Is Federal Preemption Efficient in Cellular Phone Regulation

Abstract

While many recent state-level efforts to regulate various aspects of the cellular phone industry have been abandoned in favor of federal regulations, other attempts by state regulators still exist. For this reason, Thomas Hazlett proposes that federal regulation is generally more appropriate than state-level action, due to the nature of the cellular industry. After a brief history of the industry, the author analyzes the pros and cons associated with state and federal regulation. The Article then proceeds to address the efficiencies created by national networks and proposes that the fragmentation of controlling regulatory power would reduce these efficiencies. Following a review of regulatory experiments, the author concludes that federal regulation is most appropriate and efficient, and that further state regulation of the cellular telephony could lead to undesirable balkanization of the industry

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