I saw this story in the Guardian about a guy who thinks local news should get huge tax breaks in an effort to save the industry and democracy.

Here is a portion of the story with my comments on the backend.

Local news organizations across the United States need to be given serious government financial help, especially in the form of tax breaks, in order to stave off a crisis in the media sector and help save US democracy, a leading advocate for non-profit journalism has said.

Steven Waldman, co-founder of Report for America, said a new initiative, called Rebuild Local News, wanted to revitalize hundreds of local news outlets across America decimated by changes in the industry, shifts in the sector’s advertising revenue structure and more recently, the pandemic.

The Rebuild Local News coalition is pushing for a comprehensive list of tax credits to keep afloat local newsrooms, such as a tax refund for local news digital subscribers, payroll tax credits for hiring and retaining local reporters, and a tax credit for small businesses to advertise in local news outlets.

Waldman and his coalition estimate that it would bring in $3.5bn of relief to the local news economy via “philanthropy, businesses, consumers and the government”.

Here’s the problem I see, at least when it comes to local TV news. While this might seem like a good idea and on the face, it is. It would give TV stations extra money, which would give them more cash to hire better Journalists and pay them more.

But we all know what would really happen. Media companies would pocket the money and continue to hire young and cheap.

Most of these media companies gave up on Journalism a long time ago; it is all about making the most money possible and keeping the shareholders happy.

Unless some rules were applied to the tax credits, I would bet the house that most media companies would just game the system.