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DAVID GREENE, HOST:

NPR's business news starts with some tough luck in Atlantic City.

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RENEE MONTAGNE, HOST:

Amazing but true, Popeye and Frosty the Snowman have something in common with General Douglas MacArthur and Mark Twain. They're all known for smoking a corn cob pipe. Corn cob pipes have made a comeback in recent years, welcomed news for the last company in the U.S. mass producing them. It's located in Washington, Missouri, about an hour west of St. Louis.

Still, as St. Louis Public Radio's Rachel Lippmann reports, last summer's brutal heat and drought have been a big challenge.

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Our last word in business today is: ambulance taxis.

DAVID GREENE, HOST:

We've all probably thought about it. Sitting in traffic, an ambulance zooms past and you think, I mean, if only I had one of those sirens.

MONTAGNE: Right. And in Moscow, someone saw a business opportunity. Canada's National Post reports that ads have started popping up online offering rides in ambulances for $200 an hour.

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Now to a debate over abortion that has escalated after some recent moves by states. The North Dakota legislature just passed a series of bills, including the strictest abortion ban in the country. And lawmakers there voted to put a constitutional amendment on the ballot next year which would end abortion entirely. Earlier this month, Arkansas passed a 12-week ban. NPR's Kathy Lohr reports that more states are debating stricter laws with hopes of getting one of them before the U.S. Supreme Court.

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And out next business story fits in the category of what were they thinking? Ford Motor Company is apologizing for ads sketched up by an agency in India - ads that have been decried as demeaning to women. They are cartoon drawings showing off how spacious a Ford trunk can be. One spoofs Italy's former prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi. He's at the wheel, and in the trunk, three women, tied up.

NPR's Sonari Glinton reports.

Cyprus has reached a bailout with the European Union. One of the hardest hit groups in this deal is super wealthy Russians. David Greene talks to professor Alena Ledeneva of University College London about the culture of the ultra rich in Russia, and the role they played in Cyprus' economy.

The U.S. and Mexico have a long rivalry on the soccer field. They take the field again Tuesday in a game that holds political, cultural and competitive importance. It's a World Cup qualifier.

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Imagine a world with no tax returns.

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GREENE: OK, it's just a fantasy. But actually, in some countries taxpayers can sign up to receive simply a bill. The government sends you a tax bill, you pay it and, voila, that's it.

Now, there was an effort to bring return-free filing to the United States, but that effort came up against stiff opposition. And to find out why, we called Liz Day of ProPublica. She's been digging into this issue.

Liz, thanks for joining us.

Loneliness hurts, but social isolation can kill you. That's the conclusion of a study of more than 6,500 people in the U.K.

The study, by a team at University College London, comes after decades of research showing that both loneliness and infrequent contact with friends and family can, independently, shorten a person's life. The scientists expected to find that the combination of these two risk factors would be especially dangerous.