Being a native Texan(S/East Texas), I will use Texas as my plotting. In 1987 I contracted for 16 different individual owned Catv Companies throught out s/e Texas. Today 9 of them belong to TWC, 5 to comcast,1 to Seabridge,and one(only one) is still a Mom/Pop system.
Back then we built quality Catv Systems. And we were self-governed. QC-ing was done at the bar after hours by the workers, not the companies. In short, We the workers as a whole didnt put up with hammered cable, hack splicing, shitty installs, etc., etc., etc. And if you didnt get with the fucking program you got ran the fuck off. The Boss man and Cable Co. never intervened because they knew we was self-governing.
Now, in the year 2000, I found myself doing retro splicing on one of these systems for TWC under a contract company with millions in revenues. 12 fucking splicers, seven of them didnt own hooks, five of them had less than six months exp., the other two were dumbasses without a clue to life;which left 5 of us to carry the load. And bitching didnt get you no where, the simple fact was that the bigger the company, the more under-qualified personnel on the job. Needless to say,it didnt take me long to get away from that bullshit
And TWC hires QC Personell for $6.75 an hour straight from Manpower. And you wonder why their systems look like shit.
Even a tree rat knows the difference between the real thing and shit.
