The effects of regulatory policy on the international telecommunications market

The author argues that though telecommunications is in a new era, the industry is operating in an environment designed for a past era in which government policies helped foster the expansion of national networks, built by monopolies that operated under varying degrees of oversight. He maintains that the transition from monopoly-based regulation to oversight of a competitive industry has gotten stuck somewhere in the middle, a no-man´s-land called ´regulated competition´, putting AT&T at a competitive disadvantage with its long-distance rivals. While some of the resulting marketplace distortions will clear up as regulatory rules are peeled away over time, he regards it as urgent that unnecessary and unneeded regulatory restraints be removed quickly, because they act as a drag on competitive response in an industry that is crucial to the global competitiveness of US business and industry. The author also examines the effect of government policies beyond the US shoreline on the competitiveness of US telecommunications in world markets.<>