News Analysts, Reporters, and Journalists

Low Risk
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Occupation snapshot

What does this snowflake show?
The Snowflake is a visual summary of the five badges: Automation Risk (calculated), Risk (polled), Growth, Wages and Volume. It gives you an instant snapshot of an occupations profile. The colour of the Snowflake relates to its size. The better the occupation scores in relation to others, the larger and greener the Snowflake becomes.
JOB SCORE
3.8/10
What's this?
Job Score (higher is better):

We rate jobs using four factors. These are:

- Chance of being automated
- Job growth
- Wages
- Volume of available positions

These are some key things to think about when job hunting.

Risk & user votes

Calculated automation risk

27% (Low Risk)

Low Risk (21-40%): This occupation has a lower risk of full replacement by AI, software, or robotic systems. Some tasks may be automated or assisted, but the role usually still relies on human judgement, communication, responsibility, physical adaptability, or practical decision-making.

More information on what this score is, and how it is calculated is available here.

Human strengths important in this job

These are human abilities and work contexts that are important in this occupation. They may help explain why parts of the role are harder to replace end-to-end, but they are not the only inputs into the automation score.

Communicating with people outside the organization

Very important
Why this matters
Represents the organization to customers, the public, or government—handling questions, concerns, and relationship-building through conversations, writing, calls, or email.
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Thinking creatively

Quite important
Why this matters
Coming up with original ideas and designs—creating new concepts, products, systems, or artistic work. This kind of open-ended invention and taste-based judgment is harder to automate end-to-end than routine, rule-based tasks.
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Social perceptiveness

Quite important
Why this matters
Noticing others’ emotions and reactions in the moment and adjusting what you say or do based on why they’re responding that way.
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Persuasion

Quite important
Why this matters
Influencing people to change their minds or behavior through conversation, trust, and negotiation.
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Decision-making and problem solving

Quite important
Why this matters
Analyze information, weigh tradeoffs, and choose the best solution—especially when situations are ambiguous, high-stakes, or have real-world consequences.
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Show 1 more strength

Active learning

Quite important
Why this matters
Keeps learning from new information and applying it to make better decisions now and in the future, especially when situations change.
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What users think

Based on 327 votes

46% chance of full automation within the next two decades

Our visitors have voted they are unsure if this occupation will be automated. However, employees may be able to find reassurance in the automated risk level we have generated, which shows 27% chance of automation.

What do you think the risk of automation is?

What is the likelihood that News Analysts, Reporters, and Journalists will be replaced by robots or artificial intelligence within the next 20 years?

Sentiment

Based on user votes over time

View sentiment trend

How opinions have changed over time

Pay & outlook

Wages

Moderately paid relative to other professions

In 2024, the median annual wage for News Analysts, Reporters, and Journalists was $60,280 ($29 per hour).

The median annual wage for News Analysts, Reporters, and Journalists was 21.8% higher than the national median annual wage, which stood at $49,500.

View wage trend

Wages over time

* Data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics

Growth

Very slow growth relative to other professions.

The number of 'News Analysts, Reporters, and Journalists' job openings is expected to decline 3.9% by 2034

View employment trend

Total employment, and estimated job openings

* Data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics for the period between 2023 and 2033
Updated projections are due 09-2025.

Volume

Moderate range of job opportunities compared to other professions

As of 2024 there were 41,550 people employed as 'News Analysts, Reporters, and Journalists' within the United States.

This represents around < 0.001% of the employed workforce across the country

Put another way, around 1 in 3 thousand people are employed as 'News Analysts, Reporters, and Journalists'.

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What people are saying (17)

Leave a comment
Indignant Reporter (Low)
09 Apr 2024 20:28
Ya'll put us into a big bucket. For reporters, like me, who go to meetings, talk to people, dig through public records, fight with the government to get those records, and more, AI is not going to replace what we do. AI is not going to go to the home of the mother whose son was killed in some tragedy, gain her trust and respect and give her the chance to share her story. Not in the same way at least. And AI is not going to discretely call around people who worked with a former governor and come back with 60 inches showing how she misused public funds. I could go on...

For talking heads on CNN, sure... I'm not sure how AI will impact them, and I frankly don't think a lot about people in those jobs. For journalists who have the unfortunate job of churning out and aggregating the hell out of as many local stories as possible (think Newsweek, NYPost, and any major New York media outlet), those dudes will probably be easy to replace. Honestly, though, I hope we just move on from that s*** as an industry.
lili
03 May 2024 09:16
I think that being a journalist requires too much human skills that can not be replaced by AI or robots.
First of all, you need to pick the subject. Then, you need to find information about the subject and we can think that this part is made online, but the journalist is supposed to be in the field to really comprehend what is happening. Also, for a journalisitc work, we need pictures that probably can't be taken by robots because a picture should, before anything else, create emotion. And the most important thing that can't and won't be replaced by an AI (if so, we human are probably dead) is the sensibility, the point of view, the detail, the humanity of an article.
So maybe, what could be made by the AI, in my opinion, is the writing. We could for instance create an AI software that create a really good journalistic text if we give it all the information found and the point of view and feeling we want to give to the article.
Daniel Xavier (Low)
25 Feb 2023 16:45
There is no way for a robot to steal a job from a journalist, not really in any area of ​​knowledge in the humanities because in this job subjectivity is necessary, something that no AI has.
After all, they are pre-programmed mathematical machines with some information over the internet, that is, without the internet they cannot live, after all they are computers. Creativity, on the other hand, is diverse and does not need Information to exist and just see a child who has never had knowledge in any area or has any previous information, she is already creative
VALENTINA ZANETTI RESTIFFE (Low)
31 May 2026 22:44
AI can't think and feel like humans. They are robots who only think through numbers. Journalists show the worst and the best of humanity, using logic AND using empathy. Journalism is such an old career, so why would it end so fast? AI could never be better than humans
JeffreyEpstein911
28 Jan 2026 12:44
As a journalist you need a human interaction not only article writing
Sebastián (Uncertain)
23 Jun 2023 11:08
We don't know yet what the future of journalism is, less with the "interference" of AI. Could be helpful as a writer of repetitive stuff or a possible danger as will take the job away from those who write the most basic content.
Tomás (Low)
01 Jul 2024 23:56
I think AI wil justo end up being a tool for journalist, not replace them, the job requires to much human interaction for an AI to do.
Mvcart (No chance)
07 Feb 2023 17:52
They deal with humans, that's hard
BibirMengkeroet (Low)
13 Sep 2022 12:27
We already have AI that is good enough for writing texts. It's called GPT-3. However, news reporting requires transparency. I think AI would assist journalists instead of replacing them
Marcel (Highly likely)
14 Feb 2023 13:25
chat gpt, bard, their expansion is unavoidable and just some of journalists will survive (whom are on front line)
uncertainjournalist (Moderate)
27 Nov 2021 08:44
Not all journalists, reporters etc. will lose their job but a high number of them will lose them. Because media is a diverse sector and the definition of journalist per se is ambiguous. The one who writes news on a website is a journalist, and the one who speaks on tv is also a journalist. In conclusion, I foresee that a notable amount of journalists will lose their jobs due to the AI.
Noel Wilson (Uncertain)
24 Nov 2021 00:26
Social media algorithms are learning to make news narratives from basic inputs
Daniel (Highly likely)
17 Jan 2022 03:45
Journalism is a very simple task for a robot to do. It's just reading the daily newspaper, presenting it, and that's it. A ridiculously easy task. Just put some charisma into it, and the job is done. But the media and journalists have a great influence, so they should try to stop it.
G
25 Jul 2023 05:57
Who do you think writes the content on the newspaper?
Des (Highly likely)
06 Sep 2024 19:52
Generative AI is getting a lot better. It's a real threat that jobs depending on the written word will die out for the cheaper machine work.
Stan (Moderate)
19 May 2023 17:28
We have AI news outlet channels on Youtube now… Plus more and more people are seeking unbiased truthful report which is something humans cant do. AI could definitely achieve that!
Konstantyna (Highly likely)
22 Nov 2024 17:28
AI can write pretty good articles and it will only get better

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Job description

Narrate or write news stories, reviews, or commentary for print, broadcast, or other communications media such as newspapers, magazines, radio, or television. May collect and analyze information through interview, investigation, or observation.

O*NET-SOC code: 27-3023.00