Unleashing things

From Unleashing Aspiration - Alan Milburn's report for the Cabinet Office on social mobility. The "journalism" representative was Elinor Goodman, and the "media" rep Sir Michael Grade.

Between the 1958 and the 1970 birth cohorts, the biggest decline in social mobility occurred in the professions of journalism and accountancy. For example, journalists and broadcasters born in 1958 typically grew up in families with an income of around 5.5% above that of the average family; but this rose to 42.4% for the generation of journalists and broadcasters born in 1970.

Some 98% of entrants to journalism already have a degree or postgraduate qualification.

Responses to the Panel’s National Call for Evidence show that for some professions, such as journalism or veterinary science, students are now highly unlikely to be able to progress into the profession without a minimum amount of relevant work experience.

... some professions draw their interns from a limited pool of talent. For instance, the National Union of Journalists’ (NUJ’s) submission to the Panel stated that the largest-ever independent survey of people entering the journalism profession (conducted by the Journalism Training Forum in 2002) indicated that under 10% of new entrants came from working-class backgrounds, with just 3% coming from homes headed by semi-skilled or unskilled workers.

I can find no journalism-specific recommendation in the report.