Local TV news needs to do better covering business and economy

Local television stations need to improve their coverage of business and economics issues, says Myron Kandel, the former financial and economics editor at CNN for 25 years.

Kandel spoke Wednesday on the Texas Tech campus about the relationship between the business media and business.

Kassidy Ketron of the Daily Toreador writes, “Kandel told the audience if aliens were to ever come to Earth, after it had been destroyed, all they would be able to find from local news is crime, sports, weather and celebrities.

“Local news, he said, needs to do a better job at covering business and finance.

“‘The more Americans know about business, the better Americans we will all be,’ he said.

“After a period of time, Kandel said he realized businesses learned to avoid news coverage because the news focused on businesses were in times of trouble.

“‘Business and the media share more joint goals than we have differences,’ he said. ‘We both want accuracy, honesty and credibility. That’s why cooperation between us is so important because I think that public interest requires that business and the media coexist productively.'”

Read more here. Kandel is a former president of the Society of American Business Editors and Writers.