Over here, DSL is generally a better deal, but again, like mentioned before it depends on the provider.
I currently pay $27/mo. for 1.5M/128K ADSL (with the ISP's planned free upload speed upgrade to 256K in mid-'04), and the most I can currently squeeze out of it is 1.3Mbits/sec. - there is overhead which can slow it down, along with PPPoE (though the ISP claims it boosts the connection by 6 Kbits). If you can get 80-90% of the advertised speed, you still are getting the money's worth.
Furthermore, my connection seems to be noticeably faster on Win2K than WinXP (I may think the QoS Packet Scheduler may have something to do with it, even when it's disabled), but I switched my PPPoE protocol (instead of using WinXP's PPPoE) and gained a respectable 6-10Kbps (though results may vary).
Up until a month ago, I would have said that the price for cable here was extremely horrendous for the speed they offer, they actually raised their downstream speed up from 1.8M to 3.0M, though it still remains insanely expensive for non-cable TV subscribers ($57/mo. as opposed to $44/mo. for cable TV subscribers), especially when my ISP has an offer of $45/mo. for a 6.0M/512K connection (though with a 1-year contract).
I would go for the 6.0Mbit speed, but unfortunately, being located nearly 12000 ft. from an RT makes it impossible.