Research done at Ball State University indicates that young newspaper journalists are not very happy with their jobs. Dr. Scott Reinardy found that young people are the most dissatisfied group in the newsroom:
Interestingly, younger journalists not only reported higher rates of burnout than their colleagues, but those journalists are most likely to express intentions to leave the profession. Among journalists 34 and younger, 74.5 percent either answered “yes” or “don’t know” when asked about leaving newspaper journalism. For young journalists, there clearly appears to be a distinct connection between burnout and career change. The open-ended responses indicate that dissatisfaction with pay, job demands and high levels of stress is whittling away at the commitment of young journalists.
It would be fascinating to know if there have been similar studies done in broadcast or online newsrooms. Can this job dissatisfaction be attributed to the increasing pressures on print newsrooms? Or is this unhappiness permeating all of journalism? If anyone has data or an opinion to share, please do!
