Online journalism job titles, responsibilities and pay rates (Part 1 of 2)

Jump to part 2 of this post (it’s where the numbers you want are)

First, general stats about the survey:
- This wasn’t scientific at all. So take this all with a gargantuan grain of salt. Everyone could have been lying. It’s anecdotal evidence. Having said that, as far as I know the responses seem legit.

- The survey questions were collected in one free-form text box with these questions:
1. What’s your title and how long have you worked as this?
2. What’s your publication? (Circ.? public/privately owned? union? City name? — The more details you can provide, the more it helps)
3. What’s your position entail?
4. How much do you make annually (in US dollars)?
5. Anything else you’d like to add?

- Not everyone answered all of the 4 core questions (I’m not including the 5th question because that was totally open ended). But 73 percent did. (Which is awesome! Thanks everyone!)

- There was 72 responses. I added this to my knowledge of the thirty-some job titles/responsibilities/wages I know from personal friends in the biz, as well as offers I’ve received in my time in the biz.

- Responses were almost exclusively from the U.S. There were a few from Asia, the UK and South America.

- The responses were heavily from the upper-tier of online journalism. Lots of editors, directors and managers. About 63 percent of the total survey. With the rest being a mix of producers, photographers/videographers and non-journalism web folks (but whom work similar jobs). The cool thing about this, is the new knowledge of top management wages compliments what I know from my homies (who tend to be younger producer/photo/video folks in the biz).

- Annual wages ranged from $3k (That’s not a typo. It was someone Asia. And yes, it was converted to U.S. dollars) to $130k. The mode average from the survey was around $60k, but as I said, the survey results were heavily upper-tier managers, editors and directors. The mode average of the survey and my knowledge from friends and peers would put that number at about $45K

My editorialized thoughts from the whole experience:

- There is a lot of rage out there. The last question of the anonymous survey, “Anything else you’d like to add?” was a pressure valve and some people let loose. There were stories about newspaper leaders demanding more multimedia content but not paying for training (so people had to pay out of their own pockets), stories about being rebuffed over raises for three years and stories of frustration because for the most part every city has one major newspaper, so if you have family and friends tying you to one city, you’re kind of stuck at that paper.

- There was also many, many grateful responses that I was doing this because (just like newspaper advertising online) a lot of people don’t know what things are worth in the market. And it’s a faux pau to ask what people are making.

- Mad tech skills do help but not nearly as much as I thought. (Although they definitely help, and especially at the upper-echelon papers–NYTimes, WaPost, etc.–they pay pretty well for great skills)

- Unionized papers and years on the job tend to help raise wages more than I thought. (Generally boosting $5-10k or more)

- Working for a corporation that’s publicly traded (and one of the traditional high-profit margin companies … I won’t name names but you know who they are.) tend to be one of the biggest wage deflators. (And also a major rage instigator among survey respondents.)

- Besides non-profits, working for just about anything other than a newspaper will pay more (for jobs of similar skills). $10-20+k more.

- People seem to not ask for raises or something. My parents are awesome; they taught me many things, including: 2 percent raises are costing you money. In an average year, inflation is 4-5 percent. If you’re not getting that much, you’re actually loosing money working for the same company. 3 percent standard wages are costing you money. Do not accept this malarkey.

These are media companies. Incredibly powerful and rich media companies. (Yes, things are shaky right now but please have a little perspective: Walmart clears 5-7 percent profits on a good year. The laziest media company in the world will clear 10 percent profit. The industry standard used to be 20 percent.) Take your rage, write it out and make a case for why you need to get paid fairly. Take it to your boss and his/her boss. If they don’t give it to you try to negotiate other concessions. Pension vesting. 401k matching. More vacation. Profit sharing. Performance bonuses. Get it in writing.

If they won’t play ball, then walk. (I know that’s easy to say, especially for someone with no kids/wife. But if you’re serious about getting paid fairly, you have to stand up.)

There’s a chronic brain drain in this industry and until they learn they need to pay fairly for all your awesomeness, it won’t stop. You’re too cool to waste your time getting abused. And if everyone keeps taking these sub-standard wages, pay rates will continue to plummet and tech skills will continue to be devalued.

- Maybe it’s just me and my web-nerd-bias, but an employee that’s worked for 2 years with 10 skills is worth much more than an employee who’s worked 10 years with two skills. For the most part, being in online gives you a small kick $3-5k more than someone just focused on print. But some of the results of this survey does not necessarily prove that to be so. And in some cases proves it to be the opposite (many web producers, doing the shovel-ware slave labor jobs are making substantially less than reporters producing 1-2 bylines a week). I can’t seem to find the quote right now, but I swear Bob Cauthorn once said something to the effect of, ‘The longer someone’s been in the newspaper business, the more likelihood that they’re a liability.’ Sometimes I think that is very true.

- Walter Mossberg is a jerk. “Mossberg is the paper’s highest-paid writer, earning, with bonuses, about five hundred thousand dollars a year; beginning reporters earn about forty-four thousand dollars, and senior correspondents as much as a hundred and forty thousand dollars.” I’m not trying to ‘hate.’ Good for him. But I know some awesome people getting horrible wages at the WSJ while this guy walks around on diamond-encrusted-gold-shoes-with-baby-seal-linings.

Go to part 2 of “Online journalism job titles, responsibilities and pay rates”