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Conversations on the Eve of the NEW Millenium
Economic Disparity: A Complex Challenge
DAVID HALBERSTAM is the Pulitzer prize-winning author of "The Best and the Brightest," the acclaimed study of what went wrong with America's policy in Vietnam, as well as many other books on policy, social issues, and trends in American life.
"One of the greatest challenges of the 21st century surrounds the distribution of wealth in this rich nation. The country is well situated for a more equitable sharing of our economic resources. For one thing, we're an educational superpower with access to the best venture capitalism in the world.
"Immigration policies of the last quarter century have helped keep us young and vibrant. But in the new economy, there's not enough room for growth for blue collar workers. There is a decline in opportunity that I think is directly related to the decline in the strength of unions. Unions have to figure out a way to revitalize themselves. And young workers have to see unions as essential to their livelihood. That's one of the very first questions that must be addressed early in the new century: How can we achieve a more equitable distribution of wealth in America?
"The whole issue of economic disparity continues to divide us. It's been 45 years since Brown v. Board of Education and technically, legally, politically, we've come a long way toward addressing the race issue. Since the riots of the 1960s, a great many African Americans have entered the middle class. Still, there's a hard core of poverty among minority people in the inner city that is not being addressed.
"There are no entry-level jobs in factories, stock yards or service trades, especially in the industrial cities of the North and Midwest. African Americans born in this country simply cannot compete with immigrants from other parts of the world. People who come here from Asia, for example, are assimilated into the mainstream within a generation.
"But it's no longer an issue of race or even economics. It's a far more complicated issue of class and low expectations and despair. So we have dissatisfaction and dysfunctional families and drugs and crime. And we're not doing anything about it, because we don't know what to do. That's another problem that must be dealt with early in the new millennium.
"Beyond this, I don't think we can stand here on the eve of the millennium and predict what's likely to happen in the next thousand years or even the next century. Of course, we look toward a digital age and the fact that national boundaries are losing their importance. But think back just 100 years to December 1899. Who could have predicted that the 20th century would see two world wars, the rise and fall of Stalin and Hitler, the impact of a man like Henry Ford or even that America would become the world superpower?"
Quality Health Care Under Siege
Henry E. Simmons, medical doctor and public health expert, is president of the National Coalition on Health Care, a broadly based national policy alliance of unions including CWA, as well as businesses, health care providers, religious and consumer groups.
"As we look to the future in health care in this country, the news is not good. Unless major reforms are enacted, the already serious problems in our health care system will grow so rapidly that they will exceed our capacity to deal with them.
"Problem number one is rising cost. Health care costs have increased almost $500 billion since 1990, and many employers are seeing health insurance premiums rise at double-digit levels, or five times the inflattion rate. Prescription drug cost increases are even higher. As health care costs continue to rise, more and more employers, including those of CWA members, will attempt to shift costs to their employees, drop or decrease coverage, hire contingent workers without health insurance or limit salary increases.
"Problem number two is decreasing health insurance coverage. Largely due to rapidly rising costs, coverage is decreasing and the employer-based health insurance system is eroding. Today, there are 44 million uninsured, and one million more Americans are being added to those ranks each year in spite of the best economic times in our history.
"Problem number three is poor quality. Even many people who have health insurance receive poor quality care. Such care wastes hundreds of billions of dollars and injures or kills millions of Americans each year. The chance of a patient being killed in a hospital is approximately one in every 200 admissions. Contrast that with the one in 3 million chances of being killed in a plane crash, about which the public is far more concerned.
"Managed care is not the problem. The system is the problem, and the system's problems must be addressed. Middle-class working Americans are now at risk. The necessary change is unlikely to occur unless and until the public and its leaders have a greater understanding of the facts and a broader and shared vision of a better, more equitable and affordable health care system.
"We need the help of CWA members to bring about that understanding and vision. For a trillion-dollar expenditure, you and all the American people have the right to expect no less."
Boomers Face Caring For Both Kids And Parents
TIPPER GORE is special advisor to the President on issues of Mental Health, Homelessness, and Aging. Her husband, Vice President Al Gore, is a former Newspaper Guild-CWA member from his days as a journalist.
"The Baby Boomer generation, numbering some 76 million people born between 1946 and 1964, will continue to dominate American culture, shaping everything from television shows to Internet sites.
"Boomers will also face new and different challenges, and one of the greatest will be caring for parents and children. This is the first generation to have more parents than children. Many of us are already part of the 'Sandwich Generation,' and more of us will join the ranks of those who care for aging parents as well as growing children.
"We must work together to find ways not only to care for those with long-term care needs but also to support the caregivers - the people who undertake the crucially important but often physically and emotionally difficult job of caring for a loved one who is aging or ill.
"At the same time, we must find constructive after-school activities for our children. Fifteen million children are home alone after school while parents are at work because of the lack of affordable after-school programs. We know most problems with kids start between the hours of 3 and 6 p.m.
"Just as we need to make some strategic changes, it is equally important to work together to ensure that other things won't change. Social Security and Medicare, for example, will remain paramount to our income security. Without Social Security, more than half of older women would live in poverty. Without Medicare, many could not afford health care. That's why it is imperative to dedicate the budget surplus to paying down the debt to save Social Security and extend Medicare's solvency."
New Minorities, Different Needs
GREG SPENCER is Director of Population Projections, U.S. Census Bureau.
"In the next 10 years, the U.S. will grow more slowly - by about 2.5 million people a year - as the number of women of child-bearing age declines.
Population growth is important for the health of the economy, but it also means more population density and more asphalt. It has implications for those who are concerned with the environment. In America, we value freedom of choice, but steady population growth may pinch that freedom as we crowd in together.
"One major demographic trend is that the most population growth in the nation will be among Hispanic and Asian communities, making the U.S. more ethnically diverse in the next century. The largest growth among school-age children will take place within the Hispanic community. That's never happened before.
"Historically most issues and policies regarding race and ethnicity have been driven by concerns of the white majority and a significant African-American minority. The nation's policy-makers will have to take these new minorities into account."
Civil Rights Pioneer Reminds: 'We're All in This Together'
REP. JOHN LEWIS (D-Ga.), one of America's foremost civil rights activists as well as an influential lawmaker, first elected to the House of Representatives in 1986, is the author of the recently published book, "Walking with the Wind," a memoir of the civil rights struggle.
"We're all part of a global community. We're all in this together. That has never been more important than it is today, as we look to a new century and a new millennium.
"We must never lose sight of what has transpired during the past century in the fight for social justice in America. We must constantly remind people of the achievements of the civil rights movement in America.
This is especially important today because there hasn't been a time in America - certainly not since World War II - that the classes have been pushed as far apart as they are today, with vast numbers of poor at one end, a small number of wealthy at the other and a middle class in danger of completely disappearing as most of it is pushed toward the lower end of the spectrum.
"We cannot let this continue. We cannot have a very few people visibly and luxuriantly living in excess while the rest of the nation lives in fear and anxiety.
"We can respond. The government can respond. We proved it with the civil rights movement. The changes we brought about have been enormous. No one who was born in America 50 or 60 years ago, grew up and came through what I came through, who witnessed the changes I witnessed, can possibly say that America is not a far better place than it was.
"We live in a different country today. The South is different. Racism is not gone. But no one can suggest that the situation today, especially in the deep South, is anything like it was a generation ago. The number of black students today is 30 times as large as it was a half century ago. Today, Selma, Ala. is represented by a black congressman. The city has a black chief of police. And the Selma City Council has a black majority. Times have indeed changed.
"There can be no denying the distance we have come. But today, there is also a mistaken assumption among many that these signs of progress mean that the battle is over, that the struggle for civil rights is finished.
"Somewhere, sometime - and I hope in the not-too-distant future - someone must take the lead. At the highest level, someone needs to say that we are one nation, we're one society, we're one people.
"We're one house, the American house. We don't speak that way anymore. I'm not sure we think that way. But we must. We must respond and develop a just and sensible way of redistributing our resources so that no one will be left out of society.
"If we don't invest more in our young people, we are headed for disaster. This is where the revolution must begin. A revolution of values. A revolution of attitude. A revolution that instills the sense of possibility in young people's minds, a belief that this nation does indeed offer them the opportunities of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness."
Media And Marketing: All About Story Telling
COKIE ROBERTS, a distinguished news correspondent, currently co-anchors "This Week" on ABC News. Her first book, "We Are Our Mothers' Daughters," was published in 1998 by William Morris. Her second, "From This Day Forward," an examination of marriage, will be off the press by the end of the year.
"I believe the big story of the future, and the one that will affect people most, is the story of the enormous scientific, technological and medical breakthroughs we are seeing today. New discoveries of human capability through continued advances in these fields will dominate the news well into the new millennium. And our stories will be moral conversations about how to use these new capabilities - conversations about cloning new life-forms, about cellular manipulation, about life and death.
"I don't foresee a big story in politics. That's pretty much 'business as usual.' But I do agree with the futurists who say that successful mass marketing - whether politicians, food products, automobiles, or whatever - will depend on consumers buying into their 'story.' That's one of the reasons John McCain has become so successful, because of his story. People are interested in hearing him.
"It is elemental to human behavior to listen to and tell stories. Storytelling always has been and remains our most compelling way of communicating. I grew up in the American South and there was always an eccentric aunt or uncle who could be counted on for a good story. So listening to and telling stories is part of my heritage - and that has served me well in my career.
"The stories we most enjoy hearing are the old stories of sacrifice and heroism, of reaching for something worthwhile. We are still captivated by accounts of the hardships endured by the pioneers as they went across this country, the struggles for equal rights for women and minorities in this country.
"My first book, 'We Are Our Mothers' Daughters,' is a story about me and people I've known. The women of my generation are pioneers in many ways. In career and workplace issues especially, we were the first women at almost everything we did. Most of us, at some time in our careers, had the experience of being the only woman in the room. We enjoy sharing these experiences and people, especially young women, I think, like hearing about them. And we like hearing stories of relationships between mothers and daughters, fathers and sons, husbands and wives. When we hear of an experience similar to our own, we feel connected.
"Among the stories we'll tell our grandchildren is the one about how we celebrated New Year's Eve, 1999. In writing my book, I discovered that there is a thread of continuity running through the fabric of all women. Similarly, there will be a thread of continuity among those of us who watch the dawn of the new millennium together. We will always be connected, throughout time and regardless of place."
Technology Is Driving Media To Change Rapidly
Dean Mills is dean of the renowned School of Journalism at the University of Missouri. He started his career with the Baltimore Sun, reporting from Moscow from 1969 to 1972, then covered Washington politics until 1975. He held a series of academic positions before becoming dean 10 years ago.
"The new technology has already dramatically changed how news is being delivered, faster than anybody thought it was going to happen and faster than anybody was ready for it. Newspapers are being forced to figure out ways to deliver news content and ad content online and to think more about how they can directly interact with the communities they serve. They have to if they're going to survive.
"The evidence so far is that there will be as many or more jobs in journalism. The more the information increases, the more you need someone to help you navigate, to legitimate, to check for accuracy and perform other journalistic functions, to give readers some assurance that the information they're getting is accurate and fair.
"With local television news, some stations are trying to do the same thing that smart newspapers are, and deliver news on the web, giving users the advantage of video on demand and audio on demand. With the proliferation of other ways to get news, the big question is whether every major market will still have three or four local stations in the future.
"Between newspapers and broadcast outlets on a community level, newspapers have a better chance of surviving because they've always done better than anyone else in depth and breadth of coverage of local issues.
"Nationally and internationally, CNN has had a huge impact, sometimes for good, and probably sometimes for bad. Whatever CNN chooses to focus on becomes a world problem. What it chooses not to focus on gets forgotten.
"With around-the-clock news and instant coverage of dramatic events such as mass shootings, there is some evidence that there's a copy-cat effect. But in a democracy, you can never, ever hide the news. I just returned from Indonesia where they have the chance to have a free press for the first time. Even among journalists, I find people afraid of too much freedom of the press, afraid that it stirs people up. But it you're going to have a democracy, you don't have a choice. The job of the media is to tell everything that's happening, including the awful things."
Futurist Sees DawningOf the 'Imagination Age'
Rolf Jensen is director of Denmark's Copenhagen Institute for Future Studies, one of the world's most respected future-oriented think tanks, and strategic advisor to many companies. He also is author of the "Dream Society," published in 1999.
"In today's information society, we prize those who can skillfully manipulate data; in tomorrow's dream society, we will reward those who can most successfully make this data appeal to emotions. Just as the Hunter-Gatherer Age gave way to the Agricultural Age, which evolved into the Industrial Age and now the Information Age - the new millennium will see a global society focused on dreams, adventure, spirituality, and feelings - the Imagination Age.
"The huge increase in material wealth throughout the developed world owes much to science and technology, but, in the future, attention will turn away from science toward non-materialistic and non-scientific values. The highest-paid person in the first half of the next century will be the 'storyteller.' The value of products will depend on the story they tell. Nike and many other global companies are already mainly storytellers. That is where the money is - even today.
"In the 21st century, it will be increasingly necessary to produce more than a useful product: A story or legend must be built into it, a story that embodies values beyond utility. This imperative is already occurring with more and more products: People buy blue jeans, for instance, only partly to cover their bodies; most of the money they pay is for the story that goes with the product - a story of independence, youth, power, or a statement about values. Similarly, when they buy eggs laid by free-range hens, much of the money they pay is for the hen's lifestyle. People pay because they value animal life, nature, and tradition. What's more, the consumer not only expects the product to tell him or her a story, but ownership of that product must tell a story about the consumer as well.
"Work will be different in the future. In two or three decades, only a small percentage of the population will be employed in industry, which will then be almost completely automated. However, new jobs will appear in the creation and distribution of feelings. For example, sensory designers will use colors, scents, and textures to create environments that stimulate certain emotions. 'Strategic dreamers' will help corporations understand the spiritual goals of potential customers, employees, and stockholders.
"The technologies allowing global communication - the Internet, direct broadcast satellites, etc. - will be taken for granted, and much more value will be placed on the content of that communication. For example, 500 television channels offering nothing but reruns of old shows will not be tolerated. People who can produce highly imaginative new programs will be in greater demand, as will innovative CD-ROM creators, musicians and composers, actors, artists, journalists. Storytelling will be a key skill in a wide range of professions, from advertiser to teacher to business entrepreneur to politician to religious leader - even to futurists. Each will be valued for his or her ability to produce 'dreams' for public consumption."
DAVID HALBERSTAM is the Pulitzer prize-winning author of "The Best and the Brightest," the acclaimed study of what went wrong with America's policy in Vietnam, as well as many other books on policy, social issues, and trends in American life.
"One of the greatest challenges of the 21st century surrounds the distribution of wealth in this rich nation. The country is well situated for a more equitable sharing of our economic resources. For one thing, we're an educational superpower with access to the best venture capitalism in the world.
"Immigration policies of the last quarter century have helped keep us young and vibrant. But in the new economy, there's not enough room for growth for blue collar workers. There is a decline in opportunity that I think is directly related to the decline in the strength of unions. Unions have to figure out a way to revitalize themselves. And young workers have to see unions as essential to their livelihood. That's one of the very first questions that must be addressed early in the new century: How can we achieve a more equitable distribution of wealth in America?
"The whole issue of economic disparity continues to divide us. It's been 45 years since Brown v. Board of Education and technically, legally, politically, we've come a long way toward addressing the race issue. Since the riots of the 1960s, a great many African Americans have entered the middle class. Still, there's a hard core of poverty among minority people in the inner city that is not being addressed.
"There are no entry-level jobs in factories, stock yards or service trades, especially in the industrial cities of the North and Midwest. African Americans born in this country simply cannot compete with immigrants from other parts of the world. People who come here from Asia, for example, are assimilated into the mainstream within a generation.
"But it's no longer an issue of race or even economics. It's a far more complicated issue of class and low expectations and despair. So we have dissatisfaction and dysfunctional families and drugs and crime. And we're not doing anything about it, because we don't know what to do. That's another problem that must be dealt with early in the new millennium.
"Beyond this, I don't think we can stand here on the eve of the millennium and predict what's likely to happen in the next thousand years or even the next century. Of course, we look toward a digital age and the fact that national boundaries are losing their importance. But think back just 100 years to December 1899. Who could have predicted that the 20th century would see two world wars, the rise and fall of Stalin and Hitler, the impact of a man like Henry Ford or even that America would become the world superpower?"
Quality Health Care Under Siege
Henry E. Simmons, medical doctor and public health expert, is president of the National Coalition on Health Care, a broadly based national policy alliance of unions including CWA, as well as businesses, health care providers, religious and consumer groups.
"As we look to the future in health care in this country, the news is not good. Unless major reforms are enacted, the already serious problems in our health care system will grow so rapidly that they will exceed our capacity to deal with them.
"Problem number one is rising cost. Health care costs have increased almost $500 billion since 1990, and many employers are seeing health insurance premiums rise at double-digit levels, or five times the inflattion rate. Prescription drug cost increases are even higher. As health care costs continue to rise, more and more employers, including those of CWA members, will attempt to shift costs to their employees, drop or decrease coverage, hire contingent workers without health insurance or limit salary increases.
"Problem number two is decreasing health insurance coverage. Largely due to rapidly rising costs, coverage is decreasing and the employer-based health insurance system is eroding. Today, there are 44 million uninsured, and one million more Americans are being added to those ranks each year in spite of the best economic times in our history.
"Problem number three is poor quality. Even many people who have health insurance receive poor quality care. Such care wastes hundreds of billions of dollars and injures or kills millions of Americans each year. The chance of a patient being killed in a hospital is approximately one in every 200 admissions. Contrast that with the one in 3 million chances of being killed in a plane crash, about which the public is far more concerned.
"Managed care is not the problem. The system is the problem, and the system's problems must be addressed. Middle-class working Americans are now at risk. The necessary change is unlikely to occur unless and until the public and its leaders have a greater understanding of the facts and a broader and shared vision of a better, more equitable and affordable health care system.
"We need the help of CWA members to bring about that understanding and vision. For a trillion-dollar expenditure, you and all the American people have the right to expect no less."
Boomers Face Caring For Both Kids And Parents
TIPPER GORE is special advisor to the President on issues of Mental Health, Homelessness, and Aging. Her husband, Vice President Al Gore, is a former Newspaper Guild-CWA member from his days as a journalist.
"The Baby Boomer generation, numbering some 76 million people born between 1946 and 1964, will continue to dominate American culture, shaping everything from television shows to Internet sites.
"Boomers will also face new and different challenges, and one of the greatest will be caring for parents and children. This is the first generation to have more parents than children. Many of us are already part of the 'Sandwich Generation,' and more of us will join the ranks of those who care for aging parents as well as growing children.
"We must work together to find ways not only to care for those with long-term care needs but also to support the caregivers - the people who undertake the crucially important but often physically and emotionally difficult job of caring for a loved one who is aging or ill.
"At the same time, we must find constructive after-school activities for our children. Fifteen million children are home alone after school while parents are at work because of the lack of affordable after-school programs. We know most problems with kids start between the hours of 3 and 6 p.m.
"Just as we need to make some strategic changes, it is equally important to work together to ensure that other things won't change. Social Security and Medicare, for example, will remain paramount to our income security. Without Social Security, more than half of older women would live in poverty. Without Medicare, many could not afford health care. That's why it is imperative to dedicate the budget surplus to paying down the debt to save Social Security and extend Medicare's solvency."
New Minorities, Different Needs
GREG SPENCER is Director of Population Projections, U.S. Census Bureau.
"In the next 10 years, the U.S. will grow more slowly - by about 2.5 million people a year - as the number of women of child-bearing age declines.
Population growth is important for the health of the economy, but it also means more population density and more asphalt. It has implications for those who are concerned with the environment. In America, we value freedom of choice, but steady population growth may pinch that freedom as we crowd in together.
"One major demographic trend is that the most population growth in the nation will be among Hispanic and Asian communities, making the U.S. more ethnically diverse in the next century. The largest growth among school-age children will take place within the Hispanic community. That's never happened before.
"Historically most issues and policies regarding race and ethnicity have been driven by concerns of the white majority and a significant African-American minority. The nation's policy-makers will have to take these new minorities into account."
Civil Rights Pioneer Reminds: 'We're All in This Together'
REP. JOHN LEWIS (D-Ga.), one of America's foremost civil rights activists as well as an influential lawmaker, first elected to the House of Representatives in 1986, is the author of the recently published book, "Walking with the Wind," a memoir of the civil rights struggle.
"We're all part of a global community. We're all in this together. That has never been more important than it is today, as we look to a new century and a new millennium.
"We must never lose sight of what has transpired during the past century in the fight for social justice in America. We must constantly remind people of the achievements of the civil rights movement in America.
This is especially important today because there hasn't been a time in America - certainly not since World War II - that the classes have been pushed as far apart as they are today, with vast numbers of poor at one end, a small number of wealthy at the other and a middle class in danger of completely disappearing as most of it is pushed toward the lower end of the spectrum.
"We cannot let this continue. We cannot have a very few people visibly and luxuriantly living in excess while the rest of the nation lives in fear and anxiety.
"We can respond. The government can respond. We proved it with the civil rights movement. The changes we brought about have been enormous. No one who was born in America 50 or 60 years ago, grew up and came through what I came through, who witnessed the changes I witnessed, can possibly say that America is not a far better place than it was.
"We live in a different country today. The South is different. Racism is not gone. But no one can suggest that the situation today, especially in the deep South, is anything like it was a generation ago. The number of black students today is 30 times as large as it was a half century ago. Today, Selma, Ala. is represented by a black congressman. The city has a black chief of police. And the Selma City Council has a black majority. Times have indeed changed.
"There can be no denying the distance we have come. But today, there is also a mistaken assumption among many that these signs of progress mean that the battle is over, that the struggle for civil rights is finished.
"Somewhere, sometime - and I hope in the not-too-distant future - someone must take the lead. At the highest level, someone needs to say that we are one nation, we're one society, we're one people.
"We're one house, the American house. We don't speak that way anymore. I'm not sure we think that way. But we must. We must respond and develop a just and sensible way of redistributing our resources so that no one will be left out of society.
"If we don't invest more in our young people, we are headed for disaster. This is where the revolution must begin. A revolution of values. A revolution of attitude. A revolution that instills the sense of possibility in young people's minds, a belief that this nation does indeed offer them the opportunities of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness."
Media And Marketing: All About Story Telling
COKIE ROBERTS, a distinguished news correspondent, currently co-anchors "This Week" on ABC News. Her first book, "We Are Our Mothers' Daughters," was published in 1998 by William Morris. Her second, "From This Day Forward," an examination of marriage, will be off the press by the end of the year.
"I believe the big story of the future, and the one that will affect people most, is the story of the enormous scientific, technological and medical breakthroughs we are seeing today. New discoveries of human capability through continued advances in these fields will dominate the news well into the new millennium. And our stories will be moral conversations about how to use these new capabilities - conversations about cloning new life-forms, about cellular manipulation, about life and death.
"I don't foresee a big story in politics. That's pretty much 'business as usual.' But I do agree with the futurists who say that successful mass marketing - whether politicians, food products, automobiles, or whatever - will depend on consumers buying into their 'story.' That's one of the reasons John McCain has become so successful, because of his story. People are interested in hearing him.
"It is elemental to human behavior to listen to and tell stories. Storytelling always has been and remains our most compelling way of communicating. I grew up in the American South and there was always an eccentric aunt or uncle who could be counted on for a good story. So listening to and telling stories is part of my heritage - and that has served me well in my career.
"The stories we most enjoy hearing are the old stories of sacrifice and heroism, of reaching for something worthwhile. We are still captivated by accounts of the hardships endured by the pioneers as they went across this country, the struggles for equal rights for women and minorities in this country.
"My first book, 'We Are Our Mothers' Daughters,' is a story about me and people I've known. The women of my generation are pioneers in many ways. In career and workplace issues especially, we were the first women at almost everything we did. Most of us, at some time in our careers, had the experience of being the only woman in the room. We enjoy sharing these experiences and people, especially young women, I think, like hearing about them. And we like hearing stories of relationships between mothers and daughters, fathers and sons, husbands and wives. When we hear of an experience similar to our own, we feel connected.
"Among the stories we'll tell our grandchildren is the one about how we celebrated New Year's Eve, 1999. In writing my book, I discovered that there is a thread of continuity running through the fabric of all women. Similarly, there will be a thread of continuity among those of us who watch the dawn of the new millennium together. We will always be connected, throughout time and regardless of place."
Technology Is Driving Media To Change Rapidly
Dean Mills is dean of the renowned School of Journalism at the University of Missouri. He started his career with the Baltimore Sun, reporting from Moscow from 1969 to 1972, then covered Washington politics until 1975. He held a series of academic positions before becoming dean 10 years ago.
"The new technology has already dramatically changed how news is being delivered, faster than anybody thought it was going to happen and faster than anybody was ready for it. Newspapers are being forced to figure out ways to deliver news content and ad content online and to think more about how they can directly interact with the communities they serve. They have to if they're going to survive.
"The evidence so far is that there will be as many or more jobs in journalism. The more the information increases, the more you need someone to help you navigate, to legitimate, to check for accuracy and perform other journalistic functions, to give readers some assurance that the information they're getting is accurate and fair.
"With local television news, some stations are trying to do the same thing that smart newspapers are, and deliver news on the web, giving users the advantage of video on demand and audio on demand. With the proliferation of other ways to get news, the big question is whether every major market will still have three or four local stations in the future.
"Between newspapers and broadcast outlets on a community level, newspapers have a better chance of surviving because they've always done better than anyone else in depth and breadth of coverage of local issues.
"Nationally and internationally, CNN has had a huge impact, sometimes for good, and probably sometimes for bad. Whatever CNN chooses to focus on becomes a world problem. What it chooses not to focus on gets forgotten.
"With around-the-clock news and instant coverage of dramatic events such as mass shootings, there is some evidence that there's a copy-cat effect. But in a democracy, you can never, ever hide the news. I just returned from Indonesia where they have the chance to have a free press for the first time. Even among journalists, I find people afraid of too much freedom of the press, afraid that it stirs people up. But it you're going to have a democracy, you don't have a choice. The job of the media is to tell everything that's happening, including the awful things."
Futurist Sees DawningOf the 'Imagination Age'
Rolf Jensen is director of Denmark's Copenhagen Institute for Future Studies, one of the world's most respected future-oriented think tanks, and strategic advisor to many companies. He also is author of the "Dream Society," published in 1999.
"In today's information society, we prize those who can skillfully manipulate data; in tomorrow's dream society, we will reward those who can most successfully make this data appeal to emotions. Just as the Hunter-Gatherer Age gave way to the Agricultural Age, which evolved into the Industrial Age and now the Information Age - the new millennium will see a global society focused on dreams, adventure, spirituality, and feelings - the Imagination Age.
"The huge increase in material wealth throughout the developed world owes much to science and technology, but, in the future, attention will turn away from science toward non-materialistic and non-scientific values. The highest-paid person in the first half of the next century will be the 'storyteller.' The value of products will depend on the story they tell. Nike and many other global companies are already mainly storytellers. That is where the money is - even today.
"In the 21st century, it will be increasingly necessary to produce more than a useful product: A story or legend must be built into it, a story that embodies values beyond utility. This imperative is already occurring with more and more products: People buy blue jeans, for instance, only partly to cover their bodies; most of the money they pay is for the story that goes with the product - a story of independence, youth, power, or a statement about values. Similarly, when they buy eggs laid by free-range hens, much of the money they pay is for the hen's lifestyle. People pay because they value animal life, nature, and tradition. What's more, the consumer not only expects the product to tell him or her a story, but ownership of that product must tell a story about the consumer as well.
"Work will be different in the future. In two or three decades, only a small percentage of the population will be employed in industry, which will then be almost completely automated. However, new jobs will appear in the creation and distribution of feelings. For example, sensory designers will use colors, scents, and textures to create environments that stimulate certain emotions. 'Strategic dreamers' will help corporations understand the spiritual goals of potential customers, employees, and stockholders.
"The technologies allowing global communication - the Internet, direct broadcast satellites, etc. - will be taken for granted, and much more value will be placed on the content of that communication. For example, 500 television channels offering nothing but reruns of old shows will not be tolerated. People who can produce highly imaginative new programs will be in greater demand, as will innovative CD-ROM creators, musicians and composers, actors, artists, journalists. Storytelling will be a key skill in a wide range of professions, from advertiser to teacher to business entrepreneur to politician to religious leader - even to futurists. Each will be valued for his or her ability to produce 'dreams' for public consumption."