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Ask
just about any journalist or teacher if
you can get rich being a newspaper reporter, and
you will quickly hear the raw truth.
A financially lucrative
career in journalism is generally thought to be
occupied by those fortunate and talented enough
to:
- make it big as the
editor or publisher of a major newspaper
or magazine,
- become one of the
half dozen or so network television news
anchors, or
- write a book that
is picked to be the basis of a movie.
Most career journalists
will say they entered the field for the creative
rewards - or so they claim in surveys and
interviews.
Or they may say they're
in the news business because of the thrill of
seeing others read, enjoy and learn from what
they've written, edited or designed - not for the
money alone.
Other rewards of being a
journalist
are described elsewhere on this Web site.
But those more cerebral
pleasures of being a career journalist won't put
food on the table or a sleek car in the garage of
the house of your dreams.
The big problem is how
to get a start and make enough money to afford to
live ... to lease or buy a car to get to work, to
pay the rent on a modest apartment, and to have
enough money left over to go to a movie or eat
out from time to time.
Beginning salaries
right out of college won't be sufficient to
maintain a lavish lifestyle. But the median
starting paycheck, which you can read about
below, will provide the basics.
And after two or three
years of work ... plus good performance reviews
from the boss ... a majority of newspaper and
news service writers and editors will find they
are reporting annual wages of $30,000 and more
when they fill our their tax returns.
Newspapers generally
hire beginning reporters on a probationary basis,
and then award a significant raise after a
six-month performance review. A TIP: During your interview,
ask when the first performance review will happen
and if that is also considered a salary review.
Also, you will find
that many journalists advance by changing
employers two, three or even four times early in
their careers.
The fact is, you can
make good money as a journalist, you can have a
comfortable lifestyle, and you can finish a
career of 40-plus working years with a handsome
retirement fund. A
TIP: Be sure to ask about a company's retirement
plan or pension fund during your job interview
and when you talk with your future co-workers.
What you will be trying to determine isn't about
your own pension plan, but to find out just how
much the company cares about the future of its
employees. Retirement may seem like a long way
away, but a good pension plan will signal that
the company is a good place to start a career,
too.
Studies about what
journalists earn are abundant, but three fairly
recent ones may shed some light on what you can
expect to earn as an intern, when you finish
college and in the years beyond. Here are some
excerpts:
- Nontraditional
areas of journalism are becoming more and
more important at many newspapers. These
same nontraditional areas also were the
highest paying. The average salary for
students working (as interns) at online
services was $376.70 a week, while that
for graphic artists and layout
specialists was $345.19. Salaries for
copy editors averaged $329.28 a week and
that for reporters averaged $272.50.
(Article
by Rich Holden in the 1999 edition of The
Journalist's Road to Success
by the Dow Jones Newspaper Fund).
- The median income of
full-time journalists increased from
$19,000 in 1981 to $31,297 in 1991. Daily
newspaper journalists saw their salaries
increase by 68% to a median of $35,180.
Journalists 55 and older, with a 1991
median salary of $40,333, made gains over
their young colleagues. What ... were the
real predictors of who made the most
money in journalism in 1991? Years of
professional experience and the size of
the employing organization were the
strongest factors in 1991, as they were
in 1971.
(Article by
David H. Weaver and G. Cleveland Wilhoit
in the March 1997 issue of The
Quill).
- The data reported here
suggest that excess supply of labor ...
serves to hold down salaries generally
and to explain the lower pay in
television news in comparison with daily
newspapers. Television ... has many more
persons seeking entry-level jobs than
there are jobs available. The daily
newspaper industry also has an excess
supply of entry-level applicants, but the
ratio is about half of what it is for
television. If daily newspapers want to
hire persons who specialized in print
journalism (in college), had a newspaper
internship, and worked for the campus
newspaper, ... there are not enough
graduates to go around. Obviously,
employers are going to have to compromise
to fill positions.
(Article by
Lee B. Becker, Vernon A. Stone and Joseph
D. Graf in the Autumn 1996 issue of J&MC
Quarterly).
The deeper reasons for choosing
a journalism career are, perhaps, told in the
Dow
Jones Newspaper Fund's career guide. Here's a sample of what that book, The
Journalist's Road to Success, says:
"Today's young journalists
have a mission that goes beyond making a name for
themselves or making a lot of money. The good
ones will achieve both fame and fortune, but they
will make it to that level because they have a
more important career goal. Their goal is to ask
good in-depth questions and to write and edit
honest and fair articles for newspapers,
including school newspapers. That dream is made
possible by resisting all attempts by elected and
appointed officials and others to restrict the
free flow of information to readers -- to the
community, the nation and the world."
This article was
compiled and written by Tom Engleman, program director of
the New Jersey Press Foundation. It was
updated in July 2000.
NOTE:
Information about newspaper careers, how to choose a newspaper for an
internship or job,
and the future of newspapers is available elsewhere in this Web
site.
  
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