Skip to main content

Desperate, AT&T claims it will bring 5,000 jobs to the U.S. if T-Mobile merger approved

Image used with permission by copyright holder

AT&T desperately wants this T-Mobile merger to go through. Yesterday, the wireless carrier said it would bring 5,000 jobs it outsourced back to the U.S. if regulators let its $39 billion deal go through. Most of these jobs are low-paying wireless call center positions. The company also promised not to cut any more wireless call center positions, but only if the deal goes through.

Assuming a call center employee makes about $15 an hour and works a full 40-hour week, we’re looking at about $30,000 per employee, which means about $150 million in cost to hire 5,000 call center employees in the U.S. Keep in mind that AT&T is already paying something for those employees overseas, so the actual cost is lower. In any case, $150 million is nothing compared to the $3-6 billion AT&T will have to pay out to T-Mobile if the merger isn’t approved, reports the WSJ.

While 5,000 jobs coming to the United States is definitely a good thing, it’s small change compared to the potential impacts of the AT&T-Mobile merger, in the long run. Less competition in the wireless space can only mean slowed innovation and higher prices.

AT&T has been pulling out all the stops for this merger. In the last few months, it has begun choking users of unlimited data plans and suing a group of its own customers, all in the name of buying T-Mobile.

Almost every announcement AT&T has made  in the last few months seems to involve needless choking of data or price hikes. Does the carrier wants to scare us? Is that why it recently doubled the minimum price of a texting plan? Publicly, it blames issues on the “spectrum crunch.” Even the tone of its press releases seems to indicate that if we don’t let it buy T-Mobile, bad things will happen. A recently released document shows that AT&T will refuse to build out its LTE network into many rural areas unless the T-Mobile deal goes through.

What do you think of AT&T’s plan to bring 5,000 jobs back to the U.S.? Does it help justify the merger?

Editors' Recommendations

Jeffrey Van Camp
Former Digital Trends Contributor
As DT's Deputy Editor, Jeff helps oversee editorial operations at Digital Trends. Previously, he ran the site's…
How to master your equalizer settings for the perfect sound
An equalizer from eqMac.

While most people will simply flip on the radio or load up Spotify to listen to music, audiophiles like to dig a bit deeper and customize their experience. This often comes in the form of adjustments to the equalizer, which offers the freedom to tweak every aspect of the sound booming out of headphones or speakers. Even some streaming services now have built-in EQs, giving you more ways than ever to play with your music and find something that best fits your ears.

Tinkering with the equalizer can be daunting to newcomers, as there are tons of cryptic settings you can manipulate. And if you mess with the wrong one, your sound quality might take a nasty hit. Thankfully, learning the basics isn't too difficult.

Read more
How to change your iPhone’s notification sound in iOS 17
how to change iphone default notification sound ios 17 sounds screenshot

Apple made a change to the default notification sound when it launched iOS 17, replacing “Tri-tone” with “Rebound.”Users have been unable to switch back to the original sound or select a different one as the default, and not everyone is a fan of the new tune. As you'd imagine, that's left some folks rather annoyed.

Read more
5 things I want to see in the Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra
The Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra and S Pen stylus on its screen.

The Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra is definitely one of the best smartphones on the market right now, no doubt about that. You get incredible performance with the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chip, plenty of RAM and storage, a whopping 200MP camera, two telephoto lenses for 3x and 5x optical zoom, S Pen integration, and more. It’s certainly an impressive package.

But it’s not perfect. In fact, some weaknesses could be improved in the next version, the Galaxy S25 Ultra. Here’s what I hope to see next year.
A new design
Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra (left) and Galaxy S23 Ultra Andy Boxall / Digital Trends

Read more