Newspaper Circ: 'Post' Down, 'News' Down More

Finally, the answer to a question I've been dying to know since June: Just how much circulation did the New York Post lose as a result of Rupert Murdoch's decision to double the paper's cover price?

The answer is maybe less than you'd expect. In the six months ending Sept. 30, the Post's weekday circulation averaged 625,421 copies, a 6.3 percent year-over-year decrease, according to figures released this morning by the Audit Bureau of Circulations.

But that's actually a smaller drop than the one recorded by the Post's arch-rival, the New York Daily News, which was down 7.2 percent, to 632,595 copies. That still leaves the News with bragging rights as the city's biggest tabloid.

In aggregate, the country's top 25 weekday newspapers saw circulation drop by 4.6 percent, according to an ABC analysis of the data.

Here are the figures for some of the biggest weekday papers, with an emphasis on the big New York dailies and on the ones currently or formerly (ie. Newsday) owned by Sam Zell's Tribune Co.

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