High-Speed Internet Rules Might Prove Costly

[cory777]

Source: BusinessWeek

Giving the FCC the authority to impose net neutrality on broadband service could cost more than $62 billion if providers pull back, a study says

Proposed regulation of high-speed Internet service providers by the U.S. government could cost the economy at least $62 billion annually over the next five years and eliminate 502,000 jobs, according to a study released by New York University Law School.

The report estimates that broadband providers and related industries may cut their investments by 10 percent to 30 percent from 2010 to 2015 in response to additional regulation. At 30 percent, the economy might sustain an $80 billion hit, according to Charles Davidson, director of the law school's Advanced Communications Law & Policy Institute, which released the report on June 16.

"There will be follow-on effects in the whole ecosystem," said Bret Swanson, president of technology researcher Entropy Economics in Zionsville, Ind., who co-authored the study with Davidson. "A diminution of investment by the big infrastructure companies will reduce network capacity, new services, and investment by all the ecosystem companies," such as application providers and device manufacturers, he said in an interview.

Read more: http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/jun2010/tc20100616_751009.htm

[diane in sf]

1. Smells like anti net neutrality big business propaganda to me

[WeekendWarrior]

2. Is this like when the health insurance companies

threatened to raise rates if health care reform passed?

[pezDispenser]

3. This is what I pay taxes for

Public money should be used to fund causes like this. Just to be clear, I would prefer to not pay taxes to drop bombs on innocent brown people.

[Scuba]

4. Just more right-wing propaganda....

..."I refuse to make a profit if there's regulation". Yeah, sure.

[regnaD kciN]

6. "Raising the minimum wage will cost joooooooooooobs!!!"...

Same old same old.

[Hydra]

5. I love how they throw a fit when we demand an equitable service

And it's even funnier when they say they won't expand their businesses here in retaliation.

[blogslut]

7. About Bret Swanson - Co-Author of the study

Bret Swanson is president of Entropy Economics LLC, a strategic insight firm specializing in technology, innovation, and the global economy; president of Entropy Capital, a firm that invests in both public companies and private technology ventures; and a visiting fellow at Digital Society.

He was previously a senior fellow at The Progress & Freedom Foundation, where he directed the Center for Global Innovation, and before that advised technology investors for eight years as executive editor of the Gilder Technology Report.

http://entropyeconomics.com/index.php/about/bret-swanson">link

About The Progress & Freedom Foundation:

PFF was initially started with funds raised from large corporate donors by Rep. Newt Gingrich. Many feel PFF was created as an attempt to to circumvent limits on corporate campaign contributions. These theories are lent credence by the fact that one of PFF's founders was Jeffery A. Eisenach, formerly executive director of GOPAC Rep. Gingrich's controvertial political action committee.

In November 2002, PFF opened a new "Center for the Study of Digital Property" directed by James V. DeLong, formerly of the Competitive Enterprise Institute...

~snip~

According to Common Cause.org, The Progress and Freedom Foundation’s list of corporate donors "reads like a who’s who list of the telecommunications industry. Telephone companies like AT&T, BellSouth, and Verizon; technology companies like Microsoft and Intel; telecom trade associations like the National Cable & Telecommunications Association and the Entertainment Software Association; cable companies like Comcast and Time Warner; cell phone companies like T-Mobile and Sprint; and broadcasters like Clear Channel Communications and Viacom19 have all helped fill PFF’s coffers to the tune of a $3 million per year operating budget."

In light of this line up, PFF's proposal in 2000 to reform and downsize the FCC is hardly suprising.

PFF seems to have been funded by communications companies from the outset. In an advertisement placed by PFF in the December 1994 issue of Wired, there was already a whole list of supporters from the telecom industry.

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Progress_and_Freedom_Foundation">link
http://www.pff.org/about/supporters.html">link

So Bret Swanson, forks off and starts his own wee lobbying firm think tank so as to appear "independent" of the PFF. Nevermind that his http://entropyeconomics.com">blog is blatantly anti-net neutrality. Bret Swanson is an "expert" who floats http://www.techdirt.com/blog/itinnovation/articles/20100429/0902539238.shtml">bogus theories that magically favor conservative politics and private industry.

Bonus, Bret Swanson is part of the http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Discovery_Institute">gang of goobers promoting Intelligent Design

[Ichingcarpenter]

8. Wonderful Work Blogslut

I knew it was astroturfing when I saw the headline
and you saved me some time debunking it.

[KharmaTrain]

9. And Someone Else Will Pick Up The Slack...

The market pressures will be too great when everyone is walking around with WiFi devices and phones...too much money sitting on the table to pass up. Typical corporate claptrap when they see they're losing a battle and need to draw the fear card. Oh noes...if Comcast says so we're screwn. Just demonstrates why net neutrality is so important.