.... as the story discusses
NYT economics reporter. Just checking things out over here.
1,094 followers 369 following 73 posts
view profile on Bluesky
.... as the story discusses
From me today: Squinting at GDP numbers, it's become clear that A.I. is propping up the economy -- not through productivity growth, but simply the sheer amount of money going into physical infrastructure needed to support all the computing power it gobbles up. www.nytimes.com/2025/08/27/b...
Joining @thebrianlehrershow.bsky.social shortly to talk trade and economy and stuff. Hop on that @wnyc.org channel
Labor market and inflation data have taken a turn for the worse over the past few weeks. But this economy has taken a bunch of hits in recent years and kept on ticking, so economists aren't doomcasting yet. Here's my effort to put it all together: www.nytimes.com/2025/08/19/b...
One more from my stint in South Korea: At last count, some 7 million people studied abroad. As Trump pushes away international students, it appears that fewer of them will come to American schools. But Southeast Asia is aggressively taking up the slack. www.nytimes.com/2025/08/14/b...
With @bencasselman.bsky.social and Alan Rappeport, a bit more on President Trump's pick to lead the BLS, Dr. E.J. Antoni III. The nomination has elicited strong concerns about the integrity of data that policymakers, investors, and journalists all depend on. www.nytimes.com/2025/08/12/b...
That's interesting, I hadn't realized Customs was requiring lists of parts. Do you want to tell me more about it, Barb? lydia.depillis@nytimes.com Thanks so much!
I dug into the transshipment provision of the big reciprocal tariffs now in effect. Trade lawyers suspected that something bigger was in the works: A new plan for charging higher rates on all third-country parts & materials. Turns out they were right -- www.nytimes.com/2025/08/08/b...
What's the deal with all these energy purchase commitments in Trump's trade deals? Why the U.S. is overselling and our trade partners are overbuying, with the actual expert @rfelliott.bsky.social : www.nytimes.com/2025/07/31/b...
South Korea tried hard for a tariff rate lower than its chief rivals, Japan and the E.U. It failed, despite hundreds of billions of dollars in commitments for new energy purchases and investments. Details remain hazy on what market access it gave up. www.nytimes.com/2025/07/30/b...
Story with the indispensable @bhadrarukum.bsky.social and photos by Rebecca Conway.
I detoured from my 🇰🇷 detail to check out a 👀 situation in 🇳🇵: E.V.s are taking over the auto market. It shows what can happen when a country pulls out all the stops to leverage its energy assets and fight pollution. With a little help from 🇨🇳. www.nytimes.com/2025/07/28/b...
Thank you Shannon!
From me today: Countries threatened by Trump's tariff letters are still trying to talk him down. But over the medium to longer term, they're looking for ways to deal less with the U.S. altogether. www.nytimes.com/2025/07/13/b...
Many of the 14 nations that received tariff letters from President Trump yesterday had tried for months to find something that would satisfy the White House. Ultimately, none of it worked. And now it begins again. Our story from across Asia: www.nytimes.com/2025/07/08/b...
Answer: read the story!
Meanwhile! I'm in Seoul for the next month, sitting in for the eminent @daiwaka.bsky.social. Here's a story about the South Korean stock market, which is blowing everybody's socks off right now: www.nytimes.com/2025/07/03/b...
Delighted to team up again with @christinezhang.bsky.social, with a big assist from @bencasselman.bsky.social.
For the few years I've been covering jobs reports, and one sector typically rises above the rest, quietly hiring by the thousands: Health care. How taking care of humans became the biggest employer in America, and what it means for the rest of us: www.nytimes.com/interactive/...
Also today, I take a look at the melding of labor unions and immigrant organizing that made Los Angeles the place where protests against Trump's deportation agenda were almost certain to take off first. www.nytimes.com/2025/06/11/b...
Tickled to team up today with @christinezhang.bsky.social for this exploration of how tariff revenue is shaping up and whether it could really fill the fiscal hole the Big GOP Spending/Tax/Etc. Bill would create: www.nytimes.com/2025/06/11/b... (Spoiler: Probably not. Among other problems.)
Hi Michael, one of the story authors here, thanks for noticing this! My sources think G.S.A. probably asserted ownership when Christie's listed the painting -- the staff monitor auctions in case New Deal art pops up. The GSA recently won a lawsuit in a similar case: law.justia.com/cases/federa...
One of DOGE's casualties was most of the small team that cares for the nation's sprawling art collection. Now, a Trump friend wants to loan out the works to museums and governments around the world. Me today with the great Robin Pogrebin and Graham Bowley: www.nytimes.com/2025/06/08/a...
Reupping for the morning crowd:
Without reforms, the incentive to employ people who aren't supposed to be here won't change. If they're all expelled, we'll see fewer homes built, meals served, homes cleaned, and loved ones cared for. Here's that story again -- and I'm sure much more to come. www.nytimes.com/2025/06/07/u...
Making it much more difficult to work in America without papers may force people to leave and deter others from coming. But experts told me that the fundamental economic dynamics haven't shifted: Employers still need labor, and the native-born work force won't fill the gap.
The Trump administration is trying to break that uneasy duality. The last few weeks have seen an escalation in ICE raids on work sites, as the White House pushes to boost deportations by targeting the places where unauthorized immigrants go to earn a living.
For decades, employing undocumented immigrants has been technically illegal but functionally tolerated. With a political system that has proven unable to deal with the fact that many industries depend on these workers, they pay taxes and get hired with forged or stolen documents.
Today from me and @londonoe.bsky.social: The White House is stepping up workplace immigration enforcement, and there's some stuff you should understand. www.nytimes.com/2025/06/07/u...
A pleasure to work with Eileen Sullivan on this story about the widening impact of federal job cuts, which have cascaded into the private sector as contracts are yanked. Entire fields are contracting dramatically, leaving many with nowhere to go. www.nytimes.com/2025/06/06/u...
Today with Madeleine Ngo: The GOP tax bill, and other Trump administration actions, make a show of targeting illegal immigrants. But mostly what they do is cut *legally admitted* immigrants off federal benefits, as well as their *U.S. citizen* family members. www.nytimes.com/2025/05/27/u...
Incredible work from Upshot worthies
Today from me: Under Kelly Loeffler, the Small Business Administration is cutting staff, tightening lending standards, terminating programs for women and veterans, and barring loan applications from companies that have even one drop of non-American investment. www.nytimes.com/2025/05/23/b...
Today from me: President Trump is doing everything he can to raise carbon emissions. But his economic policy may end up curtailing them, at least temporarily, for reasons that no climate economist would celebrate. www.nytimes.com/2025/04/29/b...
Great job alert: Being my editor! Awesome super-nerds only please. job-boards.greenhouse.io/thenewyorkti...
friends don't let friends cite the Atlanta Fed GDP forecasting model when confronting the president with how his acts of economic self-sabotage are likely to affect growth:
Quite a day (and late night). It started with an accidental memo that tore up the Trump admin’s case against congestion pricing. By morning, the DOT was accusing its own lawyers of sabotage, and by afternoon, those lawyers were out. The case is just warming up www.nytimes.com/2025/04/24/n...
Astonished as always by reporting from Keith Bradsher and others on the extent of automation in Chinese factories. They're just light years ahead. www.nytimes.com/2025/04/23/b...
Wow -- clean energy investment is already falling in the face of policy uncertainty, lingering high interest rates, and now tariffs. www.cleaninvestmentmonitor.org/reports/us-c...
It's nearly three weeks after Liberation Day, and although there's no guarantee any tariff will stick around longer than a few hours, business leaders are still figuring out ways to deal with the new reality. Today from me: www.nytimes.com/2025/04/20/b...
NEW: Entire scientific fields have been wiped out by the nearly 800 grants cancelled at NIH, finds a @nature.com analysis of the unprecedented cuts. About half of all 2024 NIH projects related to LGBT+ health or vaccine hesitancy — gone. See the other topics and US states hardest hit here:
Trump administration officials are recommending the elimination of the scientific research division at the NOAA, according to internal documents and people with knowledge of the situation.
here's a gift link! www.nytimes.com/2025/04/10/b...
There are a handful of apparel brands that proudly cut and sew their clothing in America. Even they're not cheering the wild, on-again-off-again tariffs coming out of the White House. I took a field trip to the garment district to learn why: www.nytimes.com/2025/04/10/b...
This sums up the internal inconsistency of the whole tariff gambit. Parts of the White House want it to be either a negotiating ploy, a revenue generator, or an industrial policy, and it simply cannot do all those things at once
Today from me: It was an epically rotten week for public markets. But small businesses are showing signs of weakness too -- battered by cuts to federal agencies, weakened contracting set-asides, and now tariffs. www.nytimes.com/2025/04/06/b...
Tariffs get all the attention, but ask economists what they're really worried about and many will point to the Trump administration's cuts to federal support for the sciences, including canceling grants and revoking student visas. #EconSky www.nytimes.com/2025/03/31/b...
Today from me: As Trump squeezes the unauthorized immigrant workforce, employers ramp up the pressure for expanded guest worker programs and a path to legal status for those who've been in the U.S. for years. www.nytimes.com/2025/03/31/b...
In today's paper, from me: Pronatalists have been gaining power and influence in Washington, but it's still not clear that the Trump administration is pushing their priorities. In some ways, its actions could lower birthrates, not raise them. www.nytimes.com/2025/03/30/b...
Support for fossil fuels becoming an article of faith on the American right -- divorced from all grounding in other conservative principles -- is one of the most consequential political stories of our time.
Collateral damage in the immigrant crackdown -- cities eager for workers and taxpayers. The St. Louis story, in nuanced detail. @lydiadepillis.bsky.social www.nytimes.com/2025/03/08/b...
Important, from Andy Duehren: Deep cuts to IRS personnel are hitting the division that investigates large corporations particularly hard. While big business frets about tariffs, this is what they're also weighing in their heads. www.nytimes.com/2025/03/10/u...
Today from me, something I've been thinking about for a while: There are many cities across America that *want* immigrants, because their populations have been declining for decades. Perhaps none more so than St. Louis. But that strategy just encountered a problem. www.nytimes.com/2025/03/08/b...
The labor market is strong -- if you have a job. But it's a hard time to find one, especially for white collar workers. Which means laid-off federal workers are entering the job market at at tough moment. #EconSky @lydiadepillis.bsky.social @colbylsmith.bsky.social www.nytimes.com/2025/03/07/b...
No, digital platform, I do not want to enhance my message with AI. I think my messages are brilliant and perfect just as my brain wrote them.
No pushback from the White House on this one: "President Trump campaigned on dismantling the Green New Scam, and that’s precisely what he’s doing," said spokesman Harrison Fields.
From me today: Clean energy had been lifting America's moribund manufacturing base. But looming cuts to the Inflation Reduction Act -- and Trump's general antipathy toward renewables -- are starting to make companies pull back on planned investments. www.nytimes.com/2025/02/20/b...
How will Trump's new steel & aluminum tariffs -- bigger than last time, at least as announced -- affect U.S. industries, from breweries to home builders to energy developers? We have some clues. www.nytimes.com/2025/02/11/b...
it's in the works!
NEW: Last week’s funding freeze didn’t just hit nonprofits, it caused waves among for-profit banks, which are a lot more tied into the world of federal funding than you might think. Their real estate loans, revolving credit lines & community development work could be upended if this happens again.
Covering the jobs report today. How can a labor market be both this strong and this frozen? Weird times in the American economy: www.nytimes.com/2025/02/07/b...
Contributed a bit to @colbylsmith.bsky.social's story about how the Fed is diplomatically conforming to White House dictates even though it doesn't have to: Staff at 7 U.S. financial regulators withdrew from a Harvard course on climate finance, citing new orders. www.nytimes.com/2025/02/07/b...
The New York Times is tracking the actions and statements by President Trump and his administration during the first 100 days of his second term. Here's a gift link if you'd like to bookmark it. We will be updating daily. www.nytimes.com/interactive/...
Took a look at that DOT memo overhauling economic analysis for funding allocation -- including the bit prioritizing areas with higher fertility and marriage rates. Turns out that agenda dovetails with a push toward suburban highways over urban transit: www.nytimes.com/2025/02/06/u...
!!!!!
Sadly not featuring this quote from @jaredb-econ.bsky.social: "It's a little bit like the scene in Jaws, where the Richard Dreyfuss character says, 'you're not going to believe a shark's out there until it bites you in the ass.'"
We're used to hearing conservatives issue dire warnings about the national debt (and then generally vote for deficit-financed tax cuts). But lately, progressive economists are also starting to say that no really, this is actually a problem. Here's why: www.nytimes.com/2025/01/30/b...
I'm no AI or markets expert but it does make you wonder what business seven companies have making up a third of the S&P 500 when a Chinese chatbot app can send their stocks into an utter tizzy
Happy IRS Direct File tax season opening day to all who celebrate (i.e. those with very simple tax situations)
This week in the NBERs: Girls born to mothers exposed to violent conflict in Afghanistan show long-term negative cognitive effects, but not boys. Why the disparity? Authors point to unequal allocation of constrained resources in war-torn environments. nber.org/papers/w33398
University of Michigan Consumer Sentiment today, via Apollo's Torsten Slok: Republicans think inflation will be ZERO in a year, while Democrats see it heading north of 4 percent.
In 2022, I wrote about the EPA official brought in to clean up after Trump regulators had delayed or watered down rulemaking on toxic chemicals. propublica.org/article/shes... Now, Hiroko Tabuchi reports, Trump has brought the same people back from industry. www.nytimes.com/2025/01/22/c...
From our straight-talking D.C. climate team -- even if there were an "energy emergency," as Trump has declared, solving it would require exactly the opposite approach from the one he is taking. www.nytimes.com/2025/01/21/c...
Thing that was always true but especially now: If you're someone with visibility into Trump administration economic policy changes and want to tell a reporter without jeopardizing your job, my Signal number is 202-913-3717.
I'm not sure they collected that data, but some agencies -- like the Patent and Trademark Office -- have had pretty generous remote work / telework policies for a long time.
"They believe it is better to have a relationship between the leader and those that they lead than to have these intermediary elements called institutions, that, it turns out, are very important in passing prosperity from generation to generation to generation."
At the Hoover Institution, a bastion of traditional conservatism, Condoleezza Rice issues an oblique rebuke to the new administration. "Populists are not undemocratic," she says. "But they are anti-institutional...
Since Trump has just ordered federal workers back to the office full time, here's some context on how many hours are worked in office by agency, excluding the average of 10% of employees who are fully remote, as of May 2024. Source is an OMB report with a link that just broke.
For more great inauguration-eve data context, don't miss this explainer on the population Trump may try to deport and all the legal statuses they fall under: www.nytimes.com/interactive/...
As a new administration comes in vowing deep cuts to U.S. government payrolls, I pulled together the data on what the federal workforce actually looks like and how it changed in the 4 years between Trump's terms: www.nytimes.com/2025/01/19/b...
Going to try an experiment: Cross-posting my X Tweets here to conserve social media energy while seeing how engagement differs. I've still got to keep an eye on the other site, but conversational quality has obviously diminished, so maybe I can get some of it back.