. It’s, I think, number one in the country for automobiles, which I just learned from this disaster. And so, that’s obviously really lucrative business for the city, and workers are kind of figuring out what this means for them.

Kimberly Adams 

How are people talking about this in Baltimore?

Amy Scott 

Well, you know, we were gone. We were actually on spring break with the kids when this happened. And so, I was gone for the initial coverage and kind of reaction. I know there was a lot of shock and sadness, you know. And since I got back, it’s just been kind of trying to absorb how people are feeling. Of course, it was, I mean, the loss of life, the loss of a kind of iconic part of Baltimore, the industries that depend on it. It’s just really sad and shocking, even a little more than a week later.

Kimberly Adams 

Well, hard turn. This next clip is from The Daily Show, which yes has comedy to it, but obviously Jon Stewart has a history of taking on serious topics as well. And host Jon Stewart had FTC Chair Lian Khan on the show to talk about some of the agency’s ongoing lawsuits, antitrust lawsuits in particular. And Stewart asked how the agency is approaching the rapidly consolidating artificial intelligence industry. You have huge companies like Apple and Microsoft buying small AI startups, and he then said this.

Jon Stewart

“I gotta tell you. I wanted to have you on a podcast, and Apple asked us not to do it. To have you. They literally said, ‘Please don’t talk to her.’ Having nothing to do with what you do for a living. I think they just.”

Kimberly Adams 

He said, “I think they just don’t care for you too much.” You know, John Stewart had a podcast that was connected to his Apple+ TV show, which ended last year, and he ended up parting with Apple over what they called creative differences. And as Axios notes, you have comedians like John Stewart and other news figures who have struggled with how to cover their parent companies. And the FTC has recently scrutinized Apple’s practices and the Justice Department recently sued the company along with a bunch of states in the District of Columbia, alleging that Apple abuses its monopoly power in the smartphone market. And this conversation between Stewart and Khan was interesting because she responded to his statement by basically saying like, yeah, this is what happens when you have so much power consolidated in so few companies. It leaves not only less space, basically for innovation, but less space to even talk about these things. And this was on the episode about two days ago.

Amy Scott 

Yeah, it was pretty interesting episode, made me realize how much I missed John Stewart from his earlier Daily Show days, because he’s just. I mean, it’s interesting. We talk about the firewall all the time in the news, but you when you’re a comedian, but you’re doing hard hitting coverage, you know, it’s matters if your employers tell you, you can’t interview Lina Khan. And another reason I’m glad to work in public radio, where we don’t have those kinds of pressures.

Kimberly Adams 

Exactly, exactly.

Amy Scott 

All right. So, moving on. The next clip is from an interview I did yesterday with a realtor named Amanda Pohlman. She’s in the Cleveland area. And we were talking about how the recent National Realtor’s Association settlement, the proposed settlement could impact the industry. And here’s what she said.

Amanda Pohlman

“What’s going to happen for buyers that simply cannot afford to pay their buyer’s agent? And it’s already competitive enough for the first-time homebuyers, the VA buyers, when they are bidding against other buyers who might have cash, or have gobs of resources, because it’s already a very challenging market with very low inventory, and a lot of buyers wanting the same house.”

Amy Scott 

So, what she’s talking about is traditionally whoever selling a house pays the commission. And it gets split between the seller’s agent and the buyer’s agent. This settlement. Under this settlement, the NAR agreed to a rule change, where they’re not going to do this sort of tying anymore. You’re not. Sellers are not going to be able to or seller’s agents are not going to be able to list a commission on the MLS, the multiple listing service, so that buyer’s agents don’t steer their buyers towards homes that pay a higher commission, for example. And now, buyers may end up having to pay their own agents. And the question is, how does that affect them? I mean, in a way, they were already paying it through the price of the house if that was, you know, getting passed on to their agent. But if they have to pay more directly, the question is, how is that going to affect the ability of people to buy homes when they’re already, you know, in many cases really stretching? Of course, Amanda, you know, has a dog in this fight. She is an agent who works on behalf of buyers and, you know, wants to get paid. But I do think that is a concern that even housing advocates have. Is how is it going to affect people’s ability to buy a house and ability to pay that fee upfront?

Kimberly Adams 

Has there been any pressure that you’ve seen yet because I know you cover housing quite a bit, on the mortgage lenders to start allowing buyers to bundle in their real estate agents’ fees into their mortgage the way that you could when they were bundled into the price of the house. Because like you can wrap in your title fees, your closing, there’s like lots of costs that you can wrap into your mortgage or your loan for your mortgage. And I wonder if, you know, has there been any movement yet? I think an enterprising lender would be like, hey, here’s one way to draw business to us. We’ll let you bundle in your agent fees into the price of your mortgage.

Amy Scott 

Yeah, I actually don’t know. I mean, that’s something Amanda talked about, especially because like, VA buyers and people who have a loan from the Veterans Administration aren’t allowed to pay their agents. And so, she was saying that that may be one way that those folks won’t be at a disadvantage because if their lender is able to pay that commission. But you know, there’s a lot of reporting to be done on this and the settlement isn’t final yet, and I think a lot of it remains to be seen. But I think that’s a really good question. Hopefully I’ll get back to you on that.

Kimberly Adams 

I’m sure you will. You tend to get to the bottom of these things pretty quickly.

Amy Scott

I will, Kimberly.

Kimberly Adams

Okay, last one for today, which I got from one of our Slack channels here at Marketplace, but here it is.

NBC Sports

“If he goes for the quad axle, they will be the first jump. The only man in the world to compete this. Four and a half revolutions. He’s setting it up. That was a huge one.”

Kimberly Adams 

That was a clip from NBC Sports coverage of Illia Malinin. His performance at the world figure skating championship. He took home his first world title. He’s 19 years old. And he made history by landing the best collection of jumps in one program in figure skating history. He landed six quadruple jumps, and watching this video is astonishing. Like he looks superhuman. The way he is like up in the air, and he’s spinning around and around. He’ll land, and he’ll jump right up back in the air again. And then like once he starts getting really into the program, and he kind of gets a sense that he’s got it. You can see him start to kind of have fun, and really get some joy out of it. And then, everybody’s so happy. It’s a really fun video to watch. And it made me happy. Did you watch it yet, Amy?

Amy Scott 

Oh, my God. Yes. I had chills. It was so amazing. And also, I love that he’s doing his routine to the music from Succession.

Kimberly Adams

I know it’s very perfect for Marketplace.

Amy Scottt

He’s very apt. Yeah. It’s beautiful. It’s just really impressive.

Kimberly Adams 

And his outfit was like a very sparkly sequins stylized business suit.

Amy Scott 

Yeah, totally. And then at the end, he just like collapses on the ice. It’s just, you see that this is just a kid who’s just pulled off this amazing feat. So yeah, I highly recommend that people watch it work.

Kimberly Adams 

Yeah, like the amount of just work. Nothing but work that must have gone into doing all of that. And then the interview afterwards, he said, you know, he was worried about not being able to make it and whether or not he’d be able to compete and then he just decided to rely on his muscle memory. And if you’re talking about relying on muscle memory for that kind of stuff, that means you have done those jumps thousands of times.

Amy Scott 

My muscles have different memories.

Kimberly Adams 

Yeah, for sure. For sure. Anyway, that is it for today. Join us tomorrow for Economics on Tap. It’s our YouTube livestream, and we start at 6:30 Eastern. The time zone for Amy and I. And 3:30 Pacific. We’ll have more news. We will have drinks, and we will play our favorite game Half Full/Half Empty. Make Me Smart is produced by Courtney Bergsieker. Audio engineering by Drew Jostad. Ellen Rolfes writes our newsletter. And Thalia Menchaca is our intern.

Amy Scott 

Marissa Cabrera is our senior producer. Bridget Bodnar is the director of podcasts. And Francesca Levy is the executive director of Digital.

Kimberly Adams 

You gotta to say and On-Demand.

Amy Scott 

And On-Demand.