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It's cheaper for me, personally, to have a cell phone than it would be to have a landline. Period.
And the fact that that is true, means the same can be true of others. Since you don't know the situation personally of every person getting one of these cell phones, your blanket assumptions about them are invalid.
The point is, I don't care what their personal situation is.. It is not my responsibility to provide other people with free phones which are not a basic requirement of need to survive. Last I checked it was food, clothing and shelter.
Now, I know several people who have these free phones and none, repeat none, of them are looking for jobs. They have ALL made a life out of living off entitlements.
This will never end, you folks will come on here and tell me how I have to support entitlement programs, I will tell you that I don't and the politicians will continue to support them for votes.
I am so tired of you folks telling me what I should do with and taking the things I worked hard for and giving the to lazy people.. If someone really needs help and can't provide for themselves I will be over backwards to help. But! Don't sit on your couch and ***** with your hand out.. That just down right pisses me off...
...the phone company can provide a wired land-line with voice mail for far less money.
I am merely asking you to support that assertion, something you have so far failed to do.
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You folks are advocating that dead-beat dirtbags are entitled to modern conveniences that the rest of us have to work for.
Telephony has been around for over a century and access to a telephone is essential if one wants to be in the job market.
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It's a difference of opinion.
The difference in cost of providing landline vs. the cost of providing basic cell service isn't a matter of opinion.
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You lack the fiscal responsibility to understand my point,
You're not making a very good case, truth be told.
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and I lack the ability to understand why one would advocate the provision of an unnecessary convenience at the taxpayer's expense
Good news! Unlike with taxes, you're perfectly free to not contribute. Ditch your phone and you won't contribute to the Universal Service Fund. It's just a convenience, after all.
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when every form of government is running a deficit right now, and hard working folks can't even put food on the table.
Working poor qualify for the Low Income phone programs, as well.
The point is, I don't care what their personal situation is.. It is not my responsibility to provide other people with free phones which are not a basic requirement of need to survive. Last I checked it was food, clothing and shelter.
Now, I know several people who have these free phones and none, repeat none, of them are looking for jobs. They have ALL made a life out of living off entitlements.
This will never end, you folks will come on here and tell me how I have to support entitlement programs, I will tell you that I don't and the politicians will continue to support them for votes.
I am so tired of you folks telling me what I should do with and taking the things I worked hard for and giving the to lazy people.. If someone really needs help and can't provide for themselves I will be over backwards to help. But! Don't sit on your couch and ***** with your hand out.. That just down right pisses me off...
It's NOT your responsibility and you don't have to pay for anyone to have anything.
If you feel you are being unfairly charged or taxed for your own service so a company can offer itself to others you are free to disconnect yourself. Go live off the land if you desire.
If your rant is just a more general "I don't want to pay tax for nuthin and nobody"...well, welcome to the world my friend. These folks you know, the ones with the FREE PHONES who are just living off entitlement, you should probably distance yourself if they bother you so much and let them sit around calling each other on their FREE PHONES 24/7 (that's what they do right?). I can't understand why people surround themselves with folks who annoy them.
I am merely asking you to support that assertion, something you have so far failed to do.
Telephony has been around for over a century and access to a telephone is essential if one wants to be in the job market.
The difference in cost of providing landline vs. the cost of providing basic cell service isn't a matter of opinion.
You're not making a very good case, truth be told.
Good news! Unlike with taxes, you're perfectly free to not contribute. Ditch your phone and you won't contribute to the Universal Service Fund. It's just a convenience, after all.
Working poor qualify for the Low Income phone programs, as well.
Oh my god, CHECK THE COSTS YOURSELF! It's freely available on the internet.
Ugggh, I can't talk to a guy whose parents named him "Dane", and is proud to live in LA. I just can't do it, and wont do it. Sorry, lol.
Oh my god, CHECK THE COSTS YOURSELF! It's freely available on the internet.
Those are the costs to the consumer. Wireless service is ridiculously overpriced in the US, mostly to cover all those handsets the providers give away to get a signature on a contract.
Now, the average US cell phone is used for about 18 months before it's updated. In other words, there's a glut of handsets that work just fine, but can't be sold. (I was about to type "can't be given away", but that's exactly what they're good for.) The carriers have thousands of perfectly good handsets - ehm - on hand.
Ah, says the skeptics, but the service is expensive! Not so. Voice is hardly worth charging for any more. It's in fact so cheap to deliver that AT&T has started offering free cell-to-cell calls to clients with data plans.
Back-of-an-envelope math: 250 minutes of CDMA voice per month, at the absolute max rate of 14400 Kbit/sec, translates to roughly 27 MByte's worth of data. That's roughly 4 Justin Bieber songs on iTunes. Or, in practical terms: It's nothing.
The voice delivery costs on wireless are completely negligible.
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Ugggh, I can't talk to a guy whose parents named him "Dane", and is proud to live in LA. I just can't do it, and wont do it. Sorry, lol.
Btw Dane, most of us know that cell is cheaper to operate. The bottom line is cost. Unless the state is going to build their own nationwide network, a cell will cost more than a land line. Cost to the state, not cost to the provider.
This has been going on for a while in NY and NJ. The phone companies that get reimbursed for these programs are actually competing for customers by using television commercials. Some offer more hours and a higher base income than their "competitor." It's quite ridiculous.
I thought you weren't talking to me? That didn't last long. Welcome back, then.
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Btw Dane, most of us know that cell is cheaper to operate.
Awesome. You should tell that to the guy upthread who stated that "...the phone company can provide a wired land-line with voice mail for far less money", then. Oh wait - that was you. Awkward.
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The bottom line is cost.
Cell is cheaper to operate, but the bottom line is cost. Mmm-hm.
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Unless the state is going to build their own nationwide network, a cell will cost more than a land line. Cost to the state, not cost to the provider.
Ah, there's the root of your confusion. It doesn't work the way you appear to think - the state does not purchase any services at all. The FCC oversees, but the money never goes through the public coffers.
The income from the Universal Service Fund is distributed by a non-profit company - a subsidiary of the National Exchange Carrier Association. Or, in plain English, the carriers/providers use the funds to finance the operation of their low-income services (and the other USF-financed services) directly.
And as you say, "most of us know that cell is cheaper to operate." After all, cost is the bottom line.
Hey, obama's got to keep that dependent on government base in his corner.
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