"There's no way to say that writing has gotten worse," said Susan Traiman, director of the education initiative for the Business Roundtable, told The Associated Press (AP). "The demand has gotten greater."
Part of the reason is attributed to computers. Approximately 66 percent of all salaried workers in large U.S. companies have jobs that require at least some writing. Among the top writing problems for most employees: accuracy, clarity, spelling, punctuation, grammar, and conciseness.
The demand for writers continues to plague the communication industry as well. The frequency of errors has become so common that even American Idol was prompted to rerun an entire show after phone numbers were incorrectly displayed during the original show.
"Businesses are really crying out. They need to have people who write better," College Board President Gaston Caperton told the AP.
While more than half of all companies surveyed now say they assess writing skills when they make hiring and promotion decisions, most seem to settle for people with only adequate skills. The survey was done with 64 companies across six industries representing 4 million employees: mining; construction; manufacturing; transportation and utilities; services and finance; and insurance and real estate.
