Democrats Try To Ban Internet Shutoffs Until Pandemic Is Over (arstechnica.com) 271
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: A proposed U.S. law would make it illegal for telecom providers to terminate Internet or phone service during the COVID-19 pandemic. The bill was submitted in the Senate today by Sens. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), and Ron Wyden (D-Ore.). "Now -- as millions of Americans hunker down, work from home, and engage in remote learning -- would be the absolute worst time for Americans to lose a critical utility like Internet service," Merkley said in an announcement.
Separately, House Democratic leadership today unveiled a $3 trillion relief package that includes at least $4 billion for an "emergency broadband connectivity fund." That money, if approved, would be given to ISPs that provide discounts to low-income households and people who lose their jobs. Subsidies would be up to $50 a month for most low-income households and up to $75 for households in tribal areas. Another $1.5 billion would be allotted to Wi-Fi hotspots and other telecom equipment for schools and libraries. The relief package also includes a provision that "prohibits telephone and broadband service providers from stopping service to consumers unable to pay during the duration of the emergency," according to House Democrats.
Separately, House Democratic leadership today unveiled a $3 trillion relief package that includes at least $4 billion for an "emergency broadband connectivity fund." That money, if approved, would be given to ISPs that provide discounts to low-income households and people who lose their jobs. Subsidies would be up to $50 a month for most low-income households and up to $75 for households in tribal areas. Another $1.5 billion would be allotted to Wi-Fi hotspots and other telecom equipment for schools and libraries. The relief package also includes a provision that "prohibits telephone and broadband service providers from stopping service to consumers unable to pay during the duration of the emergency," according to House Democrats.
Makes sense, with a caveat (Score:5, Interesting)
The Internet is basic infrastructure like electricity. It's hard to find a job and do certain shopping without it. True, one can do a lot with a phone, but not all.
Maybe a compromise, such as a reduced bandwidth. Few want to subsidize cat video viewing. That's Meowism!
Re:Makes sense, with a caveat (Score:5, Insightful)
$4 billion for an "emergency broadband connectivity fund." That money, if approved, would be given to ISPs
Re:Makes sense, with a caveat (Score:4, Insightful)
would be given to ISPs
Who are the ISPs? AT&T (Time Warner) and Comcast (NBC). All of the rest are rounding errors. If Republicans came up with this, it would be labelled payola.
Also included in the bill is funding for high population areas to collect hate-crime data. What do you get when you give away cat food? More kittens.
Re:Makes sense, with a caveat (Score:5, Insightful)
Give it to people who are behind on their bills rather than give it directly to the ISPs.
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Give it to people who are behind on their bills rather than give it directly to the ISPs.
So we can give it to the ISPs.
Or we can give it to people who are behind on their bills so they can give it to the ISPs.
What's the difference?
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The difference is that the first just funnels some money to ISP C-Levels.
The second allows people to pay their ISP, generate sales and hence taxes.
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The difference is that the first just funnels some money to ISP C-Levels.
Why wouldn't the 2nd option do that as well?
If they are receiving the same amount of money and providing the same service, why would they behave differently depending on whether they receive the money directly or indirectly?
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Because if receiving money and delivering a service are disconnected, why would they provide the same quality of service?
Re:Makes sense, with a caveat (Score:4, Informative)
We know what happens. This has been studied. They overwhelmingly pay bills and buy food.
Re:Makes sense, with a caveat (Score:4, Insightful)
Well, that's basically what the proposal is about, flushing money down the shitter.
You really think that money is better suited in the hands of ISPs? If you hand it to people, at least alcohol and ciggies industries will benefit instead of just some C-Levels at the top of the ISPs.
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That's why I'd want to see that money on the demand side. You know, so they can do what they're supposed to do in a capitalist economy, reward those that provide goods and services they want and hence more goods and services are produced that are wanted.
At least once in a while we could pretend that this still matters.
Re:Makes sense, with a caveat (Score:5, Insightful)
half the people you give a handout directly like that will simply say "fuck it, its not enough I may as well blow it on alcohol and cigies"
Nonsense. We are not handing out money to addicts and alcoholics on skidrow.
These are hardworking people who have only fallen behind because of the lockdown.
The lockdown has exposed many faultlines in American society. One is that wealthier families are doing way better. Most upper-income people are being paid to work from home, and their kids are performing well e-learning from home.
Low-income families are far more likely to have lost their income, and their kids often lack a quiet place to study, may be sharing a computer with several other people, and lack the study skills and family support necessary to succeed with e-learning.
The last thing these families need is for their internet to be cut off.
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The Internet is basic infrastructure like electricity. True, one can do a lot with a phone, but not all.
Having grown up in the days of pay-per-minute phone sex lines, I can tell you that it doesn't even compare to Pornhub.
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True. But when you're a teenager in the 80's, you take what you can get. Either is better than the J.C. Penny's swimwear catalog. Kids these days have no idea how good they have it.
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A better "compromise" would be to stop them from selling our data to the government, cut them off from government funds, and force them to comply with all past agreements WRT infrastructure improvements paid for with taxpayer money.
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Opening up the infrastructure has worked in other countries. For example in Japan anyone can attach lines to utility poles so now everyone has ultra fast fibre. And I mean ultra fast, 10,000Mb/sec in the four largest cities with 20,000Mb/sec due to roll out this summer (probably delayed by C19). Cheap too, less than I pay for 0.1% of that speed in the UK.
Another option is to have the last mile stuff government owned. Fibre everywhere but a choice of ISP.
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We are legion.
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Re:Clarification [Re:Makes sense, with a caveat (Score:4, Informative)
And by "do a lot with a phone," you meant on the Internet. So that changes nothing.
There is an assumption in this statement that everyone who has a cell phone can afford to pay for cell phone data plan that covers enough data for job search, training, online classes for their kids, etc..
A good chunk of people who have lost jobs are on the lower end of the income scale. They tend to use local WiFi for Internet access rather than cell phone data plans, simply because internet plans are are whole lot less expensive and WiFi at the local library, donut shop, etc. is free. These are no longer an option.
Just give the money to the people not the ISPs (Score:5, Interesting)
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Give it to the citizens instead and let them decide what bills are important to them.
Horrible idea. They'd spend it on flat screen TVs and then complain that their internet got cut off after.
There is a middle ground, and that is not trusting *anyone* to actually pinky promise to only spend $4bn in a certain way. Put the money aside and let ISPs claim it. In order to claim it they need to prove that a user is about to be cut-off based on already sent final notices, then they can only claim a month by month payment until the pandemic is over.
Controlled spending doesn't mean don't spend, it me
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You are sort of correct, the "liberal" media will focus on the 0.1% of people who misuse the funds, and will probably mix in people who have bought a smartphone with that group because they still think smartphones are a luxury, so this is precisely why it'll not happen.
It's the right-wing that likes to harp on "welfare queens" and the idea of prevalent government assistance abuse, not the "liberals".
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They might. That would still be less-bad than handing the money to the ISPs that have routinely misused grant money.
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There's a saying in German, the knave thinks the way he is. It's a bit like the religious nuts who think that people just don't buy their bullshit because they want to live in debauchery and rape, pillage and murder.
Which always leaves me wondering whether they would if they didn't fear their supernatural CCTV...
Same here. Would you waste that money on booze and drugs? Then I guess you shouldn't get it and leave it to people who can spend it more sensibly.
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One might want to compare that to lower sales in restaurants and bars. We might find out that it ain't the "lowlives" that buy that booze...
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By comparison
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That's an awful lot of effort you put in to compare two completely incomparable things in an attempt to contradict a point that I'm not making.
That's seriously cracked. You should probably be on a watch list.
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Always the fascist impulses with you people, isn't it?
Always with the histrionics with you isn't it. In the mean time, might I suggest some recommended reading?
https://www.collinsdictionary.... [collinsdictionary.com]
That's why you're constantly accusing others of being fascist
I was going to accuse you of being a liar, what with making libelous claims with no evidence. On second thoughts though, I don't think you are dishonest, I think you genuinely believe that about the OP despite it never happening.
Your, ahem, "logic" seems to
Re: Just give the money to the people not the ISPs (Score:2)
$50 they won't do the decent thing? That is a most generous offer, from what I've seen of their posts.
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First off, if the grant money were misused at a rate of 6.7%, we'd be lucky. Secondly, I don't know why you're dragging the PPP into this when we're discussing telcos and grant money paid to telcos in particular. You should be looking less at the PPP and more at instances when infrastructure buildout grants have been absorbed and misused by telcos/cable companies.
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You're misusing statistics. On that topic, did you hear about the man who drowned in a river that was, on average, six inches deep?
And did you know that most people have more than the average number of arms? The average is something like 1.999 arms per person. How many do you have, 2? You freak!
When Is the Pandemic Considered Over? (Score:3, Interesting)
Regardless of what you personally do, if your plan is to hide indoors until a vaccine is available in 2021 (or later), that's a ridiculous waste of your time on this Earth.... but it's your time to waste as you want.
If your state has reopened, as determined by your local leadership, I say go live your life and do the things.
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Yeah, living life afraid of everything has to be a pretty shitty way of doing things... Everyone dies, and no fun to do it without money to pay for stuff, so lets go back to work for goodness sake.
Re:When Is the Pandemic Considered Over? (Score:5, Insightful)
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If you can work from home, great, that lessens the overall burdens. Personally I don't like being around people anyway - unless I'm getting paid to do it, I don't. So I'm fine if there are no sports or theaters or even restaurants. But I don't think the people that work at those venues feel the same. If people have the means to stay at home and make money or are wealthy enough that it doesn't matter, then great! But a large % of the pop can't do that, and I don't think the gov should keep printing mone
Smallpox? Spanish Flu? (Score:5, Insightful)
As you may have thought about, if each person currently infected with COVID-19 passes it to 1.5 other people, on average, then the number of people infected increases by 50% every couple of weeks.
The same math works with and R below 1.0. If, through a combination of factors such as getting rid of the handshake as a cultural norm, improved hand washing, etc we have the base reproduction rate below 1.0, the number of people infected drops every couple weeks. At a reproduction rate of 0.5, the number of infected people drops in half each round, until it's nearly zero after a few months. That's what we're seeing in most places now - each week there are fewer and fewer cases.
It might feel like covid will last forever, but have you ever worried about the Spanish Flu? It was a pandemic like covid. Various factors got the reproduction rate below 1.0, so now it's gone.
In fact it's impossible for the infection rate to keep growing for a virus like covid which mutates fairly slowly, simply because herd immunity kicks in after around 40% have been exposed and have immunity. You can't catch it from someone who is immune, and you can't catch it from someone who is NOT immune after they caught it from someone who was immune.
We can get the reproduction rate below 1.0 and make this thing go away just like countless other diseases are no longer a threat. Many places are well on there way to doing just that.
So yes live; don't just hide scared. Go out fishing. Don't try to shake my hand at the dock, wash your hands, when you feel feverish stay home from work. We can beat covid, and we can have some fun while we do.
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Current data suggests covid mutates slowly. It also hints that, like most viruses, it's mutating to be less virulent. The first point is important for a vaccine. It should be more like the measles vaccine than the annual flu.
Of course we'll get more data over time.
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Re:When Is the Pandemic Considered Over? (Score:5, Insightful)
You can't force people to wear masks. You can't force people to take a vaccine.
We actually can (once the vaccine is available). It's not a question of "can we," it's a question of "should we."
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If everyone just staying home for 3 weeks or so we'd be fucking done. We could have been over this by mid-April.
It seems like a better solution would be to get everyone 3 weeks of food, and have roving drones kill anyone on the streets. Less loss of life and shorter too Also, less loss of innocent life.
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Let me make myself clear: there will never be a time when COVID-19 won't be a threat to humanity.
Sure there will. Just like smallpox isn't a threat to humanity anymore.
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There will come a time when the corona virus is as dangerous to humanity as the plague. The plague wiped out a LOT of people back then, but we got past it, and while getting the plague today is no joke it is treatable.
Help the poor? (Score:2)
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Think, just for a minute, about what is going to happen with an unemployment rate higher than any since the Great Depression. Suddenly ending the controls on this are not going to magically repair the economy and get all those people working.
If the death rate increases as it will when states open prematurely, the economy will crater so hard it will make today look like a dream.
What do you think all those people are going to do when the GOP cuts off relief funding? Just curl up and die?
Think 1789.
Magnified.
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There they go again (Score:5, Funny)
Leopards Eating People's Faces Party 2020!
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I'm so sick of the Leopards Eating People's Faces Party. I vote for them every election and I always seem to get my face eaten by a leopard!
I'd stop voting for them, but the No Ones Face Gets Eaten Party is way worse. They don't think that gays and illegals should have their faces eaten. They're basically destroying America.
Wasn't this addressed in March? (Score:3)
AT&T, Verizon, Charter, and others [usatoday.com] committed to not disconnect subscribers during pandemic crisis
Do the Democrats simply not know what is actually going on?
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Do the Democrats simply not know what is actually going on?
They take it one thing at a time. When they do accurately identify a problem, they do not accurately identify a solution, because that requires understanding several things at once.
No (Score:2)
Some companies committed to not disconnect subscribers for 30-60 days. In mid-March. Which was 60 days ago.
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Let them pay the bills... (Score:2)
Not the government, not the taxpayer, the Congresscritters themselves.
Seriously, if they ban shutting off service, certain segments of the population will say "great - free internet!" and stop paying their bills. It's the same idiocy as the people who don't want to pay rent. That money is going somewhere, to some company that needs it in order to pay their bills and the salaries of their employees.
TANSTAAFL
Democrats Move Toward Full Command Economy (Score:2)
"Democrats Move Toward Full Command Economy"
There fixed the head line for you. Honestly these people really need to ask themselves what the end game is. Because this idea that government can secure cheap credit right now so we should stimulate is going to be seriously tested but the deficits already created this year.
Its largely true that the deficit hawks have been wrong up until now and the appetite for Treasuries has a endured. I actually believe that if we remained more or less inline with pre-COVID exp
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Please go back to work. We survivers will even erect you a monument for your sacrifice.
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But you won't because you're a coward, that's what defines your position on this argument. Now back to your hiding place.
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Well of course he won't... that is why he wants to give government the power to do it.
Sadly, the government already knows who they plan to use these tactics on... and it will not be against people willing to do what it takes to get things done. It will be against the whiners that keep needing someone else to do their dirty work for them. After all, they actively advertise that they are weak and their solution to everything is to vote for someone else to solve their problem as they trash talk them during t
Re: Wealth redistribution (Score:2)
Still smoking the paranoia stuff I see.
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...said the population to most corporations these days.
Re:Three trillion... (Score:5, Insightful)
Sensible tax policy that balances the budget and allows us to begin paying down our debt.
Remember that last year we had a near trillion dollar deficit caused by some tax cuts that, beyond all reason, refused to pay for themselves. The CARES act contained even more pointless tax cuts.
Here' s a novel idea:
3) We stop spending like drunken sailors and raise taxes.
You can find the numbers online, but it turns out that not only can we balance the budget, but we can expand programs that actually help people at the same time.
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"Sensible tax policy"
3 motherfucking words that have NEVER EVER existed together at any point in human history. But hey, we all wish fantasies would come true and would be awesome if this one happened.
Our current political climate will never get us out of this rut we are in where everything is an emergency or issue defining our time needing the bank to be broken over.
Everyone problem in the world could be financially solved with the money that disappears from government waste... but that is not happening.
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3 motherfucking words that have NEVER EVER existed together at any point in human history.
Indeed. Except of course for all the times it did and even the USA, king of the overspenders had a budget surplus many times throughout its history with sensible spending policy.
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Many times? Well, if you define "many" as six times in my lifetime (and I'm eligible for Social Security in a few years), then it's happened "many times".
It should be noted that this year's $1200 per person payout (yes, it's necessary. It's probably too small, in fact) will give us a single-year deficit larger by a factor of four or five than the total of all the surpluses in my lifetime. It may be a larger deficit than ALL the surpluses in US history....
Re: Three trillion... (Score:2)
"there has never" - Mr Astray spends a lot of time here making these odd and undemonstrated claims. It appears to be a real problem with basic logic.
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Judging from the post history he doesn't pay any taxes. The opposite.
Re: Three trillion... (Score:2)
He collects taxes?
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No, tax pay him!
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Technically we have had flat taxation. The first peacetime income tax was 2% on all incomes over $4000.
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Raising taxes, paradoxically, will not bring in any more $ as a percentage of GDP. We are already over flowing in taxes and revenue, and history of govt revenue over the last 100 years suggests that messing further with taxes will actually reduce income in the long term after a brief surge. On the other hand, our predicted future expenses can only be balanced by a growing economy sustaining 3-4% gdp long term or by massively cutting social programs or either devaluing the currency in international trade o
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Raise taxes on corporations and the mega rich. Have them pay proportionally what they would have in, I think it was the 50's and most of the funding problems are solved.
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Those tax laws were riddled with loopholes. They dodged the high taxes by forming conglomerates.
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We had record federal government revenue last year, just like the year before that, and the year before that, and the year before that. That's not a big shock, because per capita inflation-adjusted federal revenue has increased significantly every decade for decades. Tax revenue has doubled in the last 40 years [usgovernmentrevenue.com]. It only levels out briefly when there is a recession.
The real problem is that Congress continues to manage to spend even more faster than revenues have increased. Spending has more than doubled over [usgovernmentspending.com]
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I think what you really mean is "sensible spending policy". We rake in a ton of tax revenue. There's no excuse for us to be spending so much money.
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3) We stop spending like drunken sailors and raise taxes.
Congratulations on being voted in as runner up in the election.
Humans don't see government over spending. They only see their bank balance and won't vote in the common interest. (I use humans, collectively, not as in a bunch of individuals).
Or... (Score:2)
You could just open the fucking economy back up, with masks and social distancing if that's what you prefer. See, there is a third option.
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Nope. See Sweden, which did not have quarantine in the first place. Their higher death rate is explained by their failure to isolate the elderly (which we should learn from, and do).
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Their higher death rate is explained by their failure to isolate the elderly (which we should learn from, and do).
My post from another thread on why that is essentially impossible:
OK, but what about all the people who work at nursing homes? Their families? The doctors that treat the elderly for normal age related ailments? The staff for their offices/hospitals? Their families? The vendors who supply and deliver to those nursing homes and doctors offices/hospitals? Simply "locking down" the elderly and vulnerable while the rest of us went on with our lives simply isn't possible.
You would have to also isolate so many people just to effectively isolate the elderly that you might as well just lock down everyone.
There quite possibly won't be a vaccine (Score:2)
Herd immunity is our _only_ realistic option.
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Budget sequestration.
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Re: Three trillion... (Score:3)
Get some economic and geopolitical education (in part about Venezuela).
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And where do I sign up to get that much no money?
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The CARES act "temporarily" (still ongoing) banned evictions for failure to pay rent starting April 1st, 2020.
The response of the people was that nearly 33% of all renters decided that they werent going to pay the rent due on April 1st.
The continuing response is that nearly 20% of all renters decided that they werent going to pay the rent due May 1st.
Keep in mind that unemployment only recently approached the 20% mark.
Sure, some of the people that didnt pay their Ap
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Come August 1st the Democrats will claim to be the champions of solving the impending rent and mortgage disasters by introducing more legislation that people will eagerly and selfishly exploit. A not small percentage of the exploiters will still have no plan for what they will do when the new second round of relief or restrictions runs out and they will continue to do the wrong things with the help afforded them.
So democrats are bad for pushing legislation that anyone can exploit (to the tune of maybe a couple thousand dollars at best). But I guess the GOP is good for pushing legislation that only the wealthy and corporations can exploit(to the tune of millions of dollars)?
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What's the employment rate for renters? I suspect you might be ignoring a correlation between the security of someone's income and their housing situation.
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If those people get cut off from inability to pay, the ISP can and probably still will go under if its that close to insolvency. I'm not sure how their agreements with major backbone providers are structured, but I'm pretty sure they'll be on the hook for the same amount of bandwidth no matter how many customers they lose over a 3-month period. Unless they can change allocation on a month-by-month basis (or with even finer granularity). And that's just the little guys. Some of the big ISPs (telcos) own
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Just let the budget sequester take effect. It'll cut all the things you want cut. And more.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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Especially to companies that have failed to prepare in the past. Airlines? Let them fucking fail. Don't give 'em a cent. Money should have been invested to prepare for such events, not spent on stock buybacks and executive bonuses.
You'll be hard pressed to find any business (especially heavily unionized businesses like airlines) that can adequately prepare enough to weather $50-100 million dollar per day losses over an at minimum 6 month stretch (especially when that stretch happens over what is traditionally one of that sector's busiest and most profitable times)
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Re: Does Bernie understand that things have cost? (Score:2)
You're quite the expert on trolling, as all can see.
Re: Does Bernie understand that things have cost? (Score:2)
You weren't talking about trolling?
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The 5th Amendment says that the government can't take something of value, like a provided service, without providing just compensation.
Are Democrats offering to pay the bills of people who would be cut off?
From the summary itself:
Subsidies would be up to $50 a month for most low-income households and up to $75 for households in tribal areas.
So yes, yes they would.