I became interested in business and economics not long after I graduated from college, thanks in part to the Nightly Business Report on PBS.
Anchor Paul Kangas and his colleagues filled me in on the financial news of the day. They got me interested in the stock market, helped me follow the explosive growth of mutual funds in the 1980s, and provided a sort of play-by-play coverage as the world coped with its second oil shock in less than a decade and President Reagan reshaped the nation’s tax, spending and regulatory policies. Much of this information was presented from the viewpoint of investors, who sent the stock market on a historic two-decade rally beginning in 1982.
Kangas retired this month, and the show is getting an overhaul. After 30 years of focusing on the daily rise and fall of the market, the program will emphasize analysis over raw data. Tom Hudson, former co-anchor of the nationally syndicated First Business report, has replaced Kangas as anchor, and additional commentators will replace data tables.
In his last appearance on the show, Kangas said he was certain that everyone working on the Nightly Business Report must have heard his “personal mantra which goes like this: ‘good, better, best, never let it rest, till the good is better and the better is the best!’” Kangas himself certainly took this mantra to heart. In 2003, his signature segment, "Stocks in the News," won a Financial Writers and Editors Award from the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University as "best broadcast feature or series useful to investors."
While I am sorry to see Kangas go, the new format is a welcome change and one that will help the Nightly Business Report to continue its quest to move from better to best. Daily market movements usually are meaningless to anyone who is not a stock trader. Business and economics news, on the other hand, covers an almost infinitely broad array of information about how more than 6 billion people support themselves and use their resources. Jim Russell, a news consultant who was hired to oversee the revamp, said that the show’s mission is still “to educate its audience and empower viewers to make better financial decisions.” But, as times have changed, the show must change as well.
By the time the Nightly Business Report airs at 6:30 p.m. Eastern time (later in some markets and other time zones), the New York Stock Exchange has already been closed for at least two and a half hours, enough time for anyone with Internet access to get all the raw data a person could want. “Nobody waited until 6:30 in the evening to get stock market information,” Russell said. In the evening, people already have the facts of the day; what they need is someone to help them put all those pieces together. “What people want at the end of the day is more analysis, more perspective, more context,” said Rodney Ward, the show’s senior vice president and executive editor.
I no longer watch the Nightly Business Report regularly because I’m not usually at home when it airs. Now, I get my business news from Web sites, The Wall Street Journal (delivered on my Kindle), The New York Times (delivered the old-fashioned way) and podcasts of American Public Media’s Marketplace, for which Palisades Hudson Financial Group has been an underwriter in several markets. Still, I am glad the Nightly Business Report is being made relevant to a new generation of business leaders and investors.
As new trends develop in the business world in the next few years, I hope Hudson and his co-anchor Susie Gharib will explain them to those young men and women just now starting to follow business news, as Kangas and his colleagues explained the trends of the 80s and early 90s to me.
And, on the days when I’m home in the evening, I look forward to tuning in. It will be like visiting an old friend who has a new look.
Larry M. Elkin is the founder and president of Palisades Hudson, and is based out of Palisades Hudson’s Fort Lauderdale, Florida headquarters. He wrote several of the chapters in the firm’s recently updated book,
Looking Ahead: Life, Family, Wealth and Business After 55. His contributions include Chapter 1, “Looking Ahead When Youth Is Behind Us,” and Chapter 4, “The Family Business.” Larry was also among the authors of the firm’s book
The High Achiever’s Guide To Wealth.
Posted by Larry M. Elkin, CPA, CFP®
I became interested in business and economics not long after I graduated from college, thanks in part to the Nightly Business Report on PBS.
Anchor Paul Kangas and his colleagues filled me in on the financial news of the day. They got me interested in the stock market, helped me follow the explosive growth of mutual funds in the 1980s, and provided a sort of play-by-play coverage as the world coped with its second oil shock in less than a decade and President Reagan reshaped the nation’s tax, spending and regulatory policies. Much of this information was presented from the viewpoint of investors, who sent the stock market on a historic two-decade rally beginning in 1982.
Kangas retired this month, and the show is getting an overhaul. After 30 years of focusing on the daily rise and fall of the market, the program will emphasize analysis over raw data. Tom Hudson, former co-anchor of the nationally syndicated First Business report, has replaced Kangas as anchor, and additional commentators will replace data tables.
In his last appearance on the show, Kangas said he was certain that everyone working on the Nightly Business Report must have heard his “personal mantra which goes like this: ‘good, better, best, never let it rest, till the good is better and the better is the best!’” Kangas himself certainly took this mantra to heart. In 2003, his signature segment, "Stocks in the News," won a Financial Writers and Editors Award from the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University as "best broadcast feature or series useful to investors."
While I am sorry to see Kangas go, the new format is a welcome change and one that will help the Nightly Business Report to continue its quest to move from better to best. Daily market movements usually are meaningless to anyone who is not a stock trader. Business and economics news, on the other hand, covers an almost infinitely broad array of information about how more than 6 billion people support themselves and use their resources. Jim Russell, a news consultant who was hired to oversee the revamp, said that the show’s mission is still “to educate its audience and empower viewers to make better financial decisions.” But, as times have changed, the show must change as well.
By the time the Nightly Business Report airs at 6:30 p.m. Eastern time (later in some markets and other time zones), the New York Stock Exchange has already been closed for at least two and a half hours, enough time for anyone with Internet access to get all the raw data a person could want. “Nobody waited until 6:30 in the evening to get stock market information,” Russell said. In the evening, people already have the facts of the day; what they need is someone to help them put all those pieces together. “What people want at the end of the day is more analysis, more perspective, more context,” said Rodney Ward, the show’s senior vice president and executive editor.
I no longer watch the Nightly Business Report regularly because I’m not usually at home when it airs. Now, I get my business news from Web sites, The Wall Street Journal (delivered on my Kindle), The New York Times (delivered the old-fashioned way) and podcasts of American Public Media’s Marketplace, for which Palisades Hudson Financial Group has been an underwriter in several markets. Still, I am glad the Nightly Business Report is being made relevant to a new generation of business leaders and investors.
As new trends develop in the business world in the next few years, I hope Hudson and his co-anchor Susie Gharib will explain them to those young men and women just now starting to follow business news, as Kangas and his colleagues explained the trends of the 80s and early 90s to me.
And, on the days when I’m home in the evening, I look forward to tuning in. It will be like visiting an old friend who has a new look.
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