Screenshot showing Comcast’s current prices in the bay area as of 1/19/2011

I’ve got to hand it to Comcast, it may have taken them a year to get their merger approved, but the “handcuffs” that the transaction will impose may as well have been handed to them on a silver platter. Frankly, I’m less concerned with the monopoly that this will give them on content and more concerned with the monopoly they already have on my internet access, but irregardless of what I think about the merger, the one thing that’s abundantly clear is that the FCC is certainly no friend to the consumer.

Most of the conditions around the Comcast merger seem to deal with content, but the one piece that actually “sounds” like it could help consumers is the requirement that Comcast provide $49.95 stand alone internet access to their customers for the next three years.

On the surface, I like the idea of a price cap, but when you do the math, it’s clear that the FCC has left plenty of room for profits in Comcast’s future.

Because Comcast currently offers stand alone internet access at $40.95 per month (or at they do in the SF bay area), it means that their prices can go up by $9 over the next three years, before they’ll have to worry about hitting the cap. This means that they get to increase rates by 21% to comply with the program.

Ouch, I’m sure that it will be painful to comply with this condition :roll: When you also consider that the price cap is only for 3 years (despite all the other conditions being for 7 years), it means that Comcast could effectively increase rates by 7.3% each year. With the historical rate of inflation around 3.25%, it’s clear that consumers are getting bamboozled on this one.