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The Federal Communications Commission is in the middle of a high-stakes decision that could raise taxes for close to 90 percent of Americans. The commission is considering whether to reclassify broadband as a telecommunications service and, in doing so, Washington would trigger new taxes and fees at the state and local level.

The agency would like to make Internet service a public utility, placing broadband under Title II regulation of the Communications Act of 1934. This move would make broadband subject to New Deal-era regulation, and have significant consequences for U.S. taxpayers.

Under this decision to reclassify broadband, Americans would face a host of new state and local taxes and fees that apply to public utilities. These new levies, according to the Progressive Policy Institute (PPI), would total $15 billion annually. On average, consumers would pay an additional $67 for landline broadband, and $72 for mobile broadband each year, according to PPI’s calculations, with charges varying from state to state.

Proponents of broadband reclassification, including the left-of-center organization Free Press, claim that it would not result in higher taxes or fees. The recently extended Internet Tax Freedom Act, they assert, prohibits state and local taxation of Internet service. This is incorrect, however. The act does not apply to telecom-related fees.

Free Press and other broadband reclassification proponents also say the new taxes and fees can be prevented if the FCC designates broadband as an interstate service. A Progressive Policy Institute report explains why this also is incorrect:

“When the Commission previously considered the jurisdiction of Internet traffic, it determined that such traffic was ‘largely interstate,’ but ‘jurisdictionally mixed.’ States routinely tax jurisdictionally mixed services that are classified as ‘interstate’ for purposes of regulation. For example, wireless services may not be regulated by state public utility commissions, but they are subject to a host of state and local taxes and fees. In several states, interstate wireless revenues are subject to taxation.”

Late last year, President Barack Obama waded into this contentious debate. He called for the Internet to be treated like a public utility. Critics of Obama’s position point out this would reduce investment in infrastructure and lead to inferior service for consumers. Reclassifying broadband as a telecommunications service would also stifle innovation and restrict the openness of the Internet.

The telecommunications industry has invested more than $1.2 trillion on broadband infrastructure since 1996. As a result, roughly 87 percent of Americans have access to broadband. It would be foolish for government to discourage the significant investment required to maintain, expand and improve this infrastructure by subjecting broadband to circa 1930s regulation. Subjecting Internet service providers to such onerous rules would depress innovation and penalize Web users.

Not only would higher taxes and fees leave individuals, families, and employers with less disposable income, a wealth of research indicates it would be bad for the economy.

John Hood, former president of the John Locke Foundation, found that keeping state and local tax and regulatory burdens as low as possible fosters economic growth, when he analyzed 681 peer-reviewed academic journal articles going back to 1990.

“Most studies find,” Hood stated, “that lower levels of taxes and spending, less-intrusive regulation…correlate with stronger economic performance.”

Tax Foundation economist William McBride reviewed academic literature going back three decades and found, “While there are a variety of methods and data sources, the results consistently point to significant negative effects of taxes on economic growth even after controlling for various other factors such as government spending, business cycle conditions and monetary policy.”

In McBride’s survey of 26 studies, dating to 1983, he found “all but three of those studies, and every study in the last 15 years, find a negative effect of taxes on growth.”

The Federal Communications Commission is expected to make its decision early this year. After the more than 20 tax increases signed into law during Obama’s six years in office, the last thing American taxpayers need is a gusher of new taxes and fees triggered by bureaucrats in Washington.


http://blogs.reuters.com/great-debate/2015/01/05/treating-internet-like-a-public-utility-brings-a-new-tax-for-the-new-year/



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If the internet is a public utility, would the Russians or the Chinese or the Italians pay a tax to have access to a US public utility? Would a VPN become illegal to be used on a US public utility service?

If state, money, and ownership would be abolished, would “pay[ing] a tax” (Wilikon) even be possible?

Go to a tribal area anywhere in the world and enjoy untaxation from the State - remember everything will belong to the leader, you, your wife, your children, your possession, everything at his/her mercy. In China a big Wall was build against them, and in Rome wars were waged almost continuously. Collective defense has a cost, but the cost of not collectivizing defense means living under the authority of Barbarians (and if barbarians takes control it will become RUINS).

(Colorization mine.)

Key (note the order): green = “Notice: Heterarchy”, blue = “Peril: Tribalism”, yellow = “Caution: Ownership”, orange = “Warning: Money”, red = “Danger: Hierarchy”

My privately funded screen has some difficulty with the yellow... but thank you for this new word: Heterarchy, which is if I understood well the horizontalization of the different components? I prefer Homeostasis...

Abolishing Ownership? You own nothing? Not even the Rights given to you by God when you were born? So your question has no meaning. it's like asking is it possible to breath with out air...

the Problem of the FCC, is they don't understand a basic, simple and essential principle... K.I.S.S. why change what's working? Don't get stupid it has nothing to do with taxes... but like in the U.K. a defective, corrupted, spreading group(s) is trying to censor Freedom of Speech... taxation is a collateral damage... (did you know that these people are even mentioned in the Constitution :D and in the Oath of Everyone involved in the Complex).

1. Mine was, indeed, a trick question.

2. The U.S. Government perpetuates the existence of state, money, ownership, and tribalism. There is nothing else one need note regarding its functions.

...there would be no exchange, i.e. no economy and thus no production. We would all starve to death.

You don't understand the critical importance of fungibility and the maximum-division-of-labor.

In short, you don't comprehend economics.

1. the problem of money is that it doesn't buy virtue, and it's at the core of War since the beginning.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/0/0e/Inflaci%C3%B3_utan_1946.jpg/220px-Inflaci%C3%B3_utan_1946.jpg

2. where did you get this idea? frankly, I would appreciate if you could elaborate on this point... frankly you can accuse the USA of everything you want, but tribalism... how did you get this idea? what are the fact supporting that thought? I am really curious...

1. "Inductive reasoning" (i.e., confirmation bias). ;)


2. a) "Affirmative action" is an example of the institutional reinforcement of tribalism, for it serves to affirm that there are ethnicities (beyond geno- and phenotypes) and perpetuate ethnic (i.e., tribalistic) thought. Another example is the notion of "classes" it reiterates to the public to rally them to action. The notion of classes performs a function that is two fold: (1) it moves one to adhere to the norms and traditions of ones socio-economic equals without further reasoning therefor, and (2) it moves one to desist in the pursuit of socio-economic advancement for the cause of identification with one's "tribe" (i.e., one's "class") thereabout.

2. b) "Divide and conquer."

2. c) It's actually worked.

... If a tribe live the middle of a forest and no one knows they exist, do their computer makes a sound when failing to get access to a website on the US public utility internet?

ahh okay I get your point... for me a tribe implies a tribe leader that can be killed and would then precipitate the downfall of said tribe. And again I come back to war, but a tribe due to it's inherent structural undiveristy is always at the mercy of the Empire Forces. Why? In the Empire, the Talents or Skills at the Arts Of Wars primes any others consideration, like who is your mom or dad... in short are you good? and are you with us or against? Sideliners fine... but don't move.