Three Years, Three Stories

The deep U.S. recession -- which erupted into a full-blown crisis with the collapse of Lehman Brothers in September 2008 -- was the biggest story in the mainstream news media in 2009. It accounted for 20.3% of the overall newshole studied in the News Coverage Index of the Pew Research Center's Project for Excellence in Journalism.

Attention to the story peaked in February and March of 2009 (when it filled 40.9% and 40.0% respectively), when the story focused on passage of the $787 stimulus package and efforts to fix the ailing financial sector. That number fell by half (to 20.1%) by April where it continued a slow decline through the end of the year. But the media by and large did not see this coming. Attention to the economy was minimal in 2007, filling just 1.4% of the overall newshole, despite emerging problems in the housing market. Coverage picked up in 2008 -- filling 6.3% in the first six months -- as the housing crisis worsened and the country questioned whether it was heading into a recession. But after the September meltdown on Wall Street, when the magnitude of the crisis was revealed, coverage exploded, accounting for 21.4% in the last four months of 2008.