FCC plans nationwide broadband push, funded by you and me

The Federal Universal Service Fund is going to get a new mission. It's original purpose was to ensure that all Americans had access to a basic telephone line. Today it still subsidizes phone service for the poor, but was expanded by Al Gore into funding high speed internet access for schools and rural health networks, and then last year Congress added free cell phones for welfare queens to the mix.

This boondoggle is administered by the FCC and funded by a tax on our phone bills. (Verizon dings me for $7.05 a month between our home phones and cell phones.) And now the FCC has decided that every American deserves access to high speed broadband internet (including 3G wireless). And they're going to tax our phone bills to guarantee it.

So what, now the government is going to compete with AT&T, Verizon, Comcast, Cablevision, Time Warner, T-Mobile, and all the other private broadband providers from which we can choose? Or will they just tax you and me to subsidize these private businesses?

How's this for a radical idea. Instead of the government intruding further into what seems to be a highly competitive and fast growing market why don't they unshackle these companies from the current myriad of regulations to which they are subjected? Bureaucrats aren't known for their prowess at innovation. But they are really proficient at slowing things down.

I never understood why it made sense for the taxpayers to subsidize Aunt Bea's party line in Mayberry RFD. So it makes even less sense for them to tack on yet another fee to my phone bill just so Aunt Bea can watch YouTube. Like the party line the Universal Service Fund needs to become a thing of the past.

Posted at 16:55 by Chris Wysocki   [/rants]   Comments | Perm Link |
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