Manage the cell tower infrastructure and spectrum themselves through a non profit GSE (government sponsored entity) (think ISO grid operators for electric grids) and make every commercial provider an MVNO stakeholder. Similar to a municipality owning the last mile fiber to the house, and any provider can provide you service with a quick patch cable or VLAN change at the central office/colo facility.

Running a nationwide cellular network is expensive and complicated AF. You have to provide a level playing field if you want to enable competition without needing hundreds of millions of dollars to start up.

Competition between carriers has partly driven the widespread availability of coverage. Several carriers compete on the basis of their coverage. A government-funded entity seems highly unlikely to provide optimal coverage, or to do so in a cost-efficient manner.

I'm not categorically against government-run solutions. But the cellular market isn't so obviously broken that a government-run system has any hope of being better. U.S. market concentration in cellular is less than for shipping, ecommerce, and soft drinks, and a lot less than for mobile operating systems, search, or social media. Verizon and AT&T's combined market share of about 68% is about the same as Apple and Samsung's combined share of the U.S. smart phone market.

with 4G finally getting fast enough (along with the low latency promises of 5G), i think we're almost at the point where what you propose might make sense.

before this, wireless tech/infrastructure just wasn't good enough, and needed continuing investment to improve. now that we're over the hump, a GSE can begin buying up the 4G infrastructure and leaving operations/service to the carriers.

since there are 4 national and some regional carriers, you could even divvy the duplicative infrastructure up between state and federal GSEs, much like state and federal highways. then you'd have some semblance of competition that would keep the infrastructure from just crumbling away from political/bureaucratic neglect.

Breaking up the carriers would be worse for consumers. Every carrier now has some semblance of “nationwide” coverage.

Break them up by region? With ability to use each other’s equipment? Idk, I’m shooting in the dark.

Yeah I know....

I guess you could enforce roaming agreements like they do in the EU(?) but then you still would have carriers having to negotiate with each other when one carrier has more external roaming traffic with the other - like Internet peering arrangements.

I don’t have a strong emotional opinion either way. Just trying to come up with pros and cons.

Breakup by region would not increase competition from the perspective of most consumers. They would have the same number of options.

I don’t see how. Most of the small carriers piggyback off the big 4 networks anyways.

Government owned infrastructure that anyone can rent space on. That way there is minimal startup costs.

If we did that 30 years ago, we’d have really affordable GPRS systems. We can’t even upgrade bridges and dams.

do...do we want GPRS?

That's the parent's point. If the government owned the wireless infrastructure, that infrastructure would be in the same state as our dams and bridges (i.e. not good).

Obviously your government has to not be a disaster before this will work.

Fun fact: Maryland's transit agency recently moved to diesel technology for its next generation of commuter train locomotives. The railroads in this area were first electrified more than a century ago, and most of the last several generations of locomotives were electric. But the overhead catenary is in bad shape, and some lines have stops that haven't been electrified. Maryland apparently believes that, over the 20-30 year service life of these locomotives, the infrastructure is likely to deteriorate further (to 19th century levels), instead of improve, such that diesel is the smarter option.