Struggling Americans Drop Internet Access After GOP Kills Low-Income Broadband Program
from the this-is-why-we-can't-have-nice-things dept
Back in March we noted how the GOP killed a popular program (the Affordable Connectivity Program, or ACP) that provided a $30 discount off of low-income users’ broadband bills. At the time, 22 million Americans were enrolled in the FCC effort to bring down broadband access prices for the most vulnerable.
But after House leader Rep. Mike Johnson refused to let funding bills even have a vote, the program was discontinued. Now, unsurprisingly, low income users who can’t afford expensive U.S. broadband are being forced to disconnect:
“On Friday, Charter Communications reported a net loss of 154,000 Internet subscribers that it said was mostly driven by customers canceling after losing the federal discount. About 100,000 of those subscribers were reportedly getting the discount, which in some cases made Internet service free to the consumer.”
Right now many ISPs are offering retention offers to keep users on the subscription rolls, but once those promotions end you can expect notably more users to disconnect. Many states are exploring how they can create state-level replacement programs — with decidedly mixed results so far.
The great irony here is that U.S. broadband prices are among the highest in the developed world in large part thanks to GOP (and some Democratic) support for policies that embrace unchecked consolidation, unhindered regional monopolization, and mindless deregulation. With neither competition nor functional regulatory oversight, regional giants like Charter, AT&T, and Comcast rip off captive customers.
Not only does the GOP (and some Democrats like Joe Manchin) routinely support policies directly responsible for patchy, expensive broadband, the GOP relentlessly attacks absolutely any efforts to do anything about it. Even very basic proposals like requiring that your ISP is clear with you about how much your broadband line will actually cost.
The majority of the GOP voted down COVID relief and infrastructure bills that funded broadband expansion, despite taking credit for the new deployments among their constituents. They routinely fight tooth and nail against any oversight of telecom monopolies, whether on net neutrality or privacy. FedSec lawyers just declared a program that helps bring broadband to rural schools “unconstitutional.”
All while marketing themselves as a populist party looking out for the little guy.
The GOP telecom policy, for 40 straight years now, has been quite literally to let the biggest, shittiest telecom monopolies do whatever they want. This is somehow dressed up as a noble embrace of “free market principles,” when the very obvious end result, time and time again, is muted competition, unchecked monopoly power, and expensive, substandard, patchy broadband access.
Filed Under: ACP, Affordable Connectivity Program, broadband, deregulation, high speed internet, low income, subsidy, telecom
Comments on “Struggling Americans Drop Internet Access After GOP Kills Low-Income Broadband Program”
Is anybody surprised?
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No surprise here.
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I am a bit surprised.
What’s the point of all of the Russian bots, token minorities, and all that other horse shit if the poors can’t be infected by Fox News or clowns via the internet?
I mean I guess it tracks, since Republicans don’t seem to be able look past “TODAY”, but again, a bit unexpected, imo.
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Fox News, OAN, and NewsMax are more than sufficient for brainwashing. They are readily accessible without internet. That still doesn’t mean the fascists can ignore the internet entirely.
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These folks cannot afford internet, which is commonly $50-$70, while Cable TV is often more expensive.
I doubt most have more than antenna TV, if this program truly helped them and I suspect it did help a lot of people.
More Republicans throwing shit at the wall, then decrying all the shit on the walls.
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If they can’t afford internet, then they can’t afford to participate in a lot of things, which keeps them poor yet they’ll still talk to people who can have those things about how how to vote. A person might not be able to directly access talking points, but their neighbour who watches nothing but OANN (because Fox is too liberal now) might be able to convince them of something. Then, they’re less likely to stumble across real news if they can’t afford to turn the TV on.
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Don’t forget the free-to-air channels and newspapers.
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Just See What It Did To Student Loans
The government taking over a utility and subsidizing it to the point where you are totally reliant on the subsidy, or else it becomes unaffordable, is not “looking out for the little guy”.
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Imagine how much better the internet would be without DARPA.
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The Internet might not even have existed without DARPA, fool.
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Some of us got the joke. Some of us are the joke.
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Every accusation a blaring confession.
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I accuse you of being handsome.
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I think you misspelt the word ‘ugly’.
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Says the joke.
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To itself.
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Have to agree with AC on this. The Internet was created by the Federal Government, not taken over by it.
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Some people struggle with sarcasm while others simply do not see it at all.
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To be fair, sometimes the sarcasm requires specific knowledge that not everyone will have.
DARPA is not something that most people know about or the role it played in creating the internet and email.
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Nobody wants to work anymore!
whaaaa
I just can not find anyone to fill these positions at my place of business!!
Oh.. and this “The government taking over a utility”
Is this supposed to be funny?
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I think perhaps he is confusing “community broadband” with these low-income subsidies.
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and keep the government away from my medicare!!!
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Just like roads. Get the government out of the way. Toll roads everywhere is the only way to look out for the little guy.
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Wait til you find out how much we spend on fossil fuel subsidies.
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So you don’t understand the program being referenced. You also don’t understand that ironically, local governments taking over would solve the problem being addressed better than just subsidizing the service by paying the price-gouging ISP sources of the problem.
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Lol. If you weren’t a well-known local idiot I’d ask why you think the blame in that case rests on the the government and not the private company who insists that the connection isn’t affordable without the subsidy, but I remembered who I’m addressing.
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Bruh, the government invented this particular utility.
How is it you manage to never learn anything at all?
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Careful, two other ACs made pretty much the same statement and got piled on by the regular ignoramuses far it, including Toom1275.
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pile on:
” to join other people in criticizing something or someone in usually an unfair way”
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/pile%20on
TIL: Sarcasm is the same as criticism.
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TIL: you are a dumbass that doesn’t understand sarcasm can be used in criticism.
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If Toom1275 piled on another user, that other user must have said something incorrect. Toom is a valued, respected member of the community, and his authority should not be infringed upon.
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Toom is a subversive member of the MAGAt community, and he has no authority.
nothing to laugh at
I’d attempt a “funniest comment” for this, but there is nothing funny about it.
Oh wait, there is one joke. Rep. Mike Johnson.
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Why is their title “representative” … oh yeah, because they represent monied interests.
Our education system tells students about how things are supposed to work, no wonder they are confused.
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“Struggling Americans Drop Internet Access After GOP Kills Low-Income Broadband Program”
so it had the desired effect: poor people don’t need the opportunity to become informed, or to participate in modern society. They just need to sit at home and consume Fox News.
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And do whatever Trump tells them to.
Like, say, participate in an insurrection.
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You…do know that cable TV is expensive too, right?
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Let’s not give the Murdochs any more ideas.
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They don’t need cable TV. With the take over of local over the air channels by the likes of Murdoch, the local news is spouting almost as much 💩 as OAN
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Is there a “happy” medium where a person who doesn’t have the ability to pay for cable or internet gets access to actual news instead of commercial propaganda?
I only ask because there’s so many things today where internet is actually a required utility that some people will choose to pay whatever ransom is required, but then choose to get their “news” from Twitter, YouTube and whatever instead of just watching Fox. Which isn’t an upgrade…
Cable might be expensive, but their toxin is free so long as you have internet access, and since you now need internet access for everything from banking to job applications in many places…
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Maybe reading newspapers at the public library? I’d imagine some would have deals to get around paywalls, too, and maybe seminars teaching people how to research stuff.
But that’s a very limited “happiness”. A lot of people can’t easily get to a library, or can’t spend much time outside their home (like if they’ve got kids to watch).
The sane thing would be to give them free internet, but, well, here we are. (It’s cheap enough that Google Fiber offered, a decade ago, to give people unsubsidized 5 Mbit/s service for free, if they paid a $300 installation fee. It met the definition of “broadband” at the time.)
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I’d say that, while traditional news outlets like newspapers and over-the-air TV news aren’t perfect, they’re still a lot better than Fox News.
'If it's not going to large businesses we agree with it's wasted money!'
As tempting as it might be to attribute this to the GOP not wanting poor people to have access to information that would allow them to know just how much the GOP is lying to them I’m sure it’s just another indifferently malicious example of ‘the only acceptable government subsidies are ones to large businesses’.
Vote Blue
Vote blue ffs. Get these evil bastards out of government and into orange jumpsuits.
FedSec?
What is FedSec? Federal Security? Federal Secretary? ???