ASNE 2016 Survey on Diversity in U.S. newsrooms

Keywords: USA, English, diversity, newsroom, journalism, reporters, research, study, statistics, minorities, online, traditional media

The American Society of News Editors (ASNE) Diversity 2016 Survey reveals that minority journalists comprised 17 percent of the workforce in U.S. newsrooms. The percent of journalists of colour was still greatest at the largest news organizations.  The information from the 433 organizations surveyed in both years showed that some newsrooms added more journalists of colour (+ 5.6 percent) than white employees (- 8.9 percent)

The annual survey also found that 28 percent of the news organizations reported having at least one minority journalist among their top three editors and 77 percent reported having at least one woman in a top-three position. Women also made up about a third of newsroom employees overall, with a higher number employed at online-only sites than at newspapers. Women comprised 38 percent of daily newspaper employees in this year’s survey and nearly 50 percent of online-only news organization employees.

The results summarize responses from 737 news organizations, including 646 newspapers and 91 digital-only news sites.

2016 ASNE Diversity Survey Methodology and Tables