Weathering a recession: Effects of size and diversification on newspaper companies

This article explores the impact of the recession of 1990-1991 on U.S. news paper firms and seeks to determine whether the sizes of the firms or the de gree of diversification affected their financial performance during the eco nomic downturn. Using data from 15 publicly traded companies before, during , and after the recession, correlation and regression analyses were conduct ed to study the effects of the size and diversification variables. The auth ors conclude that larger firms were more affected by the recession than sma ller firms and that nonnewspaper diversification reduced the effects of the recession. Larger firms were more rapidly affected by the recession, place d greater controls on expenses during the recession, and emerged from the r ecession more slowly than smaller newspaper firms.