What is the incremental revenue or profit per hour worked for a serious hard hitting investigative piece, vs other crap that is much cheaper to make (like regur

What is the incremental revenue or profit per hour worked for a serious hard hitting investigative piece, vs other crap that is much cheaper to make (like regurgitating press releases)? Not to mention the fact that a lot of investigative leads likely either don’t pan out, are not newsworthy, or ruffle feathers better left unruffled (news media relies on connections and access for leads on stories, and their customers are advertisers, ie large corporations). There is not much of a market for investigative journalism. IMO tort law or class-action suits could fill that niche too if the incentives were more aligned (gotta be a lawyer to make anything off a class action) and the playing field were more even - arbitration clause says what? So lacking an incentive for either of those the next best thing is short selling, which also sucks because it’s time-based, risky, requires capital, and isn’t relevant when something doesn’t have a direct link to a tradable security