2004 Annual Report - Radio Newsroom Investment

When it comes to budgeting, there are signs of growing uncertainty. Nearly half of all stations (46 percent) had the same news budget in 2001 as the year before, a figure that has remained stable for 2002 and 2003. Ten percent either had or anticipated budget cuts according to 2003 figures, compared to just 3 percent in 2001. Roughly than 18 percent anticipated an increase in the news budget, which is down from 22 percent in 2001. Certainly some of this, however, was likely influenced by the recession of 2001.⁴

Salaries

With the consolidation in radio that has occurred since 1998, pay has improved substantially according to the Papper survey. Between 1998 and 2003, news directors' salaries have risen 24 percent, anchors' salaries 23 percent and reporters' salaries 15 percent.

But these percentage increases do not tell the whole story. Consider, for instance, that the salary for a radio sports reporter has increased almost 60 percent since 1998 but still sits at less than $18,000 a year. Radio journalists are not highly paid. The median, or midpoint, salary for a news director in 2003, according to the RTNDA data, was $31,000 a year, or roughly $15 an hour, assuming a 40-hour work-week.

The typical salary for radio anchors was $29,500, about $14 an hour. And the median salary for news reporters was $23,000 a year, less than $11 an hour.

What's more, as the RTNDA data would seem to indicate, consolidation has meant fewer people doing the news, and those who are left frequently have multiple responsibilities. But the 2003 data shows that there is just barely an 8 percent difference in the salaries of news directors who handle one station ($31,000) and those who handle three or more stations ($33,500). For news anchors that jump is almost 15 percent. For news reporters, however, the salary drops as they cover more and more stations. It is possible that these lower salaries lead reporters to work with more than one outlet. Or it could be that, in this age of media consolidation, the importance of the news reporter declines as the number of stations served by a single news outlet grows. In other words, if one reporter can provide reporting for nine stations thanks to a central feed, what impetus do large radio corporations have for increasing, or even maintaining, reporter pay?⁵

Radio Newsroom Salaries

Survey of news directors, 1998 & 2003

Design Your Own Chart

Source: "RTNDA/Ball State University Annual Survey"

* Median salaries