All statements are equal until someone, anyone delivers better factual basis. But with a lack of factual basis on either side, both are equal, yes. If both carry “some backing”, then both are still equal, depending on how much weight you give the respective backings. Even the “backings” can come from sources that are impossible to qualify - op-eds don’t exactly allow us to see the evidence they claim they themselves saw. It’s like the NSA claiming how much we need them. Do we? We’ll never know because they’ll never show us the evidence.
Possibly, but neither you or I know this. There have also been claims that when the 1996 Telecommunications Reform Act was passed the phone companies lobbied to get over $200 billion in tax breaks and subsidies to build the infrastructure form the government. They were rewarded with this, and proceeded not to build it, instead investing in services that were presently profitable rather than investing in the future. Now, while there is no federal program there are state-by-state programs, including direct investment, tax breaks, public-private partnerships, etc., yet prices do not reflect the differences. Additionally, I think it was another $4 billion was given out during the latest stimulus package for more broadband infrastructure. Prices, again, did not waver. Maybe a federal program would affect prices, if it were the right program and ongoing, but to say that lack of government assistance with infrastructure is why prices are high, doesn’t bear out completely. So at the very least there has to be more to it.
Also, there’s no such thing as “artificially low” pricing if the companies are profitable. If they’re profitable, the price matches the costs involved. Artificially high, however, is harder to gauge - how profitable is “artificially high” profitability? That’s the real question at play in this whole debate, and probably the crux to what you’re trying to argue here.
The FCC regulations requiring everyone to build their own infrastructure is a game played by the telecos - it’s why the regulation was instituted in the first place, to stop third party competition from using telephone infrastructure back in the day. Instead it became a regulation to compete on a level only the massive telecos could manage - building infrastructure no one else could afford. This in no way allows for a defense of the telecos price gouging at this point in time so they can cover their unnecessary “infrastructure costs” which they lobbied into being in the first place.
“Congestion” is also an unknown quantity - are they throttling or is there really congestion? Is there really congestion because the network they build was intentionally limiting in this way with only a smaller percentage of networks build for super-speeds that could be gotten for elite pricing (the $200/month packages of 100GB speeds, etc). Nothing we’ve seen suggests that congestion happens naturally, especially with the European systems offering greater speeds with zero congestion in more densely populated areas.
