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AT&T: Meet the New US GSM Monopoly
itwbennett writes "Why should consumers care about the AT&T/T-mobile merger? Already, Verizon has dropped unlimited data plans and the US trails Japan, South Korea, and others in variety and performance of mobiles. Don't think for a second that those aren't the direct result this new monopoly, says blogger Tom Henderson. '...Those pesky State agencies that used to have regulatory authority has been usurped by the US Federal Government,' writes Henderson. 'This wasn't an accident. Who would you rather deal with, 43 different state regulatory authorities, or those convenient people on Capitol Hill?'"
It certainly seems appropriate for this article.
"What in the name of Fats Waller is that?"
"A four-foot prune."
I'm sure the free market will take care of this issue.
Are you, Americans are still paying for incoming calls and SMSes?
I don't understand how anyone can draw the conclusion that the merger caused Verizon to drop the unlimited plan. If anything I would think it would encourage them to keep the unlimited plan to directly compete with the new merger. Seems to me that it is more greed for money that caused the change.
Keep voting in the Republicans and Democrats! They clearly have your interests in mind!
Eventually, you land on their property and have to pay for staying at their hotel.
For all your one-stop shopping needs.
Ever notice how few people are really paying attention? How along the campaign trail nobody ever asks an important question like, "Would you oppose an AT&T / T-Mobile merger which really harms competition in the US?"
They had an Ohio farmer on the news, back when W was running for re-election, when asked which was more important, Social Issues or Economic Issues, the farmer said, "As long has be works to block abortion, he doesn't mind if a few eggs get broken." Really. Wonder how he's doing on that farm after the Bank Collapse. When are people going to wake up and realize they have put far too much focus on a social agenda and too little on Business and Economic issues which affect them to more devastating effect?
I suppose someone, somewhere is fine with the merger, as long as their important Social Agenda gets lip service.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
...never was unlimited. So spinning this into 'the end of Verizon's unlimited plan is spurred by ATT monopoly" is a pretty lame argument.
Good-bye
Not only are we at parity for the dollar, we are now at parity for corporate telecom monopolies! Canada and USA, BFFs for life!
I think I ruptured my spleen from all the excessive sarcasm...
They only have to bribe one guy instead of 50! The consolidation makes it so that they can spend more money on this individual, while spending less overall.
I'm sure they pass that value on to the consumer, too!
There's a reason there is no "Disagree" mod...
Another idiotic article.
DoMoCo owns 50% or the Japanese wireless market. SK Telecom owns 50% of the Korean wireless market.
AT&T/T-Mobile USA combined don't even come close to that level of market concentration.
I am not saying the US telecom industry has done a great job nor isn't greedy assholes. It is unfair to compare US telecom to any other region when almost all the countries are the size of a single state in the USA.
Correct me if I am wrong, but I believe European telecom plans are per country with significant roaming costs from country to country (or buy a SIM for each country). Whereas in the US all the wireless carriers allow at no "extra cost" use across the entire country -- and the US is approximately the same size of all of Europe.
It's a lot simpler to have great features/service at a cheap rate in a single state (which is a country if you're in Europe). Try doing that across the entire European continent and see how the US fares. What are the real costs for a European to get the same features in their country and ALL the countries in the same plan (i.e. data use, texting, minutes, etc)? I have a feeling it isn't as cheap or superior than the US...
Just my $0.02 and I don't work in telecom. :)
I'm not even interested in reading the blog post when I see a horrible conclusion that Verizon dropping its unlimited data plans are a result of the AT&T/TMO merger. It makes MUCH more sense that a response to the merger would be, "hey, everyone! We have unlimited data plans!!"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_wireless_communications_service_providers
Just because they don't have stores on every street corner doesn't mean there aren't a hundred different wireless providers to choose from.
My Other Computer Is A Data General Nova III.
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(____@) \
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Verizon likes this!
"blah blah blah... monopoly... corruption.... blah blah blah"
Do you guys ever stop flogging this dead horse?
We need unlimited.. some of you say people like me are bandwith hogs onopen networks which caused this limited plan in the first place... bit I say no.. these services are designed to be unlimited.. it is definatly greed. Even isps are becoming limited.. so if my computer crashes and I redownload my steam games I will use 500+ gb that month im paying for bandwith not for caps.. this is just the first step of many to fail the network for non facebook surfers.. mobile or not..
is to sell about the spectrum close to each other to multiple operators, on same technology, and using regulatory powers to make their mergers impossible. it's funny because you can buy prepaid here with a dongle for 39e, and pay monthly or weekly(like 7e, or more like 4 e once you count the charge up discounts, which are basically in effect almost all year). also, if you'd into paranoid anon stuff, well, nothing connects you to that line until you charge it up. and if the weather is good you can do 250kbyte/s all friggin week (in good coverage, if you opt for speed cap to 1mbit it's actually cheaper, too). we started with data caps over here too, paying 20e for 100mbyte in a month. but that's almost 10 years ago and this is 2011 - the future where you can just walk into a kiosk and buy a megabit connection and use it to download tens of gigabytes, even hundreds, in a month.
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
Sprint is still better than AT&T or Verizon. As long as Verizon doesn't buy them up we have at least one good choice for awhile.
(Unless you're unfortunate enough to not live in an area where Sprint has good coverage, to which I must say, that sucks.)
Does anybody on Slashdot actually travel? Prices in general of most goods are _way_ cheaper in the US than in Europe or Japan (I haven't been to South Korea). US taxes are relatively low. Why do I care if a cell phone bill is a few hundred bucks a year more?
And then people miss the point that cell infrastructure scales both with population and with physical area. Someone has to pay for that.
It'll be interesting to see what happens with Sprint in late 2011 early 2012 when the 2-year contracts expire for all of those Motorola Droid early adopters. It probably won't stop the death of unlimited data plans as they're too small compared to AT&T and Verizon.
You have to pay to receive a call. That is so 90s.
Bullshit. I work for a telco in Finland, and covering a piece of land is as easy/hard in both as the average population density is in the same ballpark. I would even accept that covering rural America is harder, but by that logic most Americans in the cities should have the best broadband in the world. The real difference is that we have four national networks for a population of 5M and the competition is fierce. The regulator is here FOR the people.
Every nation gets the government it deserves.
In (Ex-Soviet) Russia, you can choose from MTS, MegaFon, Beeline, Tele2, or a few other GSM Providers.
In China, you can choose from China Mobile (Easyown, GoTone, M-zone, Peoples, ZoNG), ChinaUnicom. (Yes, the main ones are state-owned)
In the "Free" United states, you can choose any GSM provider you want, as long as you "want" to use the government-approved AT&T/T-mobile.
So you say: "If there's customer demand, Capitalism shows another company will be created so competition remains..." Yeah Right. The State (FCC) owns 100% of the spectrum, and it's all been sold to AT&T T-Mobile. So exactly what GSM spectrum is available for competition?
It's also the only country in the world that will put you in jail if you even /attempt/ to buy and import a Citroen C5 or a Citroen DS3 ("R", preferably) Automobile.
Don't give me the safety line -- both of these cars are rated very well for both safety, and emissions. (Google NCAP) And they look cool too.
I'm not feeling very "Free" as we celebrate our "Freedom" this weekend.
I swore I'd never do this but...
I, for one, welcome our new Call Dropping Overlords.
You missed the point of my write-up. When you go to Spain, how does your telecom provider work for you? Cost a lot extra to use in spain right? Or just buy a pay as you go sim, but your number is now different so not that useful while there...
Its so much easier to bribe 1 than to bribe 50. Sure the bribe has to be about 10 times as big, but its still a 5:1 savings. Worse: some of those 50 can't be bribed. Gold watches, luxury homes, 'padded' expense and retirement accounts, exotic vacations, motor yachts, girls (and boys) who will pop till you drop, laugh at all your stories and always be game for a good time. Anything you want, so long as you press those others to do what the company wants. There need not be any consideration for 'whats good for the people'. Those naive days ended somewhere between 1945 and 1955.
>> It is unfair to compare US telecom to any other region when almost all the countries are the size of a single state in the USA.
Ever heard of India?
1.1 Billion people. Land area is 40% of USA. 70% of the people live in remote rural areas with sporadic electricity, no roads etc. But, in remotest areas, I got full bar signal from multiple networks.
I don't know exactly how it's done now, but couple of years ago, you paid Re 0.05/minute on outgoing call. That is $0.1/min. No charge on incoming SMS either. Many networks offered free in-network calls. Phone sells without contract, and there are gazzlion models. Priced around $100-400.
No government regulation until very recently when they decided to control 4G spectrum auction and like all the worthy and honorable governments of the world, decided to screw the customers. Massive corruption, sellout and what not.
And, before you say India is cheap, I read somewhere (dont remember the specifics) only 30% of telecom cost is labor. Everything else is tech which is more expensive in India and imported from outside.
FCC is one of the most corrupt organizations. They have been screwing us for last 75 years in the name of protecting us. This time will be different though!
That would be a fair point, if the US had tons of small inter-state cellular companies, with a few big evil cross-state providers. But that isn't the situation. Fact is, almost NO small businesses are currently operating in the US cellular sector. There is almost no competition at all in the US, the big two just make agreements on territory so they can both keep their prices high.
Honestly the EU isn't perfect but at least competition is healthy. The US has become so bad, the only solution I see at this stage is to make it illegal for a company to own both the core infrastructure and to also sell to the end consumer. That is what they did with the UK's BT monopoly. Broke it into three companies - consumer, wholesale, and Open Reach. And that was an massively successful route to take, with competition in the UK being extremely good.
Ever heard of India? 1.1 Billion people. Land area is 40% of USA. 70% of the people live in remote rural areas with sporadic electricity, no roads etc. But, in remotest areas, I got full bar signal from multiple networks.
Did India ever have the heavily subsidized rural wireline telephone initiative that the US did? Long before cell was a glimmer in anyone's eye, the US took action to build the wired telecom system, to the point that there was a charge on everyone's phone bill to pay for it. If you lived "in remote rural areas" everyone else helped pay for that wire that ran from the nearest CO to you.
I don't think India ever had that.
Why is it important? Because when most of the people already have a telephone (wired) there is less need to cover the area with cells to provide basic phone service. Less demand, less supply.
So, now, in India, they skipped the wired part of the process and went right to cell when cell became cheap. Since people didn't have ANY phones they wanted THIS -- because it was all that was available. Lots of demand, lots of supply follows.
Like they say, "good enough is the enemy of perfect." Getting "good enough" phones in the rural areas meant the "perfect" solution of high bandwidth cell/4g etc wasn't as necessary, because it cannot piggyback on the need to provide "good enough".
I'm not disagreeing with him, but it is the best we can do? "Some random guy my son met on the playground disagrees with Tom Henderson." Should that be the next article submitted on the topic?
Except for ending slavery, the Nazis, communism, & securing American independence, war has never solved anything.
Seems CNet ran a story about how much spectrum at&t actually has http://news.cnet.com/8301-30686_3-20058494-266.html .
From the article, AT&T has more spectrum than Verizon, but Verizon doesn't seem to be whining about spectrum. Seems AT&T line of more spectrum is complete bullshit.
I'm not sure how much water you argument holds when the worst European country in terms of telecom price/quality is still better than the best states in the US. Finland has a lower population density than the United States, and simultaneously better telcom.
So while true that Europe is a patchwork of carriers across its different states, every state there is better than any state in the US.
"Why should consumers care about the AT&T/T-mobile merger? Already, Verizon has dropped unlimited data plans and the US trails Japan, South Korea, and others in variety and performance of mobiles. Don't think for a second that those aren't the direct result this new monopoly", says blogger Tom Henderson. I'm pretty sure "Japan, South Korea, and others..." were far ahead of the US in mobile performance LONG before any merger talks came about.
Having a market dominated by a smaller number of larger companies is the ideal capitalist system according to rightist ideology. This is why they like mergers and hate it when antitrust laws are enforced. In this way, the few remaining companies don't have to deal with as much of that pesky "competition" thing, and through economies of scale they can deliver better goods for less money. At least, that's the excuses libertarians and conservatives usually give me.
This is also part of the reason why I argue that they are not in fact capitalists, but rather neo-feudalists.
For various reasons (one being the impending AT&T merger) I recently switched from T-Mobile to Sprint.
They have plans that give you 500 minutes with unlimited text and data for 69.99 (59.99 + 10.00 smart phone addon).
You have to sign up with this (not really) secret method to get the plan for 59.99...
http://mcguireslaw.com/2008/07/16/psst-have-you-heard-about-everything-plus/
With my wife constantly calling me and the long conversations I have with my Dad, at first I was afraid that 500 minutes would not be enough, but part of their plan is unlimited mobile to mobile and it applies to ANY mobile phone; even those from other carriers and it applies to incoming calls from mobiles.
This month I used about 41 minutes of my 500.
If the majority of people you talk to are on mobiles in the U.S., then I would look at Sprint.
Their data network seems to be a little less robust than Verizon or At&Ts, but for the first time ever I have 3G in my rural area and can steam Pandora/Slacker on my way to work - something I could never dream of with T-Mobile and the EDGE/GPRS connections they provide outside of dense urban areas.
Now I'm just hoping Sprint doesn't collapse as a result of the merger.
I don't always use unix-like operating systems; but when I do, I prefer FreeBSD.
Does anybody on Slashdot actually travel? Prices in general of most goods are _way_ cheaper in the US than in Europe or Japan (I haven't been to South Korea). US taxes are relatively low. Why do I care if a cell phone bill is a few hundred bucks a year more? And then people miss the point that cell infrastructure scales both with population and with physical area. Someone has to pay for that.
I think it depends on where you go, and what goods you're looking at. I lived in Tokyo for three years. Moved back to the US, to California, and naively expected the cost of living to be lower.
It wasn't.
What was more galling, not only was I paying more living in CA, but the quality of the goods and services purchased was generally lower.
A random sample list:
And would people *please* give the population density argument a rest? It's a red herring. The San Francisco Bay Area is quite densely populated and is supposedly the center of the US high-tech industry - and yet cell coverage is kinda crappy, and internet service is much more expensive and much slower than anything you get in Japan (unless you're out in the boonies). It's not about population density, it's about profit margins, and what regulators and the competitive environment will allow.
Cheers,
"What in the name of Fats Waller is that?"
"A four-foot prune."
Gah, whatever happened to unordered lists in HTML? Sheesh...
"What in the name of Fats Waller is that?"
"A four-foot prune."
State Agencies get eaten alive by something as big as AT&T/T-Mobile. Did a State agency break up Ma Bell? All I can say to these State's rightser Loons is Divide and Conqueror.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
How often does your average American leave the state? I don't personally consider that to be a major concern when I leave the state so infrequently. The bigger issue is the shit service around town.
The fact that I can't get decent coverage in a major city is an absolute embarrassment. And As for ISPs, Qwest apparently has written off much of Seattle in terms of upgrades deeming 1.5mbps to be fast enough. Same basic problem, shit regulation and a company that's figured out that it's cheaper to not bother to invest in infrastructure due to a lack of competition and regulation making them do it.
Compare US telecom to Indian telecom..
Indian telecom is WAY behind on Data, but calls and SMS are one of the lowest in the world.
( incoming SMS are actually free nationwide, and incoming calls statewide)
So while true that Europe is a patchwork of carriers across its different states, every state there is better than any state in the US.
But if you travel you get raped on roaming charges. Especially data roaming which is completely unaffordable.
Europe has somewhat-decent per-minute charges due to fixed line users paying way too much to call cell phones and because of roaming charges/charges for international calls. The US doesn't have that kind of make-money-fast schemes for cell phone providers but unfortunately the lack of regulation means that it is difficult to start another provider and for the users to change providers.
Finally! A year of moderation! Ready for 2019?
I still pay $50 a month total for my iPhone and still have unlimited 3G data being with ATT.
Now with the acquisition I have even more towers to cover me for the voice and 2G data end since T-mo towers are compatible with this.
Don't forget that inflation helps fixed debts (like a 30-year mortgage) become less important.
Only if your income growth outpaces inflation. If inflation is 3% per year, your income has to grow by at least 3% per year or your buying power has actually declined. If your income remains constant for 30 years, it doesn't matter what inflation is with respect to your mortgage.
My parent's actually experienced what you are talking about. Their mortgage when they first took it out really stretched them. $350/month was a lot of money in those days. Fast forward 25 years and it wasn't much of a problem at all. But the reason is because their income rose faster than inflation. Had their income remained constant, they would have realized no advantage.
I lived in Tokyo for three years. Moved back to the US, to California, and naively expected the cost of living to be lower.
California is the 3rd most expensive state in the US behind only Hawaii and Alaska. Try moving to somewhere that actually is inexpensive to live. I live in the midwest and it is FAR less expensive. My house would cost 4-5X as much anywhere remotely close to one of the bigger California cities. If you were looking for a place in the US to compare with Japan you could hardly have picked a worse example.
It's not about population density, it's about profit margins, and what regulators and the competitive environment will allow.
You say that as if you think profit margins and population density are somehow unrelated. While there are highly dense areas, the phone companies have to expend capital to cover the not dense areas too. If you spend the money to improve connections in the high density areas you necessarily are taking it away from the less populated areas. Furthermore there is the issue of return on investment. Presumably with enough cash they could make incredibly reliable connections but would they see a return on that investment in a competitive environment? Maybe, but anyone who claims to be certain of that is delusional. Population density is by no means the only important factor but it IS important.
One of the biggest problems in the US is simply finding a spot to put a tower.
Can't put it anywhere within a city limits without permission from the city. Can't put it on any land the city owns, period. Can't put it on any private land without a permit from the city. Can't put it anywhere near people that complain about the radiation hazards, how the sight of the tower offends them or any other complaint unless you like spending millions in court.
This means in non-rural areas finding a spot for a tower is a huge challenge whereas I suspect most other countries the siting for a tower is easy - you get the government permission at a high level and nobody is allowed to argue with you. This is especially true when the telephone provider also happens to be state-owned.
Sure there are "regulators" involved but they aren't listening to the lunatic fringe. Here in the US between the environmentalists, the radical environmentalists (you know, all progress since 800 AD is cruel, inhumane and against nature) and the basic nutjobs (cell tower radiation hazards, power transmission line hazards, magnetic cure-all bracelets that are negatively affected by any other EMF fields in the area, etc.) have the ear of the government and the courts.
Actually, you don't. Rates are high-ish, but capped by a EU directive...
It's a problem because as we've already seen, if AT&T or Verizon makes a business move, the other "reacts" to it and the reaction is usually it's beneficial to both parties and not to the customer.
The basic principle of regulation is missing from the US regulatory puzzle. You have a market where the telecommunications companies function as their own regulators. They set their own prices, place their towers where they can make the most money (particularly AT&T here)/screw expansive infrastructure and actual mobility, stipulate the kinds of phones that are on their network, and create a barrier of entry revolving around contracts/subsidies and credit checks. Spectrum allotment is an obvious technicality so everything works but in this case, it's a fancy way to pad and line a few wallets.
It's super cozy if you can set all the conditions and variables in your market and be the one or two companies in it. FCC and FTC basically function as agencies willing to do anything for the highest bidder and the companies only care about themselves. The problem is obvious; the customer is completely left out of the equation. It's not a free market and if it was, it's been perverted out of one.
Somewhere, somehow, it hasn't been made an issue, yet. I wonder if and how AT&T will work up the muster to get rid of it's unionized workforce with this acquisition/merger, if it does happen.
You tell me how you think the roaming charges stack up.
T-Mobile UK roaming in Germany or Spain
Outgoing calls $0.62/min (38.8p)
Incoming calls $0.30/min (14.3p)
Outgoing SMS $0.16 (10.2p)
Outgoing MMS $0.33 (20.4p)
Incoming SMS free
Incoming MMS free
GPRS/3G $2.46/Mb (£1.532)
AT&T roaming in Germany or Spain
Incoming calls $1.39/min (86.5p)
Outgoing calls $1.39/min (86.5p)
Outgoing SMS $0.50 (31.1p)
Incoming SMS
Outgoing MMS $1.30 (80.9p)
Incoming MMS
GPRS (no mention of 3G roaming at all) $19.97/Mb (£12.43)
The revolution will be mocked
The initial comment was about goods. I lumped in services for fun.
Rents? Sure, I had a ~800 sq ft place a short walking distance from Saginomiya Station (one of the express stops) on the Tôbu line for ~$1,500 / mo. ~1,000 sq ft in San Carlos right after that went for ~$1,800, but the rails were much more expensive, much less convenient, and traffic on 101 was so fun that 12 miles one way could take about an hour. Bicycling would often get your there faster, except drivers were not very kind to bikers, and the roads weren't really set up for it either (no proper bike lanes on El Camino Real, no other good north-south thoroughfare).
Cheers,
"What in the name of Fats Waller is that?"
"A four-foot prune."
I have several coworkers who live in other states and drive to work in my state every day. How would you work it if you lived in France and worked in Spain?
APK likes to ask for responses to the same things over and over. Maybe he just likes the responses?
Well for one thing, most people aren't required to have cell phones in order to have a job. And for another, cell coverage is hardly the only issue at play when living in France and working in SPain.
I also feel that the population density is a PERFECTLY valid argument when you compare why our rural areas do not have as fast of speeds as large cities. Someone has to invest in the infrastructure to reach these far out places...
I'm completely with you when it comes to the rural areas. The problem with the density argument is that it would follow that the main US urban corridors (most of the two coasts, and the area around Chicago) should have telecoms on par with the best in the world. Except we don't.
Which is why I said "it depends on where you go".
But I quite disagree with your next point:
...and it's nigh impossible for any company to create a super fast network over all our major cities when can be thousands of miles in between some of them. How far from Tokyo is Hokkaido? Maybe 750 mi? Think of how far LA is from New York. Just saying. rantOff()
I'm not talking about Hokkaido. (The distance is about 520 miles by road. Besides which, you're comparing a huge sparsely populated island province to the densely populated capital prefecture.) *Within* areas of low population density, yes, I can see ways to argue that building out connectivity could be prohibitively expensive. But when you're just talking about going *through* such areas, then if the distance from LA to NY mattered quite so much, we would again have to wonder why Scandinavia enjoys such impressive internet speeds.
Cheers,
"What in the name of Fats Waller is that?"
"A four-foot prune."
Derp. In the 90s most carriers offered the first incoming minute free. IIRC, that started disappearing around the time Verizon was created.
The revolution will be mocked
California is the 3rd most expensive state in the US behind only Hawaii and Alaska. Try moving to somewhere that actually is inexpensive to live. I live in the midwest and it is FAR less expensive.
Sure, the Midwest is quite less expensive. That said, the OP was arguing about the US as an aggregate whole -- which I think is a mistake, as it depends where you are within the US as to how much things cost. Hence why I brought up prices in California.
It's not about population density, it's about profit margins, and what regulators and the competitive environment will allow.
You say that as if you think profit margins and population density are somehow unrelated. While there are highly dense areas, the phone companies have to expend capital to cover the not dense areas too. If you spend the money to improve connections in the high density areas you necessarily are taking it away from the less populated areas.
Except, as has been substantially covered here on Slashdot, the US telecom companies get sizable government subsidies and other public assistance to carry out such work. This muddies the waters and makes the zero-sum argument about high- vs. low-density areas a bit less tenable.
Furthermore there is the issue of return on investment. Presumably with enough cash they could make incredibly reliable connections but would they see a return on that investment in a competitive environment?
I can't speak much to ROI, except to point out that telecom companies elsewhere, some of them in significantly less densely populated countries and facing much more and fiercer competition, still manage to turn a profit.
Population density is by no means the only important factor but it IS important.
I do agree that it is a factor to consider. My issue with the population density argument is with how often it is invoked as some sort of ultimate reason as to why US internet speeds are falling behind the rest of the developed and developing world.
Cheers,
"What in the name of Fats Waller is that?"
"A four-foot prune."
Who would you rather pay off, 43 different state regulatory authorities, or those convenient people on Capitol Hill?'"
FTFY
'The tyrant will always find pretext for his tyranny.' - Aesop's Fables
Except, as has been substantially covered here on Slashdot, the US telecom companies get sizable government subsidies and other public assistance to carry out such work.
I presume you are talking about the Universal Service Fund. That fund is drawn directly from the revenues of telecom companies to build infrastructure where there would otherwise be none because there is NO economic case for it. It is impossible to justify the expense of serving many of the rural and even semi-rural areas of the US. That is not a government subsidy, that is regulated reapportionment of telecom revenues for specific purposes. True, it is not a black and white case for urban versus rural but the basic argument of population density stands on its merit. It IS more expensive to serve a typical rural customer than an urban one. Population density is a critical factor in any discussion of service availability.
I can't speak much to ROI, except to point out that telecom companies elsewhere, some of them in significantly less densely populated countries and facing much more and fiercer competition, still manage to turn a profit.
It's not just turn a profit. The telecoms are private companies and their management has a fiduciary duty (an obligation with legal force) to maximize profits for their shareholders. They could easily serve a lot more customers (or serve existing customers better) without the constraint of trying to maximize profit. Profit maximization is a function of revenue and cost to serve customers, both of which are heavily influenced by population density.
All of those countries mentioned have centralized federal authorities regulating their companies. Trying to for some reason argue AGAINST federal regulation, and instead of state-level regulation, while simultaneously pointing at all these other counties ahead of the US, is total nonsense.
Not everything should be state regulated. For a heck of a lot of things, it introduces huge levels of complexity and expense, and lots of opportunity for idiotic state legislators to pass nonsense laws to gain political points.
Sorry, but Australia is the same size as the lower 48 US states, has 1/15th the population, and has cheaper rates, more carriers (at least 4 or 5 distinct actual networks, plus many resellers) and more competition in the mobile sector. Coverage on at least one of those providers (Telstra) is excellent even in very remote towns - plus they are one of the few networks in the world to have fully rolled out 21/42 Mbps HSDPA. The other carriers' coverage isn't as good, but they still cover the majority of the places people live.
Not saying it's perfect, but if you're going to make comparisons, Australia is a better one than Europe, since it's similarly huge, has the same Federal/State government structure, and has even less population than the US (although to be fair, that population is somewhat more centralised than in the US).
It isn't difficult to understand why unlimited data has been going away, and monopolies or dangers of a monopoly have NOTHING to do with it. It all comes down to the basic idea that people want faster and faster speeds, but the providers have been unwilling to limit how much speed users get compared to what the current technologies can actually provide.
Unlimited data at 2G speeds quickly turned into unlimited data at 3G speeds. Verizon released 4G/LTE, which is faster yet, and guess what, there was the same unlimited data plan. AT&T may not have released a true 4G/LTE network, but guess what, HSPA+ delivers a pretty fast connection. The faster individuals can transfer data, the more bandwidth is needed at each cell phone tower to handle the INCREASED demand that the faster data rates cause. This means that it costs the carriers a LOT of money because they have to run an extra 100 megabit/second to each cell phone tower every few months to keep up with increasing demands(as people with old 2G phones switch to 3G and 4G devices). The costs are prohibitive to continue supporting unlimited data at faster and faster speeds.
The PROPER solution would have been to put speed limits in place that are based on current available bandwidth from each cell phone tower, combined with a per-user data package that allows the USER to select data rate-monthly bandwidth plans. Unlimited data at 2G speeds(even when using a 4G network connection) SHOULD be available as an option for users, or 5GB/month at base 3G speeds, or 2GB/month at 4G speeds, and plans that extend from these suggested offerings. Most people want data to be available, but don't need or care about getting 4G speeds, or some people would be happy with a 3mbps download speed, so why make it so everyone has to pay for the fastest connection speed available.
Most cable internet providers seem to have multiple speed packages, where you get a standard download speed for the base package, but if you want faster, you pay extra for it. The idea is that the network can handle unlimited data from users with the base package, and those who want faster pay more for it. Would you be willing to pay extra for the extra speed of 4G if you could get unlimited data plans again? How about paying extra for 7 megabit compared to 3 megabit as long as you had unlimited data?
Only the per-minute charges are capped, not the data roaming charges, and the caps are WAY higher than the actual costs. The wholesale data roaming charges are capped, but that just moves the profits from the company actually doing the work to the company sending the invoice without benefit to the user -- it generally hurts the Southern countries which have a lot of inbound data roaming while benefiting the Northern areas.
Finally! A year of moderation! Ready for 2019?
There is much lower movement of labour in Europe compared to the US. I understand it would be no huge deal to move from, say, Washington DC to Boston, but moving a similar distance in Europe may well require learning a different language. Or, to put it another way, if I tell my British family I've just taken a job in France, they'll have more to say than "OK, let me know how it goes".
(This is why we have big economic problems with the Euro -- if this was the USA, the unemployed Greeks/etc would move elsewhere.)
The result is the majority of people don't have lots of people to talk to in other countries, and a lot of the people roaming are either on holiday or on a short business trip.
However, even with all that the EU is looking at more regulation to lower the cost of roaming.
I was speaking of roaming between countries in Europe as a comparison of roaming between states in the USA. No argument roaming on ATT in Europe costs more, but that's not what I was trying to get across. We don't have extra roaming charges to use our cell phones if we live in Maine and decide to visit California and use it there. Europeans do have this exact situation.
Strange, my friend living there found cell expensive. He used to tell colleagues how with our cell plan we would stay on the phone for like 4hrs straight just for the heck of it. I can't speak about coverage quality etc, but the plans were quite a bit more expensive pound for pound he told me.
Yes, I heard about the EU regs as it is a HUGE racket money maker for the carriers in Europe the crazy roaming fees and expenses to buy a SIM per country.
So it really is a non-replicated feature that the US has practically an entire continent within the plans...
the US trails Japan, South Korea, and others in variety and performance of mobiles.
Compare the land-mass and population distribution of the US to these other countries that we "trail" in terms of "variety and performance".... Some of these countries have only one or two carriers, and are about the size of a single medium sized state in the US (both in terms of land-mass and population). Once you account for land-mass and population distribution the US actually has pretty good coverage given how big the cell network has to be to deliver half-way decent speed to ~250 Million potential users spread out over 1.9 billion acres of land (not including Alaska or Hawaii).
The AT&T/T-Mobile merger would hardly constitute a Monopoly. GSM is a technology that is on the way out, AT&T and Verizon have both selected LTE as their "4G" technology of choice (as has a good chunk of the rest of the world).
This summary is full of FUD. "Already, Verizon has dropped unlimited data plans" ? Really? That's your complaint? The average user doesn't go over 1GB in a month. They're all dropping Unlimited data plans so they can charge the 1% that does go over 2-4GB/month an extra $10-$20. When you go over your cap on AT&T they charge you $10 to up your cap by another 1GB for that month... which isn't an outrageous overage fee. Saying\Implying consumers would be better off if each state had it's own regulatory commissions like the SEC, FCC, and/or FTC is like saying consumers were better off when states printed their own currency (like before the Constitution when we had the Articles of Confederation)... It would make inter-state commerce next to impossible, and that is really BAD for consumers.
If this merger happens, the world will not end and life will go on..
More expensive than Europe/UK, but less expensive than the US, is my assessment. I pay $20 AUD/month and get 1 GB data and more calls/SMS than I'd ever use...
So while true that Europe is a patchwork of carriers across its different states, every state there is better than any state in the US.
But if you travel you get raped on roaming charges. Especially data roaming which is completely unaffordable.
Europe has somewhat-decent per-minute charges due to fixed line users paying way too much to call cell phones and because of roaming charges/charges for international calls. The US doesn't have that kind of make-money-fast schemes for cell phone providers but unfortunately the lack of regulation means that it is difficult to start another provider and for the users to change providers.
Well, you won't get raped on roaming charges, if you choose to purchase a local SIM to use when you're travelling in another European country.
I know a lot of operators would like to do SIM locking to prevent this, but I'd say 80% to 90% of cell phone users in Europe buy their mobile phones outright and of course SIM locking isn't an issue in that case.
I have personally attempted to get a SIM card in Italy. All the shops asked to see my health insurance card. They were unimpressed when I gave them my Danish health insurance card. (And yes, I was attempting to get a prepaid card, so there is only a credit risk if their systems fail).
Even if you manage to get a local SIM, you have to carry two phones or somehow tell everyone what your current number is. The constant swapping of SIM cards is no fun, and the data charges on prepaid cards are almost as bad as data roaming.
Finally! A year of moderation! Ready for 2019?