The IBJ Podcast with Mason King

It's been nearly four months since host Mason King sat down with Peter "Pete the Planner" Dunn to talk about personal finance. In fact, their last get together took place in person—and it was March 12, what some are now calling Black Thursday 2020, the day Wall Street suffered its largest single-day percentage drop since 1987. Pete talks about what he got right and wrong about the economy, jobs an...

Angela Freeman is an attorney at Barnes & Thornburg, formerly a molecular biologist at Eli Lilly and Co., and is finishing up a six-year stint on the board of the not-for-profit Women & Hi Tech, the last year as president. And in those roles, she's served on a number of search and hiring committees, which have often been charged with hiring diverse candidates. Freeman talks with podcast host Mason...

The city of Indianapolis and Indy Chamber are close partners. Not only does Indy Chamber's Develop Indy division have a $1 million contract to handle the city's economic development efforts, the city has also given it millions of dollars for grants and loans to help companies deal with the pandemic. The Indy Black Chamber of Commerce, which launched in 2015, wants a piece of that action. Host Maso...

Indianapolis Motor Speedway officials are putting all their energy into running the Indy 500 with fans in August, despite continuing concerns about big crowds and the coronavirus. In fact, just weeks after IMS announced that NASCAR's Brickyard 400 would run in front of empty stands, the track's new owner—Roger Penske—said the Indy 500 would not run if fans couldn't be there. So we talked with IBJ...

Protests focused on racial inequality and police treatment of African Americans boiled over on May 29-30 into violence and vandalism that left businesses across downtown damaged and looted. Eric Wells, president of the Stadium Village Business Association, says the city failed to adequately protect businesses and has not communicated a plan or a vision for bringing the city's core back after the o...

Those familiar with Indianapolis-based Energy Systems Network say it’s one of the most innovative organizations in energy and transportation—not only in the state, but in the nation. But it’s not particularly well-known. Its officials prefer to work in the background while pushing forward initiatives like IndyGo’s bus rapid transit program, the Blue Indy electric car-sharing program, and an early...

Conversations around the family dinner table during the coronavirus crisis have taken on incredibly high stakes. Deciding whether or not the kids can see Grandma and Grandpa over the weekend now requires research into the latest physical distancing guidelines and any chronic conditions they might have. Deciding whether or not to play baseball, basketball or soccer in youth summer leagues requires...

Indiana Gov. Eric Holcomb has put himself in the public spotlight—or, if you will, the crosshairs of public opinion—nearly every weekday for the last two months, hosting press conferences about the state’s response to the coronavirus crisis. It is not an easy job, as the governor and his staff must address new fatalities, respond to questions that have no easy answer, and ask residents to make dif...

Hundreds of thousands of couple who for months have been picking preachers, flowers, venues, bridesmaid dresses, reception menus and deejay playlists now find themselves making a no-win decision: Do we keep the dates for our spring 2020 wedding and scale it way down, or do we reschedule the whole shebang and hope we’re not in the middle of another wave of infections? The coronavirus crisis and its...

As the economy swan-dives into a deep recession due to the coronavirus crisis, many of the people who live in apartments or rented homes find themselves in a frightening bind. Unemployment has surged in the working-class sectors, making it difficult for tens of thousands of tenants in Indiana to make their monthly rent payments. According to industry estimates, about 8% to 10% of renters were deli...

Last week, Indiana Gov. Eric Holcomb told businesses they needed to start planning to reopen, although he didn’t set a particular date—or, what’s probably more likely, a schedule of how restrictions gradually would loosen. That process could start as soon as early May. So, what do companies and restaurant think reopening will look like in a world still very wary of the coronavirus pandemic? How do...

Home sales in central Indiana have tumbled since the coronavirus crisis told hold in March. Home showings have cratered. The number of owners deciding to list their homes for sale has slumped well below average. That said, people are still buying and selling homes in central Indiana, even as public officials ask us to severely limit personal contact and any non-essential travel outside the home. H...

Mason King, the host of The IBJ Podcast, focuses this week on the pressures and challenges of trying to fulfill your obligations as an employee, spouse and parent during the "new normal" of sequestration, in an environment where those responsibilities easily collide. These dramas are playing out in a thousand different ways, so King invited local families to pose questions for his podcast intervie...

Just a few weeks ago, Indiana's new jobless claims numbered just a few thousand a week. Then the coronavirus shuttered the economy and Gov. Eric Holcomb ordered non-essential businesses to close. The result: The last week in March saw 146,243 new unemployment claims. The surge has flooded the state's computer system and its call center, and the Department of Workforce Department is quickly hiring...

Ed Sahm and his son, Eddie Sahm, started planning for the shutdown of the restaurant industry weeks before the coronavirus outbreak led city and state officials to order the closures. And so they were a little more ready than most owners to refocus Sahm's 16 restaurants. The result is an operation to benefit the not-for-profit Second Helpings, offer takeout at some locations, and open a series of...

The economy is at a standstill thanks to closures caused by fear about the spread of COVID-19. But it will likely come roaring back once the nation gets the coronavirus outbreak under control, says Phil Powell, the associate dean of academics programs at the IU Kelley School of Business in Indianapolis. Powell talks to podcast host Mason King about how companies should approach what he believes wi...

IBJ's personal finance columnist Peter Dunn is more worried about what the global pandemic will do to the economy than he is about what it will do (or has done) to the stock market. And he's most concerned about that economic impact on individuals and families—especially those who are vulnerable to layoffs. And so he talks with podcast host Mason King about what people can do to prepare for what h...

Nineteen hotel projects have been announced for downtown. If every one of them opens, they would add 4,203 more rooms to the central district of Indianapolis—an increase of more than 50%. But experts say it's unlikely all of those hotels will be built and opened. And in fact, three appear at least temporarily stalled. Host Mason King talks with IBJ real estate reporter Mickey Shuey about which pro...

Jon Laramore served as chief counsel for two governors and spent 10 years at what was then Faegre Baker Daniels. But he left in 2015 to become executive director at Indiana Legal Services, the state's largest, independent low-income law clinic, where he's expanded the number of people served as well as the organization's staff. He talks with host Mason King about the legal needs of people in pover...

IBJ's Mickey Shuey headed to Chicago for the 2020 NBA All-Star Game to see how the Windy City hosted what has become one of sports' biggest weekends. He wasn't alone, of course. Indy's All-Star Game host committee sent a big contingent to Chicago as well, to make sure they're as ready as possible to host some 100,000 fans when the game lands at Bankers Life Fieldhouse next year. Shuey details what...

A ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court last year could open the door to out-of-state liquor stores moving into Indiana. In fact, Maryland-based Total Wine & More, the nation’s largest retailer of beer, wine and spirits with 206 superstores, has filed an application to open a store at 1460 E. 86th St. in the Nora Corners Shopping Center. An Indiana Alcohol & Tobacco Commission hearing is scheduled for...

Hamilton County is emerging as a key player in the evolving hemp industry, primarily in the area of refining CBD oils from the plants for use in a variety of products. IBJ reporter Kurt Christian talks with host Mason King about what some are calling a "green rush," which follows a 2018 federal law that removed marijuana’s non-psychoactive cousin from the Controlled Substances Act. As a result, he...

Gary Brackett, a key part of the Colts' Super Bowl championship team in 2012, was a walk-on player at Rutgers University and wasn't drafted by an NFL team, forcing him to fight for a spot on the Indianapolis Colts. Along the way, he lost both his parents and his brother and wrote a book about his story. Now he's raising money to turn the book into a movie—in part by soliciting money privately but...

Lawmakers are meeting for their short session and are considering bills to ban handheld mobile-phone use while driving, require more transparency in health care and decouple student test scores from teacher evaluations. And they're also spending money (even though this isn't a budget year) on some university construction and other special projects. That's cash from the state's budget surplus, and...

Federal authorities have accused Community Health Network of engaging in a years-long scheme to recruit physicians and pay them huge salaries and bonuses in return for giving referrals to the Indianapolis-based health system, allowing it to improperly receive money from Medicare. The health network has denied the allegations, but the government's case is based at least in part on information broug...