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US Cell Phone Plans Among World's Most Expensive

Posted by timothy on from the yes-but-we-have-cheap-gasoline dept.

Albanach writes "An OECD report published today has shown moderate cell phone users in the United States are paying some of the highest rates in the world . Average US plans cost $52.99 per month compared to an average of $10.95 in Finland. The full report is available only to subscribers, however Excel sheets of the raw data are available to download." (You'll find those Excel sheets — which open just fine in OpenOffice — on the summary page linked above.)

4 of 827 comments (clear)

  1. Stupid prices by sopssa · · Score: 5, Interesting

    This is what I've always wondered, but learned from Slashdot comments. Why the hell mobile plans are so costly in US? I have the largest plan available from my phone company, 2500 minutes / 2500 sms per month and unlimited 3G internet. And that's still only 29 euro per month. And I did actually use that 3G internet connection for a month while waiting for adsl connection to be set up for my new apartment (hell, even running a server from it). No transfer limits or anything like that.

    Yeah, mobile companies have extra costs from providing their infrastructure, but it just seems a lot what they ask in US. Sweden is mostly woods and non-urban areas too, so why is it done better here?

    Maybe voice your opinion to the companies so they stop charging so much?

    1. Re:Stupid prices by AvitarX · · Score: 5, Interesting

      We need a VAT in the US.

      We need to tax the bad (over-spending/under-saving) and not the good (working and earning).

      This is not true around the world (Germany for example could arguably be blamed for over-saving), but the US desperately needs to tax consumption rather than production.

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      Wow, sent an e-mail as suggested when clicking on "use classic" banner, and got a fast response that addressed my msg
  2. Re:comparing apples and oranges..... by oneandoneis2 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Uh.. those perks have been available in England for years. Plus when we get a phone with a contract, the phone is usually free. And can be upgraded every year, for free.

    I'm visiting America for a couple months right now, so I've bought a cell phone for while I'm here, and I've been appalled at how bad your cell service is. You guys have phone companies boasting in adverts that they drop your call less than any other network. FFS, why do you put up with them dropping your call at all?!? Unless you drive through a lot of tunnels or live in serious wilderness, if your phone dropped a call in England as often as they seem to over here, the network responsible would be out of business long before your contract had a chance to expire.

    And the nuisance calls.. I bought a brand new phone and gave my number to maybe three people. I've received over a dozen calls from unknown numbers, all of which Google has identified as scam callers. And I've been charged for being called by these so-and-so's.

    Cell phone services over here are just dreadful. Why you all pay so much for such mediocre service, I really don't know.

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    So.. it has come to this
  3. Another comparison by Doctor+Faustus · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Swedish heavy metal: Lots of excellent black metal, power metal, symphonic metal, death metal and Opeth (whatever they fall in)
    U.S. heavy metal: Thrash and some of everything else, for about the same total good quality output. But we have 30 times the population.

    Now, Finland has at least as much good heavy metal production as Sweden (no Opeth, but Sonata Arctica is almost as good), and they have a little more than half Sweden's population.