You seriously believe that 98% of the NYT expenses are consumed by movie reviews, the crossword guy, and David Brooks? Anyway, the fact is, Seth pulled that number out of his ass, and that is irresponsibly sloppy at best. (And, ironically, an excellent example of the kind of thing editors and fact-checkers are for...)
> You seriously believe that 98% of the NYT expenses are consumed by movie reviews, the crossword guy, and David Brooks?
You're forgetting the actual paper and the cost of distributing it.
We know the revenues (roughly) and that the expenses are about the same. How many actual investigative reporters do you think that the NYT has? Multiply that number by your guess of their average burdended cost and compare that to the total expenses.
My guess is that the NYT has at most 30 investigative reporters and they cost, on average, $200k/year. That's $6M. If there are actually 100, that's $20M.
Frankly, you are also forgetting about the actual paper and cost of distributing it! I can believe your kind of calculations only in the context of a plausible accounting for all NYT expenses. With out factoring management, lawyers, plane tickets, real estate, etc., you will be way off.
BTW 30 is absurdly low. The NYT has more than 30 offices!
According to Wikipedia the Times only has 350 writers total. It's clear that the majority of these are not doing investigative journalism, they are following the candidates around and rewriting press releases and such. I don't see how the number of actual investigative journalists could possibly be more than 100.
The question isn't "writers" but all of the employees involved in actual news creation. I have no idea what it might actually be, but a 1:10 ratio between "operatives" and "support staff" is my guess.
