The End of the End of Competition for Digital Access Service
The Telecommunications Act of 1996 promised consumers that competition would replace regulation, delivering a wide range of competing choices. For local service, deregulation took place, competition did not follow. Each of the most important local communications markets, multichannel video, broadband data service and wireless service remains a highly concentrated market. In each of product markets, a series of mergers eliminated actual and potential competitors. In each market, a seminal, groundbreaking transaction unleashed a merger wave (two Baby Bells merge, a Baby bell acquires a long distance company, cable giants are allowed to merger, cellular companies are gobbled up by the dominant firms).
