In 1965 most every American family had a wired Phone, in Vietnam only a very few elite, I don't know about China, but I expect it was only party elite at the time as well.

China, in 1997 I watched an old man in a donkey cart as he pulled out his cell phone and take a call. I was very surprised but could see what was coming.

I have spent months in Vietnam in the last 3 years, everywhere it seems like everyone from age 12 has a phone. Service with unlimited data is about $5 USD a month.

There was little infrastructure for wired phones in either country and the deployment of cell technology is cheap by comparison. Every highway, rural roadway and railroad has fiber optic cable beside it, even deep in the mountainous countryside, to connect it all together.

Near Dong Hoi there are traffic lights on the Ho Chi Minh trail!

In the U.S. unlimited data by 4G was thousands of dollars per month in 2013, but now Verizon offers it for $80, still 16 times more expensive than Vietnam. My Vongae phone is about $40 per month unlimited world wide calling, I can take my modem with me anywhere in the world I can plug into wired internel and have a phone thats a free call for my friends in the U.S. and there is Skype and Facetime so do I need Vonage at all? .

The only people without cell in the U.S. seem to be folks that fear technology, usually about my age 70 or older. They give some of the dumbest reasons I've heard. "Because people will call me when I'm shopping, or driving," are they so stupid they don't realize if the leave their phones at home it will be just like a wired phone, they don't have to take it with them? They can turn it off if they don't want to be bothered at all?

It's rather astounding to me that 75% of the world's population have telephones. I would never have guessed that many.