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Four years ago, the pandemic sent the world economy into disarray. Panic buying led to widespread backlogs, with shipping gridlocks so bad you could see them in satellite images. It all revealed a troubling reality: Our global supply chain is incredibly fragile. Where did things go wrong? We discuss. Also, Tesla shareholders voted to restore CEO Elon Musk’s pay package valued at $44.9 billion, so let’s talk about how CEO pay gets determined.

Israel is withholding $35 million in tax revenues from the Palestinian Authority, which provides limited self-governance for the Palestinian people in the West Bank. The move threatens to worsen an already dire financial situation there, even as a war devastates Gaza, the other Palestinian enclave. Plus, big questions linger following the end of a strike at University of California campuses. And Wells Fargo fired some employees for “fake working.”

From the BBC World Service: Every year, more than a million Muslims from around the globe make a pilgrimage in Mecca. But there’s a lucrative trade in fake permits, and the number of scams has caused raised concerns for Saudi authorities. Then, Thailand scraps a planned $8 tourism fee for visitors arriving by air. And Virgin Australia is set to allow dogs and cats to fly in the main cabin of its planes.

Ride-hailing company Uber has lost its challenge to the California law that requires gig companies to provide employment rights to workers. We’ll have more about the legal and political saga on this week’s Marketplace Tech Bytes: Week in Review. Also, X — formerly Twitter — has made user “likes” private, marking another change to the platform’s identity and functionality since Elon Musk took over the social media company. But first, they’re calling it Apple Intelligence. That phrase was used about 60 times Monday during Apple’s annual developers confab. Marketplace’s Lily Jamali spoke with Joanna Stern, senior personal tech columnist at The Wall Street Journal. She attended the Worldwide Developers Conference in Cupertino, California, this week as Apple execs talked through the company’s entry into the AI race.

 

About 15 million Americans collectively have $49 million in medical debt on their credit reports, according to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. But a new proposed rule might remove these bills from their credit scores. We’ll explain. Plus, the domino effect of local elections being funded by national players. And, how Apple’s new AI features could change the language of emoji.

Here’s everything we talked about today:


“Vice President Kamala Harris On Sherri” from “Sherri”
“CFPB Proposes to Ban Medical Bills from Credit Reports” from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau
“CFPB Finds 15 Million Americans Have Medical Bills on Their Credit Reports” from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau
“Biden Proposes Dropping Medical Debt From Credit Reports” from The New York Times
“More parents are cosigning their kids’ mortgages” from Marketplace 
“Co-Borrowing Is on the Rise for First-Time Homebuyers” from Freddie Mac 
“Campaign donors hope money makes the difference in hotly contested states” from Marketplace
“Apple Intelligence in 5 minutes” from Apple
“Apple announces AI features” from Marketplace

Join us tomorrow for Economics on Tap! The YouTube livestream starts at 3:30 p.m. Pacific time, 6:30 p.m. Eastern. We’ll have news, drinks, a game and more.

The job market is weakening, according to recent data. Higher unemployment is a good sign — if you’re the Federal Reserve and want to cut interest rates. It’s bad, of course, if you’re a job seeker. We tackle this paradox in today’s episode. Plus: Cities adjust their tech-hub dreams, improved hurricane forecasting saves billions in damage, and Black workers pay a high price in the clean energy transition.