They can use it compare where they can sell what they make for higher prices. For every additional 10 mobile phones per 100 people in a developing country, GDP rises by 0.5%. Free Starlink text service could provide an economic lift of about $290 billion per year for the world poor with virtually no impact on SpaceX finances. It could even be a positive for SpaceX Starlink finances with later upgrades to paid services from the freemium offer.

Free basic texting (10-100 texts/day) would use about 0.5 to 5.0 Terabits per second. Free basic voice would need become significant for bandwidth. Having recorded voice texts and compressing it to make it more manageable or having voice readout of texts and voice recognition input would work better. I think 100 messages per day would be the better option.

Current Service Level (10 messages/day):
Daily income increases by approximately 3%.

GDP increases by approximately 3%.

Up to 100 Messages Per Day:
Daily income increases by approximately 9-10%.

GDP increases by approximately 9-10%.

The estimated impact at 100 messages per day is estimated at 9-10%:
Daily Income Increase: A 9-10% increase means an additional $0.18-$0.20 per day for someone earning $2 daily ($2 × 0.09 or $2 × 0.10).

Aggregate Impact: For 4 billion users, this is $720 million to $800 million per day ($0.18 or $0.20 × 4 billion), or $262.8 billion to $292 billion per year.

GDP Impact: On a $2.92 trillion GDP, this represents a 9-10% increase ($262.8 billion / $2.92 trillion ≈ 0.09, $292 billion / $2.92 trillion ≈ 0.10).

Being able to text or call can potentially saving $5-10/month in travel costs alone. The communication offsets the wasted travel.

The existence of supercheap phones and services, and the potential economic impact of lowering prices.

There is the cost or price of something and then there is return on investment.

This is why SpaceX Starlink offering global texting, voice and internet without spending billions and years for fiber or cell towers will enable live saving doubling of income for the poorest in the world. Starlink global texting can rollout to Africa, Asia and South and Central America in late 2025 through 2027.