Guild releases WashPost salary ranges

True, but you could pull off a home in the other markets if you were a writer.

Although the juice of working for the Post and living in DC is much nicer than covering a water main break in Cannonsburg.

 

93 Devil speaks the truth (at least when it comes to Binghamton). Mrs. Olsen and I bought our home on two newspaper salaries.

 

True, I have a condo, but it is my home. And you said "you would not be able to own anything other than a car."

 

So much for readers having much empathy for "beleaguered" newspaper journalists and how tough times are for the industry if a joint is paying people like that.

I'd worry that some owner would see numbers like that and figure every last one of them could take a 10 percent cut since, first, they could weather the setback and second, where they gonna go to do better right now? A bean-counter who didn't react that way would be asked to turn in his abacus, I think.

 

I don't think people outside DC realize the only reason the Post isn't joining the Tribune papers on the cutting blocks (although they did have another round of buyouts) is because they are making money hand over fist on Kaplan. That's basically subsidizing the media company at this point.

 

Not if it's a closed union shop and all the writers have to be in a union.

 

It's not...

 

It's not and a closed shop can still have exempt employees, anyway. Typically, the highest paid writers (think Woodward level) are exempt. In one of my former shops, a few of the real superstars fought to remain non-exempt because their hearts were with the Guild staff.

 

Some fight for that because it gives them better job security.

 

That, too. Most of the guys I'm thinking about are such superstars that I seriously doubt they'll ever have trouble finding work but in the current environment ... who knows.

 

The challenge the Post will face is bringing in non-union Web folks into the main operation. Will they be union? If not, will their pay be made union-scale? Will union workers shifted to Web-only operations (which is more than likely) be forced to take non-union pay cuts or leave the union?

 

I do believe that the Post's web folks, for the most part, work outside D.C. and outside the guild's reach in Virginia. And don't think that wasn't by design. This remains a major reason why the print and web operations haven't been merged as yet.