FCC Moves to Scrap the 85-Year-Old 39% Ownership Cap — and the Industrial Language Missing From Korea's Broadcast Debate

Aug. 6 vote would replace the blanket national cap with case-by-case public interest review — a starting gun for mega-consolidation among Nexstar, Sinclair and their peers

While Washington argues over broadcast survival in industrial terms, Seoul remains locked in 'normalization' fights over public-broadcaster boards — ownership deregulation nowhere in sight

The last pillar of U.S. national broadcast ownership regulation is coming down. On August 6, the Federal Communications Commission will vote to eliminate the rule that bars any single broadcaster from reaching more than 39% of U.S. TV households, replacing the blanket limit with a case-by-case review of each transaction against the agency's public interest standard. FCC Chairman Brendan Carr confirmed the plan on July 15 through an op-ed and an official FCC announcement. It comes 85 years after the first national ownership restrictions of 1941, and 22 years after Congress fixed the cap at 39% in 2004.

美 FCC, 85년 묵은 ’39% 소유 상한′ 폐지 수순… 한국 방송 규제엔 없는 ‘산업의 언어’
미국 연방통신위원회, 오는 8월 6일 전체회의에서 1941년 도입된 전국 지상파 39% 소유 상한을 폐지. 업계는 빅테크와의 규모 격차와 지역 뉴스 투자 여력 강화를 근거로 환영. 민주당 위원·시민단체는 상한이 연방 법률이며 의회만 바꿀 수 있다며 소송을 예고하는 가운데, 같은 시기 한국 JTBC 모회사 중앙그룹 206억 원 차입금 상환 실패로 디폴트를 선언하는 등 시장이 무너지는 동안 방송 규제는 소유 정당성과 이사회 구성 공방만 반복. 산업의 언어를 잃었다는 평가.
K엔터테크허브 (K-EnterTech Hub)Jung Han

Behind the push is the collapse of the economics that once sustained local broadcasting. In Nielsen's The Gauge for April 2026, broadcast fell to 19.9% of total U.S. TV time while streaming held 47.6%. Streamers and virtual pay-TV distributors like Netflix and YouTube TV can deliver programming to 100% of the country with no reach restriction of any kind, while local station owners alone remain bound by the 39% ceiling. Cord-cutting is squeezing retransmission fees and advertising at the same time, and U.S. television news employment has been shrinking since its 2021 peak, down 3.3% in 2024. Station groups have demanded the scale to compete with big tech, and the FCC of the second Trump administration has now answered.