President Obama sure has a funny way of showing how much he cares about job creation. Every time he or his czars get a chance, they come down on the side of unemployment. If they have their way, we’ll all be unemployed. The latest news is that AT&T has cancelled plans to merge with T-Mobile because the Federal Communications Commission and the Department of Justice had to get in the way. Bye, bye jobs! We hardly knew ya!
AT&T announced late Monday afternoon plans to drop its $39 billion bid to purchase T-Mobile, citing federal government intervention by the Federal Communications Commission and the Obama Justice Department as reasons for ending the deal.
A looming spectrum crisis — a shortage the availability of electromagnetic spectrum, the substance on which wireline and mobile communication travels — shadows over Washington bureaucrats, lawmakers and telecommunications companies; the deadline, 2015.
Solving the spectrum crisis — caused by increased adoption of mobile broadband devices, through federal “auctions” — is seen as one way to reduce the federal deficit by putting the auction proceeds into the U.S. treasury.
Supporters of AT&T’s deal with T-Mobile also saw the merger as another solution to the “crunch.”
Randall Stephenson, AT&T chairman and CEO, said in a statement announcing the end of the deal, “Over the past four years we have invested more in our networks than any other U.S. company.”
“As a result, today we deliver best-in-class mobile broadband speeds — connecting smartphones, tablets and emerging devices at a record pace — and we are well under way with our nationwide 4G LTE deployment,” said Stephenson.
Stephenson said that policy makers should “allow the free markets to work so that additional spectrum is available to meet the immediate needs of the U.S. wireless industry,” and that “policymakers should enact legislation to meet our nation’s longer-term spectrum needs.” (Read More)
Tech Freedom Fellows Larry Downes, Geoffrey Manne and Berin Szoka also weighed in:
Nearly two years ago, the Obama FCC declared a spectrum crisis. But Congress has refused to authorize the agency to reallocate underused spectrum from television broadcasters and government agencies–which would take years anyway.
The AT&T/T-Mobile merger would have eased this crisis and accelerated the deployment of next-generation 4G networks. Yet the government killed the deal based on formalistic and outdated measures of market concentration–even though the FCC’s own data show dynamic competition, falling prices, and new entry. The disconnect is jarring.
Those celebrating the deal’s collapse will wake up to a sober reality: There is no Plan B for more spectrum. All the hand-wringing about “preserving” competition has only denied consumers a strong 4G LTE competitor to compete with Verizon–and slammed the brakes on continued growth of the mobile marketplace.
Unfortunately, this is just part of a broader pattern of regulators attempting to engineer technology markets they don’t understand. The letter sent today by the Senate Antitrust Subcommittee urging the Department of Justice to investigate Google’s business practices relies on similar contortions of market definition to conclude that the search market is not competitive. In both cases, regulators are applying 1960s economics to 21st century markets.
Ultimately, it’s consumers who will lose from such central planning.
Jonathan Collegio of American Crossroads pointed out how this is just part and parcel of Obama’s anti-jobs agenda.
Even according to the Communications Workers of America, the ATT/T-Mobile merger would have repatriated and created more than 100,000 quality jobs in America. Just like the Keystone pipeline, where even the unions said the administration could unleash the creation of 20,000 desperately needed jobs with a presidential signature – Barack Obama put politics and his circle of supporters above job creation.
Obama has put politics over jobs again and again – with the rejection of the AT&T/T-Mobile merger (-101k jobs), the administration’s net neutrality proposal (-500k jobs), the Keystone XL pipeline (-18k-100k jobs), new EPA regulations on energy (-hundreds of thousands of jobs), the NLRB/Boeing debacle (-5k jobs), the Obamacare tax on medical devices (-40k jobs), and Obama’s attacks on the American-based corporate jet industry (-thousands of jobs) and numerous other policies and regulations.
He was reminded of this ad they put out not too long ago.
I’m reminded of this chart showing Obama’s dismal record on the economy.
Is it any wonder he’s been such a disaster? My cat could do a better job.
Liberalmann, among others, are going to be very disappointed to hear that the big money liberals who have supported him in the past are even questioning “what the hell is it with this guy” when it comes to jobs creation–citing the pipeline and other specifics. When even THEY think he’s caved to some special interest, you know he’s in trouble. No one is a bigger environmentalist than I am—in the proper sense, having a love and respect for the natural state of the planet. But that must be balanced with the love and respect I have for mankind, too, and we must have a LEADER, not a READER in the White House next time around.
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I love that Obama is refusing to press the magic jobs button just to destroy this country, all the while pushing his socialist-marxist-communistic-muslim theocratic agenda.
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Obvious monopoly is obvious. That would be like if Microsoft games division bought out Sony, leaving only Nintendo and Microsoft on the console market…while microsoft already has the biggest cut when it comes to the PC gaming market as well (becaue every gaming PC is running windows).
In short, while it would of solved some issues, and may of created some jobs, it would of done so by passing on the creation of jobs with hire cellphone rates by sheer virtue that they’ll have little to no competition. This is wholly different then the keystone project.
Overall, I think it was the right call to stop the merger.
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