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Comment by gaoshan | Hacker News Reader

It is totally pro-monopoly. I live in Ohio and many of our communities are only served by a single provider. Those providers offer fairly sluggish service as well as fairly high costs. People that I work with regularly complain about one or the other. My community discussed community broadband (going so far as to put at least exploring it to a vote on one of our ballots). It was shot down ("Why do we need to increase taxes to pay for this? I already have the internets... no one needs more") and shortly after that we finally got a second provider. Just that second provider caused prices to plummet. I went from being stuck with getting anywhere from 5 to 30 down (advertised as "up to 100") for $75 a month to getting gigabit internet for $65 a month.

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I heard a while ago that Ohio wrote into the Constitution a monopoly on casino gambling.\

Not knowing if I was remembering correctly, I read through the state constitution, and holy hell, they dedicate like seven pages of the constitution to casino gambling for four gambling facilities. For reference, most other sections are a few paragraphs, at most.

It's not that uncommon, actually.

In The Netherlands, both running a lottery and running a physical casinos are reserved for two state-owned companies. By law, half of the profit goes to charity. The rest goes to the government.

In Sweden, the government-owned liquor chain Systembolaget is the only one allowed to sell stuff containing more than 3.5% alcohol. Norway has basically the same thing going on.

The idea is that things like gambling and alcohol consumption have an overall negative impact on society, but completely banning them will cause even more harm. Having a state monopoly makes it easier to promote safe and moderate consumption, as no profit is required and criminal figures are kept out - at least in theory.

Oregon has a state run liquor board over distribution. It's great as technically they own all the product in a licensed liquor store so prices are identical. You can walk into any place, make a request for a certain bottle, and it usually arrives in a few days at the same price it would be anywhere else. If only we could apply that model to other services...

And they run a nice, light weight web site designed in the mid-2000s which lets you search the entire inventory for the liquor you want, where to buy it and for how much.

Well, these aren't state-owned entities, which is a key distinction. Most people are okay with state-run monopolies. This more akin to if The Netherlands updated their constitution to say that only Coca-cola soft drinks are allowed to be sold in the country.

Most states would put something along the lines of, "A state gaming commission will be created, with the duties and structure granted to them by the Congress of <state>." Then pass a subsequent law outlining the nitty-gritty details.

IANAL, but I suppose this is the result of some fuckery by the casino owners. It's probably easier to modify the constitution than it is to get actual laws past.

Same thing happened with marijuana.

https://stonerdays.com/will-ohio-legalize-a-marijuana-monopo...

Roughly one-third of US states have various forms of monopoly over liquor sales; sometimes it's just over wholesaling, and in a few states, only state-run stores are allowed to sell beverages over some ABV: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcoholic_beverage_control_sta...

It was/is a sensible strategic move to frame cannabis legalization as "regulate it like alcohol"; but looking at the bizarre patchwork of regulations for each state regarding alcohol (a historical side effect of the gradual elimination of Prohibition), a lot of that baggage is now getting carried over to cannabis ("from grain to bottle" compliance -> "from seed to sale").

I personally consider states and investors getting a steep cut or artificial monopoly to be a lesser evil than tolerating the grave injustice of the War on Drugs, but as legalization becomes more normalized, it's worth paying attention to these details and policy trade-offs on new state initiatives.

Source: Coloradan who formerly worked in alcohol compliance.

Not sure how it works in other states but in Ohio, voters can vote in changes directly to the state constitution. Thus the constitution is huge. I'm not sure what it takes to get on the ballot but it sounds like a way for special interests to just bypass the legislative process if they can get voter approval. There were 4 casinos permitted in the Ohio constitution change across 2 owners, but no provision for competitors to come in, it's just these 4 until another amendment.

Unfortunately, any citizen's initiative that is placed on the ballot in Ohio is an amendment to the constitution. This has an upside in that the legislature can't really override the direct will of the citizenry, but it also means that things that might not be a great fit for the constitution are there.

Massachusetts' Constitution practically grants Harvard sovereign immunity. There were different purposes and circumstances 230 years ago however.

https://malegislature.gov/laws/constitution#chapterVSectionI

The monopoly exists in certain sub categories of internet. Gigabit is limited to the terrestrial providers that each municipality allows access to the monopoly they have on the telephone poles. There are alternatives in most rural areas to the terrestrial services, but not in the gigabit speed yet.

https://www.whistleout.com/Internet/Guides/ohio-satellite-in...

> Viasat's plans start at around $50/month and with it you get an unlimited data at speeds up to 50Mbps

Starlink exists:

https://governor.ohio.gov/wps/portal/gov/governor/administra...

wikipedia: > Starlink beta testers have been reporting speeds over 150 megabits per second

Viasat's plans have 3 Mbps maximum upload, 500 ms minimum latency, low monthly caps, and high contention. Even they acknowledge VPN use might be impractical. The $50 plan is too slow to call broadband according to the FCC. 50 Mbps costs $150 plus equipment rental. It's a last resort for people who can't get terrestrial service.

Starlink availability is limited for now.

My mom gets some kind of terrestrial radio internet like WiMax for $80+ a month. The speeds are 10Mb up, 1Mb down. The cable company wants a wheelbarrow full of cash to run a line up to the house. There is no phone line run to the house.

She might be a good SpaceX Starlink candidate.

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