Marketplace 7/3/2003

Newscast

* Today: Dow slips 72.63 (-0.79%); NASDAQ drips 15.27 (-0.91%); S&P 500 trips 8.05 (-0.81%)
* Jobs: worse one-month spike in unemployment since 9/11 -- but the pain was not spread evenly
* So, will tax cuts, higher profits lead to a better economy in the second half of 2003?
* Will Saddam’s $25 million reward bring him in? Well, Osama’s identical price tag hasn’t. Some say the amount’s too excessive
* U.S.-led administration in Iraq sponsors junket at National Museum to dispel rumors that Treasure of Nimrud was looted after Saddam’s fall


Features
Music Bridge: Elmer Elevator - Shonen Knife
Purchase this music from Public Radio MusicSource
Your purchase helps support Marketplace.
Commentary - France’s new campaign wildly off course
Commentator says the new ads are a bungled public relations mess: Tourism in France has fallen off some this year, in part, because of deteriorating relations between France and the U.S. So, a new series of ads commissioned by French tourism officials has well-known New Yorker Woody Allen longing to "let bygones-be-bygones." Commentator Merrie Spaeth doesn’t think this is such a good idea. “How out of touch can you be to feature 67-year-old Woody Allen as spokesman?” she asks. And, she says his past transgressions are, well, transgressions. But she thinks the problem is bigger than this campaign. “The French have been bitterly claiming we don’t understand them -- but this is a case where they clearly don’t understand us,” says Spaeth.
Commentator: Merrie Spaeth
Week on Wall Street
Dallas stockbroker David Johnson talks with host David Brancaccio about what happened this week on Wall Street, and what it all means. Also, they take a look ahead at what’s coming up next week.
Reporter: Host David Brancaccio talks with David Johnson
"Summer School" series - What the heck causes deflation?
With unemployment up and no one spending money, it’s the right time to learn more about deflation: Marketplace’s “Summer school is back in session.” Answer this: The Federal Reserve is worried about it; economists say Germany is about to suffer through it; and Japan is fighting it. What is it? Deflation. When prices start falling -- en mass -- and there are deep discounts on just about everything, economists start talking about deflation. Consumers aren’t buying enough stuff, so companies cut prices to lure them back. So, what causes consumers to stop buying? High levels of personal debt and insecurity about the future come to mind. People also begin to believe prices will keep falling. So, inventory piles up, plants fire workers and production slows down. This can be the start of a vicious spiral downward. How do you fix this? By expanding the money supply via the Fed cutting interest rates -- but this can only work if folks can still afford to borrow.
Reporter: Stephen Henn
Marketplace "Summer School"
Take the deflation quiz; browse the quiz archive
Music Bridge: Down, Down, Down - Tom Waits
Purchase this music from Public Radio MusicSource
Your purchase helps support Marketplace.
Group’s economy ideas don’t jibe with locals
Group’s unorthodox ideas about economy anger shopkeepers: About 20,000 self-described "Rainbow People" meet this week in a national forest near the Utah-Wyoming border to pray for world peace on the 4th of July. This band of iconoclasts have some “interesting” notions about the ways an economy should function. And, cashiers at the last-chance gas stations and liquor stores nearby aren’t exactly happy, since the group believes in shoplifting supplies along the way. Car wash operators are complaining that members take group showers in the self-serve bays. But local merchants say that even though some Rainbow Family members have ripped them off, the gathering has been good for business -- because these visitors mostly pay in cash.
Reporter: Eric Ristau
Music Bridge: Rainbow Connection - Willie Nelson
Purchase this music from Public Radio MusicSource
Your purchase helps support Marketplace.
Tomorrow On Marketplace...
Thomas Jefferson had some pretty big ideas for this country and its economy. On this 4th of July edition of the program, we’ll look at some things he probably never thought of: bank mergers, free TV for political candidates, and independent record labels.