“Remember when they cancelled all the good TV shows back around 1970? “
That was certainly part of it. There was a writer’s strike, I think in the eighties. No scripts could be written, so we ended up with “unscripted” reality tv. Scripts became so expensive that nobody could produce a show like Carol Burnett or Barny Miller. This increased cost had the same effect as $15/hr wages at McDonalds. The supplier to the TV viewing market simply shriveled up.
Television has never recovered. It is slowly becoming overrun by small suppliers with their own YouTube channels. Eventually, all of Hollywood will go under. How many remakes of Superman and CHIPS can the market take?
The new content providers are doing a great job and will continue to get better - NetFlix, now Amazon and shortly Apple. They’ve had a lot of dogs, but their winners are fantastic.
NetFlix - House of Cards, Narcos, Longmire (after acquiring it from A&E)
Amazon - The Man in the High Castle
Apple - TBD