Share
So Money with Farnoosh Torabi
2029: The Bond Market Explained: What It Means For Your Money
If you’ve been following the financial news lately, you may have noticed something unusual: the bond market is getting a lot of attention.
After a year of tariff shocks, interest-rate whiplash, tax policy changes and persistent questions about inflation and the national debt, bonds have moved from the financial pages into the broader economic conversation. And whenever markets get nervous about where the economy, inflation or government borrowing may be headed, attention tends to turn pretty quickly to the bond market.
Because this isn’t just Wall Street inside baseball.
The bond market influences the interest rate on your mortgage. It influences how much the federal government pays to borrow money. It affects companies trying to finance everything from infrastructure to AI data centers. And it can offer some important clues about how investors are feeling about inflation, growth, recession risk and even the creditworthiness of the United States.
So perhaps it’s time we understood bonds a little better.
And I have to admit, after more than a decade of hosting So Money, I don’t think we’ve ever dedicated an entire episode to them.
Today, we are fixing that.
My guest is Robin Wigglesworth, one of the financial journalists who has been covering these markets up close for years. Robin is an editor at the Financial Times, where he leads FT Alphaville, its influential markets and finance blog. He’s also the author of Trillions, his acclaimed history of the index-fund revolution and the rise of passive investing and ETFs.
His new book is called A Fabulous Debt: The Epic Story of How Bonds Built the Modern World, and it comes out September 22.
And I should emphasize: this is not a book about how to build a bond portfolio.
Robin has written essentially a people’s history of the bond market — and somehow made bonds genuinely entertaining. The story begins in Venice in 1171, takes us through Amsterdam and the development of modern finance, and brings us to America and Alexander Hamilton, whose decisions about government debt helped establish the creditworthiness of the young United States.
Robin’s larger argument is that we tend to think the stock market is the star of the financial system, when really the bond market is the foundation underneath it. In fact, as he tells me in our conversation, bonds are the “bedrock that the entire house rests upon.”
We talk about what the 10-year Treasury yield can tell you about the economy — and why it matters more to mortgage rates than many people realize. We talk about America’s nearly $40 trillion national debt and the big question: At what point does all of this borrowing actually become a problem?
We also get into something I found fascinating: bonds have quietly financed some of the biggest transformations in modern history. Railroads. Canals. Telecommunications. The internet. And now, potentially, the enormous buildout of artificial intelligence.
There are also fraudsters, scoundrels and some truly wild financial schemes along the way — including one man who essentially invented an entire country so he could sell its bonds
How's midlife going? Fill out Farnoosh's survey and help shape the podcast in 2027.
More episodes
View all episodes
2047: The Hidden Cost of Aging with Senator Andy Kim
29:46|What would you do if caring for a parent meant putting your own financial future—and your kids’—on hold?That’s not a hypothetical. It’s the reality facing millions of Americans right now, including Senator Andy Kim—a father of two, a son navigating his own father’s Alzheimer’s diagnosis, and now, one of the leading voices in Washington pushing for change.Today’s episode is a deeply personal and urgent conversation about the true cost of caregiving in America—financially, emotionally, and systemically.This interview is also a special crossover with The Montclair Pod, my local news podcast, where I co-host alongside Michael Schreiber—who you’ll hear in this conversation as well. Together, we sat down with Senator Kim to talk not just about policy, but about what happens when aging, illness, and money collide inside your own family.Before serving in the Senate, Andy Kim worked in national security and diplomacy, and today he represents nearly 10 million New Jersey residents. But in this conversation, what stands out most isn’t his title—it’s his story.He opens up about his father’s battle with Alzheimer’s, the impossible trade-offs of being in the sandwich generation, and how quickly a family’s financial plan can unravel in the face of long-term care costs.We talk about why so many families are blindsided, what Medicare does—and doesn’t—cover, why long-term care insurance is falling short, and what changes may be coming.Also check out: Caring for Aging Parents with Beth Pinsker2046: : Ask Farnoosh: Can I Pause My 401(k)? Plus, Parents With No Retirement Savings
36:40|Can you pause your 401(k) contributions when life gets expensive? This week on Ask Farnoosh: balancing retirement savings with immediate needs, navigating student loans after SAVE, and helping parents who have little saved for retirement. Plus, why some retirees are returning to work, a lawsuit challenging McDonald’s use of AI in pricing, and updates on Book to Brand, MidiCon and So Money’s midlife-focused next chapter.2045: The Joy of Money (Yes, Joy.)
41:04|Today I’m joined by Carrie Joy Grimes. founder of WorkMoney(opens in new tab) and the author of the new book The Joy of Money(opens in new tab). She’s a former union organizer who spent years helping workers fight for better wages and benefits while also trying to untangle her own complicated relationship with money — debt, shame, financial anxiety, all of it.In this episode, we talk about why so many women still avoid taking ownership of their finances, how to rebuild confidence after money mistakes, whether homeownership still makes sense, and how to separate what society tells us should make us happy from what actually does.We also talk about the inspiration behind her new book, The Joy of Money, and why she believes financial security is not just about numbers — it’s about feeling safer, freer, and more in control of your life.This episode originally aired on May 13.2044: A Million Dollar Retirement By 21 (Also, Life After the CPA Steals Your Money)
48:40|If you've ever felt like the math just doesn't work anymore, you're doing everything right, still coming up short on your housing payment, groceries, student loans, this episode's for you. My guest, Freddy Smith, spent nearly 20 years acting, including nine of those years on Days of Our Lives, before a business manager, who was supposed to be handling his money, stole it and stopped filing his taxes. Then came the pandemic. He lost the show. He moved to Florida and had to rebuild his finances from zero in a brand-new career. That personal collapse turned into a mission. Freddy started sharing what he was learning about taxes, investing, inflation, and the Fed on TikTok and Instagram, not as an expert, but as someone figuring it out in real time alongside his audience, and that honesty struck a nerve. He's now built a community of two million people in three years, and it's now the subject of his new book, Generation F'd: How Millennials and Gen Z Were Robbed of the American Dream and How We Can Fix Our Futures. In this conversation, Freddy and I get into why he thinks the real crisis for millennials and Gen Z is not financial illiteracy, it's wages that haven't kept pace with the actual cost of living. We talk about his big four: housing, student loans, childcare, and healthcare, why he thinks college needs a hard math test before anyone signs on the dotted line, his wild but genuinely compelling case for how a young person could retire with millions just by investing early, and why he's cautiously optimistic that his generation is about to be the one that finally changes the system. This episode first aired on July 27.2043: Ask Farnoosh: Trump Accounts, Moneymaxxing and Stay-at-Home Boyfriends (Replay)
41:44|This week on Ask Farnoosh, we unpack the latest updates to Trump Accounts, including new workplace contribution options that could make these child investment accounts more appealing for families. We also dive into the rise of "money maxxing"—what this viral trend gets right (and where it goes too far)—plus the surprising economics behind the stay-at-home boyfriend phenomenon.Also on the show: why customer service frustrations are fueling record levels of consumer rage, what Realtor.com's hottest ZIP codes reveal about today's housing market (including why Montclair, NJ, ranks #2), and answers to two listener questions on avoiding common pre-retirement mistakes and deciding where to put your next dollar after you've built an emergency fund and are saving for retirement.This episode originally aired on August 14, 2026.2042: From Burnout to Flow State: How to Achieve More Without Doing More
37:04|What happens when you've checked all the boxes? The career, the family, the financial success, the home. You've done everything you were supposed to do, and yet something still feels...off.Maybe you're exhausted. Maybe you've become so good at achieving that you don't actually know how to stop. Or maybe, as you move through midlife, you're starting to wonder: Is this really what I want? And who am I when I'm not busy getting things done?My guest today knows this reckoning intimately.Unni Turrettini is an author, speaker and former Wall Street professional whose latest book, Soulware, explores how we can reconnect with ourselves in a world that increasingly rewards productivity, performance and external validation.Unni spent years in high-pressure legal and financial roles, pushing herself so hard that she once physically collapsed at a professional event. But even after building what looked like a picture-perfect life, she found herself questioning why she still felt unfulfilled.Today, we're exploring the difference between healthy ambition and what Unni calls fear-driven overachieving. We'll talk about why midlife can trigger a crisis of identity, how to stop operating in constant survival mode, and why giving yourself permission to work less might actually make you more creative, productive and even profitable.And in a very timely twist, we'll explore how Unni uses AI, including ChatGPT, to help reconnect with herself rather than become even more dependent on technology.2041: Starting a Business in Midlife? Here’s Where to Find the Money
34:54|If you’ve ever thought about starting a business in midlife, you probably know the idea is often the easy part. Finding the money, the support and frankly the confidence to actually do it? That’s where things get complicated.Today we’re talking about what it really takes to launch and grow a business in your 40s, 50s and beyond, especially at a time when borrowing is expensive and traditional funding can be tough to come by.My guest is Trae Bodge, longtime consumer expert, entrepreneur and co-founder of the Threadneedle Alley Foundation, a nonprofit helping midlife entrepreneurs turn their ideas into sustainable businesses through grants and mentorship.Trae and I talk about where entrepreneurs can find funding right now, including grants that many business owners don’t even realize they qualify for, why applying for every grant you see may actually be a terrible strategy, and how even $5,000 can completely change the trajectory of a small business.We also get into something I think is especially important in midlife: building your own board of advisors. The people who can help you think through the things you don’t know, make smarter decisions and keep you from operating in a vacuum.Plus, Trae shares what she learned after reviewing more than 450 grant applications last year, including the surprisingly simple things that can move your application to the top of the pile.2040: Ask Farnoosh: 5 Smart Money Moves in Your 30s (Plus: Iced Coffee to an Interview?)
36:42|This week's Ask Farnoosh includes Farnoosh's best money moves in her 30's that led to more ease and financial flexibility in midlife. Plus: the cost of dinner and the iced coffee internet wars. Is it OK to bring an iced coffee to work? Check out the WSJ article about the hell that is family dinner planning.2039: How to Create Sticky Financial Habits
34:08|What if the reason your habits never seem to stick isn’t a lack of discipline—but the way you’ve been taught to build them?Today, I welcome back Monica Packer, founder of About Progress and author of the new book Sticky Habits: A Woman’s Guide to Reclaim Happiness, Ditch Perfectionism, and Create Habits That Last. Monica is a certified habits and identity coach who has helped thousands of women move away from all-or-nothing thinking and toward sustainable growth.We explore why so many of our best intentions fall apart the minute life gets busy, how perfectionism can sabotage our routines, and why lasting habits may have less to do with streaks, elaborate trackers, or waking up at 5 a.m. and more to do with identity, flexibility, and choosing progress over perfection.