Vanek Smith moves to NPR’s economics beat

In a note to newsroom staff, Pallavi Gogoi, chief business editor, made the following announcement:

I’m thrilled to announce that Stacey Vanek Smith will be joining NPR’s Business Desk for a year as global economics correspondent to boost the network’s prize-winning coverage of the economy.

If ever there was a time to add to the network’s coverage of the tectonic shifts in the U.S. and global economy, it is now. The pandemic and its fallout has pushed the world into an era of dramatic and profound change. In the U.S., inflation is at the highest level in four decades, gas prices have recently seen record highs, mortgage rates have skyrocketed and, as we recently saw, the economy is now in recession territory.

Globally, inflation and supply chain disruptions have caused political unrest, leadership shakeups and overthrown governments. High gas prices, caused in part by the war in Ukraine, have rattled the global economy. Meanwhile the COVID pandemic continues to upend the lives of workers, change the destinies of companies and also the direction of economies across the world.

Stacey will join our top notch team comprised of chief economics correspondent Scott Horsley and business correspondent David Gura who have been firing on all cylinders in bringing insightful analysis and high-level explanatory journalism in its most urgent and essential form to our audience.

Stacey comes to the job after nearly a decade at NPR, where she has served as a correspondent and host for the award-winning Planet Money podcast and was one of the founding hosts of Planet Money’s daily Indicator podcast, where she and her team explored all aspects of the economy, from the job market to the stock market to the market for graphing calculators and developed a large and loyal listenership. Stacey also authored a book last year, Machiavelli For Women, about women in the workplace, based on economic data around equal pay, promotion and professional opportunity.

Before coming to NPR, Stacey worked at Marketplace as a host and correspondent for more than a decade. Stacey is a graduate of Princeton University and Columbia’s Graduate School of Journalism. Stacey says, “I’m absolutely thrilled to be joining the business desk, especially at such a critical moment for the US economy. I’m so excited to work with this talented team and to contribute to the exceptional work they do every day.”

Stacey will bring her economic expertise and unique storytelling sensibilities to the team and will continue to contribute to Planet Money, the Indicator and other NPR podcasts.

This is a one-year assignment for Stacey and she starts with the Business Desk on September 12.

I couldn’t be more excited to welcome Stacey to our team.