There is a great "Tech Policy Podcast" that covers this issue and why Ajit Pai made this decision. Very much worth a listen, I think he is much more reasonable and inline with HN than you might think. [1]
More specifically, are his 5 reasons for dissent on this [2]
Basically this program has NO budget so costs have spiraled "From 2008 to 2012, Lifeline spending grew from $821 million to over $2.1 billion, an increase of over 160%."
It also subsidizes way too many households instead of helping those most in need. "Roughly 42 million households are currently eligible for the Lifeline program. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, that is 34% of all households in the United States. Notwithstanding the decline in economic fortunes since 2009, that is too many. The federal government should not be subsidizing broadband service for one-third of our nation’s households. If we are going to expand the program to include broadband, Lifeline should target our neediest citizens. Yet the Commission proposes nothing of the sort."
No he isn't. He thinks broadband competition in the US is "robust"[1], which is farcical on its face.
Ajit Pai is a decidedly anti-consumer, anti-competition commissioner. His job is to make sure ATT, Verizon, Comcast, et al make as much money as possible. Period.
"Notwithstanding the decline in economic fortunes since 2009" is a rather unsubtle way of attempting to rewrite history and pin the Great Recession of 2007-2009 due to the Financial Crisis of 2007-2008 on Obama. So, no, he's not as reasonable and inline with HN folks as you think.
Basically this program has NO budget so costs have spiraled "From 2008 to 2012, Lifeline spending grew from $821 million to over $2.1 billion, an increase of over 160%."
Sounds like a very successful program that many in need are benefiting from. I'm glad the USF I pay every month is being put to good use.
"High Cost Support Mechanism - provides support to certain qualifying telephone companies that serve high cost areas, thereby making phone service affordable for the residents of these regions. "
So - right into the hands of the telecom companies.
Which is precisely why they (and techfreedom!) lobbied to kill Lifeline. It cuts into the money they get from USF.
Where they take it to claim they need it to serve rural areas, while simultaneously, wait for it, lobbying states and others to pass laws banning those municipalities from serving themselves. Because then they'd be free of this crap. Meanwhile, strangely, rural broadband penetration and speed still sucks for real, and the telecoms (and again, techfreedom!) strongly oppose things like "defining broadband as 10mbps" or anything that would demonstrate this.
Additionally, the dollars not going to subsidize lifeline go back to them double, because they also get the money from the higher telephone bills. Kind of a neat racket, if you can get it.
In case you want to argue that there are other programs that are getting the money anyway, the one i cited gets billions in funding given to phone companies.
This is not surprising at all. Our govt is now very firmly anti-consumer, anti-poor/middle class, anti-public service, and things will only get worse.
Meanwhile the rest of the world gets free public health, close to free Internet access, open research and actual science, while we increase spending on an already ludicrous and nonsensical defense budget justified by imaginary threats.
(We need to be careful with this next infant mortality stat. The US has stricter reporting)
> While the USA outspent the UK on healthcare (£6,311 and £2,777 per person respectively) in 2014, average life expectancy at birth in the USA was 78.8, compared with 81.4 in the UK.
> Despite spending, by far, the largest amount on healthcare, the USA was among the 10 OECD countries with the lowest life expectancy.
Okay, I just want to get clarity. Is there anyone on here that thinks that universal high speed broadband that's affordable to every American isn't going to be good for everyone long term? Increased opportunity, access to online resources, jobs, training, education, etc.
Because we can debate HOW to do that effectively, if subsidies are effective or just increase costs overall, if we agree on the what. But if we don't agree that universal high speed broadband internet is a good thing, then talking about the How to do that is farcical at best.
I think there is a lot of latte liberal projection around this issue. They want to bring fiber to every poor person, ignoring the fact that a huge percentage of them don't even have computers. What would be much more useful is subsidizing smart phone access for poor people (because that's where computing is headed).
Also, the "how" is really important. Democrats always want to pay for these programs with highly distortionary targeted taxes and cross subsidies instead of general tax revenue. When you target an industry for extra taxes, you disincentivize it. That's why we tax cigarettes and propose to tax sugary drinks. Imagine putting a 16-18% additional tax (the current USF rate) on all cell phones to help pay for cell phones for poor people. That would make cell phones more expensive, reduce cell phone sales and industry revenue and make the industry less of a desirable place to invest.
And the distortionary effect hurts consumers too. For example, Baltimore requires any would-be fiber provider to subsidize access to poor neighborhoods (by mandating providers build into neighborhoods where only a few subscribers will share in the cost of the node). That tanks the economic case for fiber in Baltimore, and as a result nobody gets fiber. And Baltimore is broke, so municipal fiber isn't an option either.
The FCC under Pai could start by starting to support local municipal broadband efforts. That wouldn't solve the problem, but it would be a start.
This wouldn't get anywhere in the US in the current climate, but I think it's time for public broadband ISPs to start being created/funded at a national level.
My personal dream is to see something like this being undertaken through the auspices of the USPS. The handwringing over the USPS's relevance in the age of the internet, when there's such lack of competition in ISPs, seems short-sighted to me. I think the original founders would have supported broadband being offered publicly through federal programs, especially given that the internet was a publicly developed product; the Postal Clause in the US Constitution arguably was intended to address this issue, as there's no way constitutional authors could have anticipated the internet. So, when the constitution enables congress "to establish post offices and post roads," I think public ISPs are what they had in mind. It seems natural for me that the USPS would become a point of development for public ISPs.
I love seeing small private ISPs--there's some in our area--but, at least when I've seen them, they often seem to be holdovers from anomalous circumstances during the initial boom of the internet. They started when it was possible to compete, and have maintained a foothold by doing things well, but haven't been able to expand.
I agree it's good, but I pay $30 per month (10% of my family cell phone bill) to pay for someone else's internet and other government programs. That's too much. $3 would be OK. So, I agree with the new FCC head lowering the budget of this program.
> Is there anyone on here that thinks that universal high speed broadband that's affordable to every American isn't going to be good for everyone long term? Increased opportunity, access to online resources, jobs, training, education, etc.
I do. Internet, day by day is becoming a channel to deliver more and more targeted ads.
I think the free internet provision is driven by this need, and not out of a honest urge to "empower" the poor. So in other words, if you give free internet to poor who is uninitiated, you are paving way for their oppression and exploitation....
Here is a suggestion because this problem has festered for decades and is going to get persistently worse and poison any meaningful and informed discussion in the public sphere.
Issues are being hijacked by funded groups pushing specific corporate interests and agendas masquerading as operating in the public interest.
2 issues need to be addressed urgently. And study, paper or public statements in the media from such groups should explicitly mention details on their formation, their employees, day-to-day organizational funding and all other funding. Anyone being paid to say something should declare they are being paid to say that.
Names like 'techfreedom', 'netfreedom' and other 'orwellian' names cannot be used unless they are a verified public service organization with a verifiable source of public or community funds with no corporate funding. Anything claiming to represent the public interest should do exactly that and cannot be a deceptive hijack of their interests. If funding dries up there will be no shills.
Instead, they check if you are already on the SNAP supplemental food program. If so, you get internet access for either $5 (up to 3mb/sec) or $10 (up to 10mb/sec) a month.
I would think that those prices would make it affordable well below the $38k/year figure.
Of course, not everyone has access to this one ISP. I wonder if others have similar non-Lifeline subsidized programs.
The author of this story flatly ignores the fact that the Lifeline program -- by law -- was never meant to subsidize broadband. It was VERY explicitly intended to subsidize only basic telephone service. Read the law.
If Congress wants there to be a broadband subsidy for the poor, it needs to specifically authorize one. The current law simply does not provide for it, and the FCC needs to obey the law.
There was a pilot project in 2015 for broadband subsidization. From what I remember, it went well and they were going to expand the program to cover it, but I haven't heard anything about it since.
As the owner of a small ISP, I'd like to figure out a way to provide to service to everyone regardless of their income. Internet access is critical at this point for even the most basic societal functions.
Internet is replacing telephone for necessary basic communication.
Obviously it was explicitly tailored to telephones when it was passed over 30 years ago. That doesn't mean that reworking the program under the existing law is automatically a bad idea.
This is correct. There are rural programs like CAF to subsidize the construction of internet connections in rural communities. I'm not sure if anything exists (or needs to) for the urban poor.
38. The principles listed in section 254 of the Act make clear that deployment of, and access to, telecommunications and information services are important components of a robust and successful federal universal service program, including the directive to address low-income needs.86 In section 254[2], Congress expressly recognized the importance of ensuring that low-income consumers “have access to telecommunications and information services, including . . . advanced telecommunications and information services” and that universal service is an “evolving level of telecommunications service.”87
...
41. Our approach is also supported by section 254(c)(1)(A). Under that provision, the Commission considers whether a given supported service is “essential to education, public health, or public safety.”97 We explain above the importance of BIAS to education and healthcare, among other things, along with the need for discounts in order to enable low-income consumers to realize those benefits.98 We therefore conclude that BIAS is essential for education and public health for low-income
Americans.
42. Section 254(c)(1)(B) directs the Commission to consider whether the service at issue has “through the operation of market choices by customers, been subscribed to by a substantial majority of residential customers.”99
footnote 92. ... Even before that, however, during the time the Commission had classified BIAS as generally an information service, it recognized the possibility of broadband Internet access transmission being offered on a common carrier basis as a telecommunications service. See, e.g., Appropriate Regulatory Treatment For Broadband Access to the Internet Over Wireless Networks, Declaratory Ruling, 22 FCC Rcd 5901, 5913-14, para. 33 (2007);[3]
In the 2016 Lifeline Modernization Order, the Commission established a framework for the Bureau to designate providers as LBPs, eligible to receive Lifeline reimbursement for qualifying broadband Internet access service (BIAS) provided to eligible low-income consumers.
I just found it somewhat ironic that the photo used to illustrate "internet for the poor" was a top of the line Macbook Pro..
Making it easier for everyone to access the Internet should definitely be a priority though. I'm especially thinking about educational benefits for kids in poor families.
Ya know, it's interesting to me how many people on HN suddenly have knowledge of esoteric telecom laws (which, if you look at past telecom discussions, this didn't happen), and just happen to have handy links and quotes and such less than 30 minutes after this was posted to HN at all.
I'm sure everyone stopped and took the time to read up on strange corners of telecom law just in case this came up, so we could have a vigorous intellectual discussion.
No need to ascribe to astroturfing that which is likely just someone regurgitating talk radio propaganda. I find it prohibitively unlikely that your siblings have any esoteric knowledge of telecom laws. One says "read the law", I did and it flatly contradicted his other claims.
This is a very peculiar tone to use in describing a detail-oriented fact-based discussion. I didn't know _anything_, if the other comments didn't help contextualize this I'd not get much value from the story at all.
If you feel like there's astroturfing abuse going on on HN, we'd appreciate links at [email protected] so we can investigate. It's hard to run across a comment like this in a large thread and have any idea what you're specifically referring to.
It's also a breach of HN's civility rule to insinuate astroturfing by commenters you disagree with—that trope is far more often (probably a hundred times more often) a below-the-belt rhetorical move than it is an accurate assessment of others' behavior. Though the latter does happen.
Or another interpretation is that a tech news site like HN has many people who regularly and closely follow policy and regulatory developments in Telecom, cable and the FCC.
[+] [-] ironchief|9 years ago|reply
More specifically, are his 5 reasons for dissent on this [2]
Basically this program has NO budget so costs have spiraled "From 2008 to 2012, Lifeline spending grew from $821 million to over $2.1 billion, an increase of over 160%."
It also subsidizes way too many households instead of helping those most in need. "Roughly 42 million households are currently eligible for the Lifeline program. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, that is 34% of all households in the United States. Notwithstanding the decline in economic fortunes since 2009, that is too many. The federal government should not be subsidizing broadband service for one-third of our nation’s households. If we are going to expand the program to include broadband, Lifeline should target our neediest citizens. Yet the Commission proposes nothing of the sort."
[1]http://podcast.techfreedom.org/e/153-trump-picks-ajit-pai-fo... [2]https://apps.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/FCC-15-71A5.pd...
[+] [-] xenadu02|9 years ago|reply
Ajit Pai is a decidedly anti-consumer, anti-competition commissioner. His job is to make sure ATT, Verizon, Comcast, et al make as much money as possible. Period.
[1]http://www.broadcastingcable.com/news/washington/fccs-pai-br...
[+] [-] JohnTHaller|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jandrese|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ndespres|9 years ago|reply
Sounds like a very successful program that many in need are benefiting from. I'm glad the USF I pay every month is being put to good use.
[+] [-] DannyBee|9 years ago|reply
https://techpolicycorner.org/trumps-opportunities-on-tech-po...
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2014/09/05...
These are the folks behind "don't break the net", which some folks may remember (http://dontbreakthe.net/)
and in case, you want to engage substantively, it's funny who benefits by shutting down lifeline:
Those "spiraling, out of control costs" are paid for by the universal service fund.
Where would that money otherwise go: https://www.fcc.gov/general/universal-service-fund
"High Cost Support Mechanism - provides support to certain qualifying telephone companies that serve high cost areas, thereby making phone service affordable for the residents of these regions. "
So - right into the hands of the telecom companies.
Which is precisely why they (and techfreedom!) lobbied to kill Lifeline. It cuts into the money they get from USF.
Where they take it to claim they need it to serve rural areas, while simultaneously, wait for it, lobbying states and others to pass laws banning those municipalities from serving themselves. Because then they'd be free of this crap. Meanwhile, strangely, rural broadband penetration and speed still sucks for real, and the telecoms (and again, techfreedom!) strongly oppose things like "defining broadband as 10mbps" or anything that would demonstrate this. Additionally, the dollars not going to subsidize lifeline go back to them double, because they also get the money from the higher telephone bills. Kind of a neat racket, if you can get it.
In case you want to argue that there are other programs that are getting the money anyway, the one i cited gets billions in funding given to phone companies.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_Service_Fund#Connect...
That's the one of the famous ones that has pretty much given phone companies billions and gotten us nothing actually in return.
Personally, i'm fine with that money all going to anyone but a telecom company, even if they aren't "low enough income" for you or whatever.
[+] [-] unknown|9 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] whyileft|9 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] dirkg|9 years ago|reply
Meanwhile the rest of the world gets free public health, close to free Internet access, open research and actual science, while we increase spending on an already ludicrous and nonsensical defense budget justified by imaginary threats.
[+] [-] DanBC|9 years ago|reply
> Meanwhile the rest of the world gets free public health
And the US system is more expensive to the US government.
http://visual.ons.gov.uk/how-does-uk-healthcare-spending-com...
(We need to be careful with this next infant mortality stat. The US has stricter reporting)
> While the USA outspent the UK on healthcare (£6,311 and £2,777 per person respectively) in 2014, average life expectancy at birth in the USA was 78.8, compared with 81.4 in the UK.
> Despite spending, by far, the largest amount on healthcare, the USA was among the 10 OECD countries with the lowest life expectancy.
[+] [-] lsiebert|9 years ago|reply
Because we can debate HOW to do that effectively, if subsidies are effective or just increase costs overall, if we agree on the what. But if we don't agree that universal high speed broadband internet is a good thing, then talking about the How to do that is farcical at best.
[+] [-] rayiner|9 years ago|reply
Also, the "how" is really important. Democrats always want to pay for these programs with highly distortionary targeted taxes and cross subsidies instead of general tax revenue. When you target an industry for extra taxes, you disincentivize it. That's why we tax cigarettes and propose to tax sugary drinks. Imagine putting a 16-18% additional tax (the current USF rate) on all cell phones to help pay for cell phones for poor people. That would make cell phones more expensive, reduce cell phone sales and industry revenue and make the industry less of a desirable place to invest.
And the distortionary effect hurts consumers too. For example, Baltimore requires any would-be fiber provider to subsidize access to poor neighborhoods (by mandating providers build into neighborhoods where only a few subscribers will share in the cost of the node). That tanks the economic case for fiber in Baltimore, and as a result nobody gets fiber. And Baltimore is broke, so municipal fiber isn't an option either.
[+] [-] kem|9 years ago|reply
This wouldn't get anywhere in the US in the current climate, but I think it's time for public broadband ISPs to start being created/funded at a national level.
My personal dream is to see something like this being undertaken through the auspices of the USPS. The handwringing over the USPS's relevance in the age of the internet, when there's such lack of competition in ISPs, seems short-sighted to me. I think the original founders would have supported broadband being offered publicly through federal programs, especially given that the internet was a publicly developed product; the Postal Clause in the US Constitution arguably was intended to address this issue, as there's no way constitutional authors could have anticipated the internet. So, when the constitution enables congress "to establish post offices and post roads," I think public ISPs are what they had in mind. It seems natural for me that the USPS would become a point of development for public ISPs.
I love seeing small private ISPs--there's some in our area--but, at least when I've seen them, they often seem to be holdovers from anomalous circumstances during the initial boom of the internet. They started when it was possible to compete, and have maintained a foothold by doing things well, but haven't been able to expand.
[+] [-] joshuaheard|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] babyrainbow|9 years ago|reply
I do. Internet, day by day is becoming a channel to deliver more and more targeted ads. I think the free internet provision is driven by this need, and not out of a honest urge to "empower" the poor. So in other words, if you give free internet to poor who is uninitiated, you are paving way for their oppression and exploitation....
[+] [-] kalleboo|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] throw2016|9 years ago|reply
Issues are being hijacked by funded groups pushing specific corporate interests and agendas masquerading as operating in the public interest.
2 issues need to be addressed urgently. And study, paper or public statements in the media from such groups should explicitly mention details on their formation, their employees, day-to-day organizational funding and all other funding. Anyone being paid to say something should declare they are being paid to say that.
Names like 'techfreedom', 'netfreedom' and other 'orwellian' names cannot be used unless they are a verified public service organization with a verifiable source of public or community funds with no corporate funding. Anything claiming to represent the public interest should do exactly that and cannot be a deceptive hijack of their interests. If funding dries up there will be no shills.
[+] [-] tyingq|9 years ago|reply
It doesn't appear to be subsidized by Lifeline.
Instead, they check if you are already on the SNAP supplemental food program. If so, you get internet access for either $5 (up to 3mb/sec) or $10 (up to 10mb/sec) a month.
I would think that those prices would make it affordable well below the $38k/year figure.
Of course, not everyone has access to this one ISP. I wonder if others have similar non-Lifeline subsidized programs.
[+] [-] jackmott|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] doctorshady|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] adrr|9 years ago|reply
This what happens on the cable tv side. Content is king.
[+] [-] stuartd|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|9 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] josefresco|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] witty_username|9 years ago|reply
A better way is the NIT (negative income tax) which simply gives money to the poor and lets them decide how to spend it.
[+] [-] naranana|9 years ago|reply
If Congress wants there to be a broadband subsidy for the poor, it needs to specifically authorize one. The current law simply does not provide for it, and the FCC needs to obey the law.
[+] [-] trafficlight|9 years ago|reply
As the owner of a small ISP, I'd like to figure out a way to provide to service to everyone regardless of their income. Internet access is critical at this point for even the most basic societal functions.
[+] [-] Dylan16807|9 years ago|reply
Obviously it was explicitly tailored to telephones when it was passed over 30 years ago. That doesn't mean that reworking the program under the existing law is automatically a bad idea.
[+] [-] dforrestwilson1|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Steko|9 years ago|reply
Legal Authority
38. The principles listed in section 254 of the Act make clear that deployment of, and access to, telecommunications and information services are important components of a robust and successful federal universal service program, including the directive to address low-income needs.86 In section 254[2], Congress expressly recognized the importance of ensuring that low-income consumers “have access to telecommunications and information services, including . . . advanced telecommunications and information services” and that universal service is an “evolving level of telecommunications service.”87
...
41. Our approach is also supported by section 254(c)(1)(A). Under that provision, the Commission considers whether a given supported service is “essential to education, public health, or public safety.”97 We explain above the importance of BIAS to education and healthcare, among other things, along with the need for discounts in order to enable low-income consumers to realize those benefits.98 We therefore conclude that BIAS is essential for education and public health for low-income Americans.
42. Section 254(c)(1)(B) directs the Commission to consider whether the service at issue has “through the operation of market choices by customers, been subscribed to by a substantial majority of residential customers.”99
footnote 92. ... Even before that, however, during the time the Commission had classified BIAS as generally an information service, it recognized the possibility of broadband Internet access transmission being offered on a common carrier basis as a telecommunications service. See, e.g., Appropriate Regulatory Treatment For Broadband Access to the Internet Over Wireless Networks, Declaratory Ruling, 22 FCC Rcd 5901, 5913-14, para. 33 (2007);[3]
[1] https://apps.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/FCC-16-38A1.pd...
[2] 47 U.S. Code § 254 - Universal service https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/47/254
[3] https://apps.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/FCC-07-30A1.pd...
[+] [-] yewhdriof|9 years ago|reply
Good idea; when's it coming?
[+] [-] devindotcom|9 years ago|reply
In the 2016 Lifeline Modernization Order, the Commission established a framework for the Bureau to designate providers as LBPs, eligible to receive Lifeline reimbursement for qualifying broadband Internet access service (BIAS) provided to eligible low-income consumers.
[+] [-] Girlang|9 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] sundvor|9 years ago|reply
Making it easier for everyone to access the Internet should definitely be a priority though. I'm especially thinking about educational benefits for kids in poor families.
[+] [-] DannyBee|9 years ago|reply
I'm sure everyone stopped and took the time to read up on strange corners of telecom law just in case this came up, so we could have a vigorous intellectual discussion.
[+] [-] Steko|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hawkice|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dang|9 years ago|reply
It's also a breach of HN's civility rule to insinuate astroturfing by commenters you disagree with—that trope is far more often (probably a hundred times more often) a below-the-belt rhetorical move than it is an accurate assessment of others' behavior. Though the latter does happen.
[+] [-] bogomipz|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] yewhdriof|9 years ago|reply
Any actionable claims?