From Consumer Reports:
Quote:
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Cord cutters are buying antennas to save money by cutting their monthly pay-TV services—and they’re doing it in large numbers. Consumer research from Parks Associates shows that the percentage of U.S. broadband households that use digital antennas in their home has steadily increased, reaching 20 percent by the end of 2017, up from 16 percent in early 2015.
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So why are Comcast profits increasing when number of customers is decreasing? Harm to net neutrality has increases profits of the duopolies. Consumers typically only have two choices for internet service. So internet prices have slowly increased. And profits from internet services has increased significantly thanks to less free market competition.
Comcast had 22 million customers in 2018. Down from 24 million in 2016. And now down to 21.8 million in 2019. So profits should be dropping. Nope. Harm to net neutrality and the resulting increase in prices as well as now changing the content providers have caused profits from their internet business to increase by 10% to 4.4 billion. Did profits increase because they provided better service or more innovation? Nope. As net neutrality is undermined, then the duopoly (ie Comcast) realize increased profits.
Just another example of why harm to free market competition is bad for consumers; good for the corporate elites.