I'm not making this up. You'd think with the $190 million our govt is giving Eden Park that New Zealand is the global capital of middle class welfare. But it looks like the title will have to go to the US.

Today's Wall Street Journal carries a Lee Gomes Tech Talk interview with Jason Oxman, head of communications at the Consumer Electronics Association, discussing how the US Federal Communications Commission has mandated that all TV broadcasts be digital by February next year. We pick up the action mid-way:

Q: ... 50% of Americans don't have digital TV sets. That seems like a high number, considering how in 13 months all analog over-the-air broadcasting will stop.

A: It's true that 50% of American homes have digital TV sets. But more than 85% subscribe to a video provider, such as cable or satellite. None of those 85% will be affected by the digital transition, because they don't receive their television signals over the air. The only households that will be affected are those who don't have a digital TV, and who also receive their television signals over the air. That's about 11% of American households today.

Q: Will that 11% be left high and dry?

A: Not at all. The households in this category will be eligible for a special program set up by Congress. They will all receive from the Department of Commerce two coupons, each of them good for a $40 discount on a special converter box that will allow traditional analog television sets to receive the new digital signals. Converter boxes will be priced at between $40 and $60. That means the coupons will offset most of that expense. The coupons don't get mailed until a few weeks from now, and by then, the digital converter boxes will be in thousands and thousands of stores. [Read the full interview here. Subscription required]

Talk about Baby Boomers with their fingers on the purse strings. What next? Tax breaks for upgrading to a universal remote?

In New Zealand, we have the opposite problem, with successive governments showing little interest in nudging along the quality of our TV broadcasts - though new broadcasting minister Trevor Mallard has at least drawn a line in the sand for a 2012 analog switch off. More on that here.