At Cato Unbound, Paul Starr calls for an investigative journalism subsidy: Many regional papers in the United States have cut back or shut down their Washington bureaus, reducing coverage of their region’s representatives in Congress and the implications of federal policy for their area. The analogous process has also happened within the states; in the past five years, according to surveys by the American Journalism Review, the number of reporters covering state government has dropped by one-third … Will non-commercial patrons step in to rectify this imbalance and finance more public-service journalism? Perhaps, but I see no reason to assume so. …
This is something that I have wondered about for a long time, especially with the impending collapse of the old newspapers. The talk of "new media" and the internet as this "great equalizer" has left me wondering about the future of investigative journalism, a field which, it seems to me, has been dormant for a long time, even before the cutbacks outlined above.
The cost of "access," in particular, makes me question whether independent blogger-journalists/twitter-ers can fill such an important need.
Some comments have noted the problem with gov't-funded media--namely, that it would make journalists less likely to investigate government. If we accept that claim--that media outlets are reluctant to investigate their backers/funders--then the status quo, with advertisers funding news organizations, is equally unacceptable.
Agreed. So what's the low-cost, low-discretion, difficult-to-game method of allocating funds? I assume one component would be a series of tests which can be performed by someone reading the work (doubtless there would be automatic computer-driven ones too; at the very least, a plagiarism index of some kind). One I'd vote for is a distinction between journalism, which requires commentary, and press, which only requires publishing.
The low-discretion part of the idea is probably the most important one: of course, if the subsidy was allocated in proportion to how well the journalist had defended the government's position, then I would be as saddened as anyone. However, if the metrics and/or standards for the funding were precise and difficult to alter, and the allocation was public, then that kind of favoritism would be extremely difficult to effect.
It's true that this would undermine journalistic independence from government in exchange for potentially increasing journalistic independence from corporations (the current paymasters). Pro-paycheck-giver bias will inevitably calm some potential anti-government sentiment, and what's more, breed entitlement in this new generation of journalists. But hopefully a Journalists' Lobby would prove less destructive than the, say, the Pharmaceutical Lobby.
He who pays controls: If journalists receive a subsidy, they will be even more the propagandar arm of the state than they are already. Look at education.
Thus the effect will not be cleaner government, but more corrupt government: Swedes have government subsidized journalism. In arguing with Swedes on the internet, I often find that not only do they have entirely deluded and insane beliefs about the US, for example the belief that slave markets are still being conducted, that the seriously ill are allowed to die in the streets, that millions of children are starving, but that they also have beliefs about Sweden that are similarly deluded in the reverse direction - for example that Sweden has no drug war because it has no drug problem, that Sweden is free from racial or religious tensions, that Sweden never employed state sponsored sterilization to eliminate inferior races, and so on and so forth.
What if nothing works better then the market? Then it's not the case of a market failure - or shouldn't be considered such. If "market failure" is defined so that you can "identify" it without first demonstrating that something would work better, then it's a joke concept. It's not at all clear that a government subsidy would work better. All I see here is some fairly weak speculation that it might.
Because the "free market" doesn't work. Robin has identified a serious market failure when it comes to investigative journalism.
Regarding the rest: (mine, Mine, MINE!... stamps foot) LOL. Ever heard of the sixteenth amendment. And I don't care what some long dead people thinks, the land belongs to the living.
Constant: I am taking Robert to task for being blinded by partisan bias and detached from anything approaching reality. What I called "addle-brained" is not thinking the BBC is partisan (almost any news source is, though I'm skeptical that they're worse than others), nor thinking that subsidies in this case are an unworkable idea (I agree).
Rather, I was referring to calling the BBC's existence "authoritarianism", which borders on the territory of "not even wrong" and strongly discourages me from responding to his other arguments due to moderately strong evidence of systemic irrationality.
What confuses me, in the end, is the inexplicable degree of right-leaning partisan bias (not the obvious libertarianism, but blind US-right-wing kneejerk responses) in some comments on this site, as evidenced by the handful of crackpots that came out when Robin posted on CO2-driven global warming a while back.
The picture that right-wing Americans have of British institutions like the BBC or the NHS seems so alien to practically everyone in the UK. The BBC has its failings but it is deservedly one of the most respected news organisations in the world.
Insults are not helpful. If you have an argument, it can stand on its own two feet without peppering it with abuse in an attempt to make it stronger. You are here taking Robert to task for the strength of his emotional reaction to the BBC, which also does not contribute. Looking at his two comments, he has an argument which you have not even touched, the meat of it at 11 pm (before your reply). The argument is that the BBC is an already-existing example of the plan in action and it is partisan (if you think it is not partisan that's fine for now, we can argue about it later; however, telling me - I happen to agree that it is partisan - that I'm "addle-brained" for finding it to be partisan is not persuasive), and that there is a simple reason why subsidies cannot be neutral, as he explains at 11 pm.
The BBC is not particularly expensive nor "viciously" partisan, whatever that means, and probably no more corrupt than any other organization of similar size.
More importantly, under what addle-brained definition does modest funds collected for a broadcaster that many people do voluntarily choose to watch over competitors constitute "authoritarianism"? You are diluting the definition of the word beyond all hope of recognition and I'm not sure you even know what it means.
Why is it so difficult to keep the hands of meddling left-wing do-gooders away from free markets?
Why does noone ever care about efficient markets or dealing with externalities?
I think the argument is that this is a reasonably cheap way of supporting the goal of clean government. It's true that clean government, or non-corrupt government, or non-abusive-of-power government isn't written into the Constitution that way. I find it relatively obvious that such a lack is evidence of the Constitution being, as I'm sure the framers would agree, somewhat incomplete, or at least inexhaustive. That seems reasonable to me.
I'm not actually surprised, because I have my suspicions about you, but I would be surprised--were I to know you to be a reasonable Conservative with which I, often a Liberal, could find common ground--that you wouldn't support the goal of investigating those in power. It seems like a very antigovernment stand.
I guess the big question is, how can we trust those paid by the government to investigate the government, to do a good job? Seems almost like a case for providing an investigative journalism fund for China, and hoping that they decide to provide one for us. We pay for the most embarrassing things that can be found out about them, to make us look better, which will help us in politically capital-intensive alliances (except with China).
Great post.
This is something that I have wondered about for a long time, especially with the impending collapse of the old newspapers. The talk of "new media" and the internet as this "great equalizer" has left me wondering about the future of investigative journalism, a field which, it seems to me, has been dormant for a long time, even before the cutbacks outlined above.
The cost of "access," in particular, makes me question whether independent blogger-journalists/twitter-ers can fill such an important need.
Some comments have noted the problem with gov't-funded media--namely, that it would make journalists less likely to investigate government. If we accept that claim--that media outlets are reluctant to investigate their backers/funders--then the status quo, with advertisers funding news organizations, is equally unacceptable.
Agreed. So what's the low-cost, low-discretion, difficult-to-game method of allocating funds? I assume one component would be a series of tests which can be performed by someone reading the work (doubtless there would be automatic computer-driven ones too; at the very least, a plagiarism index of some kind). One I'd vote for is a distinction between journalism, which requires commentary, and press, which only requires publishing.
The low-discretion part of the idea is probably the most important one: of course, if the subsidy was allocated in proportion to how well the journalist had defended the government's position, then I would be as saddened as anyone. However, if the metrics and/or standards for the funding were precise and difficult to alter, and the allocation was public, then that kind of favoritism would be extremely difficult to effect.
It's true that this would undermine journalistic independence from government in exchange for potentially increasing journalistic independence from corporations (the current paymasters). Pro-paycheck-giver bias will inevitably calm some potential anti-government sentiment, and what's more, breed entitlement in this new generation of journalists. But hopefully a Journalists' Lobby would prove less destructive than the, say, the Pharmaceutical Lobby.
He who pays controls: If journalists receive a subsidy, they will be even more the propagandar arm of the state than they are already. Look at education.
Thus the effect will not be cleaner government, but more corrupt government: Swedes have government subsidized journalism. In arguing with Swedes on the internet, I often find that not only do they have entirely deluded and insane beliefs about the US, for example the belief that slave markets are still being conducted, that the seriously ill are allowed to die in the streets, that millions of children are starving, but that they also have beliefs about Sweden that are similarly deluded in the reverse direction - for example that Sweden has no drug war because it has no drug problem, that Sweden is free from racial or religious tensions, that Sweden never employed state sponsored sterilization to eliminate inferior races, and so on and so forth.
Because the “free market” doesn’t work.
What if nothing works better then the market? Then it's not the case of a market failure - or shouldn't be considered such. If "market failure" is defined so that you can "identify" it without first demonstrating that something would work better, then it's a joke concept. It's not at all clear that a government subsidy would work better. All I see here is some fairly weak speculation that it might.
Because the "free market" doesn't work. Robin has identified a serious market failure when it comes to investigative journalism.
Regarding the rest: (mine, Mine, MINE!... stamps foot) LOL. Ever heard of the sixteenth amendment. And I don't care what some long dead people thinks, the land belongs to the living.
Since you want to be pedantic about it:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wik...http://en.wikipedia.org/wik...
Furthermore, not everyone lives in the United States, and even if Congress can't do it, a state government certainly could.
Oh, and what makes that money yours to begin with, anyway? There's more to life than property rights, you know. Or do you? :P
Constant: I am taking Robert to task for being blinded by partisan bias and detached from anything approaching reality. What I called "addle-brained" is not thinking the BBC is partisan (almost any news source is, though I'm skeptical that they're worse than others), nor thinking that subsidies in this case are an unworkable idea (I agree).
Rather, I was referring to calling the BBC's existence "authoritarianism", which borders on the territory of "not even wrong" and strongly discourages me from responding to his other arguments due to moderately strong evidence of systemic irrationality.
What confuses me, in the end, is the inexplicable degree of right-leaning partisan bias (not the obvious libertarianism, but blind US-right-wing kneejerk responses) in some comments on this site, as evidenced by the handful of crackpots that came out when Robin posted on CO2-driven global warming a while back.
No reason to subsidize what the world wants less of unless the goal is to create waste
That would also be a good idea, if a low-discretion way can be found to implement it.
I'm open to this idea, but how do you decide who to give the money to?
Yes James, exactly.
A neutral subsidy could be taken by partisan media.
The picture that right-wing Americans have of British institutions like the BBC or the NHS seems so alien to practically everyone in the UK. The BBC has its failings but it is deservedly one of the most respected news organisations in the world.
addle-brained
Insults are not helpful. If you have an argument, it can stand on its own two feet without peppering it with abuse in an attempt to make it stronger. You are here taking Robert to task for the strength of his emotional reaction to the BBC, which also does not contribute. Looking at his two comments, he has an argument which you have not even touched, the meat of it at 11 pm (before your reply). The argument is that the BBC is an already-existing example of the plan in action and it is partisan (if you think it is not partisan that's fine for now, we can argue about it later; however, telling me - I happen to agree that it is partisan - that I'm "addle-brained" for finding it to be partisan is not persuasive), and that there is a simple reason why subsidies cannot be neutral, as he explains at 11 pm.
The BBC is not particularly expensive nor "viciously" partisan, whatever that means, and probably no more corrupt than any other organization of similar size.
More importantly, under what addle-brained definition does modest funds collected for a broadcaster that many people do voluntarily choose to watch over competitors constitute "authoritarianism"? You are diluting the definition of the word beyond all hope of recognition and I'm not sure you even know what it means.
Why is it so difficult to keep the hands of meddling left-wing do-gooders away from free markets?
Why does noone ever care about efficient markets or dealing with externalities?
I think the argument is that this is a reasonably cheap way of supporting the goal of clean government. It's true that clean government, or non-corrupt government, or non-abusive-of-power government isn't written into the Constitution that way. I find it relatively obvious that such a lack is evidence of the Constitution being, as I'm sure the framers would agree, somewhat incomplete, or at least inexhaustive. That seems reasonable to me.
I'm not actually surprised, because I have my suspicions about you, but I would be surprised--were I to know you to be a reasonable Conservative with which I, often a Liberal, could find common ground--that you wouldn't support the goal of investigating those in power. It seems like a very antigovernment stand.
I guess the big question is, how can we trust those paid by the government to investigate the government, to do a good job? Seems almost like a case for providing an investigative journalism fund for China, and hoping that they decide to provide one for us. We pay for the most embarrassing things that can be found out about them, to make us look better, which will help us in politically capital-intensive alliances (except with China).