Chatham Dems

There is an article in the Savannah Morning News today, about television on the internet. What the writer fails to recognize is how rapidly the United States is falling behind the rest of the world in internet technology.

Americans will never want to watch much video on the web until our broadband connections improve. We have much slower, much more expensive “high speed” internet access than Japan, France, and South Korea. All three, and Germany, have more broadband subscribers per 100 population than we do. France leads the world in the number of subscribers to internet TV. The United States is not even in the top 10.

In the Clinton era, regulators forced local phone companies to act as common carriers, so that competing service providers could use their lines. As a result, American internet flourished during the dial-up era. Reed Hundt, then chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, tried to ensure that this open competition would continue — but the telecommunications giants sabotaged their efforts, while The Wall Street Journal’s editorial page ridiculed them as people with the minds of French bureaucrats.

French bureaucrats (if they care) get the last laugh. Under the Bush administration, the F.C.C. removed all regulations that encouraged competition among internet providers. Most people now have the choice between a cable company monopoly and a telephone company monopoly. The price is high and the service rotten, but you have no other choice. Meanwhile, France used careful regulation to promote competition and the installation of faster phone lines. French consumers can now choose among a variety of providers who offer affordable internet access that is faster than anything I can get and comes with free voice calls, WiFi, and TV.

In telecommunications, in healthcare, in education, and in just about all things scientific, the United States is falling steadily behind the rest of the world. Empires don’t really fall. They crumble.

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