Recently, the headlines in the Deseret News “reported” a declining housing market, which it described in bold print as the “the worst slump in 37 years.” The problem was that the story had nothing to do with Utah. The story came from Washington and was describing conditions on the East Coast and elsewhere. In fact, on the exact same page and directly below the lead story suggesting to all Utahns that the housing market (including their own homes) is in the tank was a story reporting that Utah is actually the strongest and most “dynamic” economy in America. Why? According to the contradicting local story, it is due to low unemployment and “STABLE HOUSING PRICES.”
Imagine that – “stable housing prices” in the midst of the “worst housing slump in 37 years”. Now there’s story! But nothing is deader than yesterday’s news so the paper moves on while leaving a trail of misinformation or confusion as in this case. People in the local real estate market will tell you that there is now a widespread perception that the local market is slumping badly despite low single digit mortgage rates and a thriving economy – all because of the chilling effects of misleading news reports. But there is a larger principle here. It is that Newspapers don’t always just report the news. They sometimes jump the gun and fill their papers with self generated “news.” (It surely is not intentional but it happens nonetheless and is an unfortunate side effect of the demands and realities of daily journalism. Thus, we should, as they say, take all journalism “with a grain of salt.”)
Have you ever noticed how the papers love to start early in a political campaign with their own polling and then begin giving ongoing play by play analysis of who’s winning and losing — always pulling the carrots up to see how the roots are doing. (We saw this with the SLC Mayor’s race).
Remember the classic photo of a Victorious Harry Truman holding up the newspaper with its headline that falsely announced, “DEWEY DEFEATS TRUMAN”? At least Truman only had to deal with such reporting once on the day after the election. Suppose the paper ran its own continuous polls and regularly ran such stories for several months leading up to the election? Dewey would probably have defeated Truman. Instead, Truman’s whistle stop and grass roots campaign rolled to victory when the people spoke at the ballot box at the appointed time and place.
We will have to wait and see if the Utah housing market can retain its “stable housing prices” or whether the suggestion of the “worst housing slump in 37 years” on the same page and in much bigger type proves to be controlling.
Posted by: LaVar Christensen