It's totally obscene. I traveled to the USA recently for 5 days and my options were:
i) Pay Telus $14/day * 5days = $70 (plus tax)
ii) Buy a US 30GB 10-day esim for $11.27 taxes included.
Plus in option i) I'd be using the data from my own data plan. Unless you really need to be able to use SMS and receive calls, it's really a no brainer. Especially with how easy esims are to setup, I just had to switch a setting in my phone when I crossed the border. Crazy part is, if it was ``only" twice the price, I'd probably have just paid Telus.
How was the situation any different 10 years ago? I think it was the same in most regards. Different services but same market dynamics. I think the CRTC can (if given the authority, mandate etc) hit ROBeLUS quite effectively. Monopolies/oligopolies aren't only efficient at producing stuff and extracting maximum profit. They're also efficient to regulate because you have only a few firms to regulate and check for compliance. If someone wanted to regulate them, and if the regulatory apparatus wasn't captured by them, which it might be. It's not lost on me that they're also more efficient at regulatory capture.
This is a good thing, but why aren't people giving the "discount" brands a shot? I use Public Mobile (it's been fully owned by Telus for years) and I have 50gb that also works in the US for under 40 bucks/month. I can't think of any reason people should be willingly giving these companies twice as much money for less service.