CHEAP TALENT?

First, the bad news.

Los Angeles Times reports:

"The $29,000 median salary of 2005 journalism graduates is nearly $2,000 below other liberal arts graduates.

By contrast, computer science graduates earned nearly $51,000 and accounting graduates, earned more than $46,000."

Now, the good news.

Donald L. Barlett and James B. Steele, who lost their jobs at The New York Time in June, have signed a multiyear contract with Vanity Fair, agreeing to write two articles a year.

They accepted editor Graydon Carter's offer because he's "passionate" about their kind of work and willing to give them considerable space in the magazine.

And they will pay them what The New York Times did not want to pay.

Talent is never cheap.