Do you usually report the 268th worst anything?
Steve Safran February 28th, 2007
Well lookie loo. The Dow ended the day up 50. And all the papers are full of front-page graphs showing the huge downward roller-coaster of the disaster that was yesterday’s massive, disaster-ridden sell-off. It was a massive sell-off right? I mean - the Dow lost 416 points! That’s… the 268th biggest drop ever. That’s right. Not the top ten. Not the top 100 or even 250. Please keep in mind: the Dow is above 12,000. Losing 416 was a 3.3% drop. By contrast, when the Dow lost 407 points on October 19, 1987 - that was 22% of its value. I had to go to the B section of my paper to dig out that chestnut - and don’t blame the paper. TV and news websites behaved no better. Context. It’s taking a beating. And the hysterical points-driven reporting must have added to the problems. One other point: during a “sell-off” someone is buying. It’s not like the stocks disappear.
CLARIFICATION: After re-reading the post, along with your good comments, let me clarify/amplify… I’m not saying the story wasn’t a story. As Andrew Tyndall rightly points out in comments, “Safran’s ‘268th biggest drop ever’ is another reporter’s ’single worst day since the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks’ –which sounds like a news story to me. I’d wage Safran two bags of chips that he would headline the #1 biggest event of the past six years in many categories.” What I was trying to say (badly, apparently) was that the stories focused on the point drop and didn’t put it into context. A graph showing a giant downward crash of 400 points looks horrifying. When you put the story into the context of relative days of historic losses from a percentage POV, it is less of a screaming nightmare. Context, Anna Nicole, context.
8 Comments Add your own
1. themanhattanchannel | February 28th, 2007 at 9:27 am
and no doubt the gov’t(s) is/are in there this morning stabilizing the market.
it used to be far more fun when it was a real free market.
2. Tim | February 28th, 2007 at 9:39 am
“Context. It’s Taking A Beating” ought to be a slogan on a T-shirt given to every news reporter at their annual conference!
I feel this is another example of innumeracy. If people were just a little more math-aware they wouldn’t report these numbers in such hysterical terms.
3. Cory | February 28th, 2007 at 9:53 am
I agree that context is important here — reporting the percentage drop, for example, instead of just the raw numbers — yet this was a major story, and I don’t believe most news organizations hyped it.
This is much more than the stock market — that\’s just one indicator here — that the country could be on its way to a recession. Compare that fact with the billions we’re spending in Iraq, the housing bubble, the strong technology growth that could be impacted…etc…etc…. and we have ourselves a big story that deserves more attention than the 268th worst anything.
Yet some news organizations, yes, should watch their tone and stick with percentages.
4. themanhattanchannel | February 28th, 2007 at 10:28 am
the major story is greenspan is still head of the fed reserve.
bernanke jaws the market all the time and with the help of the gov’t has managed to put a record on record at a time the country is in a friggin’ mess. yes, corp. profits are up, but at what cost? they are no longer taxed and they shed THEIR responsibilities (defined pension plans) to a gov’t agency. housing prices are taking a huge whack coast-to-coast. and this is only off the top of my head.
but onward the markets marched.
until greenspan spoke.
5. discreet_chaos | February 28th, 2007 at 12:41 pm
And, though it appears to not be a big part of yesterday;
Some people could be buying to cover their shorts.
6. Andrew Tyndall | February 28th, 2007 at 2:48 pm
Safran’s “268th biggest drop ever” is another reporter’s “single worst day since the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks”–which sounds like a news story to me. I’d wage Safran two bags of chips that he would headline the #1 biggest event of the past six years in many categories.
7. Steve Safran | February 28th, 2007 at 3:06 pm
Tyndall:
A. Love your new site. Great work.
B. I’m not saying it’s *not* a story. I’m saying it needed more context than it got. The fact that it was the 268th biggest drop ever was *not* a sidebar.
C. What flavor chips? I hate BBQ. Jarvis gets a whole meal, I better not get BBQ chips.
8. themanhattanchannel | February 28th, 2007 at 3:17 pm
like i said: greenspan da’ man.
he says “Recession” and the market drops 400 (200 of which is still a mystery)
bernanke testifies that “the economy is sound” and the market gains back only 50 of those 200 mystery points.
now, who’s the BOSS?
there is your headline.
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