The New York Times: Pink Politics and Red Ink

The Tea Party Economist ^ | May 2, 2015 | Gary North

[all the best]

The New York Times, along with all other print-based city newspapers, is slowly going bankrupt.

Specifically, Craigslist is killing them. Generally, the Web is killing them. They are all doomed. There are no exceptions. They are like mastodons caught in the tar pit. Some of them are sinking faster than others, but all of them are sinking.

What is killing them is the loss of advertising revenue in print editions. That is where the money is. That is where the money has always been. To make profits, they have to sell ad space on large pieces of paper — newsprint. But nobody over age 35 wants to read their pieces of paper any more. Only old people still hold on to these pieces of paper; nobody under 35 pays any attention. So, advertisers are departing in droves.

The Times has started a paid digital subscription operation. There are people who pay for this, but not nearly enough. In all of its quarterly reports, whatever spin specialist writes them tries to put lipstick on the obvious pig, but the bottom line always says the same thing: losses. Digital ad revenue per subscriber never equals ad revenue per newsprint subscriber.

The liberal press had secured for itself a nice monopoly by the end of the 20th century. That monopoly is not worth much any more. Matt Drudge has vastly more influence nationally than the New York Times does . . . and only three employees.

In the latest article on its quarterly report, the Times admits that the company had a $14 million loss. This had to do with pensions and falling ad revenue. Pensions are inescapable sources of losses. You do not get rid of these. They just keep adding up.

[all the best]

When advertising revenues are constantly falling, a newspaper is doomed. The only way that it can make this up this loss is to cut costs. The New York Times prides itself on having a staff of investigative reporters. There is no way to cut costs significantly, other than to fire more of these people, or else to cut their salaries.

I love this: “We got off to a solid start in early 2015,” said Mark Thompson, the company’s chief executive, “as our company maintained its digital momentum.” But the company also maintained its print edition momentum: downward. Revenues followed.

This is lipstick on a pig. The pig has cancer.

The mark of a dying operation is its replacement of key senior officers. This is taking place at the Times.

[stephenjohnbanker]

” The New York Times prides itself on having a staff of investigative reporters. “

” The New York Times prides itself on having a staff of left wing thugs”

Fixed it..

[RayChuang88]

The only reason why the New York Times is still around is the fact they have a sugar daddy financier to help pay for operations: Carlos Slim Helú, one of the richest persons in the world and easily the richest person in Mexico. If it weren't for Slim's financial investment, the Times would be in very serious financial trouble by now.

[Don Corleone]

A couple of generations ago my in-laws were all in the newspaper business. At that time the ad revenues were so great that you could actually ‘give away’ the papers and still show a profit. Back in the thirtys a daily paper, published as many as four edition a day sold for 2 cents and later a nickel, Sundays maybe a dime. They were left leaning even then but after WWII came TV and ‘horror of horrors’ the internet and their monopoly on propaganda disappeared. Now not only can they not afford to give away the papers they can’t sell them or the advertising that pays for them. It must give the Tree Huggers a great deal of pleasure since many many square miles of Forrest are not going into publishing the left wings screed.

[Albion Wilde]

ping!

[Zuben Elgenubi]

I really like the title of this piece.