| A proposal Rather than investigate (which takes time), why not have the carriers state the following policy for broadband pricing (where they are the only wireline facility at the tower/ building):
1. We will price at competitive market rates for 10 years (2 five year terms). Competitive could be mileage based which means the rural areas would cost more and the wireless carriers could assess whether or not quality would suffer with microwave.
2. After 10 years of physical deployment, for that technology (meaning the underlying physical layer + the corresponding electronics), we will price at no higher than 50% above variable + depreciation/ amortization costs.
It's not the pricing for the initial service that's objectionable, but it's the pricing for the 3rd and 4th renewals when the cash has already been returned to the telco and their shareowners. If they started with copper that's 10 years old already (think about when networks started to be built), we could enjoy copper network pricing for 2-3 years until fiber was available.
Where does this argument break down? If not for their monopolistic tendencies, why would carriers not embrace a technology upgrade policy that reduces the excessive returns in the outer years of the plant's life? |
