This project spans the fields of political science, media studies, and economics in order to investigate the political implications of patterns of TV coverage of the US economy. The analysis will be in two related parts, the first attempting to account for the content of economic news by reference to objective economic conditions, and the second attempting to account for public perceptions of the economy by reference to objective economic conditions and the contents of economic news. The first part of the analysis will establish the conventions of newsworthiness that govern the production of economic news. The second part will establish the extent to which these patterns of media coverage influence public perceptions of the economy , while avoiding the common error of confounding the distinctive effects of media coverage with the mediated or unmediated effects of real economic conditions. Each part of the analysis will take the form of a statistical analysis of time series data encompassing the period from 1970 to 1995. Existing data on actual economic conditions (from the CITIBASE data base) and on public perceptions and expectations about personal finances and business conditions (from the Michigan Survey of Consumers) will be merged with new data from a detailed content analysis of network television coverage of the economy, including monthly readings of the quality and tone of coverage of the economy as a whole as well as of the recurring issues of inflation, unemployment, GNP growth, wages, interest rates, foreign trade, and government debt.
