Alicia Wallace

Senior Economy Writer, CNN Business

Alicia Wallace is a senior writer for CNN Business covering the economy.
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Businesses highly uncertain about the direction of the economy in the wake of massive (and changing) tariffs proposed by President Donald Trump have held off on hiring, causing once-solid job gains to slow. Other policies, including federal workforce cuts, have turned public servants into jobseekers such as those seen here waiting to enter a job fair hosted by the Cook County government to support federal workers in Chicago on June 26, 2025.
Jamie Kelter Davis/Bloomberg/Getty Images
The US economy added a stronger-than-expected 147,000 jobs in June and the unemployment rate fell to 4.1%
Jul 3, 2025
The US job market continues to chug along despite heightened uncertainty about the economy and how President Donald Trump’s tariffs could shake out.
Economists expect that job growth slowed in June to 115,000 jobs and that the unemployment rate rose to 4.3%.
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US private sector lost 33,000 jobs in June, missing expectations for an increase of 115,000
Jul 2, 2025
The US private sector lost jobs in June, the first negative month in more than two years, according to new data Wednesday from payroll provider ADP.
The number of available jobs rose to a six-month high in May.
Anna Rose Layden/Getty Images
Job openings unexpectedly increased in May
Jul 1, 2025
The “wait-and-see” is turning into a “just-can’t-wait-any more.”
Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan, former Minnesota Gov. Mark Dayton, former US Vice President Kamala Harris, former US President Joe Biden, Gwen Walz and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz attend funeral services for Mark and Melissa Hortman at the Basilica of St. Mary in Minneapolis, Minnesota, June 28, 2025.
Alex Kormann/Pool/Reuters
Loved ones share tributes as leaders, including former President Joe Biden, attend funeral for slain Minnesota House Speaker and her husband
Jun 28, 2025
On a warm, humid Saturday morning, grieving loved ones gathered at The Basilica of Saint Mary in Minneapolis to honor Minnesota’s former House Speaker and her husband, whose shocking killings in an attack earlier this month stunned the nation.
Consumer spending powers two-thirds of economic growth; however, President Donald Trump's sharp escalation of tariffs on imported goods has set off a trade war that economists fear could slow that engine.
Allison Dinner/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock
Americans reined in their spending last month
Jun 27, 2025
The US economic engine sputtered in May: Consumer spending declined for the first time since January, according to new data released Friday that also showed inflation heated up on an annual basis.
GE Appliances plans to reshore more than a dozen lines of front-load washers from China to Louisville, Kentucky, including its flagship washer-dryer combo.
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Why GE Appliances will make more washing machines in Kentucky instead of China. It’s not what you think
Jun 26, 2025
Some of President Donald Trump’s steepest tariffs are on products like washing machines, and on Thursday, GE Appliances said it would spend a half a billion dollars to make even more of them in the United States.
Buy Now, Pay Later installment loans are an increasingly popular way for Americans to buy clothes, flights, concerts and even groceries. However, these financing offerings aren't fully reported to credit agencies, lenders and the government data-crunchers.
Scott Olson/Getty Images
Buy Now, Pay Later loans will factor in to Americans’ credit scores
Jun 23, 2025
How well — or how poorly — Americans are managing their Buy Now, Pay Later loans soon could be reflected in their credit scores.
US inflation has been fairly tame to start the year; however, economists expected that price hikes would pick up speed for producers in May, in part because of rising costs from tariffs.
David Paul Morris/Bloomberg/Getty Images
US wholesale inflation heated up in May
Jun 12, 2025
US wholesale inflation rose slightly in May, driven in part by costlier goods; however, tariff-related effects were largely muted.
Inflation grew less than expected in May, the latest Consumer Price Index showed. That's welcome news for consumers, but the report did show hints of the higher prices that could come from tariffs.
Jae C. Hong/AP
Inflation rose less than expected last month despite Trump’s tariffs
Jun 11, 2025
Inflation rose less than expected in May, a month when the effects of higher tariffs were starting to become more widespread.
People shop at a grocery store in Brooklyn on May 13, 2025 in New York City.
Spencer Platt/Getty Images
A break in the trade clouds lifted consumers’ spirits in May
Jun 9, 2025
Americans felt a whole lot better about prices and the job market in May, a month that featured a détente in the trade war between the US and China.
Commuters cross Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington, DC, during the morning rush hour on March 20.
Roberto Schmidt/AFP/Getty Images
The US economy added 139,000 jobs in May, slightly more than expected
Jun 6, 2025
The long-resilient labor market slowed down a little in May, adding 139,000 jobs, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data released Friday.
A graduate of the Kennedy School of Government carries an inflatable globe during commencement exercises at Harvard University on May 29, 2025, in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Josh Reynolds/The Washington Post/Getty Images
Trump’s attacks on international student enrollment could ultimately shake the economy
Jun 6, 2025
The Trump administration’s statements and actions aimed at curtailing the number of international students in the US have sent a chill of uncertainty through higher education institutions.
The Trump administration’s drastic cutbacks of government spending and the federal workforce have economists, researchers and statisticians sounding the alarm that the reliability and accuracy of economic data could become a casualty to those efforts.
Bill Clark/Getty Images North America/FILE
DOGE layoffs may have compromised the accuracy of government data
Jun 5, 2025
In the early days of President Donald Trump’s second term in office, federal websites went dark and data disappeared as the newly formed Department of Government Efficiency set its sights on streamlining the government.
View of shipping cranes seen behind trucks and shipping containers at a port in Elizabeth, NJ, on May 24.
Anthony Behar/Sipa USA/AP
Friday’s jobs report could show how much US employers will bend before they break
Jun 5, 2025
Economists expect that the May jobs report could point to a softening labor market as hiring continues to slow amid economic uncertainty.
A worker arc welds a metal door during production at the Metal Manufacturing Co. facility in Sacramento, California, on May 27, 2025.
David Paul Morris/Bloomberg/Getty Images
Private-sector firms added just 37,000 jobs in May, the lowest total in more than two years
Jun 4, 2025
High economic uncertainy has hiring grinding to a halt at US businesses.
Economists were expecting that the number of job openings — a closely watched gauge of labor market demand — would fall for the third consecutive month.
Ting Shen/Bloomberg/Getty Images
Job openings unexpectedly increased in April – but so did layoffs
Jun 3, 2025
The number of available jobs in the US unexpectedly increased in April, signaling a potential undercurrent of strength in the labor market despite broader economic uncertainty.

About

Alicia Wallace is a senior writer for CNN Business covering the economy. Based in Minnesota, she specializes in covering the economy and how it affects people, businesses and communities. Before joining CNN, Wallace was a Knight-Bagehot Fellow at Columbia University in New York for the 2018-’19 academic year. Prior to being selected for the business journalism and economics fellowship, Wallace was a business reporter at The Denver Post in Denver, Colorado, where she covered breaking news as well as topics such as Sports Authority’s bankruptcy, regional economy trends, and beer industry moves including the merger of Anheuser-Busch InBev and SABMiller. In her time at the Post, she also helmed a first-of-its-kind beat for a mainstream news organization in covering and investigating the emerging cannabis industry through a national lens.

Before the Post, she was a longtime business reporter for the Daily Camera in Boulder, Colorado, where she covered a wide variety of industries such as natural products, technology, biopharma, retail, aerospace, and craft beer.