New US Broadband Projects Get $795 Million In Funding 174
snydeq writes "The Obama administration has announced nearly $795 million in grants and loans to 66 new broadband projects across the nation. The subsidies — to be doled out by the US NTIA and the US Rural Utilities Service — will bring broadband service to 685,000 businesses, 900 health-care facilities, and 2,400 schools, according to officials. The NTIA will award $404 million to 29 projects, and the grants will finance 6,000 miles of new fiber-optic lines. Most of the money will finance middle-mile broadband network projects. The RUS will award $390.9 million, with $163 million in loans and the rest in grants. Most of the RUS money is focused on last-mile broadband projects."
So how much of this will the telcos steal? (Score:5, Insightful)
How much of this will end up in the pockets of a telco exec and leave us with nothing to show for it?
You know like every other time we have given these bastards a dime.
Re:So how much of this will the telcos steal? (Score:4, Insightful)
Nearly all of it. That is the way the corruptocracy works.
STOP SPENDING (Score:2, Insightful)
Great, hundreds of millions more out the door when we are already deeply in the hole as a notion. It's a broadband stimulus package!
You want to help out broadband in the U.S.? Make it illegal for communities to have only single providers of service. That would open the doors to competition and reduce prices for everyone, not just the handful of districts this federal boondoggle will target.
Re:So how much of this will the telcos steal? (Score:4, Insightful)
You know like every other time we have given these bastards a dime.
Seriously. I'm reminded of a pithy quote about the definition of "insanity."
Re:Public funding, private profit? (Score:3, Insightful)
On the plus side, it is expected to "create or save" about 5000 jobs (a mere $160.000) -- Hard to guess how many "bogus" saved jobs are in this accounting.
On the minus side, it is guaranteed to take (theft when not done by the government) the entire income of about 16,000 workers in order to support pay for this.
When are we going to break this cycle of stupidity. And yes, this is probably better than a lot of government spending.
There is only one difference between a bad economist and a good one: the bad economist confines himself to the visible effect; the good economist takes into account both the effect that can be seen and those effects that must be foreseen.
Frederic Bastiat - What Is Seen and What Is Not Seen
Re:So how much of this will the telcos steal? (Score:5, Insightful)
,No they promised unlimited but meant 250GB/month.
So add liars to the list.
Worked for me (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm not a fan of monopolies or anything, however if not for monopolies on "public utilities", then you'd have to have multiple runs of cable (impractical and physically destructive)
Actually it's not that destructive when you are talking last-mile solutions.
As an example, I used to live in a small community that had Comcast cable. We had a small provider come in, Wide Open West, that had fiber to the curb - the last few hundred feet was coax, delivered side by side with the traditional cable and then at my house one cable attachment replaced the other.
The benefit? I got a 100Mb/s internet feed - that was up and down, about 10x faster than Comcast internet and a 20-30x faster uplink. And it was ten years ago...
The practical reality is that you're not going to have a handful of providers running cable or wires to your house, because if there's more than three people competing for service it doesn't make as much economic sense to have a fourth come in since there's already competition lowering prices. And if any of them fold other companies can come along and make use of the infrastructure. It doesn't mean your neighborhood will look like pre-switch NYC with cables clouding the sky...
If you're wondering what happened to WOW, they got bought out and that was the end of THOSE shenanigans, offering cheap fast internet was simply not allowable.
Re:So how much of this will the telcos steal? (Score:3, Insightful)
Nope, I normally do not eat with a dumptruck. Unlimited would mean I could soak my connection 24/7. I have never been tossed out of an all you can eat buffet for eating all I could eat.
Re:Jobs (Score:3, Insightful)
>>>Our WWII spending brought us to 120% of GDP for our national debt,
Yes and when WW2 was over (1945), the Depression snapped right back and people were jobless again. The stock market and GDP did not return to 1928 levels until the early 1950s. So basically all the spending for WW2 cured nothing.
Also there's nothing productive about a war, which is basically equivalent to building a bunch of products and then blowing them up. A war is *destructive* not productive. It wastes resources and money and labor hours. It's the Glazier Paradox - smashing windows just to make work. It would be wiser not to smash the windows in the first place.
Similarly throwing a bunch of money at fiber installs, without considering whether the market will use them, or whether they will just sit unused (dark fiber) is about the same as building a bunch of bridges that lead to nowhere (don't connect to roads). That too is a waste.
Fixed (Score:2, Insightful)
Comcast, Cox, Verizon, AT&T Execs Get $795 Million In Funding.
Fixed your headline free of charge.
Re:So how much of this will the telcos steal? (Score:4, Insightful)
Taxes are how you pay for civilization. It is not stolen money. Grow up or move to Somalia.
Re:So how much of this will the telcos steal? (Score:3, Insightful)
Yeah but the Unlimited contract also says they can change the terms whenever they feel like it (such as imposing a 250 GB limit). If you don't like the new terms, cancel the contract.
Re:New Deal 2K10 (Score:4, Insightful)
The real trick is trying to figure out any policy difference between Hoover & FDR. An honest look at history (including several of FDR's advisor) admit the new deal was largely a continuation of the policies started by Hoover. FDR himself said that he would have voted for Hoover had he not gotten the nomination.
Cue the facts! (Score:4, Insightful)
Honestly, assertions are my favorite. It makes arguments so easy to win.
Yes and when WW2 was over (1945), the Depression snapped right back and people were jobless again.
No, unemployment rates stayed low and and GDP did not drop. So the real question is, are you purposefully ignorant or just being a troll?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Us_unemployment_rates_1950_2005.png [wikipedia.org]
http://www.data360.org/dsg.aspx?Data_Set_Group_Id=230 [data360.org]
Also there's nothing productive about a war, which is basically equivalent to building a bunch of products and then blowing them up. A war is *destructive* not productive. It wastes resources and money and labor hours. It's the Glazier Paradox - smashing windows just to make work. It would be wiser not to smash the windows in the first place.
War is enormously profitable for the winning country, especially when you get to control precious resources as a result. The Glazier Paradox does not apply - we were smashing millions of dollars of weapons into things we didn't repair with our own money. WWII involved a lot of nation building, and our workers provided the manufacturing for most of the planet since Europe and Japan were in pieces. (Not that I agree this is the way to come out of the recession, but it is important to remember history amid your vague rhetoric involving paradoxes.)
Similarly throwing a bunch of money at fiber installs, without considering whether the market will use them, or whether they will just sit unused (dark fiber) is about the same as building a bunch of bridges that lead to nowhere (don't connect to roads). That too is a waste.
Mass transit and communications infrastructure are investments in the future. Even if it there's a bit of waste here and there, it beats giving it to the financial industry, who do nothing useful for the economy at large.
This is the purpose of government. Keep the economic machine running by ignoring the rules when they stop working. Keep income equality high so there's meritocracy instead of aristocracy. Enforce policies to make sure that the economy is well educated and capable of performing complex functions to yield good results for investment.
The relative power of federal, state, and local governments is something that can be argued, but the larger point still remains.