A Stitch in Haste

Turns out that the “free” (really “taxpayer-subsidized”) municipal wi-fi access in Philadelphia that everyone thinks will be so “neat-o!” isn’t going to be “free” after all:

The city will tap the private sector to implement its plan for blanketing most of Philadelphia with cheap, high-speed wireless Internet access. ... Though Philadelphia is seeking help from private companies to build the system, a nonprofit organization would own it and sell wholesale access to Internet service providers, which would market it back to city residents and businesses at capped rates expected to run between $16 and $20 per month. Street has backed the plan as a way to extend high-speed Internet service into parts of the city where most people can't now afford the $30 to $60 per month now charged by commercial operators.

So, at the end of the day, this was never about “free” wi-fi access or about convincing skeptics like me that a perfectly excludable good is somehow also a “public good” deserving of government provision. Instead, it was all about the Politics of Pull — a private company (not-for-profit notwithstanding), hand-picked by bureaucrats, gets to undercut, at taxpayer expense, the competition. Truck and Barter is all over this crass bait-and-switch:

What does all this accretion of regulatory reach and manpower provide for the city (at about three million at year for the next five years)? Wireless access at...wait for it...$20 a month instead of $30-60. Even taking the high side of the range, is it really possible that the one thing blocking the traditionally underserved from getting internet access is truly $40? Or could it be the lack of computers in the first place? [NOTE: I’ve been pointing this out from the beginning. --Kip]

Perhaps I'm wrong about this, but my view of the average individual in the communities on the lacking side of the technology gap is that these aren't people/families sitting right at the margin, waiting for broadband access to drop a couple of dollars to finally get online.

But hey, the politicians “did something.” So we get both the Politics of Pull and the Politics of the Warm Fuzzy Feeling together in one illogical boondoggle.

Why exactly is wi-fi Internet access so special as to warrant not-for-profit status? Surely food is more important to the poor than wi-fi. Why not set up full-scale not-for-profit supermarkets to undercut private chains? Remember, we are not talking about a public good and we are not talking about subsidizing the poor through vouchers or tax credits or public Internet facilities (e.g., in public libraries). We are talking about flat-out short-circuiting a private market that is successfully operating — and competing — everywhere it has been allowed to.

"Cause I live and breathe this Philadelphia freedom
From the day that I was born I've waved the flag..."