New TV Season, and Fewer Viewers

With more young adults tuning out this TV season, the industry is confronting a generation of viewers who say they won't pay the typical $75 monthly cable or satellite bill.

Nielsen, whose TV ratings influence ad rates, in May cut the estimated number of U.S. TV households by 1 percent, to 114.7 million, the first drop since 1990. College towns such as Boston, Madison, and Austin posted some of the biggest declines. The impact of cord-cutting was masked earlier by rising cable-TV subscriptions, says Jeff Gaspin, former chairman of NBC Entertainment. No longer. “With a decrease in pay-TV subscribers and Nielsen’s reduction in households,” Gaspin says, “the effect is more pronounced.” The six largest publicly traded cable- and satellite-TV providers announced last month a combined loss of about 580,000 customers in the second quarter -- the biggest decline in history. Industry analysts blame a weak job market and rising pay-TV bills. It’s also because of the growing appetite for Internet-delivered TV programming among younger viewers.