Odds of Hanging On
Even if you land a great job at the New Yorker, you still might want to keep a wary eye on the future. Big news institutions are facing difficult budgetary constraints as they try to pay for top-notch reporting while dealing with readership drop-off caused by the internet. Meanwhile, independent and crowd-sourced blogging are permeating the market more and more.
If it was difficult to get in, it'll be just as difficult to hang on. There will always be upstart young reporters coming up behind you, and if the whole lot of them are working harder than you, they'll eventually pass you by. You have to work hard and keep doing so over the course of a long career. It's not going to be easy, but if you keep at it, you might find the results to be very rewarding.