Penetration Minutes Average revenue (subscribersl of use per minute Country 100 persons) Who pays? per month (dollars) United States Both parties Canada Both parties Finland Caller France Caller Germany Caller Italy Caller United Kingdom Caller Japan Caller South Korea Caller Australia Caller Source: FCC, 9th Annual CMRS Competition Report (September 2004), appendix A, table 11. U.S. carriers use three or four different standards, each uses the same stan- dard across all fifty states and offers a roaming-free national calling plan. One can take a GSM telephone across borders in Europe, but only at severe financial risk because intercountry roaming rates are extraordinarily high. Frequent travelers may have accounts in each country and a separate chip (or "SIM card") for each country, but such a practice is surely much less convenient than the situation in the United States. Finally, one cannot ignore the striking result that emerges from table 7-4. Wireless rates are lowest and usage is greatest in the United States and Canada. 46 In the United States, in particular, the low, national rates have propelled cell phone usage to extremely high levels by international stan- dards. If European policies are better, why are their prices much higher and their usage much lower than those found in the United States? Conclusion The U.S. wireless sector is growing rapidly, both in terms of subscribers and in minutes of use. A highly competitive set of five carriers introduced national pricing plans that have diverted a very large share of minutes from the fixed-line network. This competition developed in an environment of very little regulation. As a result, prices reflect network costs, not the regu- lators' desire to cross-subsidize various services. Recently, many wireless The Rapid Growth of Wireless Telecommunications subscribers have decided to drop their fixed-line service altogether. Al- though there is no firm econometric evidence on the degree of wireless substitution for fixed-wire service, wireless carriers have c