CapEx obviously doesn't tell the story, certainly not for companies like AT&T and Verizon. Try fundamentals; Moores has done good work for bandwidth, as media i

CapEx obviously doesn't tell the story, certainly not for companies like AT&T and Verizon. Try fundamentals; Moores has done good work for bandwidth, as media is still being streamed at 6 MBit. I'm not sure lawmakers understand this; there is no capacity problem. Technology is vastly ahead of growth and certainly consumer access to bandwidth. Meanwhile, internet providers are trying to tell lawmakers they need to make YouTube (and customers) pay for traffic because theres somehow congestion. Of course it's not a technical fact. The basic idea is that regulating them to be the dumb pipe can yield the biggest gain for the general economy, while they get the benefit of a low margin, but extremely stable business (as with any other infrastructure). The obvious problem right now is that instead of competing with each other, internet providers are trying to compete with their customers. That is not the sign of a working market, and it is not acceptable for critical infrastructure. Regulation is needed, and certainly not towards giving providers more flexibility.