By Jim Baller & Casey Lide
Over the last two decades, Congress has enacted increasingly forceful federal legislation intended to foster and protect competition in the cable industry. The evidence bears out the wisdom of this policy — year in and year out, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has found that incumbents charge lower prices, offer more channels, provide better customer service and introduce more new products and services in markets in which they face meaningful competition from terrestrial competitors than in markets in which they do not.