gannett plans to layoff 3,000 by december.

And sad to say, they will find people desperate enough for the job.

 

The most I made during a 17-year career in newspapers was $37,000 -- and that was working for a community edition of a major metro where I worked harder than many of the folks downtown and made a third of what they did.

 

The bigger papers with the biggest staffs do not necessarily have minimum salaries that exceed $50,000.

Just saying.

 

And many that did no longer do, since the pay cuts, furloughs and other givebacks.

Few fields have the terrific downward arc available now in newspaper work. It used to be, you'd move up a salary scale and then plateau for the rest of your career. Now it's a lovely parabola, where you start low, maybe get a couple raises on that low salary, then eventually slide backwards.

Better than the slope on the next generation's graph of newspaper paychecks, though. ;D

 

Since when is a flat line a slope?

 

Since sixth-grade geometry, iirc.

 

How do you have a slope if the line is flat, at 0 degrees?

I think the geometry sidetrack is important, because Gannett wants us to work harder and smarter with less to do more. Or is that algebra?

 

I think that's quantative analysis. And many major metro writers and editors make sub-$45k.

 

Gannett Theory of Relativity
1st Law: P rises as S diminishes, when P is profit and S is salaries.
2nd Law: Salary = Original pay + OT (y) - (F + PABCR)
and is always > LO

y= hours of overtime authorized by management which is always 0
F= hours lost due to furlough
PABCR = payment adjustment due to bogus claims in annual review)
LO= layoff

 

Here's a New York Times story on the *new* transitional pay program.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/27/business/media/27gannett.html?_r=2&ref=media

Love the last graph on how New Yorkers are particularly screwed, since those layoffs won't be announced until next week.

 

I just got done reading that Times story.
Wowsers.
You get laid off fro Gannett and have a little part-time gig or do some freelance and you get nothing.

 

What the story never addresses or never asks anyone, of course, is that with unemployment, you get a portion of your salary, not the whole thing, like severance.