I wholeheartedly agree. Is $60K mediocre in NYC? Yes, especially given the responsibilities. But as a recovering journalist, if I were of the age I imagine an n+1 person taking the job will be (I'm going to guess early 30s), I'd jump at it. (I assume health insurance is included!)
(I made $20K in my first NY job, in radio, in 1988. That's about $55K now. My job wasn't as elevated as an n+1 editorship, but it's not like n+1 is bursting with the equivalent of whatever ad pages are now. It's probably like working for the Paris Review or another well-regarded niche publication.)
I worked for CNN in Atlanta for many years. Though, naturally, most of the personnel had college degrees, they were from all over -- public schools, private schools, Ivies, whatever -- and being in Atlanta meant that you were removed from the frenzy of NYC or DC and could live a "regular" life if you wanted to. There just wasn't the same kind of Veblen-esque pressure.
I love New York, and I know many terrific people who worked (and still do) in New York journalism. But I do wish the city's journo community outside the Post and Daily News would cast a wider net when it comes to life and academic experience.
Very sage. One would *think* that Substack and social media generally could serve to bring talented writers, hailing from outside the class/educational elites, to the attention of the public, but it's not clear that that happens. To the extent that people with non-elite backgrounds find an audience as writers, it seems like higher education with some level of prestige attached is an important stepping stone (Rob Henderson/Yale, Alex Perez/Iowa).
Reading Shawn McCreesh's (St John's) account of the opioid epidemic in his high school, it was astonishing that someone from a high school like that got published in the NY Times. How often does that happen? Once every few years? Or Christian Lorentzen on truck drivers. How many of the NYC literati have a truck driver in the family? Very few I assume?
I usually feel quite confident about a writer's class background after reading a few of their pieces (even if said background is not revealed explicitly), Just a matter of vibes. Above all it has to do with the way that lifelong elite status allows one to remain (wilfully?) ignorant of so many of the ugly aspects of life and humanity, that non-elite folx simply have no choice but to confront and grapple with, one way or another.
I assume the N+1 job will likely be taken by a talented person in the NYC book world whose life is subsidized by some kind of family money—just like many of the talented people in NYC publishing.
As it ever was? I graduated from a private liberal arts college in 1998, the middle class son of a bar owner in rust belt Pennsylvania. My parents sacrificed quite a bit, including my father’s sobriety, to pay for my college and I never wanted for anything. After graduation I was granted an interview for an internship at Condé Nast. I remember sitting in the lobby with the other candidates who were so obviously the children of the ultra wealthy, I quickly realized, “Oh, this job is not for me.”
To take that internship, to get into the media business at that level at that scale required generational wealth I did not possess. Instead I went to Washington, DC and made actual money working for trades (its own dead end at the time). I’m sure this n+1 job will go to someone who is brilliant, hard working, and has parents to pay their rent and expenses. (I am not sure, as some of the other commenters are, that it comes with health insurance, or if that health insurance is any good.)
It’s not really n+1’s fault. It’s a hard business that makes little money and therefore can only pay a little. It’s a hard chain to break.
As an ancient Yaliie who came post-TASP (whose alums include Frank Fukuyama, Stacey Abrams, and Reihan Salam) in the late 1970s, I didn't fit well with students who blindly became empty vessels for Directed Studies or for demogogic lecturers holding court in huge auditoriums. My own views were more or less well-formed pre-college, as a small-business autodidact, and granted legitimacy by TASP.
Since then, I've kept occasionally in contact with new generations of students, and some new applicants to TASP. It's been fascinating to see generations change. The small business kids and autodidacts are almost absent from Yale now. At least, I haven't met them. The Overton window of status comparison seems harder to break through, and narrower. I read once that almost half of Yalies are now in secret societies whose members bare their souls to each other. Back in my day, that would have been called Maoist criticism/self-criticism. Jane Austen, Donna Tartt, and Hogwarts fantasies seem rampant.
But also, the level of general education is higher, perhaps from more acceptance of private school models. And there are far fewer obvious washouts or druggies. I doubt the empty vessels and demogogues are at all as prevalent as they were.
To me, Yale was a special place because of its social density and high levels of peer organization. It's from that, especially on the right, that mass organizations like the Federalist Society formed and spread. In earlier decades, the CIA started from Yale alum roots. My sense is that Yale still has that special character. I hope someday that historians will explore that - how schools like Yale become akin to extended families.
They probably generate about $1.8M per year in revenue.
I looked up N+1's April 2023 readership numbers that they share with potential advertisers. (Link below). Their print circulation was 12,000, and they had 4,000 digital-only subscribers. Their total readership was 28,000, but this usually includes non-paying readers and subscribers.
They have different subscription tiers, and readers churn, but some simple assumptions about their offerings and their total subscriber count shows that they made about $756K in subscription revenue per year. (12K print and digital subscribers at $45 per year; 4K digital-only subscribers at $4.50 per month.)
When I worked for the WSJ between 2017 and 2020, subscription revenue made up about half of all revenue. Subscriptions have become more important in media since then. I would expect subscriptions to be the primary source of N+1's revenue streams. But assuming it's roughly even, then they made about $1.512M in revenue from subscriptions and ads.
Of course, N+1 sells books and they receive donations. I would be surprised if both of those streams were substantial, even though every dollar counts. Accounting for growth and books, then they probably generate about $1.8M in revenue per year. (I'm excluding donations.)
How much is this? Not much at all. They have ten or so full-time employees to pay and provide solid health care to, freelance writers to pay, rent for their office to make, expenses from printing those 12,000 copies for each issue and their books, expenses for hosting their website so that it can handle traffic, expenses for whatever bare bones analytics they have, event expenses, accountant expenses, etc.
This all very back of the envelope. I don't know what their books look like! Maybe revenue growth is less than 5% per year, which I assumed. Maybe subscriptions make up 60% of revenue instead of 50%. Maybe revenue is a lot less than $1.8M. Or maybe there are actually a lot of N+1+1 subscribers ($150 / year), and their book business is booming.
Still it's instructive for journalists to actually familiarize themselves with what could keep the lights on here. Small magazines like these don't stick around for twenty years if they aren't being careful with their money.
Don't worry. Zohran will make everything more affordable with socialism, which has such a wonderful track record historically. Abundance for the commissars, but no equity for the peasants ;)
It's so weird when people think they're scoring points against socialism by describing the current conditions under capitalism and saying "we'll have that under socialism!"
I think Ross pinpointed the problem: the listing is for a managing editor. That salary is certainly low for New York City, but wouldn't be unreasonable for an entry level position or paid fellowship. But you wouldn't hire someone straight out of J-school or college to be a managing editor. Typically, people at major news organizations with that title earn three times as much.
I'd be curious who takes that job. I suspect, though, it'll be someone who doesn't rely on the salary but has a strong affinity for the position, the culture, the prestige, etc.
I don't know what anyone should make of this, but perhaps 15 years ago, I went to an n+1 party. Nearly everyone appeared expensively educated and affluent, and there was a massive line at the bathroom because so many people were doing coke. A friend said to me, "They are cinematic in their hypocrisy."
Interesting that you don’t mention readership as a source of income. The alternative ways to publish have diluted literary publishing but also demolished gate keepers to the public. Savvy young writers can publish on Substack and promote on multitudes of social sites. It is changing and I hope the New York Centric media hold goes away. A more diverse (ideas and b culture) would be healthy for our media sphere
Kaitlyn Tiffany is one of the many interchangable dullards who have made the Atlantic irrelevant in recent years. She is *very* lucky to have that Jobs money
Correct. $60k would be enough for plenty in a lot of other environments (though the difference between NYC food prices and other parts of the country is flattening). That said, NYC is so endlessly in love with itself that exiting NYC may never happen.
Related, as publishing gets more homogenized, it becomes even harder for them to figure out how to market books that aren't about themselves (MFA/children of the professoriate, etc).
What we need is a massive massive war which filters its GI Bill benefits through almost the entire population, so we could have a new renaissance of college-educated working schmoes with artistic ambitions.
I wholeheartedly agree. Is $60K mediocre in NYC? Yes, especially given the responsibilities. But as a recovering journalist, if I were of the age I imagine an n+1 person taking the job will be (I'm going to guess early 30s), I'd jump at it. (I assume health insurance is included!)
(I made $20K in my first NY job, in radio, in 1988. That's about $55K now. My job wasn't as elevated as an n+1 editorship, but it's not like n+1 is bursting with the equivalent of whatever ad pages are now. It's probably like working for the Paris Review or another well-regarded niche publication.)
I worked for CNN in Atlanta for many years. Though, naturally, most of the personnel had college degrees, they were from all over -- public schools, private schools, Ivies, whatever -- and being in Atlanta meant that you were removed from the frenzy of NYC or DC and could live a "regular" life if you wanted to. There just wasn't the same kind of Veblen-esque pressure.
I love New York, and I know many terrific people who worked (and still do) in New York journalism. But I do wish the city's journo community outside the Post and Daily News would cast a wider net when it comes to life and academic experience.
Very sage. One would *think* that Substack and social media generally could serve to bring talented writers, hailing from outside the class/educational elites, to the attention of the public, but it's not clear that that happens. To the extent that people with non-elite backgrounds find an audience as writers, it seems like higher education with some level of prestige attached is an important stepping stone (Rob Henderson/Yale, Alex Perez/Iowa).
Reading Shawn McCreesh's (St John's) account of the opioid epidemic in his high school, it was astonishing that someone from a high school like that got published in the NY Times. How often does that happen? Once every few years? Or Christian Lorentzen on truck drivers. How many of the NYC literati have a truck driver in the family? Very few I assume?
https://libertiesjournal.com/articles/the-hatboro-blues/
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/14/opinion/opioids-us.html
https://christianlorentzen.substack.com/p/truckers
I usually feel quite confident about a writer's class background after reading a few of their pieces (even if said background is not revealed explicitly), Just a matter of vibes. Above all it has to do with the way that lifelong elite status allows one to remain (wilfully?) ignorant of so many of the ugly aspects of life and humanity, that non-elite folx simply have no choice but to confront and grapple with, one way or another.
I assume the N+1 job will likely be taken by a talented person in the NYC book world whose life is subsidized by some kind of family money—just like many of the talented people in NYC publishing.
As it ever was? I graduated from a private liberal arts college in 1998, the middle class son of a bar owner in rust belt Pennsylvania. My parents sacrificed quite a bit, including my father’s sobriety, to pay for my college and I never wanted for anything. After graduation I was granted an interview for an internship at Condé Nast. I remember sitting in the lobby with the other candidates who were so obviously the children of the ultra wealthy, I quickly realized, “Oh, this job is not for me.”
To take that internship, to get into the media business at that level at that scale required generational wealth I did not possess. Instead I went to Washington, DC and made actual money working for trades (its own dead end at the time). I’m sure this n+1 job will go to someone who is brilliant, hard working, and has parents to pay their rent and expenses. (I am not sure, as some of the other commenters are, that it comes with health insurance, or if that health insurance is any good.)
It’s not really n+1’s fault. It’s a hard business that makes little money and therefore can only pay a little. It’s a hard chain to break.
As an ancient Yaliie who came post-TASP (whose alums include Frank Fukuyama, Stacey Abrams, and Reihan Salam) in the late 1970s, I didn't fit well with students who blindly became empty vessels for Directed Studies or for demogogic lecturers holding court in huge auditoriums. My own views were more or less well-formed pre-college, as a small-business autodidact, and granted legitimacy by TASP.
Since then, I've kept occasionally in contact with new generations of students, and some new applicants to TASP. It's been fascinating to see generations change. The small business kids and autodidacts are almost absent from Yale now. At least, I haven't met them. The Overton window of status comparison seems harder to break through, and narrower. I read once that almost half of Yalies are now in secret societies whose members bare their souls to each other. Back in my day, that would have been called Maoist criticism/self-criticism. Jane Austen, Donna Tartt, and Hogwarts fantasies seem rampant.
But also, the level of general education is higher, perhaps from more acceptance of private school models. And there are far fewer obvious washouts or druggies. I doubt the empty vessels and demogogues are at all as prevalent as they were.
To me, Yale was a special place because of its social density and high levels of peer organization. It's from that, especially on the right, that mass organizations like the Federalist Society formed and spread. In earlier decades, the CIA started from Yale alum roots. My sense is that Yale still has that special character. I hope someday that historians will explore that - how schools like Yale become akin to extended families.
They probably generate about $1.8M per year in revenue.
I looked up N+1's April 2023 readership numbers that they share with potential advertisers. (Link below). Their print circulation was 12,000, and they had 4,000 digital-only subscribers. Their total readership was 28,000, but this usually includes non-paying readers and subscribers.
They have different subscription tiers, and readers churn, but some simple assumptions about their offerings and their total subscriber count shows that they made about $756K in subscription revenue per year. (12K print and digital subscribers at $45 per year; 4K digital-only subscribers at $4.50 per month.)
When I worked for the WSJ between 2017 and 2020, subscription revenue made up about half of all revenue. Subscriptions have become more important in media since then. I would expect subscriptions to be the primary source of N+1's revenue streams. But assuming it's roughly even, then they made about $1.512M in revenue from subscriptions and ads.
Of course, N+1 sells books and they receive donations. I would be surprised if both of those streams were substantial, even though every dollar counts. Accounting for growth and books, then they probably generate about $1.8M in revenue per year. (I'm excluding donations.)
How much is this? Not much at all. They have ten or so full-time employees to pay and provide solid health care to, freelance writers to pay, rent for their office to make, expenses from printing those 12,000 copies for each issue and their books, expenses for hosting their website so that it can handle traffic, expenses for whatever bare bones analytics they have, event expenses, accountant expenses, etc.
This all very back of the envelope. I don't know what their books look like! Maybe revenue growth is less than 5% per year, which I assumed. Maybe subscriptions make up 60% of revenue instead of 50%. Maybe revenue is a lot less than $1.8M. Or maybe there are actually a lot of N+1+1 subscribers ($150 / year), and their book business is booming.
Still it's instructive for journalists to actually familiarize themselves with what could keep the lights on here. Small magazines like these don't stick around for twenty years if they aren't being careful with their money.
Link: https://www.nplusonemag.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/n1_advertising-dek_2023_clean.pdf
Don't worry. Zohran will make everything more affordable with socialism, which has such a wonderful track record historically. Abundance for the commissars, but no equity for the peasants ;)
It's so weird when people think they're scoring points against socialism by describing the current conditions under capitalism and saying "we'll have that under socialism!"
Yeah, look at all those Scandi peasants
I think Ross pinpointed the problem: the listing is for a managing editor. That salary is certainly low for New York City, but wouldn't be unreasonable for an entry level position or paid fellowship. But you wouldn't hire someone straight out of J-school or college to be a managing editor. Typically, people at major news organizations with that title earn three times as much.
I'd be curious who takes that job. I suspect, though, it'll be someone who doesn't rely on the salary but has a strong affinity for the position, the culture, the prestige, etc.
I don't know what anyone should make of this, but perhaps 15 years ago, I went to an n+1 party. Nearly everyone appeared expensively educated and affluent, and there was a massive line at the bathroom because so many people were doing coke. A friend said to me, "They are cinematic in their hypocrisy."
Interesting that you don’t mention readership as a source of income. The alternative ways to publish have diluted literary publishing but also demolished gate keepers to the public. Savvy young writers can publish on Substack and promote on multitudes of social sites. It is changing and I hope the New York Centric media hold goes away. A more diverse (ideas and b culture) would be healthy for our media sphere
Kaitlyn Tiffany is one of the many interchangable dullards who have made the Atlantic irrelevant in recent years. She is *very* lucky to have that Jobs money
It’s sad how we’ve just accepted that meta/google are just going to hoover up all the money that used to fund writing and art.
I want to know who paid you $10k so I can go write for them lol
Now, if the job was remote ...
easy solution: leave new york city
it's the greatest city
as the wise old feminists used to say, "you can't have it all"
Correct. $60k would be enough for plenty in a lot of other environments (though the difference between NYC food prices and other parts of the country is flattening). That said, NYC is so endlessly in love with itself that exiting NYC may never happen.
Related, as publishing gets more homogenized, it becomes even harder for them to figure out how to market books that aren't about themselves (MFA/children of the professoriate, etc).
What we need is a massive massive war which filters its GI Bill benefits through almost the entire population, so we could have a new renaissance of college-educated working schmoes with artistic ambitions.