Framing

EXTREMES VS. MAINSTREAM

Reporting on economic mobility often skews toward emotional appeals and cases of extreme or shocking poverty. While it’s critical to understand the full spectrum of such an issue, media focus on extremes can have an “othering” effect on people experiencing those extremes. Drawing on the differences between a source and the relative privilege of the “average” audience member may sound like it will stimulate civic interest and support, but in reality it serves only to stigmatize the subject and alienate them further.

It also serves to erase the even larger number of people who experience economic hardship, but do not technically live below the federal poverty line, and how their challenges — and thus their solutions — may be connected.

We know that in 2018, 11.8% of people in the U.S. were living in poverty; that’s 38.1 million people.1 But nearly 40% of Americans between the ages of 20 and 65 will spend at least one year below the poverty line.2 And, as the COVID-19 pandemic set in, fewer than half of U.S. adults had emergency funds that would last them three months.3 Unfortunately, economic hardship is mainstream, so it’s critical that it is reported on as an issue that affects many.

IT’S A STATE, NOT A TRAIT

The vast majority of people experiencing poverty vacillate in and out of "official" poverty, measured by the federal government by income. This is important to remember because it doesn’t fully capture the complex dynamics of economic uncertainty that many face, a facet of economic mobility that reporting should work to examine.

Additionally, this is important to remember because reporting on those experiencing poverty often describes them as if poverty is their defining feature, as if it is the most important thing about them. Economic status is only a piece of any individual’s identity. Reporting on sources with dignity and respect requires we see them as whole people and not as two-dimensional characters that fill our scenes.

DEFICIT VS. ASSET FRAMING

Reporting on economic hardship often means examining what a source or a community lacks, which can mean anything from limited green space to school funding. When journalism shines a spotlight on those our community has failed to support, the light often shines brightest on what one is missing in hopes that awareness will spread and the community will rise to fill in the gaps.

But this framing is incomplete. Stripping a subject of agency to form an emotional appeal around their needs overlooks their assets, their goals, their successes -- all things we can learn from and seek solutions to address. Olson Zaltman also identified that in their research about unconscious narratives about poverty in the U.S.