It's simply due to the regional monopolies the telcos and cable cos have in the US. If you had open competition it might go something like what happened in the

It's simply due to the regional monopolies the telcos and cable cos have in the US. If you had open competition it might go something like what happened in the UK. Bandwidth was pretty expensive in the UK back in the nineties, but then OFCOM (the regulator) forced British Telecom to be broken into two companies...one wholesale and one retail. BT retail has to buy from BT wholesale at the same price as everyone else, and even small ISP's could now offer ADSL, and were allowed to install their own equipment at the exchange. Fast forward to today...I pay £10 p/month for 24/2. If you have a satellite package with Sky TV you can get 2Mbps for free, or 20Mbps for £5 p/m or so. BT is just launching a 40Mbps service for around £25 p/m. Normally in the UK we get stung on prices and everything else I can think of is 20-50% higher in cost than the US...so it's pretty amazing our broadband costs are more competitive than many other countries. There just happens to be very health competition in this category.