{"id":752299,"date":"2021-09-14T17:06:03","date_gmt":"2021-09-14T21:06:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=752299"},"modified":"2021-09-14T17:06:05","modified_gmt":"2021-09-14T21:06:05","slug":"house-dems-propose-1-billion-in-subsidies-for-local-newspapers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/house-dems-propose-1-billion-in-subsidies-for-local-newspapers\/","title":{"rendered":"House Dems Propose $1 Billion in Subsidies For Local Newspapers"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"float:left\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">20<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fhouse-dems-propose-1-billion-in-subsidies-for-local-newspapers%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=752299&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><div readability=\"29.658536585366\">\n\t\t\t<span class=\"article-category\"><a class href=\"https:\/\/freebeacon.com\/media\/\">Media<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"article-excerpt\">Lawmakers hope tax credits will revive industry as trust in media plummets<\/p>\n<figure class=\"post-thumbnail-container relative lg:mr-24 w-full my-4 mb-8\">\n\t\t<img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"736\" height=\"514\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/newspapers-736x514-1.jpg\" class=\"w-full lazyload blur-up wp-post-image\" alt=\"media newspapers\" srcset=\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAAAACH5BAEKAAEALAAAAAABAAEAAAICTAEAOw==\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 736px) 100vw, 736px\" data-srcset=\"https:\/\/s1.freebeacon.com\/up\/2019\/08\/newspapers.jpg 736w, https:\/\/s1.freebeacon.com\/up\/2019\/08\/newspapers-300x210.jpg 300w\" data-sizes=\"auto\" \/><figcaption class=\"absolute text-white p-4 w-full text-right text-xs bottom-0 bg-black opacity-75\">\n\t\t\t\tGetty Images\t\t\t<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>\t\t\t<span class=\"text-gray text-xs md:text-lg\"><a href=\"https:\/\/freebeacon.com\/author\/chuck-ross\/\" title=\"Posts by Chuck Ross\" class=\"author url fn text-red-700\" rel=\"author\">Chuck Ross<\/a> \u2022 September 14, 2021 4:50 pm<\/span><\/p><\/div>\n<div readability=\"108.79953311935\">\n<p>House Democrats are offering more than $1 billion in subsidies to local newspapers as part of a massive spending proposal released this week, even as polls show record levels of distrust in the media.<\/p>\n<p>The $3.5 trillion spending plan includes up to $25,000 in payroll tax credits for each journalist on a local newspaper&#8217;s payroll. The carve-out will cost $1.3 billion over the next decade, according to the Joint Committee on Taxation. To offset this and other tax credits included in the bill, Democrats are proposing $2.9 trillion in tax hikes through higher corporate, capital gains, and personal income tax rates.<\/p>\n<p>Democrats hope the proposal will rescue local newspapers, which saw employment <a href=\"https:\/\/www.pewresearch.org\/fact-tank\/2021\/07\/13\/u-s-newsroom-employment-has-fallen-26-since-2008\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">fall<\/a> by 57 percent from 2008 to 2020. More than 1,800 newspapers <a href=\"https:\/\/www.usnewsdeserts.com\/reports\/expanding-news-desert\/loss-of-local-news\/loss-newspapers-readers\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">have shut down<\/a> since 2004 amid a shift away from print advertising and the rise of online media. Confidence in the media has also waned. Just 21 percent of Americans said they had &#8220;great confidence&#8221; in newspapers, according to a recent Gallup <a href=\"https:\/\/news.gallup.com\/poll\/352316\/americans-confidence-major-institutions-dips.aspx\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">survey<\/a>. Only television news, big business, and Congress had lower confidence ratings.<\/p>\n<p>The Democrats&#8217; plan is vague on which news outlets would qualify for the tax credits. It defines a local news outlet as one that publishes original content that &#8220;primarily serves the needs of a regional or local community.&#8221; The subsidies apply to news outlets that employ fewer than 750 people.<\/p>\n<p>Americans for Tax Reform listed the tax credit as one of 10 &#8220;giveaways&#8221; that Democrats are offering to liberal interest groups in the spending plan. The group, which supports low taxes, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.atr.org\/10-woke-items-democrats-35-trillion-blowout\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">noted<\/a> that journalists tend to be liberal. The spending bill also proposes subsidies for the solar industry to &#8220;promote environmental justice&#8221; and a tax deduction of up to $250 for dues paid to labor unions.<\/p>\n<p>The proposal is nearly identical to the Local Journalism Sustainability Act, a bill introduced earlier this year by Sens. Maria Cantwell (D., Wash.), Ron Wyden (D., Ore.), and Mark Kelly (D., Ariz.). In addition to payroll tax credits, the senators proposed a $250 tax deduction for subscriptions to local newspapers.<\/p>\n<p>The AFL-CIO, the country&#8217;s largest labor union, endorsed the newsroom subsidies in <a href=\"https:\/\/newsguild.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/Local-Journalism-Sustainability-Act-H.R.-3940-S.-2434.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">a letter<\/a> to Democratic leaders earlier this month. The union said that stipends were needed to grapple with a so-called information crisis.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The loss of the essential local news sources mean fewer Americans have access to fact-based reporting on their local government, communities and the health crisis still plaguing our nation,&#8221; the union said in a letter to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.), House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D., Calif.), and Rep. Richard Neal (D., Ill.), the chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee.<\/p>\n<p>One Republican on the Ways and Means Committee criticized the subsidy as a handout from Democrats to the media.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;As the Democrats raise taxes and stoke inflation on working families, they&#8217;re carving out a special tax gift for their friends in the media, which is the propaganda wing of the Democratic Party,&#8221; Rep. Devin Nunes (R., Calif.) told the <em>Washington Free Beacon<\/em>. &#8220;Bureaucrats will obviously exploit this clause to ensure that Democrat-friendly outlets receive this present while conservative outlets are excluded. Anyone who believes this program will be administered in a politically neutral way should have his head examined.&#8221;<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Media Lawmakers hope tax credits will revive industry as trust in media plummets  Getty Images  Chuck Ross \u2022 September 14, 2021 4:50 pm &#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":2315279,"comment_status":"close","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-752299","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/752299","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=752299"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/752299\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2315279"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=752299"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=752299"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=752299"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}