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broadbandreports.com

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  Mexicans Overbilled Billions For Internet, Voice - Courtesy of Carlos Slim and Telmex Monopoly

  Posted: January 31st, 2012, 9:37am MST

  
  According to a new report, Mexicans have been overcharged $13.4 billion a year for phone and Internet services, primarily thanks to the fact that the Mexican telecom market is dominated by one player: billionaire Carlos Slim and his incumbent telco Telmex. Telmex dominates 80% of the landline voice and broadband market, with Slim also controlling about 70% of the wireless market with America Movil.
  
  According to the new report, Mexico's uncompetitive market resulted in consumers paying $129 billion over five years, nearly 2 percent of the country's economic output. The report found Mexico had the lowest per capita public investment in telecommunications in the 34-member OECD, while Telmex maintained a profit margin of 47 percent, among the highest of all member countries.
  
  What's to be done? The OECD report suggests that actually having a strong-willed and independent regulator that does its job would be a great start. That's in stark contrast to the dominant carrier discourse that all regulation and regulators are utterly irredeemable because government can simply never, ever work properly (ignoring of course that carrier lobbyists and guys like Carlos Slim work tirelessly to ensure this becomes true).
  
  "Mexico should make the regulatory authority Cofetel more powerful and independent," notes the OECD. "This would include increasing its financial and administrative independence and being able to impose higher sanctions than it can today to deter anti-competitive behaviour."
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