I have to agree with TheBigA on this one. I think there are more format options these days maybe because there are more stations. There are few stations I personally like now but I am rolling out of the choice demographics now.
Automation in the 1960s and then satellite delivered formats in the 1980s and the computer have created great changes in radio over the years.
Radio is pressed to make itself attractive to advertisers. There are more stations and more media options than ever before, all trying for their share. Radio had to trim budgets to survive in many cases. I recall the days at a border top 40. It was a cash cow at the time but the Mexican economy tanked and media expanded. We had been one of two stations in town then. When I went back there, there was the cable system, 2 newspapers, a broadcast TV station and 3 new radio stations to deal with in town not to mention double the TV and radio stations across the border. In addition, I had stations as far as 150 miles in to Mexico calling on the same merchants selling spots for pennies (the lowest I saw was 100 spots for $15). Literally our spot rate had decreased, billing was easily a third what it had been and we had to fight hard to get every sale. Simply put, the market had changed drastically in less than 10 years although the station was still the top station in town. You can bet our operation was bare bones. Local news had been dropped well before I got there and many of the desks that had housed staff were vacant. It was really quite sad. I recall a conversation with a furniture store owner: You want me to pay $3.60 a spot to reach the community but I can buy 50 cent spots across the border on stations in several larger communities that attract the wealthy in Mexico who will spend many times the money locals spend when they come to my store. What would you do? What could I say, I understood and indeed the wealthier population did make frequent visits and they did spend a wad of cash when they did. I saw my client budgets split among several choices instead of one or two as in previous years. I think for many stations in limited markets, they saw their share of the pie doled out to all these new options available. That $500 a month might now be half that or less. The pressure is on to add exceptional value and to program to attract as many listeners as possible to attract those ad dollars. Something had to give and it was the operation budget. I usually worked easily 75 to 80 hours a week seeing clients, building proposals and such trying to get the billing to make breakeven of $16,000 a month. I always did but never topped $18,000. Ten years prior $45,000 a month was realistic and regularly reached. I wasn't alone. 45 miles away was a station that once did about $10,000 a month in their town of 5,000. They were down to about $3,500 a month thanks to a second newspaper, a cable TV representative and a new station coming on in town and another in a town 10 miles away. They went satellite delivered country and survived with a staff of 1 and the owner after decades of simply splitting ad dollars with the local paper. I fought going satellite while I was there. The station I had managed upgraded to 50,000 watts and now has sales offices in nearby towns to get the income they need for their computer in a closet. If they were live and local they'd go under.
