In the two days since he advertised "unprocessed toilet paper" for sale on Facebook Marketplace next to a photo of logs, David Traichel says the response has been better than expected. No actual buyers, just hundreds of views, laughs, and "you made my day" from other users browsing through the online classifieds.
"So many people are so freaked out about the idea of not having toilet paper," says Traichel, 39. The aerospace technician and welder from Northford, Connecticut generally uses Facebook Marketplace to sell vintage car and bicycle parts. He decided to offer his oak and cedar woodpile (price, $1) to jog users out of their shopping panic. "Maybe those people would see the ad and think, 'OK, maybe I'm overreacting."
Many things are taking place:
Gold prices weaker; bruised marketplace wonders what's next | Kitco News
Editor's Note: Get caught up in minutes with our speedy summary of today's must-read news stories and expert opinions that moved the precious metals and financial markets. Sign up here!
(Kitco News) - Gold prices are trading modestly down in early U.S. trading Thursday, amid a severely battered global marketplace that still sees would-be buyers in most markets scared and standing on the sidelines. Stability in markets remains elusive in this unprecedented economic crisis. One veteran trader commented, “Give us bad news and we can deal with that, but give us extreme uncertainty and you get panic and market dislocations” that are very hard to deal with.
Today's numbers on COVID-19 - Marketplace
Welcome to Marketplace’s daily, at-a-glance update. Like you, we're overloaded with info on COVID-19 developments. So here’s our effort to track a few critical numbers , on the pandemic and the broader economy.
Keep in mind: the tally of COVID-19 cases represents only the ones that are documented. Since many remain untested, surely the real number is higher.
If you're a member of your local public radio station, we thank you — because your support helps those stations keep programs like Marketplace on the air. But for Marketplace to continue to grow, we need additional investment from those who care most about what we do: superfans like you.
Virtual wine tasting boosts London's locked-down spirits - Marketplace
A constant stream of news about turmoil in financial markets and lockdowns across the world can get pretty heavy.
So we're highlighting how businesses across the world are finding innovative ways to stay open and serve customers as long as they can.
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He says not only does it help distract people from what’s going on, but keeps the business up and running too.
Quite a lot has been going on:
Now? Launch a startup now? History points to opportunity - Marketplace
As everyone hunkers down for what is likely to be a long road ahead — in terms of public health and the economy — it seems like this is not a good time to start a business. Venture capitalists are advising startups to hoard cash and prepare for a downturn due to the new coronavirus. Capital probably won’t be flowing as freely as it has been over the past few years.
Michael Seibel: When we look in the past, a number of our most successful startups were actually started either right before, during or immediately after the 2008 crisis. These are companies like Airbnb, Stripe, Mixpanel and PagerDuty. What we see they all have in common is that they’re software companies with small teams, and literally all they had to do to get up and running was build their software product, give it to customers and iterate and make it better.
Amazon limits Marketplace fulfillment to medical supplies and household essentials | Retail Dive
Starting Tuesday , through April 5, Amazon has suspended the intake of most products from U.S. and European Union Marketplace sellers into its fulfillment centers, according to a notice to those third parties. The e-commerce giant is temporarily "prioritizing household staples, medical supplies and other high-demand products coming into our fulfillment centers so that we can more quickly receive, restock, and ship these products to customers," according to its notice.
The Marketplace podcasts to listen to right now - Marketplace
With tens of millions of children out of school, nearly all large events cancelled and businesses closing or cutting hours in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, we're all about to have a lot of time on our hands.
Whether you're working from home, taking a (safe, socially distant) walk or just trying to take your mind off of your retirement account, we've decided to round up a few of our best podcasts for you to enjoy.
If you want a quick hit, “Marketplace Morning Report” did some quick pieces on the Fed's drastic rate cut from the weekend , and how markets responded ( not well ). And on “Marketplace Tech,” Molly Wood looked at price gouging on eBay and Amazon , and AI's potential in vaccine research .
The economics behind why toilet paper is sold out - Marketplace
This is part of our "Econ Extra Credit" project, where we read an introductory economics textbook provided by the nonprofit Core Econ together with our listeners.
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"If we see a sale; if we see coupons; if the price is different for seniors or students at a movie theater than it is for adults — all of that counts as price discrimination," said Homa Zarghamee, an economics professor at Barnard College who advises Core Econ , the publisher of the open-source economics textbook Marketplace's David Brancaccio is reading with listeners .
Happening on Twitter
FINALLY FOUND SOME TOILET PAPER I can't believe I found some! I thought I would never see toilet paper again.… https://t.co/JcZDSVW5Zr w_terrence (from United States) Wed Mar 18 17:15:51 +0000 2020
Question of the day courtesy of Monroe: "Mommy, why are people so riled up over toilet paper?" 🤷♀️ MariahCarey (from Citizen of the World Dahhhling) Wed Mar 18 12:18:27 +0000 2020
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