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SCOTUS Rules Incumbent Telcos Must Share Network Access At Cost
schwit1 writes with news, as reported by Bloomberg, which will likely have bearing on (like it or not) regulation of peering among Internet carriers: "Established local telephone companies including AT&T Inc. must share disputed parts of their networks with competitors at cost, the US Supreme Court ruled. The unanimous ruling backs the position taken by the Federal Communications Commission in a fight stemming from the 1996 law that injected competition into the local telephone business. The law requires so-called incumbent local carriers, whose ranks also include Verizon Communications Inc. and CenturyLink Inc., to share their facilities with rivals."
Enable competition and break the local monopolies of the cable companies. Expand this to include cable providers!
Verizon was handed an infrastructure paid for by years of taxes and government granted monopolies, if they can't make a profit with that kind of setup then they deserve to lose.
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
As an actual telecom attorney, I'd just like to clarify that this ruling applies very narrowly to the use of entrance facilities (wires running into telco offices) for the purpose of interconnection. The dispute centered on an order from the FCC that excluded these facilities from regulation under one part of the 1996 Telecommunications Act that requires unbundled access to network elements that are necessary for competing service providers and would impair their ability to provide service if they were denied access. A separate section of the Act requires telcos to provide cost-based access to network facilities for the purpose of interconnection. AT&T claimed that the order meant that they did not have to provide access to entrance facilities under either statutory provision. A competing provider, took them to court over it, the FCC filed a brief stating that AT&T was required to provide the facilities for the purpose of interconnection, and the Supreme Court endorsed the FCC view. That's it. This opinion does not expand the rights of competitors to unbundled access to incumbent networks in any general sense.
She was forced to compete against other companies reselling Verizon's own hardware/infrastructure cheaper than Verizon could because Verizon had more overhead as a larger company.
The problem with this argument is that overhead tends to shrink as companies grow in size as a percentage of net income. This is why Walmart has cheaper prices than Joe's General Store. Walmart's overhead, as a percentage, is far lower than Joe's.
To say that Verizon has more overhead than third parties is completely misleading. Third party overhead, as a percentage, was far more expensive on a per-service basis. True, Verizon may have had higher percentage overhead on advertising, but that is also part of their ability to out-compete a third party, even if a third party is at a lower cost. Verizon also has a much more well staffed service center. But this is a completely different "service" they can offer, but a third party could not. If a third party tried to compete with a support service center, their percentage of overhead would have been outrageously higher than Verizon.
Verizon nor AT&T are not "screwed" by selling their lines at cost any more than Walmart is screwed by Joe for selling the exact same products. Joe's overhead, as a percentage, and confined to "services" he offers is costlier. And second, Walmart can offer more "services" (more lanes, more selection, more locations, etc) than Joe ever could, and should Joe try to compete in those services, his costs will be a higher percentage than Walmart.
This makes complete economic sense, where-as your post does not. Because, if you were right, it would make no sense for Verizon or AT&T to want to purchase other providers or grow in any way. If it is more economically burdening to grow, then they would fight tooth and nail not to grow. Walmart and Costco wouldn't exist, nor would national brands. In fact, even the general store probably wouldn't exist in such a system.
But that's simply not how the economics work. While your libertarian leaning ideals may be well placed, your economic reasoning for them falls apart. Because, in fact, as a percentage, Verizon can sell its own services cheaper than a third party (at cost), because nowhere in the equation are they getting a free ride.
I8-D
That's the point *they* didn't pay for it, WE did.
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
Well, it's interesting to note that here in Canada, we have the exact opposite - the big telecommunications companies pretty much have free reign except for some small legal matters.
E.g., the FCC mandates that consumers must have choice in set top boxes, so CableCARD was created. Sure it's iffy, but at least you guys get to have "premium" PVRs like TiVo, Moxi, Windows Media Center, etc fully working with digital cable. Here we have to put up with cableco provided boxes that only work with that cableco. They won't activate any equipment you didn't buy from them even if it's identical.
Point 2 - UBB. The CRTC rule that jacked up DSL rates was changed from (cost+%) to (retail price-%). So if the incumbent sold DSL for $20/month and it cost them $10 to provide, instead of the ISP paying say, $12/month and providing service with the remaining $8 (the way it was), the rules changed so the ISP must pay say $18 (10% off retail) for the line. That's why TekSavvy had to jack up prices.
Hell, the only provider that seemed to have done a decent thing was Shaw by announcing new limits and plans that even include an unlimited service. Probably because they were bleeding customers and feared the government might end up stepping in with regulation. Bell and Rogers though... bleh.
Free market, indeed. Sometimes I wish our CRTC had balls like the FCC.