Most NYers Are Pulling Plug On Cable TV, Survey Finds

NEW YORK — Goodbye prime time, hello Netflix. A majority of New Yorkers have ditched cable TV in favor of online entertainment as the "cord-cutting" trend takes hold across the U.S., a recent survey found.

Waterstone Management Group, a management consulting firm, surveyed 5,000 people in December about their relationships with cable TV and streaming services.

Some 59 percent of the respondents in New York said they've left cable behind and turned to streaming services instead. That's on par with the nationwide rate of cord-cutting, according to the survey.

But the practice is even more widespread elsewhere, the survey found. Some 72 percent of the respondents in Idaho said they had ditched cable in favor of streaming, the highest rate of the 43 states Waterstone ranked.

New York placed 26th. But only 36 percent of respondents in neighboring New Jersey have hopped on the cord-cutting bandwagon, the survey found, the lowest rate on the list.

The prevalance of cord-cutting comes amid the continued growth of entertainment streaming services. Netflix added 29 million paid subscribers in 2018 while Hulu added 8 million U.S. subscribers, according to CNBC reports.

The respondents in Waterstone's survey represented all 50 states and ranged from 18 to 69 years old. The firm's analysis did not include seven states that did not generate enough responses.

See Waterstone's full state-by-state ranking here.

(Lead image: The Netflix App logo is seen on a television screen on March 23, 2018 in Istanbul, Turkey. Photo by Chris McGrath/Getty Images)