Having finally bought smartphones for here at home, I have to say the Samsung Note 8 is pretty nice - especially buying two $930 phones for the price of one.
But it never would have happened without T-Mobile's 55 Unlimited plan which provides unlimited 4G data, even outside the US at 2G speed, for $30 a phone which is $2 less than we were paying Verizon for voice and text once they added in all of their mystery fees and "taxes". The "unlimited" 4G drops to 3G after 50 GB per month, but it looks like we'll be using only 2 to 3 GB of that total each month as T-Mobile also makes use of an extensive WiFi network they use VPN on.
The best news for people in rural areas like Palm Springs is T-Mobile is rapidly building out the 45% of available UHF TV channel frequencies they bought for $8 billion which will provide a more extensive network coverage than Verizon using the relatively new Band 71. UHF TV stations have until 2020 to vacate the airwaves, but most have already left.
But unless you buy an LG phone you'll need to wait to buy next year's phones which will support Band 71.
Once older handsets are upgraded T-Mobile will be completely a 4G LTE data network with even voice carried over LTE as it is on our Samsung phones - it's like talking to someone in the same room sitting next to you, actually much better than a voice landline from AT&T.
We've run out of other people's Social Security taxes needed to subsidize our low income tax rates.
