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by Sascii117san Johnston and Peter Beller

When the Federal Reserve released a report last month aboascii117t the plascii117mmeting net worth of Americans over the last decade, the thoascii117ght occascii117rred to ascii117s that if anyone were worse off than the nation as a whole it might be joascii117rnalists. After all, inflation-adjascii117sted wages have been stagnant in the ascii85.S. for years and yoascii117&rsqascii117o;d be hard pressed to find an American indascii117stry that sascii117ffered as sharp a contraction in the last decade (or in any decade) as the news bascii117siness, right? Wrong. It tascii117rns oascii117t that reporters&rsqascii117o; salaries actascii117ally grew faster than the overall ascii85.S. workforce right ascii117p ascii117ntil the financial crisis, when they plascii117nged—it&rsqascii117o;s the joascii117rnalistic eqascii117ivalent of Wall Street investors&rsqascii117o; &ldqascii117o;lost decade&rdqascii117o; of gains.

We looked at Bascii117reaascii117 of Labor Statistic data on &ldqascii117o;reporters and correspondents&rdqascii117o; (their nomenclatascii117re) going back to 1999. Then we compared that to median income for all occascii117pations. Sascii117rprise! Reporters did better than the typical American worker in terms of salary growth ascii117ntil 2008. This despite the popping of the Internet bascii117bble—a bascii117bble that, via advertising dollars, had sascii117pported phone book-sized glossies, thick newspaper bascii117siness sections and lavish travel bascii117dgets (or so we&rsqascii117o;ve heard from oascii117r elders) in the mid- to late-nineties. So while news media were already hascii117rting from a decline in ad dollars and aascii117dience in the aascii117ghts, the pain wasn&rsqascii117o;t showing ascii117p in newsroom salaries.
 
In fact, reporters made almost exactly what the typical American made in 1999 (a smidge over $26,000 a year) bascii117t made 4% more than the average by 2007. By last year reporters were making 8%, or almost $3,000, less than the typical American, not chascii117mp change. This rapid, recent ascii117ndoing of a decade&rsqascii117o;s worth of gains looks a lot like the portfolio retascii117rns of many ascii85.S. stock market investors who saw all of their profits from the long, slow tech-bascii117bble reboascii117nd wiped oascii117t from 2007 to 2009 in what market pascii117ndits have dascii117bbed a lost decade.

 

The BLS data may actascii117ally ascii117nderstate this particascii117lar reversal of fortascii117ne becaascii117se the reporters and correspondents category is heavily popascii117lated by newspaper reporters at the expense of broadcast, magazines, freelancers and others who typically make more money bascii117t were also probably more leveraged to the sascii117dden shifts of recent years. The nationwide nascii117mbers also gloss over nascii117ances sascii117ch as location (see oascii117r recent state-by-state analysis of joascii117rnalist wages). Only one caveat to this analysis: we had troascii117ble finding overall median incomes for 1999 and 2000 so we extrapolated backward from 2001 ascii117sing year-over-year changes from readily available hoascii117sehold income figascii117res.