THE WEEK
As of Friday at 5 p.m. ○
DOW 32,899.37
77.84, 0.2% ○NASDAQ 12,144.66
189.98, 1.5% ○S&P 500 4,123.34
8.59, 0.2% ○GOLD $1,882.80
$28.90, 1.5% ○CRUDE OIL $109.77
$5.08, 4.9% ○10-YEAR TREASURY YIELD 3.14%
7 .0% changeCURRENCIES
$1=130.60 Y EN, 0.95 EUROSKLMNO
BusineSS
EE AX FN FS LF PW DC BD PG AA FD HO MN MS SM SUNDAY, MAY 8 , 2022. WASHINGTONPOST.COM/BUSINESS G
COLOR OF MONEY
My godmother taught me the importance of generosity
— in financial terms, but also giving of oneself. G2
WORK ADVICE
Spare the flowers and brunches. What income-earning
moms want this Mother’s Day is equal pay. G2ALLAN SLOAN
Unlike the stock market, home sale prices have stayed
hot this year. Here’s why that’s coming to an end. G5BY KARINA ELWOODTwo-plus years into the coro-
navirus pandemic, the businesses
and office space that make up
downtown D.C.’s Central Busi-
ness District are still struggling to
stay occupied and attract the
workers and visitors necessary
for a vibrant economy. And with
the future of office work so deeply
uncertain after two years of tele-
working, the District — and other
major cities around the country
— are reimagining what the
American downtown looks like.
That’s a shift that researchers
and city leaders say had already
been in the works for years as
downtowns moved away from
being strictly office districts and
toward mixed uses, such as build-
ings that might include apart-
ments, office space and store-
fronts.
“A downtown can’t make it just
as offices anymore. It has to be
more of a social district, where
there’s theater and arts and cul-
ture and education, and people
living,” Chicago Loop Alliance
president and chief executive Mi-
SEE DOWNTOWN ON G5Central D.C. l ooks for its post-pandemic identityWith offices still largely empty, downtowns here and across the country map out transformationsMATT MCCLAIN/THE WASHINGTON POST
A worker is seen through the window of a now-closed restaurant along Seventh Street NW in the
District. The shift to remote work at the onset of the pandemic made it difficult for restaurants and
other businesses downtown that relied on lunches, happy hours and errands from office workers.BY ANDREW VAN DAMWomen denied abortions face
dire and well-documented emo-
tional and physical challenges,
but a new study shows they also
face more significant financial
difficulties than women with ac-
cess to abortions. Those difficul-
ties can persist for years.
The study’s authors, most of
them economists, used credit re-
ports to measure the financial
struggles resulting from being
denied an abortion — a part of
the fallout that has proved diffi-
cult to quantify in the past. Its
narrow financial focus doesn’t
address the myriad other issues
woman denied an abortion may
face. It also doesn’t consider the
nonfinancial benefits of having
children — or of remaining child-
less.
After women were turned
away at an abortion clinic, they
saw their overdue debts climb by
78 percent, or $1,750 a year, and
they experienced 81 percent more
of the sort of negative events,
such as a bankruptcies, tax liens
or evictions, that show up in
public records. Women who were
allowed to go through with the
abortion fared better economi-
cally, researchers find.
The women studied were part
of a data set of almost 1,000
women, at 30 abortion clinics in
21 states, who had sought an
abortion. That group included
hundreds who were denied at the
clinic, almost all because they
were just a couple of weeks too
far into their first or second
trimester, depending on local
limits.
By combining the study of
women turned away at the clinic
with credit-report data, research-
ers were able to follow women
who both received and were de-
nied abortions, measuring how
outcomes affected their credit
reports. The analysis by Univer-
SEE ABORTION ON G4Women denied abortion
face more financial strife
Overdue debts, tax liens:
Study shows difficulties
that persist for yearsZACK WITTMAN FOR THE WASHINGTON POSTAshley Woodall inspects her lips after
filler treatment at Luxe Med Spa. “So
many people did what they needed to do
to get through this pandemic. That’s
really fueled this self-care thing,” says
economics professor Glenn MacDonald.BY ERIC ADELSONorlando — On the freshly painted white
walls of Mannie and Jamie Carmona’s
downtown spa here, there’s a plastic case
filled w ith empty B otox v ials and syringes.
A label on the case reads, “In case of
emergency, break glass.”
The cheeky decoration has taken on a
bit of extra meaning lately, as the spa is
experiencing the best kind of emergency:
The pandemic has waned, the masks have
come off, the Zoom cameras have stayed
on and business is exploding.
The Luxe Med Spa client list has
rocketed from 120 in 2020 to more than
800 now. Jamie left a 17-year career as an
ER nurse. Mannie, who was a vegan
restaurant cook before the pandemic,
quit his other job as well.
“It’s all because of the pandemic,” said
Mannie, 33, seated on his outdoor office
balcony. “It’s created this want — people
just want to feel better about themselves.”
As many elements of in-person life
resume, there are a number of small
businesses poised to capitalize on the
flood of customers looking to engage in
restorative and celebratory behavior.
SEE SELF CARE ON G3Small businesses experiencing
a boom as pandemic wanesA revivedlook forself-careindustry