We've long illuminated the fraud, waste and dysfunction inherent in the FCC's USF and E-rate systems, which you pay into each month via various bills to help fund rural telecom deployment. Because the system is poorly monitored by the FCC, some allege it's at best a slush fund for the incumbent telcos.

Techdirt and Daniel Berninger explore the FCC's push to regulate VoIP providers, forcing them to pay into the system without actually reforming it first. Berninger notes this is simply taking money from upstarts and dumping it into the pockets of the FCC's pals, the incumbent telcos:

"The USF represents a bureaucrat's dream, because there exists no accountability for results. Success gets judged purely in terms of collecting and spending money. (The USAC's annual report) does not mention penetration rates or any other metric that might qualify as a measure of universal service (i.e. fund results) rather than money (i.e. fund input.) The fact that the telephone industry insiders dominating the USAC board remain silent about the lack of results further shows the program exists to serve telephone companies not the cause of universal service."

As we've also pointed out, the FCC's broadband penetration statistics are highly suspect, obfuscating the possibility that incumbent friendly FCC policy may not be working. The USF program, the piece offers, currently does more harm than good.