Remote Massachusetts Towns Welcome Broadband's Arrival 90
New submitter arnoldjm writes: This story from the Boston Globe tells of the effort to bring publicly funded fiber-optic data transmission capabilities to Western Massachusetts. The Globe Reports: "The network, financed with state and federal stimulus money, will extend broadband to 45 isolated towns where 40 percent of homes have no Internet access... Leverett [one of the towns involved] has contracted a private company to provide Internet service, which will cost subscribers $65 a month. That's about same as Comcast and Verizon FIOS customers pay in Greater Boston, but the speeds in Leverett are about 10 times faster."
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My thoughts exactly. I'm in Iowa. We have co-ops that have spread high speed Internet access all across the state. For those not familiar with Iowa, we are very spread out with many people in rural areas. How in the hell does Massachusetts not have the same? It is a tiny state.
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The Boston/Cambridge area has the highest density of left-wing, big government spending justifiers on the planet. They've even defined both the volume and effectiveness of their squeaky wheel in terms of smoots.
Re:Remote? In Massachusetts? (Score:4, Funny)
Oh it's hell here. Practically as bad as Sweden without the blondes. And so socialist nobody here makes any money. They tax us so bad we're all as poor as church mice, every last lost soul.
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Hawkeye point is the tallest summit in Iowa at 510 meters (1670').
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If only there was a way to provide access without running cables....
Oh well.
Re: Remote? In Massachusetts? (Score:1)
"Remote" in the Massachusetts dialect means "anything not Boston itself or bordering Boston." Most of the state isn't aware there's anything west of Fenway Park.
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Compared to many states (like mine) Massachusetts is a county.
You ain't seen nothing... I live in Texas and we WHERE our own country, having broken off from Mexico in 1836 and joined the US about 10 years later... Sometimes I wonder what would have happened if we had stayed the Republic of Texas just a little bit longer than 10 years... Darn pesky war debt... Should have put up the "Come and Get It" flags again and held out for something more, but I guess another war wasn't a good idea, but coming into the union as a slave state wasn't either.
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Compared to many states (like mine) Massachusetts is a county.
To most of us outside New England, all of Massachusetts is Boston!
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Obviously, this can only be legal because the gov't is paying a private company to provide the service.
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Yes. Comcast and Verizon would flip out if, instead of paying a private company to do it, the towns did it themselves [regardless of whether Verizon or Comcast was ever interested in providing service there].
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Oddly enough, my television hasn't been working for months, but my Internet hasn't had a problem.
Even more oddly, I haven't even bothered to call them to fix the TV. I really don't miss it at all.
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My young kids don't even ask for the TV - they only want the tablets. We sometimes reflexively put something on TV for them, and they often ask if they can't watch it on the tablets instead.
Re:definitions for our new netizens (Score:4, Interesting)
My young kids don't even ask for the TV - they only want the tablets. We sometimes reflexively put something on TV for them, and they often ask if they can't watch it on the tablets instead.
It 's a different focking World.
I used to imagine how my own version of "two miles to school uphill both ways barefoot in the snow"" might go. I used to think it would be, "We had to get up out of our seat to change the channel."
Now I realize that it may well be, "We had to watch a program at a regularly scheduled day and time to see it each week."
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Also : "we still used phones, as phones"
Wish me luck... I'm on hold right now (Score:1)
I want to cancel TV altogether from Cox (Keeping Internet only). All representatives busy... estimated wait time 8 minutes. (I am in minute 10).
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Oddly enough, my television hasn't been working for months, but my Internet hasn't had a problem. Even more oddly, I haven't even bothered to call them to fix the TV.
I assume you are referring to your cable television and not the physical television set, based on the fact you haven't "call[ed] them" to fix it. Or maybe it's the TV set. Either way, you're paying the cable company for service you aren't using -- handing them money for no reason.
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It is not for no reason. It is ransom money. If they "try to fix" the problem then the internet will probably stop working too.
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Either way, you're paying the cable company for service you aren't using -- handing them money for no reason.
Every May, I call Comcast and threaten to cancel. In exchange, they usually offer me the same "discount" as new subscribers. Last year's offer was internet+basic cable for $50, vs internet only for $65.
I figure Comcast must have such a massive stockpile of set-top boxes that they're willing to pay their customers $15/month to store them. Or, like "12 CDs for the price of 1," they make so much money off the people who forget to cancel after the trial that they don't mind the "loss."
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Your sarcasm aside, from TFA it looks like the town in question borrowed ~$1900 per person (NOT per household) to put in the system. They'll get that back with taxes eventually, but it's not clear whether the taxes will be on the locals or Statewide. Assuming a five year note, average household size of four, and the costs paid entirely by the locals, that sho
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Your sarcasm aside, from TFA it looks like the town in question borrowed ~$1900 per person (NOT per household) to put in the system. They'll get that back with taxes eventually, but it's not clear whether the taxes will be on the locals or Statewide. Assuming a five year note, average household size of four, and the costs paid entirely by the locals, that should about double the $65/month that is the nominal cost of the system.
It says it's a town of 1900 people at the top, 800 premises so an average of 2.4 per household. They're borrowing $3.6 million which works out to $4500/household, but five years is generally too short. Most estimate that a buried fiber will last 30-40 years, if we say 20 years then it's an extra $20/month in taxes. Seems like a fair price, near my cabin they're building out to ~1200 premises for $5.2 million with a mix of government funding and extra sign-up fee, though the most part is covered by the fiber
Re:This is evil! (Score:5, Interesting)
Your sarcasm aside, from TFA it looks like the town in question borrowed ~$1900 per person (NOT per household) to put in the system. They'll get that back with taxes eventually, but it's not clear whether the taxes will be on the locals or Statewide. Assuming a five year note, average household size of four, and the costs paid entirely by the locals, that should about double the $65/month that is the nominal cost of the system.
It says it's a town of 1900 people at the top, 800 premises so an average of 2.4 per household. They're borrowing $3.6 million which works out to $4500/household, but five years is generally too short. Most estimate that a buried fiber will last 30-40 years, if we say 20 years then it's an extra $20/month in taxes. Seems like a fair price, near my cabin they're building out to ~1200 premises for $5.2 million with a mix of government funding and extra sign-up fee, though the most part is covered by the fiber company who'll profit for decades to come. Still, if all goes according to plan I can get gigabit there at the end of the year and "only" 100 Mbit at home...
I work for an ISP. You're wrong on almost every point.
Most infrastructure repair costs are for what we jokingly call the "Backhoe disconnect"
We're talking upwards of 90% of our repair costs are construction related. And before you say it, no, they don't pay us back for it. It's almost always the city that cuts the cable, they can't afford to pay us, and if we tried to make them they'd issue a press release the next day stating "We're laying off 1 police officer and 2 kindergarten teachers to pay off your Nazi ISP, sorry" and we'd be driven out of town with pitchforks.
Further, Fiber does have a lot of longevity, you are correct there. But what doesn't have a lot of longevity is wired internet service as a whole. By 2025 we'll start seeing the first 5g cellular plans they'll offer 1gig+ service for a lower price and using less spectrum than 4g. When that comes along, the residential side of my industry will die. The financial people have to plan for that, and would be idiots if they approved infrastructure projects to invest in that part of the buisness. We'll still have a lot of business services, and we are, of course, the trunks between those cellular towers. But the industry as a whole has been exiting the residential market lately. It's becoming less and less profitable. Even televisions services are a losing proposition. The tiered television services ensure that TV is VERY expensive and the only people getting those profits are the channel executives. This is why all the cable companies are trying to merge now... they want to be big enough to fight those big content providers like Viacom.
Long story short, focus your ire on the cellular industry. They will be your ISP in 10 to 20 years and you'll have forgotten all about us.
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I mostly agree with you with small exception if current trends are any indication they will come out with plans offering around 30GB of data for around $80/mo some time around 2020+ which will give you just enough time to watch about 4-1/2 hours of 4k video on netflix cellular has speed but either does not have capacity or they don't want to sell it for a reasonable rate
i have a 12mbps dsl line at work with unlimited usage from att its $40/mo i can get 50/mbps for $157 through the city also unlimited
at home
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I work for an ISP. You're wrong on almost every point.
Most infrastructure repair costs are for what we jokingly call the "Backhoe disconnect"
We're talking upwards of 90% of our repair costs are construction related. And before you say it, no, they don't pay us back for it. It's almost always the city that cuts the cable, they can't afford to pay us, and if we tried to make them they'd issue a press release the next day stating "We're laying off 1 police officer and 2 kindergarten teachers to pay off your Nazi ISP, sorry" and we'd be driven out of town with pitchforks.
Over here in Europe, such costs would have to be paid by the company (same for municipality, state, whoever) that's doing the works - or rather, their liability insurance. Such insurance is not an option here. Problem solved.
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I work for an ISP. You're wrong on almost every point. Most infrastructure repair costs are for what we jokingly call the "Backhoe disconnect". We're talking upwards of 90% of our repair costs are construction related.
I'm not really seeing where you're contradicting me, but I'm sorry you live in a third world country that hasn't invented the map. Around here it happens rarely as all cables and pipes - not just fiber but electricity, water, sewage etc. are recorded and easily available for anyone else digging. If it does happen whoever broke it pays or if it happens by natural causes it's a running cost built into the monthly subscription. If you manage to trash a fiber network so badly it has to be written down in five y
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The fun thing about old New England towns is that the infrastructure is ancient, and often times poorly documented at best. I've walked around my own neighborhood with one of the city officials as he was pointing out what his maps said versus what we could see under the various manholes. It's not uncommon to hear of pipes from the 1800s bursting and no one having any idea where the valves are to shut if off.
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...but it's not clear whether the taxes will be on the locals or Statewide.
Either way, the legislature, being comprised of representatives of the jurisdiction involved approved such an action. By extrapolation, that means that the entire jurisdiction approved and agreed to pay taxes to benefit others in the area.
That's how a republic works.
Assuming [assumptions], and the costs paid entirely by the locals, that should about double the $65/month that is the nominal cost of the system.
Which really means that the cost of the system doesn't double, but rather that $65/month of taxes are going to this project's costs, rather than building that new skate park, nature trail, or a new sign for city hall. Again, the represented con
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Either way, the legislature, being comprised of representatives of the jurisdiction involved approved such an action. By extrapolation, that means that the entire jurisdiction approved and agreed to pay taxes to benefit others in the area. That's how a republic works.
No, actually, it isn't. Neither democracy nor representative forms of government force agreement upon everyone.
I would love to see this argument applied to the times a local or city council votes to grant a cable company a non-exclusive franchise to operate in their community. Usually, such an agreement is represented as the greedy cable company bribing city officials into giving them a government-granted monopoly. Under your "republic", it's really everyone in the community agreeing to this.
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Either way, the legislature, being comprised of representatives of the jurisdiction involved approved such an action. By extrapolation, that means that the entire jurisdiction approved and agreed to pay taxes to benefit others in the area. That's how a republic works.
No, actually, it isn't. Neither democracy nor representative forms of government force agreement upon everyone.
No government based on the unanimous support of the entire population will ever work. If that's your working definition of democracy, you may want to revisit your civics lessons.
The whole concept behind a government is that everyone agrees to abide by its rules. You don't have to believe that the rules are right or best, but you do have to abide by them. In a representative democracy, the representatives create those rules on behalf of individual citizens. Again, you don't have to agree that a particula
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If that's your working definition of democracy, you may want to revisit your civics lessons.
You should notice that I'm the one saying that assuming unanimous agreement is not how our government works.
The whole concept behind a government is that everyone agrees to abide by its rules.
The claim was that "By extrapolation, that means that the entire jurisdiction approved and agreed to pay taxes to benefit others in the area. That's how a republic works." This is not about abiding by the rules, it is a statement that everyone approves of the plan to install a fiber system and that everyone agrees to pay taxes to benefit others. I don't even need to find those people who don't appr
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And in the meantime, they'll
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Your sarcasm aside, from TFA it looks like the town in question borrowed ~$1900 per person (NOT per household) to put in the system. They'll get that back with taxes eventually, but it's not clear whether the taxes will be on the locals or Statewide. Assuming a five year note, average household size of four, and the costs paid entirely by the locals, that should about double the $65/month that is the nominal cost of the system.
In addition, the Federal government (that's the rest of us in the USA) are going to cover ~$90M of the cost. Since the $90M covers multiple towns in the region, it's impossible to say how much the total cost of the system will be.
The Active Ethernet Fiber network in Leverett is paid for through property tax of the residents. State & Federal funds were not used for the construction. Operating costs of the network are paid by subscribers through the Municipal Light Plant fee (currently $49.95/month)
Residents in Leverett are now receiving 1gbps of Internet for $75/month, it is expected to decrease to $70/month by the end of the year.
The Internet service is $24.95 to the ISP and $49.95 to the Municipal Light Plant. The ISP is a
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The public is going to be mercilessly taxed to provide themselves with high-speed internet, and the cost will be entirely on the people who benefit!
This failed in Chattanooga, in North Carolina, and everywhere else it has been tried!
Never under estimate the liberal mind's propensity for hubris. They either don't know history, or they firmly believe that because THEY are running this show, it won't be a problem this time, they are smarter. What usually happens though is that they keep making the "program" bigger and bigger or put the federal government in charge which just wastes more resources and simply fails as before.
Remember it's the INTENT that matters, not the result...
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WHOOSH!!!!
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The public is going to be mercilessly taxed to provide themselves with high-speed internet, and the cost will be entirely on the people who benefit!
This failed in Chattanooga, in North Carolina, and everywhere else it has been tried!
I can guarantee it will not fail in Leverett, MA
83% of the town voted yes for the tax increase to build the network
75% of the town signed up for service before the network was built
82% of the town is signed up now as the network is in its final stages of construction
The network has tremendous support from the residents. The ISP is a local company that has been providing ISP services in the area for 20+ years
$75/month for 1gbps is a great price IMHO
$95/month for 1gbps & unlimited phone service is a grea
Money (Score:2)
So internet access is going to cost 9+ hours of minimum wage pay ?
So about 10 hours out of 160 hours in a full month.
Add 5 hours for cell phone and 4 hours for TV ( netflix/hulu cheap options)
That's about 10%+ of a person's wages.
Hopefully they have someone to share the internet and TV costs.
And I hope there is a lifeline option for the people trying to live on minimum wage.
Internet access makes so many things possible !
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Is DSL code for "the neighbor's open WiFi"?
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Read the story.. For those getting the minimum wage: 1 in 8 live at home. 1 in 4 have children, but not all of these households depend solely on one worker (or even two) making minimum wage. Many have other wage earners who are making more than minimum wage. Not to mention that there are only 30 million workers actually paid minimum wage, and 155 Million people working in the USA right now. Doing a bit of math tells me that only about 8 million workers have kids and get minimum wage, and somewhat less tha
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Lifeline does not cover the internet costs at this time.
At $65/month they are paying about half what we pay. We are also 'out in the sticks' like them but we pay twice as much and we get far slower speeds plus we have outages that total up about one to two weeks of time a year.
On the other hand, it is worth it to not have to live in a urban area so I'm not complaining.
'bout time. (Score:5, Interesting)
Nearby communities are not far behind in bringing broadband to their residents; they see high-speed Internet as an economic boon akin to rural electrification in the 1930s, one that could bring higher home values, better business climates, and easier access to the modern economy.
I've been saying that for a while. First was electrification, then telephonication, now internetification. High speed internet has become a basic service and necessary baseline for habitability.
If you're buying a house, you don't need to ask whether it has electricity, phone service, water, and sewage service. The last two might be self-service in the form of a well and septic system (hopefully not too close together) but you can be pretty sure they're in place or the home wouldn't be on the market. But you can't count on high speed internet. (Satellite and other services metered in 10s of gigs per month don't count.)
Last year, I picked the region where I wanted to semi-retire but I had to cross the entire area off my list because I couldn't get decent internet access unless I lived right in the middle of one of the little towns. Other areas were "up to" 6 meg DSL at best. I could have got 100mbit cable if I lived in town but, if I'm going to live in town, I'll live in a town with a Walmart, Home Depot, Best Buy, etc. A realtor said the first thing people ask is what kind of internet access they can get but, when I asked him what kind of internet access I could get, he had no idea. "I guess you could go ask one of the neighbors." Oh, sure. "Hi, I'm some random stranger. Can I come in and run some speed tests on your internet connection? I promise I'm not a serial killer."
So, instead of buying a cabin in the woods, I'm on the outskirts of a city within the sphere of influence of a cable company. As the rest of my generation retires in large numbers (in 20 years or so), those areas are going to continue to get passed over if they haven't got decent communications infrastructure in place.
And it's even more critical than electric/water/sewer. These days, it's possible for an individual to provide their own power. Solar panels, batteries, inverter, backup generator. Water can come from a well, sewage can go into a septic system. But creating a terrestrial internet connection 10 miles to wherever the local ISP is located can't be done by an individual.
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"If you're buying a house, you don't need to ask whether it has electricity, phone service, water, and sewage service."
I wonder where you got those ideas?
Reality check: out in rural areas you do need to check to see if a house has electricity, phone service and it probably will not have water or sewage service. It likely has a spring or a well for the water. It might have an outhouse, composting toilets or a septic tank and leach field and you had best find out how old the leach field is. Buy with wide open
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the commentor replied to a specific thing in the quote which was a patently false statement. Reread and comprend.
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and it probably will not have water or sewage service.
Not sure why you feel the need to point this out when he mentions that they might be 'self-service' in the next sentence.
Generally speaking though, if you're going to be restricted to an outhouse, it's going to mention that in the documents.
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"If you're buying a house, you don't need to ask whether it has electricity, phone service, water, and sewage service."
Never purchased a house in the country eh? Where Electricity is pretty much everywhere, the rest is NOT a given for the vast majority of buildable land in this country.
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It's not whether the government considers you 'served' by a utility, it's whether a person buying the house is. Some/most people are okay with well water and sewage tanks, once they find out the cost involved of getting it taken care of, they'll decide that way.
You cannot sell someone a house without a steady source of electric these days though. You could in the 1920's, perhaps even in the 1950's, but since the 1970's, a house without electric or at least a planned rollout of it would have been a bad inves
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Hi, I'm some random stranger. Can I come in and run some speed tests on your internet connection? I promise I'm not a serial killer.
No, but five bucks will get you the wi-fi password and a large mocha. Oh, and no hipsters.
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The last two might be self-service in the form of a well and septic system (hopefully not too close together) but you can be pretty sure they're in place or the home wouldn't be on the market.
'Dry Cabins' are a thing up here where I live. It's where you don't have water/septic, nor a well/septic system due to the location. So you either truck water in yourself or have it delivered, and use an outhouse or composting toilet.
Still, such are explicitly stated to be so rather clearly in any advertisements.
Oh, sure. "Hi, I'm some random stranger. Can I come in and run some speed tests on your internet connection? I promise I'm not a serial killer."
Talking with the neighbors where you're going to be living for possibly decades? Who would want to do that? You know, make sure your neighbors aren't meth-heads, Jehova's witnesses, or other ann
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I understand there's different rules in different states about rainwater harvesting, but surely if you have a "dry" cabin, i.e. no piped water supply from the local mains, you'd want to catch the water falling on your roof?
If you're in a rural area, and not near any other major source of air pollution, surely the rainwater is potable?
I've been living on rainwater for almost 20 years, we only buy a truckload when the dry season lasts longer than usual. We could overcome that with another tank or two (current
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I understand there's different rules in different states about rainwater harvesting, but surely if you have a "dry" cabin, i.e. no piped water supply from the local mains, you'd want to catch the water falling on your roof?
There's no rules against it here. Rainwater tends to form around microscopic dust particles, plus you get dust and bird poop and such on your collectors, so you want a settling tank and treatment system, but nothing that can't be handled. But then you probably already know all that.
Still, while there's no rules against rainwater harvesting, in my area for six months out of the year the precipitation is solid in form, so none of the cabins I've visited have rainwater collection systems. It's cheaper/easie
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My storage tanks are also the settling tanks - the pickup for household supply is about 5cm above the floor of the tank, all the dust and bird poop just settle to the bottom, and I have that cleared out every couple of years. No other treatment. It sounds icky, but I prefer to think of it as keeping my immune system active and healthy, plus I'm getting lots of minerals. My last blood test showed all mineral levels good, except for slightly low calcium - so I have to east more cheese, dammit.
Seriously, thoug
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Nearby communities are not far behind in bringing broadband to their residents; they see high-speed Internet as an economic boon akin to rural electrification in the 1930s, one that could bring higher home values, better business climates, and easier access to the modern economy.
I've been saying that for a while. First was electrification, then telephonication, now internetification.
You know, I'm not a fan of this idea, where government shoulders the costs and then owns the resource. We didn't do electricity or telephone this way back in the days, we encouraged private industry to do this by providing subsidies and a regulatory climate where private enterprise could survive. Just having the government do it is a bad idea.... Just about as bad as just handing out grants to companies that claim they will do it for government, which is, in effect, how this will end up. But we apparentl
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You know, I'm not a fan of this idea, where government shoulders the costs and then owns the resource. We didn't do electricity or telephone this way back in the days, we encouraged private industry to do this by providing subsidies and a regulatory climate where private enterprise could survive.
So, you favor government shouldering the cost, giving away ownership, and guaranteeing profitability for the utility company. Honestly, that system has worked out pretty well, in many cases. The private industry part tends to encourage cost minimization while the regulatory oversight discourages price gouging and customer abuse.
The problem with purely private solutions is that the people involved have a financial incentive to provide poor service at exorbitant prices. The problem with purely government s
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Bullshit. What the quoted paragraph
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Lived in the hell that is Leverett... (Score:1)