USA Today Echoes Occupy Wall Street
No need for the “share the wealth” crowd to worry. USA Today is ready to step into the
void and stoke class division in the absence of Occupy Wall Street.
On April 4, USA Today profiled “The $100 Million Club,” a group of wealthy corporate
CEOs, and contrasted their pay with the US median wage of $40,872 in 2013. A subhead
on the print edition complained: “CEOs get richer, workers get left behind.”
Ironically, many of the CEOs the newspaper profiled in the front page story bankroll
liberal agenda items, something that they wouldn’t be able to do if they weren’t making
millions. Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg, Oracle CEO Larry Ellison and Starbucks CEO
Howard Schultz were all supporters of liberal causes on the USA Today list.
The article blames the recent increase in CEO pay on Wall Street’s recent bull market,
which “has created a massive wealth effect,” according to article.
Outrage against high pay for CEOs was a rallying cry for Occupy Wall Street, a
movement that USA Today repeatedly covered positively. On Sept. 17, 2013, the
paper published an AP story marking the second anniversary of the movement. The
article ignored the arrests or criminal accusations made against the Occupiers, but gave
the group a platform to speak out against “economic injustice” and CEOs who made
“outrageous sums of money.” In 2012, USA Today applauded Occupy Wall Street
themes in that year’s movies, while simultaneously ignoring most of the ugly realities
associated with the protests.
— Mike Ciandella is Research Analyst at the Media Research Center. Follow Mike Ciandella on Twitter.
