[12714] in Commercialization & Privatization of the Internet
EFF and the big bad T (tax)
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Al Huff)
Fri May 27 00:09:54 1994
Date: 26 May 94 07:46:00 PDT
From: "Al Huff" <AHUFF@wsipc.wednet.edu>
To: com-priv@psi.com
Daniel Weitzner says:
>2. Direct subsidy to end users: EFF has supported direct goverment support
>to subsidize network access for libraries, schools, and other public
>institutions, where those institutions could not otherwise afford to be
>online. We first made these arguments during congressional debates about
>internet commercialization, and still, as far as I know, support this
>notion. In 1992, when internet commercialization was still a relatively
>unknown quantity, we predicted that market forces would go a long way
>toward lowering prices and increases access, but that some institutions
>might still need direct support. At the time, the monopoly internet
>provider (ANS/Merit) and its supporters argued that if you opened the
>internet market to competition, then many public institutions would never
>be able to afford net access.....
I find that there is an underlying assumption here that certain
libraries, schools, and other public institutions can not afford
to go on-line due to their financial situation. If that is the
case, then what does that imply? They are inadequately funded by
their taxpaying public? They have made other choices? If
library A is well supported by its constituents and library B is
not, should we effect national policy to correct the error in B
constituents thinking? If A has made going on-line a priority
and forgone someother activity, should B get rewarded for not
prioritizing its activities?
I raise this point because I believe we have a very difficult
public policy question here. We see it played out over and over
again in K-12 education where one local jurisdiction does not tax
itself to support its schools compared to others in the same
state. Pretty soon, inequity is perceived by the state and some
corrective action is attempted. Often, the people who were
"early adopters" get the reverse penalty of selective state help
going to the have nots. But the have nots are there by some
degree of local choice. As one librarian remarked to me about
Internet access. "The libraries who say they can't afford it
have simply made a choice to invest in other library resources.
They make those choices everyday when they order books and
periodicals, etc." I recognize that some of the inequity is
there by the drawing of political subdivision boundaries which
might leave one jurisdiction with lower property values per
capita and so forth. However, even the poorest jurisdictions
have some degree of decision-making power on what is of value to
them.
I don't have the answer to this problem, but I think the EFF
should think carefully about building policy proposals based on
such assumptions.
Al Huff
Executive Director
WSIPC (Washington, that is, in state, not DC)
