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To make it clear: we all were paying roaming charges not because "evil companies" arranged in a cartel, but because some politicians (who control telecom licens

To make it clear: we all were paying roaming charges not because "evil companies" arranged in a cartel, but because some politicians (who control telecom licenses) were deciding prices and rules. Now they decided to drop some requirements and we all fell warm and happy about it. Does anyone wonder, wouldn't it be better if Brussels didn't have such power in the first place?

amirmc 13y ago
Can you expand on this? I don't see how politicians were deciding anything about roaming charges in Europe.
netrus 13y ago
So an American in Singapore or South Africa does not have high roaming costs? I'm not sure that's true. They have established maximum prices, not minimum.
moreentropy 13y ago
[citation needed]
Atropos 13y ago
You are either horribly misinformed or simply trolling. The reason MAXIMUM roaming charges are set by Brussels is that the competition in the telecommunications market EU wide is not working. The main reason for that is a particular market structure: In most countries, landline telecommunication service was provided by the government, and the operators only later being privatized. The now private company could in a way free-ride on the original investment made in the infrastructure by the government, which is why an attack on the market by foreign companies is difficult. Furthermore the telecommunications industry has very strong network effects, so that the dominant natural provider could even be a sort of natural monopoly. The licences for example for 3G/4G networks are mostly offered in a public bidding contest in most EU countries, so the state intervention is quite minimal. Unless you are suggesting government should have nothing to do with it at all, and every operator should simply use any frequency he desires and let's see what happens? Please read https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regulation_on_roaming_charges_in_the_European_Union https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regulation_on_roaming_charges_... to see how bad the situation was before EU intervention!
objclxt 13y ago
You do realise that the reason the EC currently mandates roaming charges caps is because before they did so roaming was stupidly expensive??? You seem to have got the situation completely back to front.

amirmc 13y ago

Can you expand on this? I don't see how politicians were deciding anything about roaming charges in Europe.

netrus 13y ago

So an American in Singapore or South Africa does not have high roaming costs? I'm not sure that's true. They have established maximum prices, not minimum.

moreentropy 13y ago

[citation needed]

Atropos 13y ago

You are either horribly misinformed or simply trolling. The reason MAXIMUM roaming charges are set by Brussels is that the competition in the telecommunications market EU wide is not working. The main reason for that is a particular market structure: In most countries, landline telecommunication service was provided by the government, and the operators only later being privatized. The now private company could in a way free-ride on the original investment made in the infrastructure by the government, which is why an attack on the market by foreign companies is difficult. Furthermore the telecommunications industry has very strong network effects, so that the dominant natural provider could even be a sort of natural monopoly. The licences for example for 3G/4G networks are mostly offered in a public bidding contest in most EU countries, so the state intervention is quite minimal. Unless you are suggesting government should have nothing to do with it at all, and every operator should simply use any frequency he desires and let's see what happens? Please read https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regulation_on_roaming_charges_in_the_European_Union https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regulation_on_roaming_charges_... to see how bad the situation was before EU intervention!

objclxt 13y ago

You do realise that the reason the EC currently mandates roaming charges caps is because before they did so roaming was stupidly expensive??? You seem to have got the situation completely back to front.