CNN
—
Since the start of the century, the number of journalists working in the United States has declined by more than 75 percent, according to a new report detailing “severe shortages” in local news.
“Stunningly, more than 1,000 counties — one out of three — do not have the equivalent of even one full-time local journalist,” states the report, published Thursday by Rebuild Local News and Muck Rack. “And the ‘better off’ parts of the country are in lousy shape, too.”
Overall, even as the US population continues to grow, the pool of journalists is shrinking, leaving local communities without relevant news coverage.
Areas with few or no local news outlets are often referred to as “news deserts,” and the new report highlights that these exist not just in rural areas, but also in highly populated parts of the country.
The report uses data from Muck Rack, a PR software firm, to count journalists at the county level across the US. The researchers found that “less than a quarter-century ago, the United States had about 40 journalists per 100,000 residents on average. Now, the number is 8.2, according to our new calculations.”
The sharp decline translates to fewer stories being told at the local level.
“Thousands of rural, urban and suburban communities are being left without the basic reporting they need to stay informed, connected and civically engaged,” said Steven Waldman, the president of Rebuild Local News, who has led the charge on this issue for years.
Waldman said he hoped the new data “will help philanthropists target their funding; entrepreneurs spot opportunities; and local stakeholders better argue for public policy changes to help sustain local news.”
Those policy changes include tax incentives, government advertising, consumer subsidies and investment funds.
Many of the trend lines for local news are discouraging. In an advertising marketplace dominated by Big Tech and an attention economy with endless distractions, traditional print newspapers and other forms of old-fashioned news media are struggling to survive.
Report Local News and Muck Rack found that only 111 counties in the US — 4% of the total — “currently have at least as many local journalists as the national average from a generation ago.”
Some states, however, are doing significantly better than others, the researchers observed. On the high end of the scale, Vermont has five times as many local journalists per capita as Nevada, according to the report.
Vermont ranks highly in part “because major new publications such as the nonprofit Vermont Digger and Seven Days have helped fill some of the gaps and in part because few of the newspapers have been bought by private equity firms,” the researchers concluded.
Both Seven Days and VTDigger rely heavily on reader donations and other forms of direct support from residents.
