Context: Inside the Crisis at NPR

Will NPR exist in its current form in the year 2034?

If NPR does not exist as a wide public radio station network, covering >=90% of America (>98% today), this Resolves NO. This includes privatization of the company.

Listeners are tuning out. Sponsorship revenue has dipped. A diversity push has generated internal turmoil. Can America’s public radio network turn things around?

While NPR still has an audience of about 42 million who listen every week, many of them digitally, that is down from an estimated 60 million in 2020, according to an internal March audience report, a faster falloff than for broadcast radio, which is also in a long-term decline.

“I believe that public radio has five to seven years to reimagine itself before it’s simply unsustainable,” said Eric Nuzum, a former NPR executive and co-founder of the audio consulting and production company Magnificent Noise. “And they can’t take two or three years of that time debating a business model.”