Public Employee Press

Study blasts newspapers' anti-labor bias

By GREGORY N. HEIRES

On June 16, 30,000 unionists demonstrated against layoffs, service cuts and privatization at City Hall. On June 17, New York City's three main newspapers together devoted one minuscule story to the massive protest.

The virtual blackout would not surprise readers of a recent study that found the mainstream dailies guilty of a consistent anti-labor, conservative economic bias that shows more concern about taxes and deficits than human needs.

Andrew Slater, a former DC 37 member pursuing a master's degree in urban policy, conducted the analysis, which compared coverage of the current state and local budget situations by the New York Times, the New York Post and DC 37's Public Employee Press.

The Times and the Post "identified the primary problem facing the city and state as budget deficits, and not as unemployment like the Press," Slater said.

"They both faulted excessive spending as the principal contributor to the deficit, and not insufficient tax revenue, as the Press did," said Slater. Both blamed deficits on "too-generous labor policies with public employees, while the Press blamed cost overruns from contracts with private companies."

In an interview with PEP, Slater said the anti-labor and fiscally conservative ideology of the mainstream dailies fails to account for the deeper social, political and economic context of the budget debate and fails to meet their responsibility to tell the whole story, including the human costs of budget and service cuts.

On the other hand, he said, PEP emphasizes the human side of the cuts and their negative impact on the jobs crisis. Slater cited a recent column by DC 37 Executive Director Lillian Roberts that noted the damaging ripple effect of layoffs on the local economy.

While the mainstream media blame budget gaps on overspending, PEP has shown that the deficits result largely from falling revenue caused by the recession and years of tax cuts that mainly benefit the wealthy, Slater said.

His study analyzed the three newspapers' budget coverage from Jan. 1 to Feb. 14, examining 34 articles in the Times, 27 in the Post and 14 in PEP.

Slater, a master's degree candidate at the New School, was a member of Local 1113 as an Investigator at the city's Civilian Complaint Review Board in 2008 and 2009.

He titled his study, "Media Coverage of the Budget Situation: An Illustration of the Mainstream Media's Hegemonic Power to Shape the Public Discourse." Slater said the anti-labor and anti-government slant of the Post and the Times was particularly disturbing because of their "hegemonic" ability to influence the public's perception and opinions.

He praised PEP's budget coverage for including the housing crisis, the jobs crisis, the decline in affordable child care, the increasing demand for food stamps and soup kitchens, and the social cost of layoffs.

"The labor press gives people an alternative viewpoint to the corporate world and helps people make connections and understand how systematic problems can be fixed," he said.