Posted on 02/09/2012 6:46:26 AM PST by C19fan
Last year, a federal program paid out $1.6 billion to cover free cell phones and the monthly bills of 12.5 million wireless accounts. The program, overseen by the FCC and intended to help low-income Americans, is popular for obvious reasons, with participation rising steeply since 2008, when the government paid $772 million for phones and monthly bills. But observers complain that the program suffers from poor oversight, in which phones go to people who don't qualify, and hundreds of thousands of those who do qualify have more than one phone.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
Do they get a data plan? They would if iPhones were as much in vogue as Air Jordans.
But they’ve so engrained the fear of being called a “racist” that we don’t dare complain about this “unfairness”. This is TRUE unfairness, not the “unfairness” that 0bama & his ilk talk about - that some have more income and wealth than others.
This is unfairness where one group of people is using violence (government) to take away from those who earn their wealth in order to live a lifestyle that they aren’t willing to work for themselves.
That was my first reaction, as well, that the bill is paid by TAXPAYERS. Who are also paying for their OWN cell phone bills, if they can afford them, after paying their TAXES.
Economists refer to items that we purchase in order to reveal our prosperity to others as wealth signals. But why use sneakers, as opposed to phonics toys, as a wealth signal? First off, for a signal to be effective, it needs to be easily observed by the people we're trying to impress. This includes not just those near and dear to us, but also the person we pass on the street, who sees our sneakers but would have a harder time inferring how much we're spending teaching our kids to read. For a wealth signal to be credible, it also needs to be hard to imitate—if everyone in your community can afford $150 sneakers, those Zoom Lebron IVs would lose their signal value.
How much airtime do you get with that $99 annual thing? I have double minutes for life and get 90 days each time I purchase a air card. Right now the scroll on my phone is telling me I need to add more air time before November 2015!!!
It's NOT Washington that's footing the f*****g bll- it's YOU and ME!
I assume these ACORN phones receive daily text messages from David Axelrod.
The reason I mention this is that I regularly get mail that tells me I should apply for this Federal cell phone deal because I have such a low income and am disabled. I don't see how anyone can justify paying for services like this if I can even save up the money to get the minimum service each year.
guarenteed bucks from the government.
Pure insanity.
Based on my volunteer work as a triage interviewer at a local food bank, I can testify that this program is very popular and horribly abused.
Some people have two or three phones. One woman I interviewed freely admitted to having five phones, one for each family member. To her credit, I don’t think she realized she was abusing the system.
The FCC better get it’s stuff together on this pronto.
I pay $20 a month for 600 minutes and the minutes roll over. (net 10) I now have 6700 minutes as I seldom use my cell phone.
Not to mention those 50inch TVs. That money should go directly to lowering the national debt. If some old lady needs a phone for an emergency, give her a tracfone with thirty minutes a month.
Everybody who pays a phone bill is paying for “low income people” having free cell phones.
It’s the Federal Universal Service Charge on your phone bill, one of the many taxes on your phone bill.
Far too many people think that Federal money just grows on trees.
This may be a good policy. The beneficiaries may only be able to shoplift half as much while holding the phone to the ear with onbe hand.
Thanks again.
This crap really gets me PO’d. I make very good money as part owner of a business. My budgit says I shouldn’t spend the money on a cell phone account... so I live without it. Some sorry asshole in “da hood” apply’s for gubmint funding of a cell phone, which my hefty taxes pay for, and they use it to play games, listen to muzak, and view porn among other things, all the while making drug deals by phone. The government has NO right to do this yet they have gotten away with it to the tune of 14 trillion dollars of debt. We need a power change.
How else could they manage to assemble all the yutes together at the same time so they can swarm and knock off the local 7-11?
So past Time magazine finally noticed this. I guess when you are in bed with the liberals it’s hard to see when you’re under the covers. This has been going on a long time. The next is the follow up on studies about the “digital Divide” uncovered with stimulus funds. Some cable companies are giving the bundle (phone, cable, and internet) for $9.99 to the “poor”.
Ohh, they are already doing broadband inter-net. Right now, it goes to underserved Tribal areas, where there were no lines, but wait, they will bring it to the inner cities eventually.
We have lots of areas in our county with no broadband service at all, but the only area that the government provided service was to one of the Tribes.
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