Media Again Ignore Consumer Confidence Highs
Networks leave out good news that high gas prices aren’t hurting confidence in the economy.

By Ken Shepherd
Business & Media Institute
April 26, 2006

     Are the media having an Office Space moment? If they got the memo on consumer confidence, they sure aren’t reporting it.

     On April 25, The Conference Board reported that it found consumer confidence at a four-year high. The network evening newscasts all ignored the news, focusing instead on their continuing drumbeat about high gas prices.

     The Associated Press reported on April 25 that the Conference Board found that consumers “shrugged off higher gasoline prices in April and sent a widely watched barometer of consumer confidence to its highest level in four years.”

     The Conference Board’s latest report mirrors a rise in another consumer confidence index as measured by the Ipsos polling earlier in April.

     The Business & Media Institute showed at that time how the media ignored good news.

     While ignoring buoyant expectations by American consumers, all three broadcast networks led with “the pain at the pump.”

     NBC’s Brian Williams opened the April 25 “Nightly News” insisting that a “nation of drivers and consumers does a slow burn over another sudden sudden spike in the price of gas.” ABC’s Elizabeth Vargas asked if President Bush’s proposals to curb high gas prices would “be enough to help the people at the pump.” Russ Mitchell, substituting for Bob Schieffer on the “CBS Evening News” opened that program asking if Bush’s plans would “have any real impact” on gasoline prices.

     This latest move by the networks is similar to how both ABC and NBC dealt with the three-year high June 28, 2005. The networks not only ignored the good news, but ABC covered negative numbers twice as often as positive.