Dilemma on Wall Street: Short-Term Gain or Climate Benefit?
Portfolio managers have conflicting incentives as the economic and financial risks from climate change become more apparent but remain imprecise.
By Lydia DePillis
I pay close attention to all kinds of data and research that tell us about the health of the U.S. economy, what’s going on with American workers and businesses, and how they’re affected by public policy. To understand what that means on the ground, I often travel to meet people where they are, whether it’s the scene of a recent forest fire or a university contending with shrinking enrollment.
I’m particularly fascinated by the ways in which climate change is warping everything from agriculture to the financial system, the shifting bargaining power of American labor, and why cities and regions grow or shrink.
While most of my work is explanatory, I also consider it part of my job to expose wrongdoing and hold power to account.
I’ve been a journalist since 2003, when I started writing for my high school newspaper in Seattle, and turned professional after graduating from college in 2009 with a major in history.
Since then, I’ve covered beats that helped me understand the many corners of the economy: real estate and land use at The Washington City Paper, technology at The New Republic, labor and finance at The Washington Post, and the energy industry at The Houston Chronicle. I first handled the national economy while writing for CNN, and then learned investigative techniques covering federal agencies at the nonprofit investigative newsroom ProPublica.
I joined The Times in 2022, and I live in Queens.
As a Times journalist, I share the values and adhere to the standards of integrity outlined in The Times’s Ethical Journalism handbook. The guiding principle in my work is to maintain an open mind. That means carefully assessing the data, interrogating popular narratives, interviewing people with a wide variety of backgrounds and perspectives, and consciously accounting for my own biases. I also obsess over accuracy. I make every effort to ensure everything I report is true, but if there is an error, I ensure corrections are made quickly and completely. I do not directly trade individual stocks, have personal relationships with the people I cover, or accept compensation of any kind from interest groups.
Tell me how you’re doing financially and what stories you think we should write about the economy; share your thoughts here.
Email: [email protected]
Signal: 202-913-3717
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Portfolio managers have conflicting incentives as the economic and financial risks from climate change become more apparent but remain imprecise.
By Lydia DePillis
This was featured in live coverage.
By Lydia DePillis
This was featured in live coverage.
By Lydia DePillis
Hiring was unexpectedly robust in May, with a gain of 272,000 jobs, but it wasn’t all good news: The unemployment rate ticked up, to 4 percent.
By Lydia DePillis
Year-over-year inflation hovered at 2.7%. The Federal Reserve has been waiting for firmer evidence that rapid price increases are behind it.
By Lydia DePillis
The Biden administration aims to better support small farmers while still aiding big operations and rewarding climate-friendly practices. It’s a tall order.
By Lydia DePillis
An enormous amount of work is underway to remove carbon from the atmosphere, but who will pay for it?
By Lydia DePillis
This was featured in live coverage.
By Lydia DePillis
Employers added 175,000 jobs in April, a milder pace than in the winter months, though layoffs have remained low and most sectors appear stable.
By Lydia DePillis
White House officials have barnstormed Wisconsin to make the connection between big changes and their signature laws.
By Lydia DePillis
Long-term undocumented immigrants — and their employers — are feeling left out by Biden administration policies allowing most who just crossed the border to work legally.
By Miriam Jordan and Lydia DePillis
The Wendy’s debacle is a warning shot for brands: If you want to play with prices, make sure to communicate why and whom it could help.
By Lydia DePillis
As forests succumb to ever-fiercer wildfires, the federal government and some adventurous private companies are trying to resuscitate an industry.
By Lydia DePillis
This was featured in live coverage.
By Lydia DePillis
This was featured in live coverage.
By Lydia DePillis
This was featured in live coverage.
By Lydia DePillis
This was featured in live coverage.
By Ben Casselman and Lydia DePillis
Economists are trying to gauge whether forecasts of a slowing labor market were mistaken or just premature. For now, gains are consistent and strong.
By Lydia DePillis
Voters feel slightly better about the economy as inflation recedes, but partisan divides remain deep, a Times/Siena poll found.
By Ben Casselman, Lydia DePillis and Christine Zhang
Immigrants aided the pandemic recovery and may be crucial to future needs. The challenge is processing newcomers and getting them where the jobs are.
By Lydia DePillis
“Natural asset companies” would put a market price on improving ecosystems, rather than on destroying them.
By Lydia DePillis
This was featured in live coverage.
By Lydia DePillis
U.S. employers added 353,000 jobs in January, far exceeding forecasts, and revised figures showed last year was even stronger than previously reported.
By Lydia DePillis
The buyout giant KKR pioneered a model of granting ownership stakes to employees at portfolio companies. Now it wants the approach to spread.
By Lydia DePillis
With climate change affecting everything from household finances to electric grids, the profession is increasingly focused on how society can mitigate carbon emissions and cope with their impact.
By Lydia DePillis
Franchisees are fighting Choice Hotels’ attempted takeover of its biggest rival, which would create a dominant player in the budget hotel sector.
By Lydia DePillis
Interest rate increases have taken the edge off labor demand, but unemployment dipped in November, and wages rose more than expected.
By Lydia DePillis
The Times’s economics team is looking for reader input on what you’re going through financially and what you see in your community.
By Lydia DePillis, Ben Casselman, Jeanna Smialek and Talmon Joseph Smith
Interest rate increases have taken the edge off labor demand, but unemployment dipped in November, and wages rose more than expected.
By Lydia DePillis
Unemployment is low and people are still spending. But that doesn’t mean they think things are going well.
By Sabrina Tavernise, Shannon Lin, Mary Wilson, Asthaa Chaturvedi, Eric Krupke, Luke Vander Ploeg, M.J. Davis Lin, Lisa Chow, Lexie Diao, Marion Lozano, Dan Powell and Alyssa Moxley
A majority of those who backed President Biden in 2020 say today’s economy is fair or poor, ordinarily a bad omen for incumbents seeking re-election.
By Lydia DePillis
As the Biden administration prepares to toughen air quality standards, health benefits are weighed against the cost of compliance.
By Lydia DePillis
More than three years since the beginning of the pandemic, more than 100 million workers are back to commuting or never stopped. For many, their commutes have changed in ways both good and bad. Take a data-driven dive into what’s happened to the American commute.
By Lydia DePillis, Emma Goldberg and Ella Koeze
Gross domestic product expanded at a 4.9 percent annual rate over the summer, powered by prodigious consumer spending. But the pace is not expected to be sustained.
By Lydia DePillis
Everyone who relies on credit in America is confronting a new reality: Money will cost more for a good long while.
By Lydia DePillis
Pandemic disruptions drove the expenses associated with owning a car through the roof, creating a financial burden that many drivers didn’t bargain for.
By Lydia DePillis, Rebecca Lieberman and Crista Chapman
Factors including catastrophes linked to climate change are prompting insurers to raise premiums — a “hardening” market.
By Lydia DePillis
The increase in poverty reversed two years of large declines. Median income, adjusted for inflation, fell 2.3 percent to $74,580.
By Ben Casselman and Lydia DePillis
Hiring continues to contend with higher interest rates as the economy loses the momentum built up from the end of pandemic lockdowns.
By Lydia DePillis
Walkouts by screenwriters and actors have meant less work in fields that cater to the TV and film industry.
By Lydia DePillis
Employers added 187,000 jobs in August and unemployment rose to 3.8 percent as the economy continued to lose momentum built up after pandemic lockdowns.
By Lydia DePillis
The fallout is probably limited — and there may be some upside for American interests.
By Lydia DePillis
The federal wage floor of $7.25 is increasingly irrelevant when even most teenagers are earning twice that. But what happens when the economy cools?
By Ben Casselman and Lydia DePillis
A price index that is largely composed of domestic tickets has been below prepandemic levels for two months.
By Lydia DePillis
This was featured in live coverage.
By Lydia DePillis
Employers added 187,000 workers in July, a slower pace than the recent norm, but “more sustainable,” one economist said.
By Lydia DePillis
If you have never had the option to work from home because your job must be done in person, tell us how your commute has shifted over the past three years.
By Lydia DePillis and Emma Goldberg
Shortages of state and city personnel, especially those who must work on site, are so dire that unions are helping to get people in the door.
By Lydia DePillis
Ticket prices are subject to several idiosyncratic factors, but they have eased markedly since last summer’s surge in demand.
By Lydia DePillis
The Consumer Price Index climbed far more slowly in June, a relief for shoppers and a hopeful — though inconclusive — sign that America might pull off a “soft landing.”
By Jeanna Smialek
Wildfires are hurting many industries and could strain households across Canada, one of many countries reckoning with the impact of extreme weather.
By Lydia DePillis
Economic growth is often seen as incompatible with conservation. It doesn’t have to be that way, economists say.
By Lydia DePillis and Manuela Andreoni
Three years of relief from payments on $1.6 trillion in student debt allowed for other borrowing and spending — and will shift into reverse.
By Lydia DePillis
The car market has helped keep inflation too hot for comfort, but there are signs of easing as new supplies comes online.
By Lydia DePillis
It wouldn’t be the last time the media would grapple with whether to publish something that might inspire others to take harmful actions.
By Lydia DePillis
The Inflation Reduction Act contains tax breaks for solar and wind companies to buy American equipment. Qualifying won’t be easy.
By Lydia DePillis
Health care, government and professional and business services powered the strong growth, but manufacturing has flattened.
By Lydia DePillis
If you’re planning a big cookout on Memorial Day, the Alabama grocer Jimmy Wright recommends chicken. Here’s why.
By Lydia DePillis
Financial markets are still betting that Congress and the White House will strike a deal. But the uncertainty alone is having consequences.
By Lydia DePillis and Ben Casselman
Prices of new and used vehicles were supposed to recede quickly as supply chain problems dissipated. The market had other ideas.
By Lydia DePillis and Jeanna Smialek
The market for vehicles has been surprisingly robust, slowing inflation’s decline.
By Lydia DePillis
The unemployment rate fell to 3.4 percent as the labor market showed enduring strength.
By Lydia DePillis
Employers added 253,000 jobs in April and unemployment fell to 3.4 percent, but the labor market’s strength complicates the Fed’s inflation fight.
By Lydia DePillis
Factories that roared out of the recession have stalled, hampering the economy, even as a new wave of production looms.
By Lydia DePillis
Discontented franchisees have found allies among state legislators and federal regulators in pushing for new laws and rules, but change has been slow.
By Lydia DePillis
The first Black woman to serve as chief economist at the Labor Department advanced the idea that lifting up people on the margins helps everyone else, too.
By Lydia DePillis
This was featured in live coverage.
By Lydia DePillis
Employers added 236,000 jobs as the Federal Reserve’s interest-rate increases appeared to take a toll. The unemployment rate fell to 3.5 percent.
By Lydia DePillis
Job-switching barriers are routine at TV stations, even for workers not on the air. A proposed federal rule would curb the practice across all fields.
By Lydia DePillis
Artificial intelligence is confronting white-collar professionals more directly than ever. It could make them more productive — or obsolete.
By Lydia DePillis and Steve Lohr
Declining student enrollment is hitting the rural areas that rely on universities. They’re trying to adapt to survive.
By Lydia DePillis
The Labor Department report follows unexpectedly strong hiring at the opening of the year. The growth in hourly earnings slowed.
By Lydia DePillis
The economy added 311,000 jobs in February despite higher interest rates. But hourly earnings rose more slowly as the pool of available workers grew.
By Lydia DePillis
While the Biden administration has accelerated processing after Trump-era restrictions and a pandemic slowdown, visa backlogs remain large.
By Lydia DePillis
The industry has been rebuilding after the pandemic lockdowns. Professional and business services and government employers also hired briskly.
By Lydia DePillis
The Labor Department found a rise in the number of posted jobs per worker in December, despite the Fed’s efforts to cool the labor market.
By Lydia DePillis
The same playbook that has notched high returns acquiring things like foreclosed homes and highway rest stops is being tested by a family-oriented franchise.
By Lydia DePillis and Michael Corkery
The Biden administration has set out to measure the economic value of ecosystems, offering new statistics to weigh in policy decisions.
By Lydia DePillis
Trillions of dollars in government spending will profoundly affect the labor market, but in ways hard to measure, and mostly under the surface.
By Lydia DePillis
This was featured in live coverage.
By Lydia DePillis
The number of people receiving unemployment benefits has been rising, even as new claims remain low.
By Lydia DePillis
The Federal Reserve’s moves to cool the economy with higher interest rates seem to be taking gentle hold. Wage growth lost momentum.
By Lydia DePillis
This was featured in live coverage.
By Lydia DePillis
From Barbiecore to revenge travel, social media trends gave us a clear picture of the forces reshaping the economy.
By Jeanna Smialek
Core inflation, which strips out volatile food and energy prices, slowed to 6 percent over the year, an indication that price increases are slowing broadly.
By Lydia DePillis
Climate change is reshaping the American economy. New Mexico is leaning on ecotourism and sustainable industries to see it through, but extreme weather keeps getting in the way.
By Lydia DePillis
The Labor Department report gauged the impact of the Federal Reserve’s campaign to tame inflation by tamping down hiring.
By Lydia DePillis
People have stayed on the sidelines for a variety of reasons, complicating the Federal Reserve’s push to ease pressure on wages.
By Lydia DePillis
Employers added 263,000 workers in November, even as some industries showed signs of a slowdown. Wage growth exceeded expectations.
By Lydia DePillis
Men ages 35 to 44 are staging a lackluster rebound from pandemic job loss, despite a strong economy.
By Jeanna Smialek, Lydia DePillis and Ben Casselman