Telling the stories of workers in a down economy
A recent story from The New York Times featured workers struggles in a economic downturn.
News outlets have found a variety of ways to tell the story of the millions of unemployed workers struggling across the country.
This week, The New York Times and Reuters highlighted two different angles of the issue: the toll of unemployment wages and how the numbers of out of work Americans has affected the housing market.
An article by The Times, “New Job Means Lower Wages for Many,” humanized the unemployment issue by focusing on two women forced to take lower paying jobs as a result of the economic recession. It was over a year before one woman found employment and both women ended up taking jobs in different fields.
To further highlight the unemployment toll, The Times also featured a video, which followed the challenges faced by two girls who graduated from college in 2008 and haven’t yet found jobs in their field of study. Both girls majored in journalism, but are now working as bartenders to pay the bills. The video follows their routine of job hunting by day and tending bar by night.
By personalizing the issue and utilizing different multimedia components to tell the story, the publication offered its viewers a fresh perspective of the unemployment crisis.
While The New York Times examined how unemployment has affected earnings, Reuters posted an article showing how a lack of workers has impacted the housing market. The article, “Unemployment drives more home sellers to cut price,” focused on how housing prices have fallen due to buyers not being able to meet the higher sale prices.
Both news outlets found interesting ways to tell the stories behind the unemployment numbers and show the scale of the problem. With 14.6 million unemployed Americans as of July 2010, it’s obvious that this is a story with many different angles that will stick around for quite some time.
