Dispelling the Myth of a Terminating Access Monopoly

Central to the rationale that Title II advocates persist in using to justify common carrier regulation is the claim that broadband providers supposedly enjoy a “terminating access monopoly” that allows them to restrict consumer choice and disadvantage competitors. This is simply not true.

We filed a declaration by Professor Janusz Ordover, former Deputy Assistant Attorney General for Economics in the Antitrust Division of the US Department of Justice, and Dr. Andres Lerner confirming that there is no “terminating access monopoly” for wireless broadband. As Drs. Ordover and Lerner explain, the basic premise for that case is both flatly inconsistent with the competitive reality of the mobile broadband marketplace and deeply flawed as a matter of economic theory. The declaration also makes clear that there is no terminating monopoly in the case of Verizon’s wireline broadband services, including Verizon’s FiOS broadband service, since these services face near-ubiquitous competition with next generation cable broadband. The lack of a “terminating monopoly” eviscerates the case for Title II reclassification. When these economic considerations are added to the many other legal, factual and public policy arguments against Title II regulation, the risk of pursuing the radical Title II path becomes all the more clear.