Why do it cost so much to use a cellphone in general?

There are less costly ways to use a cellular phone such as minimum package no texting from Verizon or T-Mobile or Virgin or Cricket or other inexpensive phone carrier. A family plan will allow an extra phone for just $10 extra charge monthly. A pre-paid cellular telephone can be charged or pre-paid and the minutes are good for as long as three months, maybe even six months. Check the details from the carrier. A home-line METERED usage costs just 10 to 12 dollars, plus 10 cents for each outgoing call, if a home land-line will be suitable. Incoming calls to a metered-rate land line are free, here in Arizona. The cellular phone companies are for-profit businesses so they set the rates based on the most that they can charge that many people will agree to pay, but not so high that a competitor will deeply undercut their fee. Most or all of the for-profit big companies are really money making machines for the profit of their stock-holders and executives, and yes, these companies also provide pay-checks to their large number of employees who keep the day-to-day business to keep the business and the phone system running. You may even have family or relatives who own stock in one of these companies; the stock will lose value if the company does not make a profit. It is the free enterprise system at work - lots of products at the prices that companies are able to charge because customers willingly pay the cost. If you get a large group of rich friends together who will start a charitable or low-cost co-op for cell-phone service and make the board of directors and executives take salaries and payments that are never more than twenty times what their average employee salary is then your company can change the world for the better.

Data, mostly....people just like paying a lump sum each month for a bundle package...unlimited texting....high 3G capacity, unlimited incomming calls, free evenings and weekends...it's convenience and people will pump out 50 dollars a month on a contract for it. It's not really a huge difference, if you pay pay as you go, it's 25 bucks a month either way...so the extra is worth it. And everybody needs a high tech phone lol this is 2011, the information age.