What happens to your health data when it leaves your doctor’s office? In this episode of Interconnected, we uncover the hidden world of data brokers and algorithms shaping your health insurance premiums, often without your knowledge. Through the story of Maya—a composite character built from real experiences—we explore how apps, pharmacies, and loyalty programs collect your personal health information and feed it into an unregulated marketplace. Learn how data flows from your fitness tracker to brokers, insurers, and even employers, creating risk profiles that can affect everything from costs to opportunities. We ask the big questions: Who profits from your data? Why is it so hard to opt out? And what changes when we truly see how this system works?

Keywords: health data privacy, data brokers, health insurance, HIPAA, algorithmic bias, health data exploitation, insurance premiums, health surveillance, financial systems, personal data

A master's degree for entry-level jobs. Five years of experience for roles that didn't exist five years ago. Certifications, skills, portfolios—and it's still not enough. This isn't about you not being qualified. It's credential inflation: a broken system where degree requirements exploded while entry-level salaries stagnated.

We trace how this happened: why employers demand degrees they don't need, how résumé screening algorithms locked these requirements in place, and how student loan securitization created a $1.7 trillion debt market that profits from credential inflation. We follow universities expanding graduate programs that cost six figures but lead to jobs paying $41,000 a year. Then we find something unexpected: some companies hire without degree requirements—and they're faster, cheaper, and find better people.

So why isn't everyone doing it?

An investigation into the hidden economics of hiring, student debt, and why the job market broke—and what it would take to fix it.

Childcare costs more than rent. A toddler teacher earns $11 an hour—and can't afford to enroll her own daughter. A manufacturer loses skilled workers every time a preschool closes. This isn't a childcare problem. It's a trap. We trace how the childcare crisis became a closed system: Low wages drive 300% annual turnover among early childhood educators. High turnover destroys quality. Declining quality pressures parents to pay more, but tuition hikes force centers to cut hours or close entirely. When centers close, women exit the workforce—costing employers $12.7 billion annually in lost productivity.

Then the external pressures hit: Federal Reserve interest rate hikes stall childcare construction. Immigration backlogs remove one in five workers from the sector. Zoning laws push centers to industrial zones where parents won't drive. State tuition caps intended to help families instead tripled rural center closures in nine months.

But some cities and employers found the leverage points. Multnomah County raised educator wages to $18/hour—turnover dropped 27%. Denver's "Right-to-Care" ordinance created 400 new slots in nine months by opening underused spaces. One CFO called childcare "uptime insurance" and cut absenteeism 24% by subsidizing it directly.

An investigation into the hidden economics of childcare, workforce participation, and why working parents can't win—and the three pressure points that could break the trap open.