Alternative news is thriving and Americans have access to more information than ever before.
But government-supporting (“mainstream”) newspapers continue to fall in circulation and importance.
The Pew Research Center has found that total US daily newspaper circulation, print and digital combined, was down 11 and 10 percent, respectively, from the previous year.
(Two major papers, the New York Times and Wall Street Journal, were excluded from the calculation because their circulation data is computed differently. Both the NYT and WSJ are said to be doing well.)
News ad data is also declining.
And, according to US government data (always suspect), 39,210 people worked as reporters, editors, photographers, or film and video editors in the newspaper industry in 2017, down nearly eight percent in a year and 45 percent from 2004.
