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Add to cart: Greenland

Houses on Ilulissat, one of the main tourist destinations in Greenland
Sean Gallup
/
Getty Images
Houses on Ilulissat, one of the main tourist destinations in Greenland

President Donald Trump's proposal that the United States take "ownership" of Greenland has raised a lot of eyebrows. Can the U.S. just buy itself this big territory? Is that a thing? Turns out if you look at U.S. history, it's absolutely a thing.

Today on the show: how massive land deals called "sovereignty purchases" have shaped the country we live in today, and why the idea of the U.S. buying Greenland is a lot more complicated than it would have been in the past.

For sponsor-free episodes of The Indicator from Planet Money, subscribe to Planet Money+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org.

Fact-checking by Sierra Juarez. Music by Drop Electric. Find us: TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, Newsletter.

Copyright 2025 NPR

Adrian Ma
Adrian Ma covers work, money and other "business-ish" for NPR's daily economics podcast The Indicator from Planet Money.
Wailin Wong
Wailin Wong is a long-time business and economics journalist who's reported from a Chilean mountaintop, an embalming fluid factory and lots of places in between. She is a host of The Indicator from Planet Money. Previously, she launched and co-hosted two branded podcasts for a software company and covered tech and startups for the Chicago Tribune. Wailin started her career as a correspondent for Dow Jones Newswires in Buenos Aires. In her spare time, she plays violin in one of the oldest community orchestras in the U.S.
Cooper Katz McKim
Cooper Katz McKim is an Assistant Producer for NPR's daily economics podcast The Indicator from Planet Money. Before The Indicator, McKim reported at NPR Member stations in South Carolina and Wyoming. At Wyoming Public Radio, he filed stories with NPR's Environment And Energy Collaborative on bankruptcies, carbon capture and economic transition. He's won a national Edward R. Murrow Award for Best Use of Sound. More recently, he's served as a podcast producer at Sports Illustrated and the HISTORY Channel. He graduated from Tufts University and now resides in Denver, Colorado, where he spends his time mountain biking and playing jazz piano. [Copyright 2024 NPR]
Paddy Hirsch
Kate Concannon
Kate Concannon is the Supervising Senior Editor at The Indicator from Planet Money. She leads this small, collaborative team of hosts, reporters and producers in making sense of crucial, but often complex and confusing, economic news in just 10 minutes a day.