Got this from Rebecca last week. It just slipped my mind to put it up before today. I apologize to Rebecca for not doing this earlier. She is writing in response to a letter that ran a week ago about graphics that accompanied an article about the economic impact of immigrants in N.C.
- Andrew -
I’d like to take a moment to respond to Paul Worley’s letter in Monday’s paper. Worley questioned the usefulness of the graphics accompanying the “Hispanics’ economic impact increases” that ran last Thursday.
As co-editor of the graphics desk and a co-creator of those graphics, I take responsibility for any ill feelings they may have caused. As graphics is still a relatively new desk at the Daily Tar Heel, we are always thrilled when we receive space in the paper to print them. Our ultimate goal is to present the facts visually so that readers can better understand the world around them and consequently make informed decisions with that knowledge. Consequently, in no way do we wish to be considered unthoughtful in the presentation of our numbers.
For the particular graphics in question, I kept in contact with the writer of the story through meetings and emails while developing the graphics. Every choice was a conscious one. The bar graphs that ran on page 4 depict only manufacturing, agriculture and construction job disparities because that is where most of the recently migrated Hispanic workers, the focus of the article, have been able to find immediate employment. We pulled these numbers from the report on which the story was based (you can read it at this link: http://www.kenan-flagler.unc.edu/ki/reports/2006_HispanicStudy/) Statistics on small business owners and educators weren’t available, although they would have made a nice comparison. With the space we had, the writer and I chose these professions to emphasize the disparity in annual salaries between non-Hispanic and Hispanic workers in job fields that are already known to not pay incredibly large annual sums.
The graphic on the front, which Worley considered disturbing, I actually found surprising. The numbers show that Hispanic immigrants cost the state $61 million – or $102 per Hispanic resident in 2004 – was much lower than I think we’ve all been led to believe. And additional benefit through this depiction was that the Corrections costs were so minimal compared to the portion of the population which consisted of Hispanic immigrants in 2004, combatting another common misconception about this group. We also tried to put the costs into perspective by indicating, for example, that the largest cost to the state – the $467 million paid for K-12 education – consisted of only 7.5% of the entire K-12 budget (and an even smaller percentage of the entire education budget.)
Worley says these graphics do not do justice to the study’s finding that Hispanic immigrants contribute $9.2 billion to the state’s economy, greatly off-setting the $61 million in costs to the state. I would agree. In talks with the writer, space became an issue, and we decided this important point at the very least should run high in the story. We simply did not have room in the graphic size we were allotted, and we tried to compensate by utilizing the space as mentioned above. Our graphics hinted at this large difference (through wage disparities in particular) but relied on the accompanying story to deliver the full message.
Should it have worked this way? I would like to think readers look at both the graphics and the stories, but this may not always be true. So I want to thank Worley for writing a letter and bringing this to our attention. I hope he continues to read and critique our work, as it is only through this valuable insight that we can continue to improve.
Thank you,
Rebecca
Graphics Desk Co-Editor
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