What is the average salary for a broadcast journalist or sports radio host?

Salaries for broadcast journalists and radio hosts have a very broad range. Everything from experience, to market size to the ownership group and specific job title can impact this. For example, a TV anchor/reporter fresh out of college working in market 180 would make significantly less than an anchor/reporter with a decade of experience who works in a top 20 market. Television personalities also tend to make more on average than radio hosts.

Just for a bit of a baseline though, speaking from personal experience and from other colleagues in the business, a first job in TV working in a market anywhere from 130-190 (these would be cities like Bismarck, North Dakota or Butte, Montana) a relative range for a reporter/anchor could be anywhere from $18,000-$25,000 a year depending on your specific on-air role at the station. From there the salaries will go up as the market grows (most of the time, again ownership group can impact salary).

Salaries also tend to follow this hierarchy: anchors make more than reporters, news typically will make more than weather and sports personalities.