Cable companies have built up a lot of control over the years. They have had nearly undisputed control over utilities everyone is socially expected to have for decades. Although there are many big name cable companies available in the US, due to the locations where they cover, there is little to no competition between them.
If you’ve ever done any research on cable company reviews, you know that nearly all of their customers are not satisfied. This is because they don’t have anything to worry about regarding competition. There is rarely ever a full blown economic battle between companies like Verizon, Time Warner Cable, and Comcast. Each has control over certain districts in the country where they are free to charge as much as they want to their customers.
Competition in a capitalist market it the best way for consumers to benefit in terms of prices. The more competition companies have for getting costumers, the more they are willing to provide you for your money. Even though customers are very unhappy with the cable companies, the customers really don’t have too much of a choice over what services they can get. Even with all that dissatisfaction, monthly fees continue to rise and customer service continues to disappoint.
Cable companies are strongly against Digital antenna tv, since it’s a one time payment option for costumers to provide television service for their homes. However, HDTV antennas are hard for cable companies to restrict since they are regular transferable goods. Instead, cable companies just increase fees on their existing customers and do whatever they can to keep new cable services from gaining ground on their territories.
Companies like Google and T-mobile are currently fighting to get into the industry against the current big name cable and service providers. Google is in the process of trying to install Google Fiber across the country, a fiber optics service that would rival services like Verizon Fios and create large amounts of competition. T-mobile has been offering unlimited data plans, so that mobile users would be free to surf the internet as much as they want.
Google Fiber has recently been able to get some ground in Kansas thanks to local partnerships. Unfortunately, new legislation has been brought to the table in Kansas, trying to outlaw the factors that allowed Google to gain ground in the area. Big cable can be seeing lobbying for their own profits and advantages, which just slows down progress to a fairer market.
Big cable can see the competition trying to break into the market, and they are doing their best to put a stop to it. A great majority of people are all on the side against big cable, although big cable has an intimidating amount of influence in the government. This is a war of money and power, which will slowly affect the present culture.
