Should Canada's cellular network be nationalized?

[TimG]

The terrain of EC Alberta is just as ideal for cell service as that of WC Saskatchewan, yet there are dead zones everywhere besides the Trans Canada - not just in valleys. This is about as apples-to-apples of a comparison as you are going to get.

You miss the point. There are few customers in these areas so a profit driven provider is not going to invest as much. Whatever the government is doing is in Sask it is likely not making money doing it. That also does not change my point about how one does not make decisions on what to do with a national network based on what happens in light populated rural areas.

[eyeball]

Perhaps you should read the post I was responding to.

Fair enough, cyber's question stands, what's your point?

[Rupert S. Lander]

You miss the point. There are few customers in these areas so a profit driven provider is not going to invest as much. Whatever the government is doing is in Sask it is likely not making money doing it. That also does not change my point about how one does not make decisions on what to do with a national network based on what happens in light populated rural areas.

That would be fair comment as long as we were willing to consider the cellular network nothing more than a profit-driven enterprise, indefinitely. If I agreed with that, I would agree with you because, as a general rule, I am as much for free enterprise as anyone.

The whole point I am trying to make is that the cellular network has passed a threshold where it can now be reasonably and feasibly deemed essential infrastructure, on par with other utilities and roads. This is not just a matter of convenience - being able to speedily summon emergency services on a highway can literally be a matter of life or death. Therefore, I never considered and will not consider whether SaskTel (i.e. the Government of Saskatchewan) is directly turning a profit on every single tower they build because, to be frank, that is not why governments invest in infrastructure and that is not why governments are supposed invest in infrastructure.

Edited April 11, 2016 by Rupert S. Lander

[Wilber]

Fair enough, cyber's question stands, what's your point?

My point is, how much are you willing to pay because it isn't a matter of collecting taxes from everyone. Right now, in addition to taxes we pay over $1600 per year in BC MSP premiums. I assume you pay around the same. Are you willing have that doubled or tripled as well as other taxes being raised?

[eyeball]

My point is, how much are you willing to pay because it isn't a matter of collecting taxes from everyone. Right now, in addition to taxes we pay over $1600 per year in BC MSP premiums. I assume you pay around the same. Are you willing have that doubled or tripled as well as other taxes being raised?

Not until every single penny that's hidden in the economy can be accounted for and taxed.

I say again I have zero sympathy for concerns about how harmful social welfare is to the economy in light of how harmful tax evasion is.

[Wilber]

Not until every single penny that's hidden in the economy can be accounted for and taxed.

Well that can never happen so I guess the answer is no.

Edited April 11, 2016 by Wilber

[eyeball]

Fine. Fire up the printing presses at the mint, allow more cheap doctors into the country, scrap the military...I really don't care.

[Wilber]

Fine. Fire up the printing presses at the mint, allow more cheap doctors into the country, scrap the military...I really don't care.

Well you know darn well every penny can't be accounted for and taxed.

[eyeball]

I know darn well we can try a lot harder and I'm not willing to pay a penny more until we do.

[cybercoma]

They'll have lots of money to cover it when asked, instead of not being able to afford it being the meme.

Yeah, I'm sure te extra money one individual gives them would cover most of it.

[cybercoma]

Actually i did. The phone does everything i want out of a computer. No sense in having two. I dont program anything so a phone does the job

You're certainly the exception.

[Bryan]

In the long run competition between private providers is the only path that leads to better value for consumers.

I'm generally with you on that concept, but there are things that break the mold on that, and Saskatchewan is the proof. They have better cell phone rates and plans than anywhere other than Manitoba (and the lone MB company that does almost as well as they do used to be public and still operates in some ways as if it were). MB and Sask also have rates and conditions for car insurance that (in most cases) are as good or better than the neighbouring private options.

As much as I despise the CONTENT on CBC, the infrastructure of it also flies in the face of "private is better". Terrestrial broadcasting may be on it's way out the door, so the future value may be negligible, but for generations CBC was the one that was the very best in the nation when it comes to reaching the most number of people. In large swaths of the country, CBC was the only radio or TV you could get for a long time.

So, even though I originally dismissed the idea of a nationalized cell network, I now wonder if that might be a more productive use of the CBC infrastructure. Use those towers and satellites and repeaters and such as a public cellular network to reach the places that the private service is bad or absent?

[GostHacked]

Now that the vast majority of Canadians own cell phones, is it time to consider nationalizing the country's cellular network? I am referring strictly to things like the cell towers, etc. as opposed to the cellular providers themselves. I base this proposal on the rationale that the public sector ought to be able to provide better and more consistent service across the country (particularly in rural areas) compared to the private sector's current performance, and that the cellular network could now reasonably be deemed essential infrastructure that should be owned by the public sector as opposed to the private sector.

Then what is to say that other things cannot be nationalized? Like oil and gas? This hints of some kind of socialism.

[Rupert S. Lander]

I wouldn't support the nationalization of the oil and gas industry, and for that matter I don't support state ownership of the automobile insurance industry or liquor stores. I'm pretty much in favour of free enterprise and private ownership for everything other than essential services and essential infrastructure. That's a mixed economy, not socialism.

As I've posted more than once in this thread, I have come to the conclusion that the cellular network should be regarded as essential infrastructure and placed under government ownership - preferably at the provincial level although I realize that nationalization could only be enacted by Ottawa.

[dre]

I'm generally with you on that concept, but there are things that break the mold on that, and Saskatchewan is the proof.

The things that break the mold are things that its very hard for the consumer NOT to buy. Cell phones are becoming one of those. Healthcare is another. Auto insurance is another. Companies know they can jack up the rates, and reduce the quality of service and still have about the same number of subscribers.

And that guaranteed customer base allows for very poorly run companies like Rogers and Bell to stay profitable by just charging more.

Hell... they could probably charge 300 dollars a month for basic phone access and there would still be 35 million Canadian subscribers.

I don't support state ownership of the automobile insurance industry or liquor stores.

I agree on liquor stores but disagree on auto insurance. I don't think private insurers should be kept out of the market but I think there should be a public option.

Here's quotes from private insurers in Ontario for the same coverage you get from ICBC for about 1400 bucks.

Edited April 12, 2016 by dre

[Rupert S. Lander]

The things that break the mold are things that its very hard for the consumer NOT to buy. Cell phones are becoming one of those. Healthcare is another. Auto insurance is another. Companies know they can jack up the rates, and reduce the quality of service and still have about the same number of subscribers.

And that guaranteed customer base allows for very poorly run companies like Rogers and Bell to stay profitable by just charging more.

Hell... they could probably charge 300 dollars a month for basic phone access and there would still be 35 million Canadian subscribers.

I agree on liquor stores but disagree on auto insurance. I don't think private insurers should be kept out of the market but I think there should be a public option.

Here's quotes from private insurers in Ontario for the same coverage you get from ICBC for about 1400 bucks.

In a truly competitive industry, companies are accountable to both their shareholders and their customers. Once an industry becomes uncompetitive, shareholders win out every time. At least if the cellular infrastructure was publicly owned there would be some accountability to the voters, both for the rates charged to subscribers via providers and the quality of service rendered. It's far from a perfect system, but it's far better than what we have now.

As for auto insurance - full disclosure, as a forty-ish old driver with a good record I pay about the same for Albertan insurance and plates as I'd pay SGI for the same coverage. It's nothing close to those rates. I suppose the question of whether auto insurance should be public or private largely comes down to whether or not driving is a necessity.

PS I looked it up on the banking app - we paid $2087 to insure two vehicles and $167 to put plates on them. But I didn't create this thread to argue for public or private auto insurance.

Edited April 12, 2016 by Rupert S. Lander

[eyeball]

Nationalization of all sorts of things makes most sense now simply as a cure for offshoring income.

Edited April 12, 2016 by eyeball

[dre]

In a truly competitive industry, companies are accountable to both their shareholders and their customers. Once an industry becomes uncompetitive, shareholders win out every time. At least if the cellular infrastructure was publicly owned there would be some accountability to the voters, both for the rates charged to subscribers via providers and the quality of service rendered. It's far from a perfect system, but it's far better than what we have now.

As for auto insurance - full disclosure, as a forty-ish old driver with a good record I pay about the same for Albertan insurance and plates as I'd pay SGI for the same coverage. It's nothing close to those rates. But I suppose the question of whether auto insurance should be public or private largely comes down to whether or not driving is a necessity.

I think for an industry to be truly competitive there has to be a LOT of supply side players. If there's a few big fish then theres a good chance they are too smart to get into a price war with each other. They watch what the others are charging and act accordingly... especially when there's limited consumer choice.

Lets say you and I both sell water by the glass and each glass costs us 50 cents. We are the only two vendors on a busy walking trail across a dry hot desert. People pretty much have to buy some water on their way by (limited ability for the consumer to choose not to buy). Both of us know that we will BOTH make more money charging $50 dollars per glass... we aren't going to have a price war and "compete" each other down to 75 cents.

Its unspoken collusion... not competition. And its happening because the consumers cant choose not to buy.

Whats more is that we no longer have much of an incentive to run our businesses well. We can make all kinds of bad decisions and still show our shareholders that we are making big profits.

[Bonam]

Its unspoken collusion... not competition. And its happening because the consumers cant choose not to buy.

The US has 4 national cell service providers (Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile, and Sprint). Their relationship looks a lot more like competition than collusion. Sprint competes on low prices, Verizon competes on having the most coverage, T-Mobile competes on all the extras that you get, etc. They're constantly trying to steal customers from each other however they can. I don't think this competition would turn necessarily to collusion if you had 3 instead of 4. And large Canadian markets can and do definitely support 3 providers.

As for the idea of government owned cell towers... hah! We'd still be on 2G.

The government's role is to properly regulate the industry and to prevent monopolies and collusion, not to take it over.

Edited April 12, 2016 by Bonam

[bush_cheney2004]

The US has 4 national cell service providers (Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile, and Sprint). Their relationship looks a lot more like competition than collusion.

Agreed, and further to this point, lots of additional competition exists in the way of national and regional resellers (mobile virtual networks) that lease services from the major providers listed. 3G text, voice, and data plans are available for as low as $8 USD/month. MVNOs are also available in Canada.

[dre]

The US has 4 national cell service providers (Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile, and Sprint). Their relationship looks a lot more like competition than collusion. Sprint competes on low prices, Verizon competes on having the most coverage, T-Mobile competes on all the extras that you get, etc. They're constantly trying to steal customers from each other however they can. I don't think this competition would turn necessarily to collusion if you had 3 instead of 4. And large Canadian markets can and do definitely support 3 providers.

The government's role is to properly regulate the industry and to prevent monopolies and collusion, not to take it over.

Managing critical infrastructure is often a government role.

As for the idea of government owned cell towers... hah! We'd still be on 2G.

Why wouldn't they simply buy LTE base-station hardware from Samsung or Errikson or Altec Lucent or Motorola and plug it in? A 4G upgrade starts at about 25k per tower and is extremely easy to do. Its about as hard as getting a home wifi network up and running. You plug a piece of hardware in to an outlet... plug in a T1/T3 line... and plug in the antenna.

Were you under the impression that companies like Roger actually develop technology or tackle difficult IT problems?

The government is actually positioned very well to run cell towers. First of all they wouldn't have to pay for radio spectrum... they also wouldn't have to purchase or lease much land. The government could then sell bandwidth at cost to dozens of providers.

Anyways... back to your silly claim. In my province at least the government does a decent job of running and maintaining the power grid. They don't use hardware that's generations old... the grid is fairly modern, and its functional and pretty affordable. And building and running a power grid is a fairly big technical challenge... running a cell network is easy in comparison.

Edited April 12, 2016 by dre