by Kevin Clang
The value of knowing how to report on businesses as really shown itself in the past few months. With the possible economic recession, President Barack Obama’s stimulus package and the bailouts and bankruptcies of many major American companies, business reporting has taken its place on the front page of many newspapers.
Like education and healthcare before it in previous chapters, business reporting will always be a necessity in one form or another. For this reason, it is an invaluable skill to have.
Perhaps the easiest companies t o investigate are those that are publicly traded in the stock market, as there are several laws and regulations that they must follow. The SEC’s Wed site is a great starting point for any investigation. There, one will find all of the quarterly documents and files that every publicly traded company must release. 
With hindsight being 20/20, if today you looked at the reports from Chrysler over the past five to ten years or so, one would definitely be able to see the warning signs long before anyone actually spotted them. Understanding the terms used in a company’s annual reports is key to doing this.
After paper trails like these, undoubtably the most useful sources any reporter will use are human ones. Papers give details, but human sources provide necessary insight into just what is going on in any business. Ideally the major movers and shakers in any business would be honest and forthcoming with information, but unfortunately this often is not the case. Instead, it is sometimes useful to contact academics or other experts.
Steven Pearlstein of the Washington Post has made a career out of doing all of this. A recent Pulitzer Prize winner for his commentary on the economy, Pearlstein investigates America’s most important businesses every week in his column.
While it would be easy to be all doom and gloom in such a column, especially given the current state of the economy, Pearlstein resists. Instead, he uses his intelligence and experience to offer constructive criticism to the nation’s largest conglomerates, and has written many articles on just what the American people have to do in order to save them. Through his hard work he has earned the trust of not only the American public, but also the businesses that he has investigated.
The story extends much further than the owners and experts of the business game; sometimes a reporter will have to move into the warehouse. Stories can benefit from both white collar and blue collar perspectives, and for this reason it is important to investigate how a CEOs decisions will affect the average Joe. The Detroit Free Press has done an exemplary job in doing just this while looking into the city’s failing auto industry.
America needs business. But like everything else, businesses can become corrupted, lazy or poor, so they need a watchdog to keep them in line. It is a business reporter’s job to understand the complicated theories and transactions associated with any business dealing. By doing this, they exercise a check on the amount of power any business has. If we had been better at looking out for businesses sooner in the millennium, we may have saved Wall Street and Detroit.
