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Planet Money
2:54 am
Fri December 7, 2012

Why The Falling Birth Rate Is Bad News For My 2-Year-Old Son

Credit Alex Blumberg / NPR
Please don't make me pay for your retirement.
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Originally published on Fri December 7, 2012 7:26 am

The U.S. birthrate just fell to its lowest point since we've been keeping track. Here's why that may be a problem for my 2-year-old son.

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All Tech Considered
2:53 am
Fri December 7, 2012

To Catch A Suspect — On Pinterest

Credit Pinterest
People wanted by the police in Pottstown, Pa., are displayed on the Pinterest page of a local newspaper. The police department's social media strategy, which aims to get the images of criminals seen by more people, has also been adapted in Philadelphia.
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Originally published on Fri December 7, 2012 9:35 am

Pinterest is known as a place where people share recipes, crafts or fashion. But a new set of images have started showing up on the social media site: mug shots.

Bonnie Stankunas has come to the post office in Pottstown, Pa., her entire life. She remembers, as a kid, spotting "most wanted" posters hung on a wall.

"It kind of reminded me of the Wild, Wild West," Stankunas says.

None of the people at this post office remembers exactly when the posters went away, but the FBI stopped sending the notices out a couple of years ago.

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The Salt
2:50 am
Fri December 7, 2012

In Farmer's Market, A Free Market Rises In Cuba

Credit Greg Kahn / Getty Images
Cuba has relaxed some business rules, allowing street vendors to sell produce and a large wholesale produce market to open at night on the edge of Havana.
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Originally published on Fri December 7, 2012 8:30 pm

Cuba has no shortage of fertile farmland, but the country spends $1.5 billion a year importing about 70 percent of its food.

The communist government's chronic struggle to get farmers to produce more is forcing authorities to grudgingly accept a greater role for market principles and the profit motive.

Now authorities seem willing to go another step further, tolerating the rise of what might be described as Cuba's "free-est" market.

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Space
2:49 am
Fri December 7, 2012

Is Another Moon Mission Written In The Stars?

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Credit NASA
Apollo 17 was the sixth and final Apollo mission to the moon. Here, lunar module pilot Harrison "Jack" Schmitt, Cmdr. Eugene Cernan and command module pilot Ron Evans pose in the lunar vehicle.
Credit NASA
Apollo 17 blasted off just after midnight on Dec. 7, 1972.
Credit NASA
Cernan is seen in the command module during the outbound trip to the moon.
Credit NASA
Cernan tests the lunar vehicle. He and Schmitt landed in the moon's Taurus-Littrow region. Evans stayed behind, orbiting the moon.
Credit NASA
During their stay on the moon, the astronauts set up scientific experiments, took photographs and collected lunar samples.
Credit NASA
Cernan photographed Schmitt while he set up a transmitter used in a geological experiment.
Credit NASA
Schmitt is photographed standing next to a huge, split lunar boulder at the Taurus-Littrow landing site. The lunar roving vehicle is visible in the background. This photo is made from two frames from one of Apollo 17's cameras.
Credit NASA
Schmitt stands by the American flag during a moonwalk. Look above the flag — that's Earth, a quarter-million miles away.
Credit NASA
Apollo 17's lunar module rendezvous with the command module.
Credit NASA
A camera aboard the Apollo 17 spacecraft captured this glimpse of Earth peeking out above the lunar horizon during the final lunar mission.
Credit NASA
Cmdr. Eugene Cernan tests the lunar vehicle on the surface of the moon during the Apollo 17 mission.
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Originally published on Fri December 7, 2012 8:23 am

On Dec. 7, 1972, NASA launched its final human mission to the moon. Forty years later, Apollo 17 commander Eugene Cernan says he'd love to give up his claim to fame as "the last man on the moon."

"I'd like to be able to shake the hand of that young man or young woman who replaces me in that category," Cernan told NPR. "But unfortunately, the way things have gone and the way things are looking for the future, at least the near-term future, that won't happen in my lifetime. And that truly is disappointing."

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U.S.
6:46 pm
Thu December 6, 2012

Crime-Ridden Camden To Dump City Police Force

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Credit Alisa Chang / NPR
Camden City Police Chief Scott Thomson says he has shooting investigations "backlogging like burglary cases." Half of his force was laid off last year, and the city says expensive benefits in the police union contract are preventing them from hiring more cops.
Credit Alisa Chang / NPR
Because of the city's high crime rate, protective iron bars encase the front porches of many houses in Camden. Residents call them "bird cages."
Credit Alisa Chang / NPR
Memorials to shooting victims can be seen throughout Camden on front porches, at the side of houses and on empty lots.
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Originally published on Thu December 6, 2012 7:54 pm

As the New Jersey city of Camden blasts through its all-time-high homicide record — exceeding 60 murders so far this year — city officials have an unusual solution to rising crime: laying off the entire police department.

Year after year, Camden ranks as one of the most dangerous cities in America based on several categories: murders, rapes, assaults and robberies. But the city says it's too poor to hire more police officers. So it's dissolving its municipal police force and letting the county set up a bigger, cheaper force to replace it.

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