Planet Money

If you can't get a loan from a bank, maybe you can get one from your friends or family. That's the idea, loosely, behind a peer-to-peer lending site like Prosper.com. Clay Shirky, New Media professor at New York University and author of Here Comes Everybody, says it appeared to be working, at least until the SEC shut it down. Plus: From Dayton, Ohio, an amazing layoff story.

If you add up all the U.S. currency out there, it's about $900 billion. But where is it? Economists Ken Rogoff and Richard Porter say a lot of it is overseas, and much of the missing currency helps people avoid paying taxes. The good news: It helps the economy. Plus: Money trader Will Aston-Reese gives the (improving, but still not great) view from his desk. And a laid-off worker wonders if she can get even a low-wage job.

President-elect Barack Obama headed to the place least receptive to his economic policy today, George Mason University. Obama was there to pitch his plan for economic stimulus. Russ Roberts tells us why he and the other economists at George Mason don't think it's such a great idea. Plus, a critique of the government's response to the current crisis from a man who knows a lot about central banking.

If you're an American and your gas stove won't light, you start by calling a repair company or checking to make sure you paid the bill. If you're a European, you might start by blaming Russia. That nation's state-owned Gazprom appears to have cut the supply of gas to neighbors from Romania to Austria. It's the second time in recent years that Russia has turned off the spigots. Meanwhile, in Africa, Nigeria is burning off 20 billion cubic meters of natural gas a year — because it has no way to ship the stuff to market. As Eurasia Group analyst Geoff Porter tells it, some in Europe would like to build a pipeline from Nigeria through Northern Africa and across the Mediterranean. It's a bit of a pipe dream, but one player has shown some interest in the region — Russia's Gazprom.

Renee Edlund, 26 and living in Houston, takes a hard look at the prospects for finding a job. She gets help from economist Simon Johnson of Baseline Scenario. Plus: A listener checks in from Centerville, Ohio, and Mike Pesca reads a book with an amazingly long subtitle.

With the incoming Obama administration planning for a $700 billion economic stimulus, the question now is whether a wave of government spending will revive the economy. For answers, we turn to the example of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. If you're like me, you first encountered FDR in history class as the hero of the Great Depression. Lately, though, some people have renewed debate over whether FDR and the New Deal saved America or made matters worse. We'll start with historian Eric Rauchway, who considers a world in which FDR had done nothing.

Some weeks, Planet Money listeners have hopped all over us for using too many free-market economists. Now, David Kestenbaum sets one free-market thinker against an ideological opposite, a Keynesian. These two forces have had only one proper fight — the Great Depression. Both claimed victory. It's Russell Roberts, who wants to keep government out of the economy, versus Steven Fazzari, who thinks it's time for a stimulus package. Who's right? Your future could depend on it.

An incoming president faces a downturn in the economy. He gathers the best and brightest economists, and they get to work on a stimulus program of government spending. No, we're not talking about President-elect Barack Obama. We're talking about President John F. Kennedy, whose policies author Robert J. Samuelson says ultimately backfired. The Washington Post op-ed columnist looks at the long-range consequences of Kennedy's deficit spending. Samuelson, author of The Great Inflation and Its Aftermath, says even the smartest folks make mistakes. The worst of it, he argues, is that you sometimes need decades to see the effects.

Satyajit Das says the old economic order got obliterated this year, and without a new one in place, no one really knows what to do. Bill Bernstein, neurologist and genius economic historian, has an idea. Bernstein backs a style of playing in the market called "passive index investing."

The economy is sending surprising signals, not all of them easy to decode. A Brooklyn printing company says business is down, but a certain kind of salesperson still buys big. A California man wonders why his mall's Christmas tree looks so puny. And recycling folks out West say they suffer when consumers put off buying that new TV.

Call it a mystery solved. We've been promising to figure out who slipped language into the $700 billion bailout that allows the federal government to buy stock in banks. Now, David Kestenbaum reveals all, in conversations that include lawmakers Spencer Bachus, Barney Frank and Jim Moran It all happened in on the floor of the House of Representatives. Bonus: Why did U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson need all those M&Ms?

Listeners have been writing in with their stories of reductions in overall pay — whether in tips, 401k contributions or hourly wages. Economist Howard Rosen of the Peterson Institute considers the bigger picture.

On Tuesday, the Federal Reserve cut its key interest rate to the lowest on record. On Wednesday, Simon Johnson, former chief economist of the International Monetary Fund, explains what the federal funds target rate is, why anyone would want to change, how you do that, and what it means. Bonus: He loves the Mardi Gras feel of it.

The Federal Reserve sliced its benchmark interest rate to the lowest on record. Housing starts notch a historic low. Consumer prices fall again. But Ian Shepherdson says we're still not in deflation yet. Nor are we near the bottom. Plus: A Barnard professor explains the kind of trade a Bernard Madoff might have been making. It's complicated, but you'll get it.

New York investment manager Bernard Madoff stands accused in a $50 billion Ponzi scheme at his firm. As Felix Salmon of Portfolio explains, Madoff wasn't running a hedge fund. But in hindsight, things might have turned out better that way.