U.S. Mobile Service Prices Actually are Quite Low

Comparing retail prices for anything across countries is difficult, largely because income and costs for anything are different across countries. For that reason, some believe the better gauge is not actual prices for anything, but the price as a percentage of income and costs in any single country.

The bottom line is that where a U.S. mobile service customer might represent a percent or two percent of income, in many countries in the Americas mobile service costs five percent to 15 percent of income, and the same situation prevails in many of the Pacific Islands, for example.

Beyond that, there are lots of other issues that make such determinations complicated. Light users will spend less than heavy users, prepaid users might pay less than postpaid users. Feature phone users might pay less than smart phone users. Users on shared service plans might pay less, per user, than single-person accounts.