Most Americans Unwilling to Pay for Online News

Harris Poll finds number is even lower than 15 months ago

Newspapers and other traditional media outlets have spent a lot of time and money trying to figure out how to sock their online readers, who they perceive are getting a free ride when they read online news content.

But, according to a story by Truman Lewis at consumeraffairs.com,  the latest Adweek/Harris finds a large majority of Americans (80%) say they are willing to pay exactly “nothing” to read a daily newspaper online.
Of the one in five who would pay, 14% said they would pay between $1 and $10 per month while very few said that they would be willing to pay between $11 and $20 (4%) or more than $20 per month (2%).

The New York Times recently put up a paywall, charging online readers who view over 20 articles per month.

But while online paywalls are becoming more common, fewer people say they would be willing to pay to read content online now, than said so in late 2009 — 20% say they would be willing to pay for a daily newspaper's content online today, compared to 23% who said so in December 2009.

Other findings of the recent poll include:

• Younger adults are more likely than those older to pay for a daily newspaper's content online — over a quarter of adults aged 18-34 say they would (26%) compared to between 15% and 18% of all other age groups;
• Men are more willing to pay than women are — a quarter of men say they would (25%) with 18% saying they would pay between $1 and $10 per month, while only 15% of women say they would pay anything to read a daily newspaper's content online; and,
• The more education a person has the more likely they are to be willing to pay to read a daily newspaper's content online — over a quarter of college graduates say they would pay (28%) compared to one in five people who have attended some college (19%) and just 15% who have not attended any college at all.

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