The ever-readable Robert Picard has the best piece (subscription) in the new edition of Journalism Studies. The abstract lays it on the line:

The author finds that the relationship between GDP and expenditures is weakening, that growth is not keeping pace with inflation, and that there is greater volatility in advertising than seen in the past. The author concludes that trends indicate the advertising expenditures will plateau and decline in the future, denying newspapers revenue growth that is critically needed for sustainability.

His conclusion is spot on – although I’ve left off the last sentence (buy it and you’ll see why):

Although the shifts in newspaper advertising are removing the unusually high profitability of the industry, they are not yet dooming it to demise or altering the basic structural element of the local newspaper markets in the United States.

But he doesn’t address the managerial strategies that flow from that – sustained job reductions and cost-cutting.

As Picard’s posted before:

If one rationally looks at the industry, however, one sees that it is fundamentally sound, but that a unique, financially golden period in its history is ending.

And if one looks rationally at the history of international warfare over the past one hundred years the Iraq and Afghan conflicts rank as rather small, regional wars. But, try telling that to the combatants…