Reinventing Myself in a Changing Journalistic Landscape

Six months ago, I took a buyout from a shrinking Los Angeles Times and wrote about it here. I didn't know what would come next. Certainly, I couldn't have predicted where that step would take me.

Now I'm across the country at an influential Washington D.C. think tank -- the Economic Policy Institute -- puzzling over how to pour two decades of newspaper experience into a new job of translating economic research and policy for a broad audience.

I'll still be writing. And in time, I hope to add context to the numbers coming from EPI's staff Ph.D.s with street reporting, just like the old days. But there's a key difference: My writing now will be unabashedly informed by a point of view.

Like the folks who started EPI in the mid-1980s as a counter to the reigning economic philosophy, I view the working and middle classes as the bedrock of the U.S. economy, and believe that government policies should do a better job of strengthening them. I also see a role for strong labor unions in balancing economic power, now so clearly out of whack.

In the artificial objectivity of modern journalism, which pits equally-weighted sides (i.e., labor and management) against each other, those sorts of opinions might be viewed as bias.

But through years of reporting on labor, trade and immigration, I've seen the consequences of an unbalanced economic culture that prizes cheap products and high corporate profits over stability and equitably-shared growth. It's not pretty and, as the numbers are increasingly telling us, it's not sustainable.

EPI has broken ground on these topics since the mid-1980s, documenting wage, employment and wealth inequality trends with impeccable research, building credibility in the face of skepticism and even hostility, and becoming an indispensable source to journalists covering workers and the economy.

Its work has quietly moved the political and economic debate, forcing recognition that free markets alone are insufficient to ensure a fair and prosperous economy. With political change on the horizon and cracks appearing in the conventional economic wisdom, the institute may have its best shot of influencing policy in years.

To take advantage of that opportunity, EPI is expanding, trying to find new ways to reach out beyond the beltway policy wonks and the shrinking number of elite economic journalists. As senior economist Jared Bernstein puts it, EPI is "going retail."

I was hired, along with author and speechwriter David Kusnet, is part of that effort. We're still working on the details, including a title (resident journalist? staff writer?). To a certain extent, this is a leap of faith, built on the idea that the old centers of information are being displaced by something new, and we want to have a voice in it.

I'm not alone in puzzling about how to proceed. As news organizations across the country push out experienced writers and shrink substantive reporting, more research groups like EPI are bringing their own journalists on board. We're reinventing ourselves as the world of journalism changes.

In my case, I'll continue to ask questions, to translate and explain, building on the careful research of economists I've learned to trust and respect. The difference is that I'll now be marshalling those facts to infuse the economic debate with I view as a long-missing dose of fairness.

Comments

[azrix]

Some economics fallacies here. America hasn't had a free market since at least 1913, when the Federal Reserve and Federal Income Tax were created. I don't see how the failures of a highly regulated economy can be the fault of a free market economy.

Things have gotten worse, especially since about 1970-1973, depending on what you're reading at the time. But Nixon closed the gold window in 1971. The dollar went from a psuedo gold standard to just being paper. We're to believe that growing inequality just happened? I mostly blame it on inflation. Any remedy that doens't take inflation into account is just not workable.

http://www.populistamerica.com/why_are_you_worse_off
http://www.populistamerica.com/wage_gaps__inequality__and_government

If you are really interested in understanding poverty, I would recommend you read Henry Hazlitt's "The Conquest of Poverty" (available here: http://www.mises.org/books/conquest.pdf ).

[racetoinfinity]

I also wanted to say that you and other new progressive economic analysts and reporters are sorely needed. The conventional wisdom (myth) that "free markets" and multi-national corporate globalization are magical

("voodoo economics" is one of the few halfway brilliant phrases Bush pere coined running against Reagan)

equal-pros­perity-to-­all "trickle down" "manifesters" is still extremely prevalent, despite its fake truth having been chipped away in the last 7 years, by reality and by progressive voices finally speaking up as the gap widens, and things get worse for the 95+% of us.

[racetoinfinity]

Great to have you doing this work -- and your observations about the changing nature of journalism (and the state of it today) are cogent.

Looking forward to reading and commenting on your posts here and elsewhere!!

[TexasRuby]

May the wind be at your back as you re-invent yourself. I left journalism 15 years ago to work for several state legislators and agencies and have been appalled at how weak most mainstream media is against the forces of corporate-­goverment. Our middle class must be saved or our way of life is over so I join with others in wishing you well in inflicting pain on the greedy and delivering truth to the public.
And I hope other think tanks and groups take up the slack for our lack of real journalism these days. I still think Hillary won in NH because voters wanted to see media celebrities like Tim Russert, Maureen Dowd and George Will sweat like stuck pigs.

[glitzqueen]

Lucky you to land at EPI. I was a writer for decades, but now that they want 'em young, cheap, unprincipled and preferably in Bangalore, forget that. I've been selling everything I own to survive.

[LawrenceR]

... You paint a very interesting and exciting picture of possibilities for tomorrow. I truly look forward to where this journey will take us...
... I also had to laugh as I went to bookmark a link to your 'Economic Policy Institute,' only to find that it was already there from a previous discovery. I must have thought it was important enough to save then. I cetainly think it's important enough to save, and examine, now...

... In our contemporary world of seeming 'moral relativism' -where only the glass that is 'half full' is shown to be of primary focus- it is quite refreshing to see journalistic skills once again being employed and shedding much needed light onto an equally harsher reality as well. That harsh reality, but equally important fact, is that our metaphorical glass is not just one that is but half full -whereby ones simple realization of said fact is merely blinded by our own lying eyes- but rather that 'both' realities exist simultaneously. Not only can that very same analogous glass that is the human condition be seen to be half full with pregnant possibilities, it would be pure folly not to equally recognize that very same cup to be simultaneously (to exist side-by-side) half empty as well, and stagnating to very same pregnant possibilities right before our very eyes...

... More writers -and journalists- need to find it within themselves to see this polarizing dichotomy for what it truly is. How can one honestly be considered 'objective' if they only insist on showing 'half' of reality to the public... Your insight is a breath of fresh air, and will go a long way toward that 'new' journalistic standard of tomorrow...

[Uselessboy]

If the economy wanted strong and rising working & middle classes, it'd be building them. It's hard at work building what it wants, and thanks to the freedom of globalism, it's obviously not concerned with adverse consequences for some of us here.

Good luck with your career, and good luck finding a way to make it matter.

[hglindquist]

Well, Nancy, I'm a fan already! And even David Brooks wrote today in his NY Times OpEd column about the jobs and families fairness agenda for the future:

"There are four main spheres of policy innovation. First, a human capital agenda. The U.S. needs a more skilled work force, but for the first time in our history it is getting a generation no better educated than its parents.

"To remedy this, Ramesh Ponnuru of The National Review proposes an increased child tax credit to reduce the stress on young families, the seedbed of human capital."

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/11/opinion/11brooks.html

Don't you just love those ideas ... "needs a more skilled work force" and "young families, the seedbed of human capital."

And Paul Krugman mentioned today in his column the decline we've experienced in the employment­/populatio­n ratio.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/11/opinion/11krugman.html

In addition to fair labor practices and "families as the seedbed of human capital", I am interested in the failure of the bogus "free" market economists to deal with externalities ... among other things.

You wrote: "Like the folks who started EPI in the mid-1980s as a counter to the reigning economic philosophy, I view the working and middle classes as the bedrock of the U.S. economy, and believe that government policies should do a better job of strengthening them. I also see a role for strong labor unions in balancing economic power, now so clearly out of whack."

Bravo! With one caveat. I have a healthy skepticism of labor unions that fight for their turf rather than expanding job opportunities for all. The goal of the labor movement should be a job under fair labor practices that pays a living wage for everyone willing and able to work. And I think young people are a wee bit tired of us old folks (I'm over 65 and retired) who suck up the bennies but haven't done the hard work of protecting fair labor practices and jobs for their generation.

Keep writing!

[situationcritical]

You're not reinventing yourself - you're deluding yourself into thinking there is a journalistic landscape at all after Ailes and Murdoch.