Marketplace Features

SPEED
Speed Fact:

 

"Speed just means getting to where you want to go or end up faster, but missing the little side trips or joys of life until it's too late. . ."

Read more audience comments about Speed.

The pace of daily life is faster than ever. It differs from city to city, country to country, and it speaks volumes about a culture's economy and quality of life. June 25-29, Marketplace sprints cross-country to explore the costs and benefits of speed from a number of perspectives. The Speed series begins in Boston, America's fastest city, and ends in Los Angeles, its slowest—with stops in Houston, Indianapolis, and the Silicon Valley along the way.

Features from Marketplace and the Marketplace Morning Report will appear here after they air (in the swiftest manner possible, of course!). In the meantime, find out more about Speed and read what speed means to the Marketplace audience.

Features for June 29 - Los Angeles, California:
(All Features in RealAudio)

From Marketplace Morning Report

But I HATE Having to Wait: Sure, we all know we should slow down and that our lives are too hectic. But think of how many things could still use some goosing: ordering new furniture still takes forever, getting a new magazine subscription started, having a baby. Are there limits to how much we can speed things up? And is there a virtue in waiting? David Brancaccio essay of top 10 things that are slow and unlikely to change.

From Marketplace

The City of Angels: According to Levine, LA is the slowest city in the country. But those of us who live here know that's only part of the story. The image is we're all about sunglasses, fancy cars, the Hotel California. But a lot of people here who live a mellow lifestyle chose to operate at a rather fast place. Bob Levine helps reorient us to the lifestyle of the West.

The Ultimate Price: In Global Soul, Pico Iyer talks about our ability to travel around the world in the blink of an eye. What do we lose? A sense of place and a sense of self. As he eloquently puts it, "everywhere is so made up of everywhere else."

Here Today, Gone Tomorrow: For many companies, the ability to stay ahead of trends is key to the economic bottom line. But how do they keep up with popular likes and dislikes and consumer needs? Reporter Sarah Gardner will follow a trend-spotter as they work and find out what's at stake when it comes to the next big thing.

How Did We Get Here?: Time flies, but it hasn't always. John Rennie, Editor in Chief of Scientific American speaks about how humans are moving at faster speeds than ever imagined. NASA's scramjet will travel faster than 5,000 miles an hour. But this is not why, he argues, we're stressed out by speed. What causes us stress is how fast we demand that our environment moves around us, from fashion images, to business transactions, to social trends. It causes us great anxiety. He muses that it's because we humans are fickle, and have become afraid of the quiet.

David's Diary: All week, David has been keeping a journal of how fast he actually moved, when he wasted time, when journeys that were supposed to take two hours really took four.

 

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