The world of economics has these two different sides. One one side, there are the economists in their cozy armchairs and dusty libraries, high up in their ivory towers. On the other, there's the messy world we're all living in, where those economics are actually playing out. Sometimes, researchers will write about something that they themselves have never actually experienced. Sure, they've thought about it, theorized, come up with smart analyses...but that's not the same as getting out of that armchair and into the real world. So, in this episode, we play our own version of Never Have I Ever. We dare two researchers to go places and do things they have never done before, in hopes of learning something new about the economic world around us. (Okay, fine, it's maybe more like Truth or Dare...but go with us here.) Today's episode was hosted by Alexi Horowitz-Ghazi and produced by Emma Peaslee with help from Willa Rubin. It was edited by Sally Helm, fact checked by Sierra Juarez and engineered by Maggie Luthar. Alex Goldmark is our executive producer. Help support Planet Money and get bonus episodes by subscribing to Planet Money+ in Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org/planetmoney. Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices NPR Privacy Policy
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A few weeks ago, I found myself standing around the storied office water cooler chatting with my colleague Darian woods from our sister show, the indicator.
He was telling me about this kind.
Of fun new economics paper he'd just come across.
The researchers had used cell phone tracking data to map out socioeconomic diversity in America and they identified the place where the widest array of people from across the socioeconomic spectrum were most likely to actually rub shoulders in the same physical location.
And that place was pretty surprising.
It turns out that according to this cell phone data rich and poor and middle class people are most likely to mingle not in public parks or in the pews of a church but inside of moderately expensive chain restaurants places like Applebee's or Olive Garden or the australian themed outback steakhouse.
Now, I happen to know that Darian is part australian.
So when he then told me that never had he ever been to an outback steakhouse, that got my attention.
And when he reminded me that he was also a vegetarian I knew we didn't really have a choice.
I had to take Darian, the australian vegetarian, on an adventure.
Darian Woods.
Alexi Horowitz Ghazi.
Good to see you.
Fancy seeing you here outside the outback steakhouse.
A few days later, we found ourselves at an outback steakhouse in Bayside, Queens.
We were mostly there to cross an item off of my bucket list for Darien.
Right, reason enough.
But we also wanted to get some anecdote about whether or not it's true that people of all income levels are hanging out together at the outback stakehouse.
But first, of course, we had to eat.