Oh, I'm with you more than you may think. However, when I talk of affordable electricity or broadband, I'm talking of those areas where free market competitors simply won't take their business because it costs too much to serve those areas and they can't make a profit to serve them.
For example, I was watching a show on TV the other day about a little town of farmers. They couldn't get broadband in their area, because no broadband company had built the highspeed infrastructure to their community and to their households. Most still had dial up. There were many small businesses and farmers that said they had trouble getting access to commodities data and other Internet goodies like exchanges where they could sell their goods.
So what does our country do about that kind of thing? Well, with electricity, our government imposed a fee to subsidize underserved areas to ensure everyone had access to electricity. I am one of those who believe that broadband is not a social right, but an absolute requirement for the prosperity of this country. I guess we could leave those underserved areas to wallow in poverty and eventually everyone would move away...probably all of them to the big cities. That's the other option. That certainly would be the free market option.
Here's something else, though. Sometimes we need government to step in, not to impose more regulation, but to create a more sensible regulatory environment. I live in a relatively large city, and yet, the only broadband choice I have is TWC. I pay more than anyone in my family who live in Texas, where they have more choice. The broadband choice in this country is limited and the major players like Comcast, TWC, and a few others have monopoly power in regions around the US. I think it is incumbent upon the FCC to figure how to ensure cities like mine get more competition. For example, if Verizon were to offer FiOS to me, I'd snap it up, because it would save me alot of money over TWC. But I don't have that choice, in large part because the government puts so many intra and interstate regulations down on telecoms that Verizon is having a really hard time expanding their service everywhere.
So sometimes we need our government to help out either with subsidies or to streamline a strategic industry's regulations to ensure broader competition and a level playing field for companies and consumers. This health bill was an attempt at that and includes provisions like free market exchanges. In addition, we can all honestly point out that it is a very large expansion of the nanny state and it certainly doesn't go far enough in creating competition in an industry that is hopelessly broken.
However, I am very glad of one thing. By Sunday, for better or worse, this damn health debate will be over and our Congress can turn to other priorities like energy. :) |
