Abstract: Using the method of generalized method of moments (GMM), the influencing factors of China’s urban residents’ communication consumption is analyzed with the panel data from Chinese provinces during the period of 2001—2012.The research results show that communication consumption of urban residents has a strong inertial effect. The urban residents’ per-capita income, the consumption price index of the communication industry and the actual interest rate all have significant positive effects on communication consumption. However, the per-capita personal income tax of working-age population, Engel’s Coefficient, the children dependency ratio and the elderly dependency ratio all have negative effects on communication consumption. What’s more, the results imply that promoting economic development and improving residents’ income are the major impetus for the further development of the communication industry. At the same time, the development of communication industry also cannot ignore the factor of population, and diversified service should be developed to meet the communication consumption of different economic groups and age groups.

Key words: communication consumption, influencing factor, dynamic panel data, method of GMM