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FCC Approves New Internet Phone Taxes
basotl writes to tell us CNet is reporting that the FCC has approved a new round of taxes for internet phone service. Some 4 million users could receive this nasty little surprise as early as their next monthly bill. From the article: "The VoIP industry wasn't alone in questioning the FCC's move. In a letter sent last week to commissioners, attorneys for the U.S. Small Business Administration urged the agency to postpone its action until it had done a thorough analysis of the economic effect on smaller providers."
To think up a way of taxing virtually-free phone calls.
NO NEW TAXES PLEASE!
-- Brought to you by Carl's JR
A VoIP call is just another internet connection between two individuals, sending data back and forth. What makes VoIP so special that it needs taxation? Are they going to tax internet video conferencing and Netmeeting next? Instant messaging? Just another example of old people in government not understanding the differences in new technology.
Oh also that fund that is supposed to "subsidize" rural areas is such a waste. My parents have lived in a rural area for years without DSL and it wasn't made available until a couple years ago. And then, it's 128kbps and it wasn't funded by this stupid fund, but by the local telephone co-op. I'd rather the tax go away.
Would it kill the FCC to allow us to communicate WITHOUT paying protection money?
This outfit is getting entirely too powerful. This crap has to stop.
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Does the FCC have the authority to levy taxes? Isn't the FCC an executive agency? Have we stopped even pretending that we have a constitutional government?
-Peter
Dont you already get charged Telecomm taxes if you have DSL, since its basically a phone line anyway?
( i dont have DSL, so no, i cant go look at my bill )
---- Booth was a patriot ----
is that I'm already paying communications taxes (of various sorts levied by various taxing bodies) on my Internet connection. Actually, in my case it's a significant chunk of my monthly bill. In any event, this is a discriminatory tax squarely aimed at smaller companies providing an Internet-based service that inconveniences the incumbent telephone companies. So far as I'm concerned it's double-taxation as well, if I happen to use a VoIP service. Way to go, FCC. Let's just open the door to taxing everything on the Internet ... if you can tax me because I happen to use packets formatted for this purpose, what stops the government from taxing packets formatted some other way. Ridiculous on the face of it.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
So what about audio chat inside online computer games? I can talk to other players in - how is that different from telephony?
If I'm taxed for talking to someone using VOIP but not when I happen to be playing a game at the time - then maybe VOIP providers should include a copy of PONG that you can play with the other person while you talk to them?
The idea that you can tax bytes that contain the human voice in realtime - but you don't tax bytes that contain pictures, or human voice that was recorded a few hours ago...of all the millions of uses for data sent over the Internet - why should realtime human voice be singled out as special. It's just silly.
We either need to tax ALL data transfers over shared communications links or NONE of them. Repeal the tax on telephony or tax broadband the same way you tax dialled telephony - there is no practical difference.
Hmmm - so if I use dialup to connect to the Internet - and then use VOIP - do I get taxed twice? I think that's probably illegal.
The lawyers will make a fortune arguing this one.
www.sjbaker.org
thanks alot FCC, I shall now make a fortune selling ssh stunnels to canada dedicated to "media traffic".
perpetually dwelling in the -1 pits
If they tax VOIP and not other data, then I want a refund for my YEARS of dialup, when my phone line was used for data and not voice.
The above is due (FTA) to the fact that the FCC assumes ~65% of VOIP calls are long distance, while less than 30% of wireline and wireless calls are long distance. That makes it sound (to me) like some underhanded lobbying was involved.
In fairness, VOIP that does not connect to the POTS system (e.g. p2p calls) should be excluded as it does not use the same infrastructure and thus should not face the same tax burden. In fact, services such as Skype are excluded from the taxes for this exact reason, so some calculation should be made to determine the percentage of VOIP calls that never touch the POTS system. Other than that, I don't see any reason that VOIP services that use the same resources as the POTS carriers should be granted special exemption from the taxes collected for consuming the same services/infrastructure.
On a side note, my first impression from the summary was that the FCC was levying new taxes specifically against VOIP providers. I got the impression that the FCC was creating new taxes (No taxation without representation!) and that really pissed me off. Upon reading the actual article, that was definitely the implication, however the facts make it obvious that these are existing taxes and VOIP services are only being reclassified so that they fall under the same category as other voice carriers Anyone who thinks they don't -- specifically for services that access the POTS system, not p2p like skype and vonage to vonage calls -- is either ignorant or in denial. Of course, the conversion rate seems extremely off and weighted toward the destruction of VOIP and there doesn't seem to be an allowance for VOIP to VOIP calls which should bypass the regulation. I'm pissed about the extremely questionable fairness of this proclamation, but please present the facts without insinuating that things are happening (FCC creating new tax laws) which are clearly not.
If it is leveled by any portion of the government and you don't have a choice about paying it is a tax. You can call it a 'levy' or 'fee', but, it is a tax!
Panic now, beat the rush!
I wonder what they'd to if someone made this set up:
You speak into a microphone and a speach-to-text program IMs the words to your friend's computer which then reads them aloud. Is that voip? Taxable?
-Grey
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You get your investment advice from a guy that screams a lot and has a soundboard full of afternoon radio-show sound effects?
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A VoIP call is just another internet connection between two individuals, sending data back and forth. What makes VoIP so special that it needs taxation? Are they going to tax internet video conferencing and Netmeeting next? Instant messaging? Just another example of old people in government not understanding the differences in new technology.
If you would have read TFA, you would have found out that they are only taxing calls made to the PSTN, not internet only calls. I don't have a problem with that. I do, however, have a problem with the rate discrepency between VoIP companies vs the Bells vs the cell companies. VoIP companies are paying double the amount the incumbents are paying based on an arbitrary percentage (a number not justified in any sort of way).
Oh also that fund that is supposed to "subsidize" rural areas is such a waste. My parents have lived in a rural area for years without DSL and it wasn't made available until a couple years ago. And then, it's 128kbps and it wasn't funded by this stupid fund, but by the local telephone co-op. I'd rather the tax go away.
The rural telephone co-ops in my area are heavily subsidized by Universal Service Funds. I am 99% certain that your DSL is funded by USF.
The FCC seems again try to overstep the legal boundaries of its authority. In fact, the legislative underpinnings of the FCC's foundation have become increasingly questionable and, contrary to widespread believe, its authority does NOT extent to internet based personal communication, namely VoIP. This means that should the FCC try to collect taxes from VoIP users you can simply refuse to pay and take the matter to court. There is already a class action lawsuit underway that addresses this issue and that will most likely put a final end to the FCC's attempts to overstep its legal boundaries.
OTOH Vonage has some drawbacks... Here in El Paso, TX, retailers like Best Buy are selling Vonage's VoIP appliances on endcap displays and offering great rebate deals - and it's not until you bring the thing home, unpack it and try to sign up that you find out Vonage can't give you a phone # in El Paso's 915 area code.
"If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it."
Circumcision is child abuse.
It's only a requirement if they offer the service as a 'primary line' service, which is why I said he should ask his provider. Even from the same provider the service will differ between areas.
The Universal Service Fund actually does subsidize rural phone users -- poor ones more than richer ones, but a lot of the subsidy goes to the service provider rather than the customer. It's a pretty good chance that without the Universal Service tax, your parents wouldn't have a phone, much less DSL. Or they would be on a party line with 16 other subscribers.
Same thing with schools. A lot fewer elementary or high schools in the US would have Internet connections if it weren't for Universal Service.
Now, I personally, happen to think that getting phone service (and DSL) to rural customers is important. On the other hand I think putting the Internet into schools so that the school can then spend a tidy sum to try to keep viruses and pornography out is kind of dumb. But for some reason they overlooked my name when looking for a candidate to replace Michael Powell (and we should all thank God that he is gone) at the FCC.
Anyway, the US has been subsidizing rural phone users for so long that most of us have forgotten that it happens and we are taxed to support it. We don't have a tax to support DSL to rural areas and as a result, most rural areas don't have broadband. If you believe that subsidizing rural users is important, then taxing calls made via VOIP is perfectly reasonable. (Whether the tax rate is reasonable is a different issue -- and one on which I don't have an opinion.)
You can't see ANYTHING from a car, You've got to get out of the goddamned contraption and walk...Edward Abbey
I am so sick and tired of this crap from our gov't. Spying and invading our privacy, fees and taxes left and right, weird obscure agencies doing stuff that the gov't shouldn't even be doing in the first place, subsidising monopolies, wasting tax money to make a show of supporting a bill that is 100% known to be struck down as unconstitutional, and a whole laundry list of so many other things... It's HORRIBLE! I'm sick and tired; I wish I could fire these jokers.
Please people, don't keep electing back the same morans. Don't vote for Party X because it's what your family does. Grow a pair and vote for someone who will fix whats wrong with this country. I hate to turn around and generalise myself (so please do your research before voting one!), but I find most Libertarian cadidates want to fix our country. PLEASE let's let them.
There's some argument for subsidising infrastructure, but the current model of "taxpayers pay, telcos profit" isn't nessiarily the best plan - it'd be like if the government payed for the construction of a private toll road and then got none of the tolls.
-- The act of censorship is always worse than whatever is being censored. Always.
It's actually an example of you not understanding the fee.
If you read the fine article it says in the second sentence that VOIP will be charged when it connects to the PSTN network (yeah yeah, ATM machine, deal with it). This isn't discriminatory against VOIP; all other voice services including cell phones are charged when they connect to the PSTN network. VOIP to VOIP won't be charged because that's independent of the PSTN network.
So far the VOIP companies have been getting a free ride because they've been sending voice traffic over the PSTN network without paying the fee. This makes VOIP->PSTN look cheaper than PSTN->PSTN partly because the customer isn't paying the same fees as the PSTN providers. With the fee in place there will be even more encouragment for customers to switch to pure VOIP->VOIP.
The point of this tax is to only tax those voip services who use land lines. It is the same as when telcos tried to backhaul all their long distance calls across their backbone and circumvent charges and taxes. If you use point to point voip w/o using land lines or a service that uses land lines then you won't or shouldn't be taxed. But if you use Vonage or such who do use land lines to make calls then you will be taxed.