© 2024 All Rights reserved WUSF
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations

Episode 501: A Shirt, A Meat Grinder And The Book Of Everything

The Hansa Kirkenes carried all 6,078 of the Planet Money women's T-shirts from Cartagena, Colombia, to Miami.
Eric Helton for NPR
The Hansa Kirkenes carried all 6,078 of the Planet Money women's T-shirts from Cartagena, Colombia, to Miami.

Part of the Planet Money T-shirt project.

On today's show, the Planet Money T-shirts arrive at the Port of Miami. But they're not quite here yet. If you've ever waited at an airport to clear customs, you can understand where our shirts are now: waiting for permission to enter the country.

Standing between our shirts and the rest of America is a 3,000 page book. The book is a powerful force that creates and destroys entire industries around the world. Squadrons of government agents use tools of violence and destruction to ensure that the rules laid out in the book are followed.

Also, the book tells us how much we'll have to pay in taxes to import our T-shirt into the U.S.

Music: Leagues's "Mind Games," Dan Auerbach's "I Want Some More" and Goldspot's "The Border Line" Find us: Twitter/ Facebook/Spotify/ Tumblr. Download the Planet Money iPhone App.

Copyright 2020 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

You Count on Us, We Count on You: Donate to WUSF to support free, accessible journalism for yourself and the community.