Binyamin Appelbaum on Economic Journalism, Power, and Reporting From the Inside

Binyamin Appelbaum has spent his career explaining how economic policy shapes real lives—often in ways that are politically charged, deeply technical, and easy to misunderstand. A longtime journalist at The New York Times, Appelbaum has reported from inside moments of crisis, from the 2008 financial collapse to the Obama administration’s internal debates over housing, banks, and government intervention.
In this Pathway Blog conversation, Appelbaum reflects on his accidental entry into economic journalism, the collapse of the local‑newspaper career ladder, and how reporting changes when you move from chasing information to being chased by people in power. He also offers a candid look at how polarization has fused economic and political identity in the United States—and what young journalists should focus on if they want to build real credibility today.

This transcript has been edited for length and clarity.

Beginnings: Finding Journalism — and Economics
Ben Wolf: Thank you for joining me Mr. Appelbaum. If you would, please tell me a little bit about how you got your start in journalism, how you knew you wanted to report on economics, and how you found your own stylistic voice.

Binyamin Appelbaum: I got my start in journalism in a pretty classic way. I edited my high school paper, and when I got to college, I signed up to work for the student paper. I didn’t intend to make a career out of it—it just seemed fun—but I ended up falling in love with it. It became more and more the center of my college experience.
I eventually ended up as the editor of the student paper at the University of Pennsylvania. By my senior year, a little later than I probably should have, I started thinking about how to turn this into a career. I sent out letters to the 100 largest papers in the country asking if anyone would take me on as an intern—using the free stamps from the college newspaper office. One of those papers, the Florida Times-Union in Jacksonville, Florida, offered me an internship.
I wrote a column for the Philadelphia Inquirer about my experience of job hunting, noting that I didn’t really know where Jacksonville was at that point in my life. But it was an opportunity, so I jumped at it and became an intern at the Florida Times-Union.

The Vanishing Career Ladder in Journalism
BW: Do you think that method—sending out 100 letters—is still applicable today? Or do you see other paths people are taking into journalism now?

BA: No, I don’t think it would work today. I was lucky that it worked then. At that time, there were a lot of big papers across the country that were hungry for young, cheap journalists.
I sometimes think of my career as a rat scrambling up the halls of a sinking ship, jumping from paper to paper as they collapsed behind me. Most of the places I’ve worked are shadows of themselves. Local newspapers are in dire straits—this isn’t news to anyone. Only a very few have found anything like a sustainable bottom, and even those are much smaller than they were in their heyday.
When I was a kid growing up outside Boston, the Sunday Globe was a substantial object when it landed on your doorstep—hundreds of pages of content. The Globe is one of the luckier regional papers, but even it isn’t anything like what it once was.
It’s very difficult today to build a career by working at smaller papers and moving your way up. In the old days, newspaper journalism was like baseball: you started in Single-A, moved to Double-A, then Triple-A, and maybe you made it to the majors. Plenty of people had fulfilling careers at Double-A or Triple-A papers. Today, both that ladder and the likelihood of lifetime employment at a regional paper are broken. People seeking careers in journalism need to find other paths.

When Economics Became Fully Political
BW: I think that extends beyond newspapers, too--to all forms of media. I’m from Kansas City, and our local NPR affiliate is KCUR. I recall last year going to a lunch with Steve Inskeep, who of course is one of the predominant NPR voices, and he told me about how national broadcasters are being sent to smaller affiliates to help raise funding, because those stations are struggling so much on their own. It definitely is a problematic trend.
I wanted to ask you about economic policy debates today. From my perspective, they seem far more political than they were a generation ago. I saw this recently at the DealBook Summit, where Scott Bessent was openly criticizing Democratic-run states over inflation. I was surprised to see this from a figure institutionally separate from the federal government. Is that assessment right, that economics are more political today? And if so, has it made reporting harder—or forced greater honesty about the consequences of policy choices?

BA: I’d say a couple of things. Politics and the economy have always been extremely intertwined. Economics is a way of thinking about how a polity should work, so that part isn’t new.
But two things are much more pronounced today. First, everything is national to a degree it wasn’t historically. You asked earlier how I started covering economics, and the answer is relevant here. I was working at a newspaper in Charlotte, North Carolina, covering local government. The managing editor called me in and said, “We’re looking for a banking reporter.” I said, “That sounds really boring.” He said, “You are the new banking reporter.” That’s how I got into economic journalism—by accident.
At the time, Charlotte was a center of the regional banking industry. Decades ago, the southeastern, northeastern, midwestern, and west coast financial industries were more discrete from one another, and often regulated at the state or regional level. As that system has been replaced by truly national banks and a national financial system, economic issues have become national issues. Debates are adjudicated at the national level, and they inevitably become partisan battlegrounds.
The second factor is polarization. Historically, there was overlap between Democrats and Republicans. Over time, we’ve seen a "sorting"—the parties are more cleanly divided and in more constant conflict over everything, including economic issues. For both reasons, every economic policy question is now national and partisan, which makes good decision-making much harder.

BW: That reminds me of a conversation I had with Bret Stephens about political sorting—not just in Congress, but in people’s personal lives, too. People are far more likely now to marry someone of the same political party than they were decades ago. That trend has reduced conversations across party lines--

BA: --and let me add to that, it’s not just politics—it’s economics too. A cliché captures it: half a century ago, doctors married nurses; today, doctors marry doctors. Political and economic identities are increasingly aligned—for individuals, for families, and for communities. We’re more segregated economically, and those identities reinforce political conflict.

Reporting Power from the Inside
BW: You’ve worked at both local newspapers and national institutions like The New York Times. What has been the biggest difference in the newsroom or in how you reported between the two?

BA: The dividing line for me was between the Boston Globe and the Washington Post. I arrived at the Post in the middle of the 2008 financial crisis. On my first day, before I even had computer training, an editor told me there had been a secret meeting at the White House and asked me to report on it.
I panicked. At a regional paper, you don’t expect to find out what happened in a secret meeting. I was sitting at my desk trying to figure out what to do when the phone rang. Someone who had been at the meeting called to tell me about it.
That’s the difference. At regional papers, you’re desperately trying to get information and often failing. At national papers, the challenge flips. Many people want to give you information—often competing versions of events. Your job becomes figuring out what’s true, what agendas people have, and what they’re leaving out. You become part of the system, which brings real risks. But the most important part of that is the "New York Times" part of your title. If you start thinking sources are calling you rather than calling The New York Times, you can get into trouble.

BW: Could you share a moment where that's happened to you--where you had competing individuals try to shape coverage directly?

BA: It happens all the time. During the Obama administration after the financial crisis, there was a hugely consequential debate about how to help homeowners who couldn’t afford their mortgages. Millions were trapped in homes worth less than their loans.
Different factions within the administration had competing ideas, and each wanted favorable coverage in The New York Times. They were making their cases to me because they knew there would be stories and wanted their approach reflected accurately—and persuasively.
During crises, the dynamic intensifies. Jamie Dimon, for example, would sometimes just call reporters directly. And every night, after our stories went online but before they were finalized for print, my phone would ring—often with someone from the White House trying to “work the refs,” asking why something was phrased a certain way or why another point wasn’t included. The more important the issue, the more senior the person calling.

Translating Complexity for the Public
BW: That’s really fascinating. As we wrap up, I want to ask about the craft itself. Economic journalism requires simplifying complex systems without flattening their stakes. What’s the hardest balance to strike when writing for a general audience who doesn't have the same level of knowledge as you do?

BA: That’s the core of the work. I sometimes say journalism is like being Moses: you go up the mountain to talk to God, then you come down and explain it to the people. Both parts matter.
You need to understand the subject deeply by talking to experts, then explain it to educated readers who aren’t specialists. At The Times, we have a clear sense of who our reader is—an educated person who isn’t an expert in that field. The work is translation: finding accurate illustrations, anecdotes, and language that make economics accessible and interesting.

Advice for Aspiring Economic Journalists
BW: Finally, if you were starting today and trying to build credibility as an economic journalist, what would you focus on in the first year?

BA: I’d focus on becoming deeply expert in something specific. Early in my career, I covered banks—and even more specifically, the mortgage industry. That expertise let me write with authority and build trust. Luck matters too, but being really good at one thing gives people a reason to rely on you, and then to trust you with broader subjects.

BW: Mr. Appelbaum, it’s been a real honor. Thank you so much for joining me.

BA: My pleasure.