The Structural Imbalance of Political Talk Radio
THE STRUCTURAL IMBALANCE OF POLITICAL TALK RADIO A Joint Report by The Center for American Progress and Free Press June 21, 2007 Center for American Progress Authors John Halpin, Senior Fellow and Executive Speechwriter James Heidbreder, Research Intern Mark Lloyd, Senior Fellow Paul Woodhull, Special Adviser Free Press Authors Ben Scott, Policy Director Josh Silver, Executive Director S. Derek Turner, Research Director Report Design and Layout, Center for American Progress Adorna Williams, Art Director Andrew Pratt, Special Assistant Shannon Ryan, Graphic Designer Introduction espite the dramatic expansion of viewing and listening options for consum- ers today, traditional radio remains one of the most widely used media Dformats in America. Arbitron, the national radio ratings company, reports that more than 90 percent of Americans ages 12 or older listen to radio each week, “a higher penetration than television, magazines, newspapers, or the Internet.”1 Although listening hours have declined slightly in recent years, Americans listened on average to 19 hours of radio per week in 2006.2 Among radio formats, the combined news/talk format (which includes news/talk/ information and talk/personality) leads all others in terms of the total number of sta- tions per format and trails only country music in terms of national audience share.3 Through more than 1,700 stations across the nation, the combined news/talk format is estimated to reach more than 50 million listeners each week.4 As this report will document in detail, conservative talk radio undeniably dominates the format: ß Our analysis in the spring of 2007 of the 257 news/talk stations owned by the top fi ve commercial station owners reveals that 91 percent of the total weekday talk radio programming is conservative, and 9 percent is progressive.
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