New Zealand print freelancers: Who they are, what they earn, where and what they publish?

Abstract

This article provides a statistical picture of print freelancers, the largest freelance sector in New Zealand. Compared with journalists employed in the print industry, freelancers had generally the same ethnic profile and distribution throughout the country, but were more likely to be older and female. In our content analysis, 20 percent of daily newspapers’ copy, a third of weekly newspapers’ copy, and about 60 percent of magazine copy came from freelancers. The analysis suggests the newspapers found freelancers particularly useful in providing specialist copy and comment.