Comments on: Corrections and Amplifications, Part 1 http://jackneely.com/wordpress/2014/11/17/corrections-and-amplifications-part-1/ The Scruffy Citizen Thu, 02 Jul 2015 21:04:24 +0000 hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=4.1.41 By: Chris Hodge http://jackneely.com/wordpress/2014/11/17/corrections-and-amplifications-part-1/#comment-43 Mon, 17 Nov 2014 19:20:14 +0000 http://jackneely.com/wordpress/?p=81#comment-43 I believe your statement that the New Yorker Magazine has never made a profit is incorrect. The magazine was founded in 1925 by the Fleischmann family (the people who make the yeast). According to Raoul Fleischmann’s obituary – he died in 1969 – the magazine did fail to make a profit for its first 4 years, but profits grew steadily after 1929., and in 1968 the New Yorker had gross revenues of $26 million, with a net profit of $2.2 million — $14.5 million in 2013 dollars. The magazine was able to command high ad rates – and even be selective as to which ads it accepted – because of its affluent subscriber base. (The average income for the New Yorker subscriber is today twice the national median.) Profits declined in the years leading up to its sale in 1985 to the Newhouse family, but never disappeared entirely. Working solely on memory here, that period coincides I believe with an overall decline in the profitability of general interest magazines, and in the case of the New Yorker in particular, the dryness of William Shawn’s final years. (The National Lampoon, in a wonderful parody, cited a 12-part piece on the history of sand. I myself can attest to having read their 5-part piece on the history of grains.)

If I can indulge in some pedestrian speculation of my own, I think publishing has historically been a great means for acquiring wealth. Wealth, and influence. Publishing was also a respectable profession for the wealthy, and while I’m sure some publications were subsidized, I doubt many were subsidized by much and for long. Marion Ascoli made significant inroads into her Sears stock to keep her husband’s magazine The Reporter going for 20 years, but I doubt whether there are many significant examples like that. I think today people have found better tax write-offs. (After all, even yachts not sailed get sold.) But other media have become larger sources of news and entertainment – and for their owners, wealth and influence – for several generations now.

I don’t doubt that the Newhouses bought the New Yorker in part to improve their own social standing, but their efforts since the purchase would indicate that they have expected the magazine to pay its own way, and do not regard it as a public charity. They continue to move very aggressively on both the business side and the editorial side to make it so.

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