NPR cancels 4 podcasts amid major layoffs
npr.org
npr.org
“ Disclosure: This story was reported and written by NPR Media Correspondent David Folkenflik and NPR Intern Mary Yang. It was edited by Acting Chief Business Editor Emily Kopp. Under NPR's protocol for reporting on itself, no NPR corporate official or news executive reviewed this story before it was posted publicly. “
Ie., they reported on themselves without interference from the suits.
Makes news like these layoffs all the more heartbreaking.
I'm all for human rights. I listen to NPR because they report on human rights. But FFS, I'm always left cringing and thinking "does the audience really demand this level of progressivism?"
It's so bad now that I can't trust them to report objectively.
Wanna solve your money problems? Spin up a conservative arm and let it rip. With the same journalistic standards of course.
NPR and the News Hour, it is hard to take them seriously anymore, and I run a household of people who feel strongly about the environment, human rights and worker rights. Some of us are women, LGBTQ and we have friends who are people of color.
Your groups of concern represent 51%, 21%, and ~10% of the US population.
What is the appropriate amount of time to spend on themes concerning those groups?
I am not immune to that same feeling, but sometimes I wonder if it's just a discomfort with no longer always being a member of the relevant default.
They cover but stay clear of the worker rights that disproportionately help those groups. It is a disservice.
And yes it can be uncomfortable for those of us who are losing our default stature as nature's chosen ones.
The pendulum swings, inevitably. The successful case we can hope for (work toward?) is that the swings are damping over time. This doesn't have much historical precedent, however.
https://twitter.com/NPRpubliceditor/status/13192811012239400...
maybe these clowns can learn to code
Maybe a few months later, I changed my default to the local Boomer news radio, KCBS, and have been fine since.
NPR might as well stand for No Politics but Race at this point.
Can you provide a few examples that can support your accusation against, what I assume is all news organizations in the US?
That doesn't mean you don't have empathy.
No welfare, no social programs, send criminals to jail forever and god damn the conditions right? When you don't have empathy there's nothing stopping you from creating the animalistic, live or die, capitalist utopia you dream of.
The slow destruction of public schools will push parents towards home schooling, private schools, and religious schools where you snuff out any sense of caring in these kids before it becomes a problem.
This is why everyone on the right is pure evil
I struggle with this, because if we accept the idea that racial inequality is an issue, then I have to wonder:
- Who are the right people to think or talk about it?
- What is the right time for them to do so?
- Where it is appropriate for them to be part of the public discourse?
So then what is too much?
I sympathize with "give me non-challenging corporate news/noise on my morning commute".
But where is the space for other peoples' complicated topics? And at what point does my ignorance become willful, and harmful?
Salvation, eternal life. Everyone, any time.
So, when is too much Jesus talk too much? I'd imagine many listeners would start tuning out pretty fast.
Why frame it this way? Because the racial inequality stuff isn't THINKING. It isn't pondering about things, figuring out how things are or anything of the sort. It is the repetition of a narrow, formulaic dogma that's simply being slathered onto everything, and the conclusions are always miraculously the same, the cause the same (there is always only one cause), the prescriptions similar. The question is simply do we just say white people bad. Or do we start having fun and saying stuff like, idk:
> Whiteness is a condition one first acquires and then one has-a malignant, parasitic-like condition to which "white" people have a particular susceptibility. The condition is foundational, generating characteristic ways of being in one's body, in one's mind, and in one's world. Parasitic Whiteness renders its hosts' appetites voracious, insatiable, and perverse. These deformed appetites particularly target nonwhite peoples. Once established, these appetites are nearly impossible to eliminate.
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34039063/
This person still has a job. If he wrote that about black people or Jews, say, today's school assignment would be calculating the arc his ass would fly in when he got fired from his job.
If we were actually doing THINKING about racism, it'd look a hell of a lot different than rainbow activism, and much more varied. Just to list some topics or questions:
Does the abolition of objective measures in school actually help underachieving (disproportionately minority) students, or is this a way for an underperforming teaching establishment to game their numbers while their actual performance at instilling useful skills and knowledge tanks?
We'd investigate whether inclusion and equity policies are covert methods of reducing Asian representation in higher education, while not really denting white liberals' standing that much.
We'd look at actual patterns of crime (and notice that a giant chunk of violent crime is by a small number of repeat offenders) and try to deal with them to provide the poorer areas with actual safety and stability. There would likely be some hard questions about stigma and whatnot, but those can and should be weighed against actual prosperity. Now they're just presumed to be the worst thing in the world to the point security guards don't arrest/check suspicious-looking people because they're afraid of appearing racist. Oh, oops, that guy really was a bomber. Sorry.
We'd seriously question minorities' hatreds of each other, and their racism against whites (and whites' racism against themselves) instead of plastering some black guy smearing shit on an Asian grandpa's face as an instance of white supremacy. We'd ask why the activists themselves are quick to sling racial epithets to minorities that don't toe the line.
There's a TON of very varied work to do, questions on what methods even work for reducing bad outcomes and so on, and the answers to many of them are not at all clear. There's years of genuine, engaging intellectual work and concrete organizing to do with a real possibility of achieving genuinely good things like literacy rates that don't suck.
Are the rainbow activists doing ANY of that? No. They're just hiring more DEI bureaucrats to lecture us about the same things over and over and over again.
Every time the Washington post uses the word ‘Amazon’ they note who their owner is. The New York Times has a public editor whose sole job it is to crap on the broader NYT organization when they get stuff exactly like this wrong.
There are many, many lower quality organizations which aren’t careful, but the major newspapers are good on this.
But.. I don't know the org structure of NPR, but it's possible that over the long run for the NPR suits to fire journalists who don't toe the "party line", or refuse to give them promotions or salary increases. If they can, or have in the past, there would still be self-censorship of stories by journalists.
"BBC News tried to contact the BBC to comment on this story, but no-one could be reached."
If you’ve never seen it, absolutely go find it.
[2] https://training.npr.org/2017/01/31/the-ear-training-guide-f...
Now it's always falling over itself to be cute and talks down to its audience. It's like they think they're a podcast for middle schoolers, and if they're not cracking lame jokes and playing silly songs nobody will listen.
I always wrote it off as “not my style” or “for a different audience” as opposed to thinking it was objectively bad.
Also, when they tracked a t-shirt thru the supply chain or bought mortgage securities.
One of the major forces behind it left to start Gimlet at some point.
... for good reason.
Is there evidence to show that the BBC and CBC have reduced polarization in Britain and Canada? One could argue that they have plenty of their own biases and are not especially good at detecting or correcting for those.
The only reason for why there isn't a CBC equivalent in the US is 'because it happened that way'. Trying to find some generalized reason in this particular artifact of a political culture is like trying to find reason in a drunkard's walk.
They aren't on the same level as major US news networks when it comes to distortion and agenda-pushing though. This is my opinion, but there are plenty of systematic studies that show the same thing. If you look but can't find any then I'll come back with links.
It's always really odd to watch an episode of eg NOVA about climate change only to see the underwriting by the Koch foundation.
It seems like they aren't selling influence or pulling punches for their benefactors... but would I actually be able to tell if they were?
I stopped watching a show on PBS once the API (American Petroleum Institute) began sponsoring it.
You can stream and watch ondemand PBS.
FRONTLINE is great. They did a show on banking crisis.
i.e. all the newspapers just print Tory propaganda nonstop and don't report on any scandals until they suddenly notice something happened a year after when they decide to not like the PM anymore.
If you disagree with the public broadcaster, you'll still choose a new source you agree with, along with a movement to defund the public broadcaster.
PBS? (Literally "public broadcasting service")
So if you mean “America would benefit from a government run media outlet that mostly supports one party” then i’d have to disagree.
To what extent is this an actual "issue?" What are we sacrificing for having a plethora of divergent ideas?
> Since Americans don't have a public broadcaster that they all have a stake in as taxpayers
I would really prefer not to have one, and in the era of the internet inside of a nation with a strong first amendment that these other countries do not enjoy, I'm not sure what it could possibly add.
> Americans pick and choose which news sources they listen to
Freedom of choice is wonderful, but what you are missing is that several media ownership rules were rescinded in the 1990s. There used to be _more_ choice. Strangely, that actually _reduced_ the "issue" of polarization.
> which inevitably leads people to listen to news that confirms their personal biases.
Then that probably isn't news. It's an opinion piece masquerading under a news masthead. I'm not sure how true news, that is factual information told by someone who's only interest is informing the public, creates bias.
> Americans are allergic to such things as "state run propaganda".
I contributed to NPR, right up until I felt they were veering into "state run propaganda." If they truly covered the news, I might donate again. It's a market, they should serve it, and not seek to survive as a tax driven entity answerable to a federal congress. I'm sure that would just make things worse.
There's nothing wrong with divergent ideas per se, but divergent ideas themselves don't really do anything. You and I probably have different ideas about something. And we can leave it at that and both go on with our lives, never interacting and learning about another idea than our own.
In the best case, nothing is gained by this, and that's OK and probably even describes the majority of interactions we will ever have with distinct people. But the "value" of divergent ideas is when they converge back together and generate brand new ideas their neither party would have on their own.
But, in the worst case we continue to diverge in our own ideas, only ever converging with people with the same ideas, building "echo chambers" that separate us from anything new and "in-groups" and "out-groups" that further divide us.
And this seems to be the problem with American politics, and bleeding into American society in general. Everything's a partisan issue and everything's on the extremes, so you're either a left-extremist, a right-extremist, or you're not even part of the conversation. If something isn't promoting our ideas, isn't serving us and shouldn't be supported.
So, what we seem to be sacrificing for having these divergent ideas is having any meaningful conversations that can create new ways forward. Which certainly does seem to be creating a lot of issues.
But for what it's worth, considering how our federal congress behaves these days, I'm inclinded to agree that a tax funded public broadcaster would probably not really be in our best interest.
Then the pandemic happened and for reasons I can't fully explain I just stopped listening to all of them. Part of it was the subject matter became less compelling. There were also internal drama issues like with Reply All and I just lost interest.
Kind of a shame as the podcast format is great way to consume media when you're primarily doing something else like cooking or doing the dishes.
1. I started driving a lot less, so I really couldn't get into a topic.
2. The conversations became very focused around the pandemic. There are pros and cons to escapism, but that was the main thing I wanted out of the medium.
Academic and informational channels tend to be better, with Peter Adamson's "History of Philosophy Without Any Gaps" and Stephen West's "Philosophize This" among my faves. Even here there are exceptions with intrusive spots (often dropped without any break / segue from the main content), with LSE and the New Books Network (otherwise both excellent) being notably annoying.
Learning to skip into/outro themes is part of the game. "You Are Not So Smart" wins my award for most annoying intro, and the opening monologue / ad break are highly skippable in most cases.
Otherwise, my principle problem with most US public-media pods is that they're overly popular (in the negative sense) and talk down excessively (Freakonomics, Planet Money, etc.), though there are exceptions. I find Fresh Air's long-form interviews typically excellent, for example, and its ad spots whilst excessive are clearly indicated and can be skipped pretty easily.
There were a couple novel podcasts worth a binge and then everything started getting turned into a podcast series nobody has time for.
In the end it’s the chasing of engagement over solid reporting and storytelling, a slide towards mediocrity that moves the needle right up until it doesn’t.
Nowadays I subscribe to nothing and trust if something is good, friends will clue me in. Plus I poll the BBC Radio iPlayer for the occasional gem.
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-witch-trials-of-j-...
I find this especially grating on Youtube where all the title cards look the same, there is a lengthy intro/outro, person trying to add loads of "wacky" humor, constant shifts in tone and topic, basically seeming like it's made for people with the attention span of a fly.
I really just want something bare-bones, the bare minimum of music intros and interludes, not trying to be overly funny or preaching every episode, just give me the facts and details in depth, and don't try to over-produce it.
I remember when Bitcoin dropped dramatically and they had a story about how it was disproportionately impacting black investors.
I’ve had similar feelings toward a lot of media. The early iterations felt so much more special and genuine. Lately everything feels so overproduced, formulaic, and optimized to some generic blended target of what they think will drive the most clicks/views/listens.
The early days of a lot of media felt like they cared more about producing the content the creators wanted to make. The more recent material feels like everyone is just following a formula to produce content on schedule.
Personally, I started listening to NPR in 2007, and have consistently found them on point, unbiased, and including programming that enriches all. I tried to listen to talk radio (AM, some FM local) before that point and was decidedly turned off to most, if not all, of it (admittedly, I do not listen to every show).
They do overwhelm my ears, however, and I can't often make it through a full episode in one sitting.
Long enough, in other words, to grow quite significantly older.
> Terri Gross and the whole lot abdicated their responsibility to be neutral.
Gross was never a journalist, and her show never had any aspirations toward neutrality. It's an interview show at the intersection of culture, politics, art and science. Of all the people you would pick as having "abdicated their responsibility", she's probably the worst possible choice, because there never was any responsibility implied or explicit.
Source: me, take this all with a huge grain of salt
Edit: Upon reading which podcasts were cancelled, I feel my theory is somewhat validated.
I don't even disagree with most of what they are saying, but it feels like it just became more about campaigning for what they had already decided was the truth rather than actually producing good journalism. There was a time where I actually started listening to old podcasts from years ago because my podcast feed had just became an endless barrage of BLM and culture wars.
I think it has gotten a bit better again over the last year or so, but maybe I just got used to it.
> it feels like it just became more about campaigning for what they had already decided was the truth rather than actually producing good journalism.
I'm really hoping at some point they'll come back because they were my favorite news source, but if they have views like many of the people I've discussed this with then they don't even realize there is a problem.
Note that I still like quite a bit of their content, but…
The frequency and aggressiveness with with some NPR folks try to seek out perceived “victims of society” can be eye-roll worthy. I realize that it’s a narrative that resonates with their audience, but they can definitely cherry-pick their sources to the point that one could reasonably argue that their sources are not representative of the population/group (often by a lot).
This has certainly been true when I’ve known the populations/groups well. Friends from other areas/domains have confirmed similar bias in their geographic areas and/or areas of professional expertise.
>> Matthew 25:40 “The King will reply, 'Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.”
ps. re: a bible quote, I am either an atheist or at best a radical agnostic in the James Randi tradition of "I don't know - and you don't know either".
The issue I have is when NPR uses sources theoretically representing “the least of these brothers and sisters” who do one or more of the following:
- refuse help
- actively sabotage themselves or their situation
- leave out key details of the story
- lie about key details of the story
It’s these types of folks who both undercut the veracity of NPR coverage and push away moderate listeners (again, most of whom are on board with helping those in need).
They're quick to mock the right's media not realizing their biases and blindspot are just as bad, just in a different way.
I'll post the source if I find it but, yes, npr changed their content to cover these subjects dramatically more at that point.
Contemporary with NPR and NYT talking about racism and sexism more is Twitter and other social media getting a lot more vocal about such topics (while #metoo really hit its stride in 2017, it started in 2006, for instance. Likewise, Black Lives Matter got its start in 2013), where individuals are sharing their stories a lot more.
That's not to say that I don't think it was a deliberate move on their part, but rather I think the move was part of a feedback loop that already existed.
If I had to speculate, I'd say it came down the explosion in podcasts giving them a much larger audience than just folks listening to the radio, coupled with a sort of org-wide understanding that media had a hand in creating the culture war as it stood. You see the same sort of more-outspokenness in a lot of other media outlets doing their level best to balance out the impact of Fox News, with varying degrees of success.
That has always been part of the show. Typically the stories are snapshots of a moment in life and often life isnt bubbly and happy. But it seemed like every single episode was just depressing.
I still listen to Embedded which is good depending on the topic and Serial and occasionally pop the local NPR station on on drives but it does feel like there was a change for the worse around that time.
Same. I couldn't do it anymore. I eventually realized that when I seek out specific media to consume, I need it to be less depressing than I found that show to be.
Anyway, Wait Wait and Planet Money have paid ad-free podcast tiers now.
The rest do seem to be serial podcasts about true crimes or otherwise why you should feel bad about someone somewhere.
Rather than BBC and other world news, my local NPR station seems to be exclusively focused on hyper focused representation life style issues.
Some of that is of course fine but I would rather hear about actual news particularly during prime time driving.
The “experts” they interview are so damned hand-wavy and imprecise, it’s like listening to a middle-schooler’s book report.
[1] https://www.cjr.org/special_report/why-the-left-cant-stand-t...
Among other things, NPR feels like among the most aggressive advertisers in podcasting, usually advertising for other NPR shows in which I have no interest.
The daily “Boston Public Radio” talk show is pretty fun, but more Boston based.
[0] https://www.npr.org/podcasts/381444600/marketplace
[1] https://www.npr.org/podcasts/344098539/wait-wait-don-t-tell-...
I wonder if this page is more of a generic podcast feed and player
https://www.npr.org/podcasts/510325/the-indicator-from-plane...
One bright spot (but it's not NPR): Locally, WGBH has Jim and Margery of "Boston Public Radio"
That's because everything Bloomberg does is an ad for Bloomberg and their primary product, the Bloomberg terminal.
Among podcasts:
- Fresh Air. Terry Gross and Dave Davies are both consummate interviewers, the guest list is excellent, and long-form interviews (30--40+ minutes typically) allow real exploration of a topic, beyond what a 2--6 minute news segment might address. The topical coverage is broad and includes numerous aspects well beyond my own typical interests. There's also a tremendous back-catalogue in the Fresh Air Archive: <https://freshairarchive.org/>
- NPR Headlines: If you just want the most recent 5-minute rundown, that's its own podcast feed.
- Selected Shorts: Short stories --- narrative fiction. A nice break from nonfiction / news / political coverage, and a good end-of-day / end-of-week unwind. Very New-Yorkerish as a friend notes... <https://www.npr.org/podcasts/381443486/pri-selected-shorts>
- The World (PRX): Not strictly NPR, but a news programme which has its primary focus outside US borders. <https://theworld.org/programs/the-world>
- Radiolabs, Freakonomics, Planet Money, How I Built This, Ted Radio Hour: Variable quality IMO, but often good. For someone who's not especially interested in business-launch stories, HIBT has delivered some real hits. I'll sample from these streams. Many of these series have been around for a long time, and have gone through a few hosts. They're generally pretty solid. Most have become at least somewhat "popular" / watered down / formulaic, though original brilliance does sometimes shine through.
- On the Media (WNYC Studios): Distributed by NPR (and at one time directly affiliated), this is the left-central media-analysis programme out of NYC. I was greatly disturbed at the ejection of former co-host Bob Garfield (his own subsequent podcast has been shut down, though he still tweets and has a substack). The show remains relevant, though much more uneven and less compelling than previously. In part it's become a platform for showcasing other podcasts' and series' productions, some of which can be quite good. Currently (re)running a multi-episode bit on right wing talk radio.
- From the CBC, "Ideas" with Nahlah Ayad: <https://www.cbc.ca/radio/ideas>. This also has a very long back catalogue (notably with former host Paul Kennedy who helmed the programme from 1999--2019). The Massey Lecture segments are especially good.
I strongly favour less topical programmes, generally not affiliated with NPR/PBS or other US public broadcasters. Notably a number of philosophy-related podcasts (Adam Davidson "History of Philosophy", Stephen West "Philosophize This", Wesley Cecil "Humane Arts" (popular and error-prone, but engaging), the truly excellent "Talking Politics: The History of Ideas" with David Runciman, now concluded). A few Libravox books (variable in technical and speaker quality, but some gems), and histories (Rome, Byzantium, China).
I also listen to numerous author / academic podcasts, most especially from the New Books Network (<https://newbooksnetwork.com/>) and various university series (Yale, Harvard, Stanford, LSE, etc.) These may be public lecture series, university press, or specific departments of interest. Speaker quality varies tremendously, but topical knowledge is excellent and the material tends to be noncommercial and is generally only glancingly topical, with some exceptions.
> NPR says that the investigative podcast series Embedded, which has appeared irregularly, will become the umbrella under which all of NPR's investigative and enterprise narratives series will stream. Officials say it will become a frequent, dependable channel for listeners to consume NPR content.
I see couple of big names in there too..
Karen Grigsby Bates
Sylvia Poggioli (retired last week)
We must be twins. It was the highlight of my day.
https://www.investopedia.com/terms/m/marginaltaxrate.asp
https://www.investopedia.com/articles/personal-finance/11061...
It's the marginal tax rate we're concerned with, not the average. That's what you're deducting against.
Secondly, some people cite the 13% of taxpayers who itemize as the relevant number. The relevant number is the high-income taxpayers who itemize, and even more relevant is that same number but in high-tax states.
It's a legitimate debate whether public broadcasting serves a purpose, or whether it's biased. It's also a legitimate debate whether 501(c)(3) should exist at all. But whether we're subsidizing NPR through private deductions is not a debate. We are.
Likewise lots of 501(c)(3) organizations that are deeply controversial.
This suggests a longer-term and sharp weakness in the advertising market and spending. Given that public media sponsorships seem to be longer-term committments (I'm supposing quarterly or longer), this would mean a strong and likely lagging overall indicator.
Then was yesterday's news of layoffs and programme cancellations at NPR.
Given the significance of advertising to much of present Web / Mobile / online business space, this would seem to have a broader interest to HN's readership as well.
Also, there is an undercurrent of preachiness to NPR podcasts, and their hosts tend to have a "we think we're smart but we're trying to play that down and be relatable" vibe which I find incredibly off-putting.
And I literally never listen to the radio anymore.
I don’t particularly love Trump either, but it would also be nice to be able to listen to an NPR podcast without hearing about him on a regular basis.
I sort of do this already with my local public broadcaster. I give to OPB but I also make a separate donation to KMHD radio because I value what they are doing. The money all ends up under the same umbrella organization but I hope the separate stream shows that their listeners value this relatively small part of the overall mission.
You can also support some of the podcasts directly by joining NPR+.
It would be similar to complaining that people are forced to pay Ford via taxes because the government uses F-150s
The GP leaves the degree of taxation/funding, as well as the broader context of what other entities are tax funded and to what degree, unspoken; and they imply that, whatever those facts may be, it's a bad thing in this case. The parent (and other commenters) then provided some of that relevant information (and, assuming that information is true, you presumably would appreciate such a thing).
As for the downvoters, they may reasonably disagree with the parent's implication that it is a bad thing, or disapprove of their omission of details. You may reasonably disagree with this use of the downvote button, but it means they are not necessarily claiming the GP is stating an untruth.
Individual contributions to NPR are tax-deductible. That means the public IS indeed subsidizing NPR, far beyond the government's direct payments.
Less true for art museums and things because wealthy people can get more out of their donations, like their name on stuff and cool party invitations.
that's an easily-testable hypothesis. I dispute it.
As for "Wealthy people are too rare to matter" do a search on the percentage of income taxes paid by the wealthy.
But the reality is only ~13% of US tax payers itemize deductions so in general there isn’t any such support when the average person donates to anything. It’s really just support for the kinds of people who can itemize their taxes rather than supporting charities.
I don't know what your point is in the first paragraph. Yes, we do "support" any 501(c)(3). Are you opposed to that?
Anyway, a more relevant “how many NPR contributors itemize their donations.” But of course it’s roughly in line other such charity’s, because when your talking about such a wide selection of the population it tends to look like the general population. Aka, when you start talking millions there aren’t enough billionaires for the group to mostly consist of billionaires.
I had an aunt who got a 7 figure refund after an IRS audit because she wasn’t bothering with minor donations. No idea how representative that is, but people are strange especially when you look at large numbers of them.
what's your point? Who else's can you itemize?
> when you start talking millions there aren’t enough billionaires for the group to mostly consist of billionaires
who mentioned millionaires, or billionaires? For that matter, that entire paragraph doesn't make any sense. I proposed a very simple test, which we unfortunately can't get the data for (easily).
when you watch a PBS pledge drive, they do seem to emphasize "tax-deductible" a lot when they ask for your pledge. So they must think it matters, at least.
Many people who could deduct donations don’t because they don’t bother with the paperwork. It’s a very meaningful distinction because the option doesn’t inherently cost tax payers anything only those who actually use it do.
Being tax deductible on the other hand is an easy way to saying they’re a legit charity. Anything that isn’t tax deductible that still wants donations should raise major red flags.
Who would have this data, after all? Not the IRS, since by definition the taxpayer didn't file it.
Tax preparers would know if their clients decline to file itemized, but would they report it? Similarly, TurboTax or other servers might know, but I doubt they'd release such data.
So we're left with self-reporting.
I'm going to say that any claim that NPR's public financing is very low (1% or 5%) is either malicious splitting of hairs or outright lying.
We can find plenty of taxpayers in NY, CA, or MA who have a marginal rate of 40-50%. They are the highly affluent people that those PBS pledge drives featuring Baby Boomer musical acts are aimed at.
Just look at the continued campaign to remove the $10,000 limit on State and Local Taxes. Where's that coming from?
No, it's not. Someone making $250k in California pays an effective Federal rate of 22% and state of 8%. Even someone making a million a year sees an effective rate of ~42%. (And that's before tax avoidance strategies they'll undoubtedly pursue.)
https://www.forbes.com/advisor/income-tax-calculator/califor...
Same thing for New York; $100k income nets out at a 20% effective rate. https://www.forbes.com/advisor/income-tax-calculator/new-yor...
(And these are single-filers. If you've got a family, it dips substantially further.)
> Just look at the continued campaign to remove the $10,000 limit on State and Local Taxes. Where's that coming from?
The $10k limit isn't a limit on taxes, it's on how much state/local tax paid you can deduct, set in 2017 as a way to punish high-tax blue states. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tax_Cuts_and_Jobs_Act_of_2017
Pedantic. Obviously that's what I meant (and knew)
Learn about marginal tax rates. See, Forbes even tells you: "your marginal tax rate is 35%"
22% is the average tax rate. It's the *marginal" tax rate we're concerned with for deductions.
Itemized deductions these days are either extremely small (limited to a few hundred dollars) or only for the very wealthy.
During the Trump years, the standard deduction was doubled, with the result that vastly fewer people now itemize deductions. Yes, you can report a limited amount of tax-deductible donations, but last time I looked it was around $300/yr (and even that was easy to overlook).
"Presently, NPR receives funding for less than 1% of its budget directly from the federal government, but receives almost 10% of its budget from federal, state, and local governments indirectly."
https://www.influencewatch.org/non-profit/national-public-ra...
https://www.npr.org/about-npr/178660742/public-radio-finance...
I'm not a total public radio hater or anything, but this definitely makes me take the idea that public radio is mostly listener supported a lot less seriously in the bigger scheme of things. Public radio fans can try to talk me down. I'd like to know where I'm wrong.
[0] https://www.wpr.org/sites/default/files/annualreport2021_fin...
Edit: ... and I do know there is a distinction between the national entity and the member stations. It's just that tracing it up further feels like a shell game. Maybe all the other states are different and have way more donations, but I have no idea. I'm already confused about how many of WPR's "in kind" funding from the UW-system are state/federal funds and even if any of the state funds are from federal aid.
I wish them the best and I hope they are successful in growing their new user base.
Only KALW showed up for me, but I previously donated to them anyway because I prefer their programming and they were the original home of 99% Invisible for which I'll be eternally grateful
It's apparently not available in WI.
Only difference is that as of a few months ago, NPR began accepting direct donations for the first time. I think they will send some of that donation to affiliates as well.
And then you compare it with fox news...
But that Car Talk guy died in 2014, 14 years after Wait Wait started recording some shows in front of live audience, and 9 years after they started recording almost always in front of a live audience.
Your comment doesn't really make sense if those two events aren't in the same general timeframe so I had assumed you probably didn't realize how early Wait Wait was having live audiences.
I think your are confused about one of these shows at least, I don't see these as being relayed at all other than they are podcasts talking about things, which can hardly be claimed as original.
Meanwhile, Democracy Now! has been going since February 19, 1996 with a daily worldwide summary somewhat better than the BBC and then proceeds to dig into long-form, important interviews on topics that don't get much CNN-MSNBC airtime.