Why The U.S. No Longer Leads the World in Mobile Communications

The U.S. is officially nowhere near the best in mobile communications.

It’s an unequivocal fact that this country has been whipped up into a frenzy over Apple’s latest technology, the iPhone 5. This is particularly because it features the newest Holy Grail of Mobile Communication: 4G LTE. Although it’s been around in the country since 2010, both Apple and major cellular providers have been hyping up increased access and rollout of the upgrade to our mobile and data transfers — and geeks are rejoicing as well.

The only problem? LTE, a service proposed in 2005 and nationwide standard in a handful of countries, is already becoming out-moded by faster, smarter technologies. Ladies and gentleman, we are being lapped in the telecom world.

In looking at the bigger picture, the telecoms systems in the U.S. aren’t in any way considered “excellent.” The country that invented the telephone and spent decades dominating nationwide (and worldwide) communication is now losing out to not only known technophile countries like South Korea and Japan but also European countries like Sweden, Norway and Finland.

If that doesn’t smart, then what will is the fact that when it comes to services we have, we are mediocre at best. According to the most recent worldwide study conducted by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) on worldwide telecommunications development determined that America has fallen out of the top tier of telecommunications coverage. The country scraped by with 2% above average for nationwide 3G adoption, and a jaw-dropping 16th in broadband coverage.

The U.S. is ultimately setting itself up to be left in the dust with mobile communications, and the consumers are feeling it in dropped calls, data caps and increasing bills.

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