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During the last decade, ATT’s leaders decided to burn tens of billions of dollars by overpaying for obviated businesses like DirecTV and Time Warner.

I can only imagine the quality of mobile and fiber networking we could have had if that money was spent on telecommunications. And maybe they would have spent a few million on having proper security.

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Not only that they blew $8 billion/year on dividends that could've gone into the business or to employees instead of being extracted and given to people who have nothing to do with the business.

When people invest in a business, whether it be your sibling’s business, or a local business, or a publicly traded business, they do it because they expect a return on investment.

An infrastructure utility such as ATT typically has to offer dividends because it is not going to experience the type of growth that would result in a return via share price increase.

Of course, ATT’s prices are not regulated like a proper utility, even though they should be, but it is still subject to the same market forces that prevent it from growing like a tech company would, who would have the option of foregoing dividends (or share buybacks).

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