[mbruce]

Counter - counter argument: data caps fundamentally help segment users and make more $$$ from those who value more data. This doesn’t directly relate to capping download rate. Related: Growth on total users and downloads is far far greater than improved spectral capacity in 5G and hence more cells are needed to improve capacity. So costs not only to refresh, but to build more cells are significant.

[TheCoelacanth]

If you were going to make bandwidth costs actually based on costs to provide service, you would probably end up with something similar to the way that electricity is priced. A connection fee plus a metered rate that varies to be higher during periods of high demand and lower during periods of low demand. The data cap model is pretty clearly designed just to extract extra money from customers, not as a genuine way of fairly allocating costs.