Census Data

The "Statistical Abstract of the United States 2007" was publicly released on December 15th by the U.S. Census Bureau -- www.census.gov/compendia/statab/

My local newspaper's overview of the Abstract included a section of "Television and Other Media Use" statistics that caught my attention. This section noted that throughout the year 2006 Americans will spend the following amounts of leisure hours and dollars per person on the following activities:

Watching television -- $283 and 1,555 hours
Listening to radio -- $5 and 975 hours
Internet use -- $139 and 190 hours
Reading newspapers -- $49 and 179 hours
READING A BOOK -- $91 and 106 hours
Watching movies/video/DVD at home - $151 and 84 hours
Playing videogames -- $36 and 82 hours
Watching movies at theatre -- $39 and 12 hours

Breaking these statistics down on a weekly basis shows us that Americans do the following on average:

Watching television -- 30 hours per week

and

Reading a book -- 2 hours per week


Wow, this is a dramatic difference which tells me that I would have to quit my job so I could have enough free time to watch enough TV to be an "average American" -- who the hell are these people anyway???

Open books, open minds,

Todd