Word: breakups
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TELEPHONES. The dismantling of Ma Bell in 1984, the result of a Government antitrust suit, is probably the most unpopular deregulatory move. According to a Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll published in April, 59% of consumers think the breakup was a "bad thing." One emerging problem is the perceived decline in the quality of the nation's telephone service since the Bell system was broken up. Customer complaints and confusion are at an all-time high...
Since the breakup, telephone users have enjoyed a cut in long-distance rates of about 20%, or $4 billion, thanks mainly to deep rate reductions by AT&T that tiny rivals like MCI and US Sprint find difficult to match. But rates for local service, which remains a monopoly business, have jumped nearly 35%, or $6 billion. Overall, a typical telephone bill has increased about 25%. The increases in local rates appear likely to slow down, but unfortunately so do the long-distance discounts. AT&T so dominates the market, with an 82% share, that its competitors may lack...
Frustrated consumers can find relief at their local telephone-equipment stores, where they have enjoyed a remarkable bounty. Since the breakup, the number of telephone makers selling to the U.S. market has jumped from 25 to more than 200, which has vastly improved the range of prices, styles and capabilities. The high-tech scramble has produced phones with such space-age functions as voice-activated dialing and message machines...
...field with three awards. (Its third was for a feature story by Steve Twomey about life aboard an aircraft carrier.) The New York Times won two: one for its coverage of the aftermath of the space shuttle Challenger disaster and another for reporting by Alex S. Jones on the breakup of the Bingham family's Louisville newspaper empire. The / Los Angeles Times also took two prizes: for Michael Parks' reports from South Africa and Richard Eder's book criticism. Charles Krauthammer, a Washington Post columnist and TIME essayist, won the commentary award for his newspaper columns, and Berke Breathed, creator...
...ignorance about the Pollard operation. "If we had one major party in power, you'd find a scapegoat. But here they all hang together because everybody's implicated," charges Shlomo Avineri, a former director general of the Israeli Foreign Ministry. "You can't scapegoat anyone. That would mean a breakup of the government...