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When monopolies are bad (another SCOTUS decision) - Printable Version +- MacResource (https://forums.macresource.com) +-- Forum: My Category (https://forums.macresource.com/forumdisplay.php?fid=1) +--- Forum: 'Friendly' Political Ranting (https://forums.macresource.com/forumdisplay.php?fid=6) +--- Thread: When monopolies are bad (another SCOTUS decision) (/showthread.php?tid=150498) |
When monopolies are bad (another SCOTUS decision) - deckeda - 03-27-2013 One commenter said that in Philadelphia, Comcast is the only provider of broadband Internet and cable TV. If that's true, customers and potential customers would be hurt in various ways not easily or neatly wrapped up into a soundbite. But they DO know they pay more for their service than in other areas. Economies of scale are supposed to come from monopolies. In practice, they don't, because the monopolist isn't incentivized to do perform efficiently. Something for the anti-regulation and anti-municipality ISP crowds to consider. http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2013/03/supreme-court-rules-in-favor-of-comcast-denying-philadelphia-class-action-suit/ The class-action lawsuit couldn't prove where the damage came from. It wasn't narrow enough and theorized too much. Personally, I don't blame the Supremes here. The problem of course is in allowing companies like Comcast to gain so much control that they can't be effectively targeted legally. Re: When monopolies are bad (another SCOTUS decision) - gabester - 03-28-2013 deckeda wrote: An excellent point that highlights areas for action that, were the FCC, FTC, and DOJ not already captured by the very industries they ought to be regulating, would be gaps where policy would be established and enforced. However, we have regulatory capture aided and abetted by a political duopoly that is on one side complicit and on the other complicit whilst duplicitously preaching an anti-regulation, pro-competition stance to willfully deceive a like-minded portion of the electorate into further entrenching the duopoly's complicity. What's to be done? I say a general boycott of the monopolists' services, as much as that can be done. I'm sure if everyone who had no choice but to view Comcast were to cancel service for 3 months at the same time, the company's quarterly revenues would take enough of a hit that then you'd have grounds to demonstrate harm in any particular market by how much they missed their profit estimates. g= Re: When monopolies are bad (another SCOTUS decision) - Bill in NC - 03-28-2013 Cable TV & broadband internet aren't considered 'essential' services and as such probably will never be regulated like electricity & water/sewer. Re: When monopolies are bad (another SCOTUS decision) - Mac-A-Matic - 03-28-2013 deckeda wrote: I don't agree with this thinking that monopolies aren't "incentivized" to perform efficiently. Companies like Comcast want to be efficient because it makes the most of their A) economy of scale, and B) profit margin. And monopolies like Comcast are definitively profitable. I think a very simple, easy and readily-available example of a monopoly is your local football or baseball stadium. A visit to the stadium will demonstrate $7 Bud Light beers. And if that ain't the demonstration of the problem with a monopoly, I don't know what is! Re: When monopolies are bad (another SCOTUS decision) - deckeda - 03-28-2013 They don't have to focus on efficiency when profits are high. No company has to. Comcast went looking for ways to spend some cash, not save it. Comcast's status as a "natural monopoly" (i.e. a business with high fixed costs that is granted an exclusive customer base as compensation) disappeared many years and several mergers ago. Since then, they've made so much money they bought a major content provider, NBC -- not a mere "cable channel" but one with its own network of affiliates belonging to a competing delivery method: broadcasting. ************** You can define monopoly however you like the target service to appear. A pro sports franchise has the monopoly for pro sports within that sport unless you'd just rather spend your "sports dollars" outside of that sport and go bowling instead. So if you don't want their service they aren't a monopoly! Similarly, Comcast isn't a monopoly ISP in Philadelphia where Verizon DSL or FiOS is available. But if you don't like Verizon you only have one other player because the satellite companies can't compete on performance. The Philly case here claimed Comcast swapped some territory (presumably with Verizon?) in order to maintain some kind of control (and therefore, prices). The judges got glassy-eyed trying to make sense of it and told everyone to go home. As I said, I don't fault the Supreme Court here. |