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Columbia Journalism Review content tagged USA Today

1. September 14, 2012 03:26 PM

   USA Today’s 30th birthday bash

   The paper promises to reinvent the news businesses amid crab cakes and blue champagne

   By Michael Meyer

   Thursday night, the Gannett Company gathered employees, friends, and family at the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, DC, to celebrate the 30th anniversary of USA Today. Recognizing that an event in 2012 that looked back fondly on 30 years of newspaper history could seem more like a wake than a celebration, event organizers instead went with the theme “My USA...

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2. March 1, 2011 05:47 PM

   USA Today’s Ham-fisted Public Workers Story

   By Ryan Chittum

   USA Today runs a poor story this morning that says its analysis finds that government workers make more in total compensation (wages plus benefits) than private-sector workers in forty-one states. And so it does, but this is a case when stats are very misleading. Amazingly, USA Today doesn't take into account factors like education that account for the differences in...

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3. December 6, 2010 01:09 PM

   USA Today’s Mixed-Up Message

   What exactly did the deficit commission do?

   By Trudy Lieberman

   On Friday, USA Today reported that the president’s fiscal commission “approved a plan today to cut federal deficits by $3.9 trillion over the next decade, providing momentum for future spending cuts and tax increases but falling short of the super-majority needed to prompt immediate congressional action.” The story’s lede conveyed that the commission had “approved” the package of budget cuts...

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4. August 14, 2012 06:50 AM

   A critical eye on the ‘skills gap’

   The Free Press, Star Tribune, and USA Today ask questions

   By Ryan Chittum

   There's no shortage of uncritical reporting on the notion that employers, and particularly manufacturers, can't find enough qualified workers even in a time of high unemployment. Last week, even the auto industry was complaining about not being able to find enough qualified workers. A Crain's Detroit Business headline said, "Auto leaders at Management Briefing Seminars still lament shortage of labor...

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5. June 7, 2012 11:00 AM

   An eye on environmental justice

   EHN series focuses on an under-covered angle on toxics

   By Curtis Brainard

   A number of media reports in last year have examined the impacts of toxic pollution on communities, but few have emphasized, let alone focused on, the fact that low-income, minority neighborhoods tend to bear the brunt of the burden. That changed on Monday, when the website Environmental Health News (EHN) launched a special series, “Pollution, Poverty, People of Color,” about...

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6. April 12, 2011 07:49 PM

   Audit Notes: Perk Up, Core Inflation, What Passes for News

   By Ryan Chittum

   USA Today takes a long look at CEO perks, but it doesn't do a good job of prioritizing the really egregious (ie newsworthy) ones. Its first anecdote is about Larry Ellison, the Oracle CEO who's a billionaire forty times over: Oracle spent $4,642 on legal advice for CEO Larry Ellison to help him figure disclosure requirements tied to his personal...

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7. November 30, 2012 06:50 AM

   Audit Notes: pyramid people, Disney and ABC, no USA Today paywall

   Roddy Boyd digs into a diet-shake pyramid scheme

   By Ryan Chittum

   The investigative journalist Roddy Boyd has some excellent reporting on a multilevel marketing company (read: pyramid scheme) called ViSalus: ViSalus is a multilevel marketing company that promises ordinary folks a shot at financial success based solely on their skill at building a sales group that essentially draws on personal social circles: A distributor must recruit customers (usually starting with friends,...

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8. November 12, 2012 06:50 AM

   Context-free market reporting on a post-election dive

   First-term bull market goes unmentioned after a November 7 stock dip

   By Ryan Chittum

   The stock market dive the day after President Obama was re-elected, dropping 320 points, or 2.4 percent. The Drudge Report, the testing ground/early-warning system for right-wing memes, put the Dow as its top post-election story, telling Obama to "own it": Fair enough, but as I wrote on Twitter the other day, if Obama has to own that one-day 2.4 percent...

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9. December 13, 2010 10:34 AM

   Other Views of Social Security

   The MSM gives some equal time

   By Trudy Lieberman

   Campaign Desk has been hard of late on some MSM outlets that have presented lopsided views of the Social Security picture. So we were pleased to see that some other voices are now being heard. On Friday, NPR’s All Things Considered aired a piece that raised questions about the payroll tax holiday the president negotiated with Republicans last week. That...

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10. November 2, 2010 02:59 PM

    Some Helpful Guides to Election Night TV

    What to read while you watch

    By Joel Meares

    My colleague Liz Cox Barrett previewed the big guns' plans for tonight’s coverage. But just what should you have in hand as you watch? Jumping off from the assumption that we need TV guides that go beyond listing programs to actually explaining how to watch them, a number of outlets have today published viewer’s guides for tonight’s election coverage. Mostly,...

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11. August 17, 2012 06:50 AM

    The media’s ‘happily ever after’

    Why are women like Jennifer Aniston portrayed as sad and lonely if they aren't married?

    By Jennifer Vanasco

    In her column, Minority Reports, Jennifer Vanasco analyzes how the mainstream media covers social minorities. Jennifer Aniston is one of the wealthiest women in the entertainment industry. She has appeared in 27 feature films, starred in the hit sitcom Friends, owns a film production company, and just secured her own star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. But the poor...

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