Ajit Pai faces heat over proposal to take away poor people’s broadband plans | Hacker News Reader

Ajit Pai faces heat over proposal to take away poor people’s broadband plans

arstechnica.com

35 pointsohjeez10 comments

> Pai claimed that kicking resellers out of the program would spur facilities-based carriers to invest in their broadband networks.

Where does the FCC get the idea that they can manipulate the market for economic reasons? This is completely beyond their purview.

I would think that getting carriers to invest in their broadband networks reasonably could be part of the FCC's job.

FCC has no business meddling in the operation of businesses. Their mandate is to regulate the airwaves not decide what's the best strategy for broadband carriers.

By that logic, they never had the right to interfere with broadband. They're the Federal Communications Commission, not the Federal Airwaves Commission.

Using the statistics in the article, the subsidy currently goes to 16% of all households (even assuming all have computers), so it's not highly targeted as is.

Also, cutting out these artificial middleman resellers could result in savings that exceed the subsidy.

I'm surprised he hasn't already tried to shop an investment in the FCC led by Verizon and Comcast. Obviously it'd be better if taxpayers didn't have to foot the bill for an agency they already own.

Uselessly partisan title.

How, exactly, is it partisan? You could argue that he in himself is a Republican stereotype, given his actions, but that in itself doesn't make it partisan.

Are you saying that taking away subsidized broadband plans for the poor is a partisan thing? If so that doesn't portray the Republicans in a good light at all.

Are you aware that Pai was originally appointed to the FCC by Obama?

If there is a factual problem here or a word choice you think would be more accurate, offering that would be useful. Do you have any corrections like that? As it is, the title seems to be an accurate description of the story, and your complaint of partisanship just seems to mean that they aren't putting in any effort to defend a plan that looks bad when described neutrally.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com