The industry has done a reasonable job on insulating itself from this effect in the postpaid user base. Many users are once again on contracts, and fixed airtime buckets for a fixed price mean users can't economize by restricting usage. With buckets, wireless is an all or nothing purchase, at a price that's reasonable enough that few customers are likely to simply drop service entirely. Prepaid is another matter, however. Prepaid service has extended wireless to a large customer base with above-average sensitivity to economic fluctuations.
Prepaid minutes are also an incremental purchase.
A prepaid customer can easily cut back in hard times. This combination of maturity and recession is likely to hit the industry hard in the coming year. One might argue it's bad luck that the industry's growth spurt is petering out now, during overall rough economic seas. However, the industry should keep in mind the other side of the coin. If it weren't for the go-go mentality of the late 90's, the industry might never have been able to finance its huge spending on spectrum and equipment based solely on that spurt in subscriber growth.