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Please protest the merger of T-Mobile and Sprint


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2019 Jan 7, 9:23pm   1,727 views  11 comments

by Patrick   ➕follow (55)   💰tip   ignore  

It means even less competition in cellular, and even higher prices for you, the consumer. Americans already pay nearly the most in the world for cellular.

We find the monthly prices in the U.S. are almost three times of those in Germany and more than twice the monthly prices in Denmark,” Faccio said. “In Italy, where I am from, the prices are even lower. The difference in prices is part of what motivated our study.”

In 2015, the average cost in the U.S. of a mobile phone plan was $67 a month, compared with $23 in Germany and $31 in Denmark, according to the Finnish study, which found that Americans pay $65 billion and $44 billion a year more than consumers in Germany and Denmark, respectively, for similar cellphone services.


“The difference in prices we observe across countries depends on the extent to which regulations protect existing operators,” says Mara Faccio, a Purdue finance professor who wrote the 2017 working paper. “In countries where political connections are more prevalent, regulations protect incumbents and are associated with much higher prices.”

Price levels in the U.S. could get even worse if Sprint and T-Mobile, two of the country’s four giant mobile carriers, end up merging, according to Rewheel. That consolidation without another carrier entering the fray “will lessen the already weak competition” in the U.S., the report says.

Lack of competition in the U.S. isn’t a new problem, according to experts.

“The United States lacks meaningful competition in its cellular market sector, which leads to higher cell plan prices than a growing list of other countries,” Sascha Meinrath, founder of the Open Technology Institute, explained in 2014, according to The New York Times.


https://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/national/article223087025.html

Please contact the https://www.fcc.gov/ and let them know you would prefer actual free market competition like other countries have, and not just an even smaller oligopoly.

Comments 1 - 11 of 11        Search these comments

1   Ceffer   2019 Jan 7, 11:20pm  

If they would allow access to everybody's names and nude pictures from the cloud, nobody would mind the rates.
2   PeopleUnited   2019 Jan 8, 4:21am  

I agree that cellular phone service costs should be lower. However comparing a country the size of Germany or Italy to the USA is not reasonable. Cellular providers in the US have to spam an entire continent with towers andinfrastructure. What is Italy, is it even the size of Florida in regards to land mass?

From a logistics and economics standpoint, the cost of cellular should be lower in more densely populated areas such as Europe compared to the less densely populated continent of North America.
3   clambo   2019 Jan 8, 4:26am  

I have Republic Wireless for $23 per month.

This is great for California because the phones default to VOIP=internet calls whenever there is wifi around. In two of my friends' houses there is no cell service because of the hills around.

If you are anywhere in the world there is wifi, you can call free to the USA because the phone doesn't care about your location when it's VOIP.

VOIP calls have higher quality; have you ever used Facetime Audio or WhatsApp to make international calls? The sound is clear.

But fuck T-Mobile anyway.
4   🎂 Tenpoundbass   2019 Jan 8, 6:07am  

PeopleUnited says
he cost of cellular should be lower in more densely populated areas such as Europe compared to the less densely populated continent of North America.


America has always subsidized the rest of the world in Technology and Medicine.

We pay out the ass for health care and technology so other countries and poor countries can get it dirt cheap.
When i was in Malaysia I got a chicklett phone for $20 it came with enough minutes I talked to my wife everyday for a week.
In Peru I got a desk phone with a sim card for $70 with enough minutes for an hour meeting everyday for 2 weeks.
5   FortWayneAsNancyPelosiHaircut   2019 Jan 8, 6:29am  

Absolutely protesting this
6   PeopleUnited   2019 Jan 8, 6:45am  

Tenpoundbass says
PeopleUnited says
he cost of cellular should be lower in more densely populated areas such as Europe compared to the less densely populated continent of North America.


America has always subsidized the rest of the world in Technology and Medicine.

We pay out the ass for health care and technology so other countries and poor countries can get it dirt cheap.
When i was in Malaysia I got a chicklett phone for $20 it came with enough minutes I talked to my wife everyday for a week.
In Peru I got a desk phone with a sim card for $70 with enough minutes for an hour meeting everyday for 2 weeks.


Are you saying that in Peru it cost you $5 an hour for phone service? That's expensive! And I can only imagine that in local currency to a person with local average income, the cost appears even more outrageous.
7   NuttBoxer   2019 Jan 8, 7:46am  

I'm in favor of the merger. Higher prices and shittier products hopefully mean more people will stop using cellphones, stop radiating their brains, stop turning into tuned out zombies everytime their device interrupts them, and stop living in the FB/Instagram matrix.
8   Bd6r   2019 Jan 8, 7:49am  

NuttBoxer says
people will stop using cellphones, stop radiating their brains, stop turning into tuned out zombies everytime their device interrupts them, and stop living in the FB/Instagram matrix.

Or more likely they will go deeper in debt
9   zzyzzx   2019 Jan 8, 7:52am  

Patrick says
It means even less competition in cellular, and even higher prices for you, the consumer.


True, but that won't stop them from somehow claiming that it will result on lower rates to the consumer.
10   NuttBoxer   2019 Jan 8, 7:55am  

d6rB says
Or more likely they will go deeper in debt


Either way, leads to a more unsustainable trend.
11   Bd6r   2019 Jan 8, 8:09am  

PeopleUnited says
From a logistics and economics standpoint, the cost of cellular should be lower in more densely populated areas such as Europe compared to the less densely populated continent of North America.

I wonder what cellular price is in Finland, Sweden, or Australia which are more sparsely populated than US

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