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Universal Service Fund
The Universal Service Fund (USF) is a system of telecommunications subsidies and fees managed by the United States Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to promote universal access to telecommunications services in the United States. The FCC established the fund in 1997 in compliance with the Telecommunications Act of 1996. Originally designed to subsidize telephone service, since 2011 the fund has expanded its goals to supporting broadband universal service. The Universal Service Fund's budget ranges from $5–8 billion per year depending on the needs of the telecommunications providers. These needs include the cost to maintain the hardware needed for their services and the services themselves. In 2022 disbursements totaled $7.4 billion, split across the USF's four main programs: $2.1 billion for the E-rate program, $4.2 billion for the high-cost program, $0.6 billion for the Lifeline program, and $0.5 billion for the rural health care program. Unlike many government program ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Federal Communications Commission
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is an independent agency of the United States government that regulates communications by radio, television, wire, internet, wi-fi, satellite, and cable across the United States. The FCC maintains jurisdiction over the areas of broadband access, fair competition, radio frequency use, media responsibility, public safety, and homeland security. The FCC was established pursuant to the Communications Act of 1934 to replace the radio regulation functions of the previous Federal Radio Commission. The FCC took over wire communication regulation from the Interstate Commerce Commission. The FCC's mandated jurisdiction covers the 50 states, the District of Columbia, and the territories of the United States. The FCC also provides varied degrees of cooperation, oversight, and leadership for similar communications bodies in other countries in North America. The FCC is funded entirely by regulatory fees. It has an estimated fiscal-2022 budg ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rick Boucher
Frederick Carlyle Boucher (; born August 1, 1946) is an American politician who served as the U.S. representative for from 1983 to 2011. He is a member of the Democratic Party. He was defeated in his bid for a 15th term by Republican Morgan Griffith in the 2010 elections. Early life, education and career Boucher is a native of Abingdon, Virginia, where he currently lives. He earned his BA from Roanoke College where he was a member of Kappa Alpha Order fraternity. He received his J.D. degree from the University of Virginia School of Law. He has practiced law on Wall Street initially as an associate at Milbank Tweed in the firm's New York City office, and later in Virginia. Prior to his election to Congress, he served for seven years as a member of the Senate of Virginia. He is a former member of the Law and Justice Committee of the National Conference of State Legislatures, the Board of Directors of the First Virginia Bank of Damascus, Virginia, and the Board of Directors ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Return On Investment
Return on investment (ROI) or return on costs (ROC) is the ratio between net income (over a period) and investment (costs resulting from an investment of some resources at a point in time). A high ROI means the investment's gains compare favorably to its cost. As a performance measure, ROI is used to evaluate the efficiency of an investment or to compare the efficiencies of several different investments.Return On Investment – ROI , Investopedia as accessed 8 January 2013 In economic terms, it is one way of relating profits to capital invested. Purpose In business, ...[...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bell System
The Bell System was a system of telecommunication companies, led by the Bell Telephone Company and later by the AT&T Corporation, American Telephone and Telegraph Company (AT&T), that dominated the telephone services industry in North America for over 100 years from its creation in 1877 until United States v. AT&T (1982), its antitrust breakup in 1983. The system of companies was often colloquially called Ma Bell (as in "Mother Bell"), as it held a vertical monopoly over telecommunication products and services in most areas of the United States and Canada. At the time of the breakup of the Bell System in the early 1980s, it had assets of $150 billion (equivalent to $ billion in ) and employed over one million people. Beginning in the 1910s, American antitrust regulators had been observing and accusing the Bell System of abusing its monopoly power, and had brought legal action multiple times over the decades. In 1974 the United States Department of Justice Antitrust Division, Anti ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Interexchange Carrier
An interexchange carrier (IXC), in U.S. legal and regulatory terminology, is a type of telecommunications company, commonly called a long-distance telephone company. It is defined as any carrier that provides services across multiple local access and transport areas (interLATA). Calls made on telephone circuits within the local geographic area covered by one local network are handled only by that intraLATA carrier, commonly called a local telephone exchange carrier. Local calls are usually defined by connections made without additional charge whether the connected call is in the same LATA or connects to another LATA with no charge. IntraLATA usually refers to rated or toll calls between LATA within state boundaries, as opposed to interstate, or calls between LATAs in different states. Call handling An interexchange carrier handles traffic between telephone exchanges. Telephone exchanges are identified in the United States by the three-digit area code (NPA) and the central offic ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Competitive Local Exchange Carrier
A competitive local exchange carrier (CLEC) is a North American telecommunications provider classification that emerged based on the competition model of the Telecommunications Act of 1996 in the United States. The act required the previously established incumbent local exchange carrier (ILEC) in each local market to provide infrastructure hosting and services to CLECs to enable competition with the ILEC. Background Local exchange carriers (LECs) are characterized as incumbent (ILECs) or competitive (CLECs). The ILECs are usually the original, monopoly LEC in a given area, and receive different regulatory treatment from the newer CLECs. A data local exchange carrier (DLEC) is a CLEC specializing in DSL services by leasing lines from the ILEC and reselling them to Internet service providers (ISPs). History CLECs evolved from the competitive access providers (CAPs) that began to offer private line and special access services in competition with the ILECs beginning in 1985. The CA ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Price-cap Regulation
Price-cap regulation is a form of incentive regulation capping the prices that firms in a natural monopoly position may charge their customers. Designed in the 1980s by UK Treasury economist Stephen Littlechild, it has been applied to all privatised British network utilities. It is contrasted with both rate-of-return regulation, with utilities being permitted a set rate of return on capital, and with revenue-cap regulation, with total revenue being the regulated variable. Functioning Price-cap regulation adjusts the operator's prices according to * the price cap index that reflects the overall rate of inflation in the economy, * the ability of the operator to gain efficiencies relative to the average firm in the economy, and * the inflation in the operator's input prices relative to the average firm in the economy. Revenue cap regulation attempts to do the same thing but for revenue, rather than prices. [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rate-of-return Regulation
Rate-of-return regulation (also cost-based regulation) is a system for setting the prices charged by government-regulated monopolies, such as public utilities. It attempts to set prices at efficient (non-monopolistic, competitive) levels equal to the efficient costs of production, plus a government-permitted rate of return on capital. Rate-of-return regulation has been criticized because it encourages cost-padding and because if the rate is set too high, it encourages regulated firms to adopt capital-labor ratios that are too high. That is known as the Averch–Johnson effect, or simply "gold-plating." Under rate-of-return regulation, regulated monopolies have no incentive to minimize their capital purchases, since prices are set equal to their costs of production. Rate-of-return regulation was dominant in the US for a number of years in the government regulation of utility companies and other natural monopolies. Such companies, if not regulated, could easily charge far higher ra ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Incumbent Local Exchange Carrier
An incumbent local exchange carrier (ILEC) is a local telephone company which held the regional monopoly on landline service before the market was opened to competitive local exchange carriers, or the corporate successor of such a firm, in the United States and Canada. Definition An incumbent local exchange carrier is a local exchange carrier (LEC) in a specific area that * on the date of enactment of the Telecommunications Act of 1996, provided telephone exchange service * on the date of enactment, was deemed to be a member of the National Exchange Carrier Association pursuant to the Code of Federal Regulations (C.F.R) Title 47, section 69.601(b). * or is a person or entity that, on or after such date of enactment, became a successor or assignee of a member described in the previous bullet. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) may, by rule, provide for the treatment of an LEC (or class or category thereof) as an ILEC if: * such carrier occupies a position in the marke ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Local Exchange Carrier
Local exchange carrier (LEC) is a regulatory term in telecommunications for the local telephone company. In the United States, wireline telephone companies are divided into two large categories: long-distance ( interexchange carrier, or IXCs) and local (local exchange carrier, or LECs). This structure is a result of 1984 divestiture of then-regulated monopoly carrier American Telephone & Telegraph. Local telephone companies at the time of the divestiture are also known as Incumbent Local Exchange Carriers (ILEC). The divestiture created local exchange carriers for the management of local telephone lines and switches, and provisioning of local phone services within their business area, as well as the long-distance calls originating or terminating in their business area. The vast majority of the United States are served by LECs called Baby Bells, or RBOCs (Regional Bell Operating Companies). The rest of the United States, most commonly in rural or outlying suburban areas, are ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Incumbent Local Exchange Carrier
An incumbent local exchange carrier (ILEC) is a local telephone company which held the regional monopoly on landline service before the market was opened to competitive local exchange carriers, or the corporate successor of such a firm, in the United States and Canada. Definition An incumbent local exchange carrier is a local exchange carrier (LEC) in a specific area that * on the date of enactment of the Telecommunications Act of 1996, provided telephone exchange service * on the date of enactment, was deemed to be a member of the National Exchange Carrier Association pursuant to the Code of Federal Regulations (C.F.R) Title 47, section 69.601(b). * or is a person or entity that, on or after such date of enactment, became a successor or assignee of a member described in the previous bullet. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) may, by rule, provide for the treatment of an LEC (or class or category thereof) as an ILEC if: * such carrier occupies a position in the marke ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jessica Rosenworcel
Jessica Rosenworcel (born July 12, 1971) is an American attorney who served as a member and chair of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). She originally served on the FCC from May 11, 2012, to January 3, 2017, and was confirmed by the Senate for an additional term on August 3, 2017. She was named to serve as acting chair in January 2021 and designated permanent chair in October 2021. She was confirmed for another term by the Senate in December 2021. Early life and education Rosenworcel was born to Willa (née Linoff) and Elliot Rosenworcel, she grew up Jewish in West Hartford, Connecticut and in 1989, graduated from Hall High School. She graduated from Wesleyan University in 1993 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in economics and English literature, then studied law at the New York University School of Law, graduating with a Juris Doctor in 1997. Career After law school, Rosenworcel was an associate at the law firm Drinker Biddle & Reath (now Faegre Drinker), where she work ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
