“In 2004, one reporter in eight lived in New York, Washington, or Los Angeles,” Schieffer notes in his must-read book “Overload: Finding the Truth in Today’s Deluge of News.” “That number is now down to one-in-five who live in those three places.”
Schieffer saw another problem: The massive decrease of local reporters due to shrinking budgets.
He writes, “While no solutions seem obvious, there is general agreement throughout the industry that if local newspapers go away and some entity does not rise to do what we have come to expect of them—that is, keep an eye on local government—we will experience corruption at levels we have never seen.”
Since 2004, approximately 1,800 newspapers have shut down because of the collapse of print advertising and readers turning to more convenient online consumption. Fewer reporters and editors has resulted in less trust as news gathering becomes more and more confined to two or three cities.
Overall, according to Pew, just 29 percent of U.S. adults say they have at least a fair amount of trust in the information they receive. In 1976 in the post-Watergate era, trust in the media stood at 72 percent, or 43 points higher.