I'd expect they've got a LOT of baggage. They have the ex-SBC copper-wire networks they probably wish they could shed (compare when Verizon basically refused t

I'd expect they've got a LOT of baggage. They have the ex-SBC copper-wire networks they probably wish they could shed (compare when Verizon basically refused to rebuild damaged infrastructure after Hurricane Sandy). But they also went all-in on pay TV, buying DirecTV at a premium price just as cord-cutting became a thing. I wonder if we'll eventually see an "Amtrak" style nationalization for our POTS and related infrastructure. The firms with nothing sexier in their portfolio (Frontier) are frequently unhealthy, and the ones that do have other things to sell (Verizon, AT&) don't give it their full attention. It's no longer a competitive commercial product, but it serves enough of a public interest (i. e. not breaking a billion POTS-attached alarms, the high resiliency in natural disasters) that it can't just be dug up and scrapped for copper.