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Globe preparing story about how tough it is to be well off these days
By adamg on Mon, 03/02/2009 - 3:39pm
Halleyscomet became outraged when she learned the Globe is working on a story about how people earning $250,000 in the Boston area aren't rich and so are right to be concerned about possible Obama tax increases:
... How, exactly does making a quarter of a million dollars not make you rich in the Boston area? ... $250,000 a year is only middle class if you consider 98% of Americans to be lower class.
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Comments
Rich and should be taxed at
Rich and should be taxed at a higher rate = makes more money than me.
yup, and these poor people
yup, and these poor people are just so bad off!
What will they ever do!? No one in their right minds would work with that tax rate!
Bollocks.
Progressive taxation is a necessary evil of capitalism. Just like light and prudent regulation.
Don't like it, go find a hut in the woods in some third world nation that won't bother you and try running your business there.
Repeat after me: Suburban
Repeat after me:
Suburban Globe
Suburban Globe
Suburban Globe....
going after that $250k+ demographic
True, $250k in Boston isn't what it is in Butte (or Syracuse or Indianapolis or a lot of places), but this piece of guano-in-progress may be Exhibit No. 92832 why the Globe is losing its relevance.
The President is being politically expedient when targeting his tax hikes at the very, very top income earners. In a more giving society, he could start with the top 10 percent and gradually increase the rate from there, without getting politically pummeled.
From Wikipedia, here's a nice overview of income distribution in the U.S., which adds some context to the absurdity of this planned article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_income_in_th...
Exhibit No. 92832 Or maybe
Or maybe just exhibit 02482.
One could wait for the
One could wait for the article rather than make assumptions about its conclusions or biases.
For one thing, a reporter saying "I want to interview people with perspective X" does not necessarily mean "I have predetermined that X will be the conclusion of my report, and I will also assert that Y is true as well, since some bloggers will think X implies Y, and I guess they should know."
sometimes past performance is an indication of future failures
The Globe has a long history of the sort of writing that begins with a conclusion, or a clever closing line, and works its way backward toward sources that bolster that POV... a really long history of that, particularly with the articles that might be seen in some corners as slice-of-life stories. unfortunately, that sort of coverage DOES feed back into the surrounding environment, and does sometimes turn debates in unfortunate directions. The globe wrote it. It must be true. Even as they slide into their respective black holes, newspapers are (deliberately or due to lazy/unthinking reportage, doesn't matter) directing and focusing public discussions.
Isn't that what any well-written piece does?
Whether you're writing a thesis or an investigative article, that's exactly what you do, isn't it?
You state what you're about to prove
You present evidence to support your theory
You state your conclusion again.
Of course, the important part is the middle part - the evidence, and whether the evidence supports the conclusion. This is where the intelligent reader will determine for themselves whether it's a good article or not. Is there a good sample of data, or is it biased? Are the statistics presented slanted to support the conclusion? Maybe there is an agenda, and the writer will just cobble together some interviews to support the article. We'll see.
That's not what reporters are supposed to do.
Reporters seldom (as in never) do that pesky middle part when the begin with a conclusion. All the work goes to supporting the conclusion, They aren't trained in scientific, skeptical thought, are punished if a story has to be sacked because it conked out, what with there actually being no story there. time wasted. Money wasted chasing a dead end. I've heard the complaints, and I've worked with the people.
There are some good investigative reporters out there, but remember that THAT sort of work is also not about finding something that might not be there, but about filling in the details about what probably is there (thanks to a tip). Even Geraldo Rivera managed to fill a couple of hours of network prime time while digging a hole in some dirt.
Reporting isn't science and does not proceed as you described, not even once in a while, really. Reporting is about presenting what /is/. By stating that something /is/ (worthy of being reported-on) it gets a kind of special standing that every thing NOT reported on can't have. This is still true in the time of blogs and alternative media pouring out of every Internet spigot.
Shows what I know
Good thing I'm not in the newspaper biz, I'd be living in a tent. ;-) Thanks for the insight.
This is what a lot of news
This is what a lot of news reporters, producers, and editors do every day. "My publisher/managing editor/editor told me it's true, ergo it's true!"
It takes someone willing to be seen as a troublemaker to challenge this kind of story suggestion (and it's one reason I stopped working in TV news).
maybe...
...the preliminary reaction will help to make the article a better one.
Maybe she'll highlight high income earners who believe that a reasonable, modest tax hike on the most fortunate is an okay thing.
Well, OK then!
--so long as it's reasonable and modest, who could possibly think it's not OK?
This is the same newspaper
This is the same newspaper that wrote about the plight of millionaires a couple years back and how a million doesn't get you what it used to. The Globe has a well-documented history of playing the violin for those poor, poor rich folks.
Rich is relative
The use of the word "rich" here is not a good one, Adam. Certainly, couples earning $250K are doing well, but I hesitate to use the word "rich".
I'm particularly sensitive to this because my wife's family calls us rich. I'm a software engineer and she works at a bank as a facilities manager, two very common jobs around here. We're doing OK, we're DINKs, we have jobs (for now, anyway), but rich?
Well, if your each pulling
Well, if your each pulling $125K, personally I'd say your very upper middle class, lower rich class for suburban Boston. Living a middle class life with children should be very easy on that salary as long as you're not overextending yourself on luxury goods.
Especially with financial's that will start people in office jobs are 30K a year with minimal benefits.
Rorschach Test
This post has become something of a Rorschach Test! And it's grounded on the (accurate) assumption that most Americans do not like to think of themselves as rich or poor, but rather "middle class."
I like that
I agree, good observation. Maybe we'll see something similar in the article.
Ever read the Globe Magazine
Ever read the Globe Magazine in the Sunday paper? Is that some kind of inside joke? The thing is targeted at suburban millionaires.