In 1981, Paltrow moved to the Washington Star, where he covered
federal courts.[1] After the Star shut down the same year, Paltrow moved to the Wall Street Journal, where he was a reporter in the Los Angeles bureau.[1] In 1985, Paltrow became a European correspondent for the Journal based in
Brussels.[1] In April 1988, Paltrow returned to the United States as New York financial bureau chief for the Los Angeles Times.[1] During this period he did numerous investigative stories on
Wall Streetinvestment banks,
markets and the
insurance industry."[1] While at the Times, Paltrow won a 1993
George Polk Award for Financial Reporting.[1] Paltrow returned to the Wall Street Journal in May 1997 and served as senior special writer based in New York and writes for the paper's Washington bureau.[1]
In 2007, following
Rupert Murdoch's purchase of
Dow Jones & Company (which owns the Wall Street Journal), Paltrow left the paper and joined
Condé Nast'sPortfolio.com as a contributing editor, starting September 1, 2007, following another longtime Journal journalist who moved to Portfolio.com, Peter Waldman.[4]
In September 2010, Paltrow moved to
Reuters, where he and fellow financial journalist
Mark Hosenball were brought on as "key hires" in an effort to expand Reuters' "coverage of business, Wall Street and Washington."[5] Paltrow joined Reuters to cover "
financial crimes, specifically covering criminal and civil investigations related to the
financial crisis of 2007–2008, as well as the effort to more closely regulate and police the financial world."[5] In 2012, Paltrow won a
Society of American Business Editors and Writers Best in Business Awards in the Explanatory/News Agency category for his investigation into banks' use of
robo-signing.[6]
Paltrow has written a report, The Case for a Stronger Federal Role in Insurance Regulation: Weak State Regulation Highlights the Need for Federal Oversight of Health Premiums, for the
Center for American Progress Action Fund.[7]
Paltrow has received the 1994
Gerald Loeb Award for Large Newspapers for an investigative series on
Prudential Securities.[1][8] Paltrow won 1992 and 1993 John Hancock Awards for Excellence in Business & Financial Journalism, the 1994 Los Angeles Times Editorial Award, the Unity Award in Media, and a 2001 Deadline Club Award from New York City Chapter of the
Society of Professional Journalists.[1]
^Scot J. Paltrow. The Case for a Stronger Federal Role in Insurance Regulation: Weak State Regulation Highlights the Need for Federal Oversight of Health Premiums (June 25, 2010). Center for American Progress Action Fund.
Scot J. Paltrow; Kelly Carr (July 2, 2013),
"Number Crunch: How the Pentagon's Payroll Quagmire Traps America's Soldiers", Unaccountable: the High Cost of the Pentagon's Bad Bookkeeping, no. 1, Reuters — Examines "how the Pentagon’s record-keeping dysfunction results in widespread pay errors that inflict financial hardship on soldiers and sap morale."