Delta Air Lines has opened a new front in the push by companies to get employees vaccinated against the coronavirus. Yesterday, Delta said that workers who aren’t vaccinated by Nov. 1 will have to pay an additional $200 per month to remain on the airline’s health plan. More companies are considering imposing such fees on the unvaccinated, following the airline’s lead.

The shift from incentives like extra pay or time off to get the shot to financial penalties for choosing not to is a noteworthy change in corporate vaccination initiatives. Companies are taking a tougher stance even if they, like Delta, stop short of mandating that workers get the vaccine or lose their jobs.

Recent hospital stays because of Covid have cost Delta about $50,000 per employee, and every one of those workers was not fully vaccinated, Delta’s C.E.O., Ed Bastian, said in a memo to staff. Like most large employers, Delta insures its work force, meaning it pays health costs directly and hires...

For weeks, big employers like Citigroup, Google and the Walt Disney Company have been warming to the idea of requiring coronavirus vaccines for employees. Now that one vaccine has received full federal approval, President Biden wants more to follow suit.

Delta Air Lines has chosen a very different tack — one that might seem to provide employees more choice but could be much harder to carry out. The company on Wednesday became the first large U.S. employer to embrace an idea that has been widely discussed but is mired in legal uncertainty: charging unvaccinated employees more for health insurance.

Starting Nov. 1, Delta employees who have not received the vaccine will have to pay an additional $200 per month to remain on the company’s health plan. It is part of a series of requirements that unvaccinated workers will face in the months to come, the airline’s chief executive, Ed Bastian, said in a memo to staff.

“We’ve always known that vaccinations are the most...

WHITEHAVEN, England — Britain has been getting out of the coal business for the past 100 years. The fuel that turned an island nation into a black-skied manufacturing giant during the Industrial Revolution has steadily been replaced by oil, natural gas and, increasingly in recent years, offshore winds and the rays of the sun.

That’s why a proposal, the first in decades, to dig a new coal mine in Whitehaven, a faded harbor town in northwest England, has excited so much interest — enthusiasm from some, repulsion from others.

And it has put Prime Minister Boris Johnson in a bind. As he prepares to host the U.N. climate conference COP26 in the fall, the proposal forces him to choose between economic development for a region eager for new investment and burnishing his environmental credentials as climate change dominates political debate.

The proposal by West Cumbria Mining calls for investing 160 million pounds, or $218 million, in a mine that would create more...

Across Britain, a slow-burning problem has ignited into a supply chain crisis in recent weeks as restaurants, supermarkets and food manufacturers warned customers that some popular products may be temporarily unavailable because of a shortage of truck drivers.

McDonald’s milkshakes, Nando’s chicken, Haribo sweets and supermarket milk are among the items that have become scarce in Britain over the summer. But it goes far beyond food: Nearly every industry is complaining about delivery problems. And already organizations are warning that logistics issues could upend the arrival of Christmas toys and the trimmings crucial to family holiday meals.

A long-running shortage of truck drivers has been exacerbated by a post-Brexit exodus of European Union workers. Adding to the problem are disruptions to new driver training because of the pandemic. And for years, the trucking industry has struggled to attract new workers to a job that has traditionally been low paid and...

China’s buzzy high-tech companies don’t usually recruit Cambodian speakers, so the job ads for three well-paid positions with those language skills stood out. The ad, seeking writers of research reports, was placed by an internet security start-up in China’s tropical island-province of Hainan.

That start-up was more than it seemed, according to American law enforcement. Hainan Xiandun Technology was part of a web of front companies controlled by China’s secretive state security ministry, according to a federal indictment from May. They hacked computers from the United States to Cambodia to Saudi Arabia, seeking sensitive government data as well as less-obvious spy stuff, like details of a New Jersey company’s fire-suppression system, according to prosecutors.

The accusations appear to reflect an increasingly aggressive campaign by Chinese government hackers and a pronounced shift in their tactics: China’s premier spy agency is increasingly reaching beyond its own...

The investment company Nuveen has spent $120 million renovating its office tower at 730 Third Avenue in Midtown Manhattan, overhauling the lobby, devoting the second floor to amenities and refurbishing a 22nd-floor terrace.

And the finishing touch? Two beehives on a seventh-floor terrace.

Following the latest trend in office perks, Nuveen hired a beekeeper to teach tenants about their tiny new neighbors and harvest honey for them to take home.

“In conversations with tenants, I get more questions about that than anything else,” said Brian Wallick, Nuveen’s director of New York office and life science investments.

Office workers who were sent home during pandemic lockdowns often sought refuge in nature, tending to houseplants, setting up bird feeders and sitting outdoors with their laptops. Now, as companies try to coax skittish employees back to the office and building owners compete for tenants when vacancy rates are soaring, many have hit on the idea of...

It’s almost phone season again — the time of year when tech companies like Apple, Google and Samsung bombard us with glitzy marketing campaigns to persuade us to upgrade.

Their new phones vary somewhat, but the pitch is always roughly the same: The phone you have is no longer good enough because this new one has a fancier camera and brighter screen, plus it’s faster. So give the “old” one to a less tech-inclined member of the family or trade it in for credit toward a shiny new gadget.

This hype cycle creates an annual dilemma: Is it time to upgrade? We all know that after a few years, our phones no longer work as well as they used to. It might not be able to run the latest apps. It can feel sluggish. Some components, like touch-screens, may begin to fail.

At some point, it does become practical to get a new phone, like when too many negatives add up or the cost of fixing a broken part is too high. But often, upgrades may be unnecessary because the elements...

Only 6 percent of board seats at Japanese companies are held by women. After years of unkept promises, these businesses are now facing pressure both at home and abroad to diversify.

It’s a strategy that’s almost guaranteed to produce skimpy profits, and banks are not thrilled to be doing it, analysts say. But they have little choice.

“Widget companies make widgets, and banks make loans,” said Jason Goldberg, a bank analyst at Barclays in New York. “This is what they do. It is what they want to do.”

By putting their customers’ deposits into investments such as loans or securities, like Treasury bonds, banks make the money needed to pay interest on those deposits and pocket a profit. When the economy is growing — like now — banks usually have no problem finding borrowers as consumers make big purchases and businesses expand. These loans provide better returns than Treasury bonds, which are usually reserved for times of uncertainty because banks will accept their lower rate of return in place of a risky loan.

When Jerome H. Powell speaks at the Federal Reserve’s biggest annual conference on Friday, he will do so at a tense economic moment, as prices rise rapidly while millions of jobs remain missing from the labor market. That combination promises to test the meaning of a quiet revolution the central bank chair ushered in one year ago.

Mr. Powell used his remarks at last year’s conference, known as the Jackson Hole economic symposium and held by the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, to announce that Fed officials would no longer raise interest rates to cool off the economy just because joblessness was falling and inflation was expected to heat up. They first wanted proof that prices were climbing sustainably, and they would welcome gains slightly above their 2 percent goal.

He was laying groundwork for a far more patient Fed approach, acknowledging the grim reality that across advanced economies, interest rates, growth and inflation had spent the 21st century slipping...

Rand V. Araskog, who as chief executive of the ITT Corporation in the 1980s and ’90s successfully refocused an unwieldy conglomerate that at various points ran the Sheraton hotel chain, owned the New York Knicks and Rangers and made Wonder Bread, died on Aug. 9 at his home in Palm Beach, Fla. He was 89.

His death was confirmed by his daughters, Kathleen Araskog Thomas and Julie K. Araskog. No cause was given.

A West Point graduate who worked at the Department of Defense before pursuing a career in business, Mr. Araskog took the helm of ITT in 1979, when the company, then known as the International Telephone and Telegraph Corp., was the 11th largest industrial concern in the United States, with $19.4 billion in annual sales (in today’s dollars about $73 billion, putting it on a par with IBM and Procter & Gamble). Its global holdings included pulp mills, baking companies, a large network of hotels as well as financial services and telecommunications and...

The investment company Nuveen has spent $120 million renovating its office tower at 730 Third Avenue in Midtown Manhattan, overhauling the lobby, devoting the second floor to amenities and refurbishing a 22nd-floor terrace.

And the finishing touch? Two beehives on a seventh-floor terrace.

Following the latest trend in office perks, Nuveen hired a beekeeper to teach tenants about their tiny new neighbors and harvest honey for them to take home.

“In conversations with tenants, I get more questions about that than anything else,” said Brian Wallick, Nuveen’s director of New York office and life science investments.

Office workers who were sent home during pandemic lockdowns often sought refuge in nature, tending to houseplants, setting up bird feeders and sitting outdoors with their laptops. Now, as companies try to coax skittish employees back to the office and building owners compete for tenants when vacancy rates are soaring, many have hit on the idea of...

It’s almost phone season again — the time of year when tech companies like Apple, Google and Samsung bombard us with glitzy marketing campaigns to persuade us to upgrade.

Their new phones vary somewhat, but the pitch is always roughly the same: The phone you have is no longer good enough because this new one has a fancier camera and brighter screen, plus it’s faster. So give the “old” one to a less tech-inclined member of the family or trade it in for credit toward a shiny new gadget.

This hype cycle creates an annual dilemma: Is it time to upgrade? We all know that after a few years, our phones no longer work as well as they used to. It might not be able to run the latest apps. It can feel sluggish. Some components, like touch-screens, may begin to fail.

At some point, it does become practical to get a new phone, like when too many negatives add up or the cost of fixing a broken part is too high. But often, upgrades may be unnecessary because the elements...

It’s a strategy that’s almost guaranteed to produce skimpy profits, and banks are not thrilled to be doing it, analysts say. But they have little choice.

“Widget companies make widgets, and banks make loans,” said Jason Goldberg, a bank analyst at Barclays in New York. “This is what they do. It is what they want to do.”

By putting their customers’ deposits into investments such as loans or securities, like Treasury bonds, banks make the money needed to pay interest on those deposits and pocket a profit. When the economy is growing — like now — banks usually have no problem finding borrowers as consumers make big purchases and businesses expand. These loans provide better returns than Treasury bonds, which are usually reserved for times of uncertainty because banks will accept their lower rate of return in place of a risky loan.

When Jerome H. Powell speaks at the Federal Reserve’s biggest annual conference on Friday, he will do so at a tense economic moment, as prices rise rapidly while millions of jobs remain missing from the labor market. That combination promises to test the meaning of a quiet revolution the central bank chair ushered in one year ago.

Mr. Powell used his remarks at last year’s conference, known as the Jackson Hole economic symposium and held by the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, to announce that Fed officials would no longer raise interest rates to cool off the economy just because joblessness was falling and inflation was expected to heat up. They first wanted proof that prices were climbing sustainably, and they would welcome gains slightly above their 2 percent goal.

He was laying groundwork for a far more patient Fed approach, acknowledging the grim reality that across advanced economies, interest rates, growth and inflation had spent the 21st century slipping...

Only 6 percent of board seats at Japanese companies are held by women. After years of unkept promises, these businesses are now facing pressure both at home and abroad to diversify.

A producer at the ABC News program “Good Morning America” accused Michael Corn, a former senior executive producer of the show, of sexually assaulting her and creating a toxic work environment in a lawsuit filed Wednesday against Mr. Corn and ABC.

Kirstyn Crawford said in the lawsuit that Mr. Corn sexually assaulted her in 2015 during a work trip to Los Angeles to cover the Academy Awards. Mr. Corn denied the allegations in a statement on Wednesday.

In the suit, which was filed in New York State Court, Ms. Crawford said Mr. Corn had assaulted her during an Uber ride and in a hotel. The assaults traumatized Ms. Crawford, a producer for George Stephanopoulos on “Good Morning America,” and caused her career to stall, according to the complaint.

The suit also names ABC, which is owned by the Walt Disney Company, because its executives “knew or should have known that Corn had a propensity to sexually harass female colleagues and that he perpetuated a hostile work...

Facebook has approached academics and policy experts about forming a commission to advise it on global election-related matters, said five people with knowledge of the discussions, a move that would allow the social network to shift some of its political decision-making to an advisory body.

The proposed commission could decide on matters such as the viability of political ads and what to do about election-related misinformation, said the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the discussions were confidential. Facebook is expected to announce the commission this fall in preparation for the 2022 midterm elections, they said, though the effort is preliminary and could still fall apart.

Outsourcing election matters to a panel of experts could help Facebook sidestep criticism of bias by political groups, two of the people said. The company has been blasted in recent years by conservatives, who have accused Facebook of suppressing their voices, as well...

Rand V. Araskog, who as chief executive of the ITT Corporation in the 1980s and ’90s successfully refocused an unwieldy conglomerate that at various points ran the Sheraton hotel chain, owned the New York Knicks and Rangers and made Wonder Bread, died on Aug. 9 at his home in Palm Beach, Fla. He was 89.

His death was confirmed by his daughters, Kathleen Araskog Thomas and Julie K. Araskog. No cause was given.

A West Point graduate who worked at the Department of Defense before pursuing a career in business, Mr. Araskog took the helm of ITT in 1979, when the company, then known as the International Telephone and Telegraph Corp., was the 11th largest industrial concern in the United States, with $19.4 billion in annual sales (in today’s dollars about $73 billion, putting it on a par with IBM and Procter & Gamble). Its global holdings included pulp mills, baking companies, a large network of hotels as well as financial services and telecommunications and...

Last week, Mike Richards lost his gig as the new host of “Jeopardy!,” faced a rebuke from the Anti-Defamation League, heard an outpouring of dismay from the show’s demoralized staff, and was forced to apologize after it was revealed he made sexist and crude jokes on a podcast several years ago in which he mocked women’s appearances, unemployed workers, and the size of Jewish noses.

This week, Mr. Richards is back running the show. And his bosses at Sony appear intent on keeping it that way.

In a show of defiance that has baffled Hollywood, Sony Pictures Entertainment has signaled that it will keep Mr. Richards on as executive producer of “Jeopardy!” and “Wheel of Fortune.” During a call with “Jeopardy” staff on Monday, Sony’s top TV executive, Ravi Ahuja, made clear that the studio supported Mr. Richards, according to several people briefed on the call who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal conversations.

Mr. Ahuja praised Mr. Richards for his...

A booster shot of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine dramatically raises the levels of antibodies against the coronavirus, the company reported on Wednesday.

Johnson & Johnson will submit the data to the Food and Drug Administration, which is evaluating similar studies from Pfizer and Moderna. If authorized by the agency, the Biden administration wants to provide booster shots eight months after vaccination.

The Johnson & Johnson vaccine was absent from the government’s initial booster plan, announced last week. But with the new data, the company hopes to be part of the initial distribution of additional shots, which could happen as early as September.

“We look forward to discussing with public health officials a potential strategy for our Johnson & Johnson Covid-19 vaccine, boosting eight months or longer after the primary single-dose vaccination,” Dr. Mathai Mammen, the global head of Janssen Research & Development at Johnson & Johnson,...

The investment company Nuveen has spent $120 million renovating its office tower at 730 Third Avenue in Midtown Manhattan, overhauling the lobby, devoting the second floor to amenities and refurbishing a 22nd-floor terrace.

And the finishing touch? Two beehives on a seventh-floor terrace.

Following the latest trend in office perks, Nuveen hired a beekeeper to teach tenants about their tiny new neighbors and harvest honey for them to take home.

“In conversations with tenants, I get more questions about that than anything else,” said Brian Wallick, Nuveen’s director of New York office and life science investments.

Office workers who were sent home during pandemic lockdowns often sought refuge in nature, tending to houseplants, setting up bird feeders and sitting outdoors with their laptops. Now, as companies try to coax skittish employees back to the office and building owners compete for tenants when vacancy rates are soaring, many have hit on the idea of...

Only 6 percent of board seats at Japanese companies are held by women. After years of unkept promises, these businesses are now facing pressure both at home and abroad to diversify.