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State Senator Admits Cable Industry Helped Write Pro-Industry Legislation
jamie sends in news of comments by David Hoyle, a State Senator in North Carolina, about recently defeated legislation he sponsored that would have limited the ability of government to develop municipal broadband. Hoyle readily admitted that the cable industry had a hand in writing the bill. We discussed the cable industry's extensive lobbying efforts in that region last year. From the article:
"The veteran state senator says cities should leave broadband to the cable companies. 'It's not fair for any government unit to compete with private enterprise,' he says. In the last legislative session Sen. Hoyle tried to put a moratorium on any more local governments expanding into municipal broadband. When the I-Team asked him if the cable industry drew up the bill, Senator Hoyle responded, 'Yes, along with my help.' When asked about criticism that he was 'carrying water' for the cable companies, Hoyle replied, 'I've carried more water than Gunga Din for the business community — the people who pay the taxes.'"
It is a great US myth that corporations fund the government. The actual facts are that the people pay more.
Also the citizens vote. So why are the politicals doing the behest of the corporations ?
http://www.usgovernmentrevenue.com/yearrev2009_0.html
2009 Income Taxes
Individual: $915.3B
Corporate: $138.2B
Hardly a secret that industry basically writes policy and law at both the state and federal level. As expensive as Congressional campaigns are, and with free reign to donate to (aka "bribe") any politician they choose, is it any real surprise that they're calling all the shots? Hell, Dick Cheney even gave the oil companies their own secret task force to write U.S. energy policy.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
It certainly drove them out of letter delivery business which is illegal for anybody other than the Post Office to do: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Postal_Service#Universal_Service_Obligation_and_monopoly_status
Negative moral value of force outweighs the positive value of good intentions.
in letting Senator hoyle know exactly what they think of his ideas. Office: 300-A Legislative Office Building Phone: (919) 733-5734 Email: David.Hoyle@ncleg.net Legislative Mailing Address: NC Senate 300 N. Salisbury Street, Room 300-A Raleigh, NC 27603-5925 Terms in Senate: 9 (0 in House) District: 43 Counties Represented: Gaston Occupation: Real Estate Developer/Investor Address: P.O. Box 2567, Gastonia, NC 28053 Phone: (704) 867-0822
The source article doesn't mention his party, which is odd, but that's a perfectly non-conspiracy-theory explanation for why it's not in the summary if you'd like one.
Only at the mercy of the USPS which has an absolute monopoly over mail delivery in the US. At it's discretion USPS made an exception for "urgent" letters (costing minimum of $3 per letter) which can be done by UPS and FedEx. They cannot deliver the equivalent of regular first class mail. They are also not allowed to deliver to mail boxes.
Negative moral value of force outweighs the positive value of good intentions.
The source article is a local news outlet in Charlotte, and the article is posted in the "Local News" section - I would guess, to bolster your point, that the people of Salisbury, NC, have a passing familiarity with who David Hoyle is, and so the party was deemed irrelevant to the story.
They still pay state tax where they do business. The reason corporations headquarter in Delaware is because (1) the franchise tax is low and (2) Delaware has really [strong privacy protections|lax reporting standards].
This is a problem. But not as big as you'd make it out to be; we could institute mandatory withholding on transfers out of the country (like Argentina does). This would be a good way to fix the problem -- file an auditable return, and you can get any overpayment refunded to you. A problem is that it would required a central bank processing system, which is not gonna happen. And off course, the people who really have the influence are those who prefer the status quo. And then there's the tax treaties we have that would prevent this, although we could make withholding mandatory only for countries that operate as tax havens.
"Trolls they were, but filled with the evil will of their master: a fell race..." -- J.R.R. Tolkien on Olog-hai
Most local and state governments cannot just decide to run deficits in the way that the federal government does. That's one of the reasons why state and local governments are having to severely cut services and get rid of employees over the course of this economic turmoil.
One time I threw a brick at a duck.
It has nothing to do with subsidies; it has to do with regulated business delivering service at cost + 10% profit rather than at market price. Properly regulated utilities produce cheaper products than their unregulated ('competitive') counterparts.
http://yro.slashdot.org/story/09/05/05/1734238/Bill-Would-Declare-Your-Blog-a-Weapon
http://yro.slashdot.org/story/09/12/22/1738232/Florida-Congressman-Wants-Blogging-Critic-Fined-Jailed
http://yro.slashdot.org/story/08/12/30/1955229/Oregon-Governor-Proposes-Vehicle-Mileage-Tax
http://games.slashdot.org/story/09/01/12/2255224/Congressman-Wants-Health-Warnings-On-Video-Games
Other than the first class mail monopoly, the USPS also enjoys government 'protection' from having to pay gasoline taxes, parking tickets, vehicle registrations. and any other tax or fine that is imposed on a private sector business.
When the USPS decided to push into the package business around 1995 IIRC, UPS and FedEx started letter writing campaigns to alert Congress to the unfair advantage they would have with the ability to subsidize their losses with their first class mail monopoly. I haven't worked for UPS for a while now, but I do remember that was something management talked to us about, a lot!
No. Pricing is not done to maintain a fixed profit, it is done to maximize profit. If they have room to move prices higher to maintain net profit in the face of higher taxes, then they are not pricing correctly.
In theory, raising the tax on gross profit will have no impact on pricing, since their product is already priced to maximize gross profit.
Very few. The location of the headquarters has little to do with where the bulk of the jobs are. Instead, we'd have a higher direct tax burden on everyone, and no recourse if a company fucks people over.
"Trolls they were, but filled with the evil will of their master: a fell race..." -- J.R.R. Tolkien on Olog-hai
In many localities, cable rate increases are limited by contract. Has your local government failed to secure proper oversight in exchange for monopoly privilege? I guess you have no one to blame but them, then.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
In fact, it took the gas prices of the mid 2000s to really bugger up USPS. Largest private fleet, every penny gas went up they'd be out another $2 million. Then tack on the decrease of snail mail, the inability to do the simple things private industry can do unilaterally but for USPS requires an act of Congress (close branches, reduce days of service), and the inability to raise rates above the rate of inflation...
USPS HAS a plan to get in the black...they just can't cause their board (Congress) won't let them.
Is your municipal power also provided by a dam on the Connecticut river? That would explain the cheap power, not some municipal vs. private business distinction.
You can't send stuff at a "normal" priority. If UPS accepted a letter (as opposed to a package) saying it'll be there in a few days they would get sued.
Why exactly would they get sued? Customers are presented several shipping options.
Private companies can only deliver letters when they are doing it at a time-frame USPS can't match.
UPS or FedEx can deliver a letter whenever the customer chooses and agrees to pay for as long as it fits within the description of the service purchased.
The USPS will deliver on Sunday if purchased.
USPS Express Mail
The only overnight delivery to mailboxes and P.O. Boxes.
http://www.usps.com/shipping/expressmail.htm
UPS Next Day Air
Delivery Commitment: Next business day delivery by 10:30 a.m., 12:00 noon, or end of day, depending on destination.
Saturday deliver is available just like with the USPS.
http://www.ups.com/content/us/en/shipping/time/service/next_day.html