Washington State Attorney General Bob Ferguson is expanding a $100 million dollar lawsuit against Comcast. They have evidence that Comcast tricked over 500k of it's customers into paying a total of $73 million bogus subscription fees for a fake Service Protection Plan.
This is what corporations do when they are a monopoly, they take advantage of people to increase their revenue and profits.
More info in the article;
http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/Comcast-Accused-Again-of-Billing-Fraud-140942
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Comcast isn't a monopoly. Charter Communications, AT&T, etc still exist.
Either way, the antidote is competition and free market capitalism. That is the only way to kill monopolies. If the state does it you live in an authoritarian country and your freedoms will be taken next. It also kills trust and artificially shifts the market, rather than the natural collapse that would happen in the free market.
Make sure not to support any laws that support the idea of a monopoly. Net neutrality was particularly bad for this because it enforced the monopolies that these corporations had.
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A free market economy is a fairy tale, it does not work in practice, please give me an example of a country on earth where there is a working free market economy where a government does not have any laws/regulations over how a private corporation can perform it's business practices?
The reason a free market economy does not work is because the goal of any private corporation is to make the most revenue/profit in the market it is operating in, and to do that it must do whatever it takes to be #1. In order to be #1 you have to eliminate your competition, private corporations don't like competition, so they can either make a better product, price their competition out of the market, or simply buy the corporation that is competing against them (or even lie to their consumers, telling them their product does this and this when it actually does no such thing). In a free market economy a corporation can do any of these with no consequences since there are no laws/regulations telling them how to run their business.
Since the USA is technically not a free market economy another favorite thing for corporations to do is simply take over the government. They turn the government into an oligarchy and either eliminate or create laws that help them increase their revenue/profits. They currently do this by lobbying and bribing/funding politicians.
Once a corporation like Comcast gets to the size it has, it is impossible to compete against, no smaller company has a chance. You are correct, Comcast is technically not a monopoly but it is as close as you can get to one in the current system we have simply because there are some areas of the USA where Comcast is the only option for consumers, there is no one else to choose from.
Net Neutrality did not enforce monopolies, it protected consumers from corporations like Comcast and AT&T, that is why they paid million of $$$ to politicians to eliminate the law so now they can increase their revenue/profits.
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If free market capitalism doesn’t work, how did America become the greatest nation on earth? How did 1 billion people get elevated out of poverty in 20 years? Why is Singaporean unregulated internet the fastest in the world.
I study economics and free market capitalism works. It works in every society and more often than not a monopoly is a byproduct of regulation. If you want prosperity you become capitalist. If you want tyranny and failure, turn to the government for everything.
Your phone? Brought to you by capitalism. As is your internet. Your car.
The free market works because greed aligns with the good of society. Making profit means providing a product or service that people want. That’s a fantastic thing because the worst people have to contribute to society to make money.
You have large blind spots when it comes to understanding the economy and even greater blind spots with net neutrality. Under net neutrality the doomsday scenario was legal. Corporations were allowed to throttle internet and make fast lanes. But they didn’t.
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Like I said above, if a free market economy is such a great system please name me one country on earth that currently uses a free market economic system?
America was never a free market economy, the closest it ever was to a free market economy was before the Great Depression of the 1930's, and the economy almost collapsed. And since you are familiar with economic history you should know what happened after the great depression, capitalism almost ended if it had not been for FDR saving it with social programs...
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Singapore. America was a free market economy under Calvin Coolidge in the 20s. The Great Depression began as a stock market crash in 1929, but became a depression after Herbert Hoover's interventionist policies. FDR's more radical interventionist policies prolonged the depression and made it the Great Depression. FDR did not save the economy, he held it back for many years longer and it was only after winning the war that America was able to have a stable economy again. Since I study economics in higher education I have an understanding of what causes economic crises.
The idea that FDR somehow saved the economy is ludicrous. Capitalism was working and recession/crises solve themselves far better without government intervention.
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Ah yes Singapore, one of the tax havens for the wealthy... and of course one of the highest wealth inequality rates in the world an obvious symptom of a so called free market, the destruction of a middle class.
So your example of a free market is a country that created an economy the wealthy and the corporations they own ran to just so they could avoid paying taxes in the countries they were before...
Singapore may be closer to a free market than other countries but their government still has plenty of involvement in how the economy is run.
Since you claim to study economics you must understand how FDR's policies saved the US economy after the depression but it seems you are not willing to admit it from your statements. So there really is no need for us to continue this discussion, good luck to you.
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Of course Singapore’s government has an effect on the economy. It’s still a free market because taxes are fair and regulations are low. Singapore has an average internet down speed of 150MB/s, twice that of America.
Wealth inequality doesn’t mean very much. All it shows is that those willing to be successful make a lot of money and those unwilling do not. Inequality isn’t a bad thing or a good thing. It’s not something that should be changed or corrected in a free market system.
If FDR saved the economy, why is it that the economy only picked up after his death? He was a big time interventionist and caused mass unemployment. FDR wanted control, not prosperity. Winning the war is what boosted the economy back, not FDR’s failed policies that made a depression last for 10 years with the effects felt heavily until 1945.
The notion that FDR was good for the economy is revisionist history and an unwillingness to admit how harmful FDR actually was.
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Hi all! A wide range of services, including cable TV, Internet, telephone, and home security, have made Comcast a one-stop destination for customers looking for reliable, quality telecommunications solutions. Today they serve several million users, who in comcast reviews report that they almost never have problems with this company, and they are happy about it. It is worth saying that their prices are among the best, and therefore many people choose this particular telecommunications provider.
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