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Old 03-01-2006, 05:48 PM   #5 (permalink)
arch13
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Location: North of Mexico, South of Canada
I am actually for the Universal Service Fund where phone coverage is concerned. I do believe that the every area should be served by this basic need.

I can even see taxing companies like Vonage (As an aside kudos to most VoIP companies for paying willingly though no law requires them to do so. I beleive that companies doing such things should be given more credit) that are transporting voice and injecting it into the existing voice network. In that case, the principal is the same, just not the transport method.

My objection comes from using the fund to wire up rural locales for broadband. I enjoy high speed access, so do many. But dialing in works just fine for researching your childs paper or paying your bills. The fact that the USF already has these areas wired for phone service means they have access to the internet.
We are essentially being asked to pay a tax to upgrade rural areas to high speed when market conditions suggest the area has little demand for services faster than dialup.

I do see the internet as a needed utility in our world. But access is already availible. Just not at 1.5mb.

What struck me as well was that some of the lawmakers proposing this have previously stood on principals of free-market economics and less taxes. Is this simply them pandering to their home states and their home states telephone operators who would reap highly subsidized upgrades to their network at the taxpayers expense?

I would love to make sure every university, school, and library in every state (No matter how rural) has high speed access. I just flinch slightly at the thought of paying for someones personal services when those services are already there, just slower.

I also have a great suspicion that this is a lead in to a larger tax on the tech industry that has grown in size to replace the declining tax revenue as manufacturing closes down.
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