the kicker

Sad Stats from Seattle

November 12, 2009

Ruth Teichroeb, former Post-Intelligencer writer and current blogger, catches up with her colleagues to see where they are now–7 months after the paper closed. The results are anything but reassuring, with less than 1/3 of the 71 respondents having found full time jobs and fewer still in journalism.

Seventy-one of the 140 who lost their jobs responded:

路 23 have new fulltime jobs for an employer, half working in journalism and the rest in corporate or nonprofit communications, business, etc.

路 3 are working part-time for an employer and 6 started their own businesses

路 18 are freelancing (blogs, photography) or working on journalism start-ups (Post-Globe, InvestigateWest) and collecting unemployment

路 14 are in school, including 10 who are also on unemployment. Studies include education, web design, marketing, paralegal, art

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路 4 said a combination of unemployment/jobhunting/parenting while two retired and one has a journalism fellowship

For Ms. Teichroeb’s analysis of the numbers, visit her Safety Net blog. CJR’s Justin Peters also wrote about the state of Seattle journalism last month in his profile of Kery Murakami, ex-P-I reporter and current proprietor of the Seattle PostGlobe.

Diana Dellamere is a former CJR staff writer.