Independent Communications Authority of SA have tripped over each other trying to regulate the same thing: MultiChoice-DStv, its content providers and its customers. Their competing conceptions of competition led to sneaky calls and collusive meetings in smoke-free rooms.
If all consumers decide to buy one brand from one supplier, competition policy that forces additional suppliers, and restricts what suppliers may provide, as is proposed, violates consumer freedom of choice If contestable markets — ones without regulatory barriers — result in a single supplier, or none, or a few, the outcome is pro-consumer because it reflects consumer preference. Eminent SA economist William Hutt observed that “consumer sovereignty” prevails in contestable markets. When markets are free and contestable, consumers “vote” in a perpetual dollar democracy for preferred products and suppliers.
Counter-intuitively, competition does not need competitors. A sole supplier is mistakenly called a “monopoly”. Consider a small town such as Wakkerstroom. There was one bank, called a “monopoly”. When it closed, the market remained competitive, without any banks, because it was contestable. When an ATM opened, the bank concerned had to behave competitively because freedom from regulatory barriers of the kind proposed created a threat to entry.
Regarding the poor, all they proposed is vacuous rhetoric. They have no idea how many people watch sport in sports bars, shebeens, township halls, with friends or in restaurants . Nor how many listen to live on radio broadcasts, attend live matches, or watch free-to-air extended highlights.
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