Look, you know I love a conversation about money. This show has always been a place where we

investigate and compare notes on how money and our decisions around it and our different levels of

access to it shape everything else in our lives. It's something we have to look straight at

and be honest about in order to make smart decisions.

And money is also an area of life where no matter how good our preparation, we are not in total control.

Markets collapse. Technology evolves. Prices go up. Student loan payments resume. Retirement accounts grow and contract. And so as we make decisions

about jobs or housing or relationships or taking any kind of risk, we have to ride these changing

tides. And lately, it feels like the changes in currents have been really hard to predict and even to keep your head above.

We've been hearing over the last several weeks from listeners about their current money dilemmas.

Some of your questions are about a choice you have to make.

Others are about managing the emotions that are coming up for you when you feel uncertain or financially unstable.

I personally have been feeling a lot of this. Like, I don't know what groceries will cost next month. I don't know how the media business will look in three years. I don't know what AI is going to do for wage-earning work for my kids in 15 years.

So we are just going to invite all that in to our conversation this week.

I am joined by some experts who think about money in the economy

and about coping with the unknown from some really nice and different perspectives.

And I love to hear what they made of your questions.

And so I hope that this episode this week feels helpful and also like a personal finance and economic analysis panel that's unlike any you've heard before.

First of all, a husband is way more expensive than a cat.

Let me just...

I feel like that needs to be said.

Being one myself, I can assure you that is 100% true.

This is death, sex, and money.

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