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from the cue-the-America-is-too-big-apologists dept.
Ezra Klein of Vox.com interviews Susan Crawford about treating the internet as a utility. Crawford is the author of Captive Audience: The Telecom Industry & Monopoly Power in the New Gilded Age. Former Special Assistant to president Obama on Science, Technology and Innovation Policy, she may well be the Telecomm Lobby's enemy #1.
From the interview:
We need a public option for internet access because internet access is just like electricity or a road grid. This is something that the private market doesn't provide left to its own devices. What they'll do is systematically provide extraordinarily expensive services for the richest people in America, leave out a huge percentage of the population and, in general, try to make their own profits at the expense of social good.
When it comes to fiber penetration - that's the world class kind of network we should have - we're behind Sweden, Estonia, Korea, Hong Kong, Japan. A whole host of other developed countries. We should be looking the rest of the world in the rearview mirror. Instead, for more than 77% of Americans, their only choice for a high capacity connection is their local cable monopoly. So just as we have a postal service that's a public option for communications in the form of mail, we also need public options in every city for very high-capacity, very high-speed fiber internet access. That way we'll make sure and we can compete with every other nation in the 21st century.
What happens is that we deregulated this entire sector about 10 years ago and the cable guys already had exclusive franchises across across the country. They were able to very inexpensively upgrade those to pretty high-speed internet access connections. Meanwhile the telephone companies have totally withdrawn. They have copper line in the ground and it's expensive for them to build and replace it with fiber. Because of both deregulation and sweeping consolidation in the cable industry we've ended up on this plateau where for about 80% of Americans their only choice for a high-capacity internet access connection is their local cable monopoly.
In a sense I'm trying to have it both ways. This is by nature a monopoly. It really makes sense to have one wire going to your house. The problem is we've gotten stuck with the wrong wire. We've got a cable wire and it should be fiber and it should be then shared by lots of competitors. That's what drives prices down. If you hand the one company the ability to control that market they'll just reap their rewards and price discriminate and make lots of profits.
(Score: 3, Informative) by jmoschner on Thursday April 03 2014, @01:33AM
There is some faulty logic here saying that "internet access is just like electricity or a road grid. This is something that the private market doesn't provide left to its own devices."
Actually the private market does in the case of electricity, and the government makes special allowances for private companies to be monopolies in the power sector. Utility poles in most places in the US are owned by either the utility company or the phone company.
The rise of people adding solar panels and turbines also undermines the point that the private market does not provide electricity.
And the wrong continues. In many areas roads are actually privately built and maintained. For instance the road my wife's family lives on was privately built and maintained by the people in the neighborhood. The city won't go out that far to build roads. The city won't even run water to some areas or offer trash service.
If the government doesn't put in place the infrastructure for electricity (and even in some areas roads), why should it do so for internet access?
Plus the government does provide internet access to people. Many libraries and a number of government buildings (such as some unemployment offices) have areas where the public may use the internet or provide free Wi-Fi.
The cost of the government taking over and upgrading the lines would be ridiculous. In Texas it something like $8million in stimulus funds to reach under 300,000 people with internet. In Vermont using federal dollars and loans they have spent over $116 million and still not everyone has internet access (the populations is around 626,000). And in many of the places that do, it is a poor connection.
And think of the problems in having to go through the government every time a storm or car accident takes out a untility pole. It could be days even weeks before the line is fixed.
If there is to be change, the government needs to lower the barriers to entry into the telecom market through regulation and incentives or by breaking up the existing telecom monopolies. None of that will likely happen. That leaves the option of either starting or supporting companies that would run fiber to your home.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by mrbluze on Thursday April 03 2014, @02:53AM
Private industry is notorious all over the world of bleeding infrastructure dry until it falls over in the next puff of wind, whilst at the same time gouging customers of every possible cent, especially when there is a lack of oversight or real competition. Private industry, when left to its own devices, forms cartels and uses stand-over tactics.
I don't say that governments are better, but you don't need to look much further than a company such as the one that bought out the web-site I used to love. It's shiny and slick but soulless and the main focus of development drifts away from the consumer (community) to profit generation. So the article is right, the Internet is so big now it is part of the public domain. Government has to step in, but only to ensure:
Do it yourself, 'cause no one else will do it yourself.
(Score: 1) by migz on Thursday April 03 2014, @03:14AM
The problem is government involvement. The industry has NOT been deregulated. Can you lay a cable to your neighbor, and connect him to your lan? No? I would willingly do so. I know a lot of people who would, and some who have done so ... illegally (Think of the poor children^H^H corporation!) .
Think about it, why cant we make our own communication network.
The only thing stopping me from doing so is government regulation forbidding me from communicating across property boundaries.
So the government granted some of their friends licenses to do telecommunications. Well that's the cause of the problem. If there was more competition, as much as the market will support, the price will drop. However since competition is restricted to the well connected, they can exploit their UNNATURAL oligopoly to charge what they like, offer what they like, on the terms that they like.
Regulation is THE problem. What is needed is LESS regulation.
(Score: 1) by urza9814 on Thursday April 03 2014, @12:03PM
Half my apartment complex already uses my 50mbit FiOS connection (I usually find about a dozen unrecognized devices connected to my wifi at any given time)
But even if that's illegal (which I highly doubt -- show me the law!) it doesn't mean industry hasn't been deregulated. Comcast is industry. You are not. You are a consumer, and regulating you is exactly what the industry wants. Giving the industry more ability to regulate you can actually be part of industry deregulation.
(Score: 1) by migz on Thursday April 03 2014, @12:55PM
I agree that oligopolists like Comcast have unfounded power to prohibit me from competing. The ONLY way Comcast can do this is through regulation, granted by government, and government alone, that grants an artificial license to allow them to do something and prohibits me from doing it. Those regulations need to go away.
We don't need more regulations e.g. net neutrality laws. We just need the freedom to self-provisions. Then they can go fly a kite.
You do understand that this is the telcos, asking government to give them tax payers money? Won't anybody think of the poor who can't afford internet access? How will the corporations make money off the poor? I know! Let's screw the tax-payers again!
(Score: 1) by urza9814 on Thursday April 03 2014, @01:27PM
The problem with government is corporations and the problem with corporations is government. Brilliant.
In the absence of government corporations would find other ways to impose their will on you. The difference between a government and a corporation is that a government asserts an exclusive right to use violent force within some geographic area. Now, should the government give up that right, you think nobody else will try to take it? You think corporations won't be hiring armed guards? You think they can't afford it? They'll just jack up prices. They have power, you do not, and you will lose every time.
We need to get rid of government, but we need to get rid of corporations first. Otherwise you'll just wind up paying taxes to News Corp. And without the corporations we *may* find we don't need to get rid of government after all. Although I kinda doubt that.
Wipe out both and establish a federation of cooperatives.
(Score: 1) by migz on Thursday April 03 2014, @02:04PM
It's called fascism.
Corporations as juristic persons only exist because of government.
The government does not have and exclusive right to use violence. They may claim it, they may do it, but that does not make it a right.
Who has the power? From where I'm standing the elephant in the room is government, not the corporations.
Who is going to protect you from that big massive overarching corporation that can sell you stuff you don't want, take what they like, and use force? Your answer is government? Well the name of that overarching corporation is The Government!
And yes, smaller units of voluntary association would be better.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 03 2014, @02:56AM
Think of what the United States would be like if the government didn't build the Interstate Highway System. The country would be a mess of private and toll roads and no one would be able to get anywhere without paying extortionate fees to the various private road builders and maintainers. And I have a question for you. Does your wife's family vote in the mayors and other elected officials? More to the point, do they pay taxes to the city? If so, then they have the right to demand such things as roads and water and sanitation that their taxes are supposed to give them. If not, then they don't belong to the city at all, and they need to incorporate their own township or whatever.
Your government gave billions to the telcos to build out precisely this sort of infrastructure. The telcos never delivered, and haven't been punished for not delivering the goods. Just because your government is victim to regulatory capture doesn't mean that the idea of publicly owned Internet infrastructure is a bad thing.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Thursday April 03 2014, @03:20AM
You were going great till the last paragraph.
The government didn't give billions to the telcos to build any sort infrastructure.
It was almost all private money. The government coughed up the right-of-way for wires, but that was largely local government.
The telcos built each successive generation of the network with the revenue earned by billing customers of the current network.
If any part of this was left to the government, we would still be using only the post office. That is the only public communication system implemented by the government.
Discussion should abhor vacuity, as space does a vacuum.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by naubol on Thursday April 03 2014, @03:41AM
It does seem to me that the interstate highway system is a communications system that is wildly successful.
OTOH, you mentioned the Post Office. How is this not an excellent example of a "government run business"? It has operated without tax revenue since 1980, last year it handled 158.4 billion dollars worth of items, and so forth. It delivers 6 days a week everywhere in the United States. It is an amazing achievement.
That said, I think a possible answer is simply to convert internet telecommunications to common carrier status. I have yet to hear a good argument against this, and I would really like to hear one.
(Score: 1) by gishzida on Thursday April 03 2014, @03:26AM
just one issue with your line of thought... You assume that those providers own something which "we the people" had no say in... That is not the case: our various governments [States, Federal, and local] have provided the "rights of way" and or "licensing of the transmission media" and / or provided "tax breaks or other incentives" to the various cable / satellite / telcos... the purpose of this was of course public benefit... Yet while the rest of the world speeds by us on services at half the price at ten times the speed one wonders how anyone can believe that the American consumer is getting good service and fair value for accommodating these kinds of monopolies... I'm sorry but the free market wet dream that is every libertarians / republican's dream is only another form of oligarchic oppression...
I lived in L.A. for forty years... which was serviced by the L.A. Department of Water and Power. Guess what? DWP had better service than the private utility companies I've had to deal with since I left L.A. You are holding up straw men that you have never actually any actual experience. A broken streetlight fixed in hours in L.A. while the streetlight across from my house which is serviced by SCE&G has been out for a couple of months. Private monopolies have no reason at all to provide service... "public benefit" it cuts into their profits.
As for Texas... do the rest of us a favor: succeed please and take all the lame ass "free market" and "tea bag" rabble with you. I'm just a bit tired of hearing how Texas Politicians talk of cutting government spending when Texas is near the top of the list on a per capita basis see this 2012 chart [wikipedia.org] In fact it appears 57 Billion Federal tax dollars more was spent in Texas than it citizens paid as federal taxes.
When you look at that chart you'll see 32 states put in less in taxes than they received... and the majority of those are Republican controlled states... The majority of the positive cash flow states are Democratic. Tell me honestly now do Republicans really want to quit spending all that money in their states? Great let them voluntarily return all that "extra money" to the treasury then lets talk about budgetary reform.
Sorry but the "Big Government is always Bad" theory is probably as fallacious as "Big government is always good".