[2] Public Notice at 1.

[3] If this rebalancing makes "core" services unaffordable for some customers, then those customers should be eligible for targeted, explicit subsidies which are supported by all telecommunications providers.

[4] Unless there is regulatory symmetry among telecommunications providers in the marketplace, competition cannot be sustained over the long run.

[5] In the NPRM, the Commission proposes that universal service support should be available for the following set of "core" services: single party, voice-grade telephone service, touch-tone, access to emergency service (911 and E911) and access to operator services. NPRM at pars. 18-23.

[6] Mueller, M., & Schement, J. (1995) "Universal Service From the Bottom Up: A Profile of Telecommunications Access in Camden, New Jersey," Research Performed for Bell Atlantic by Rutgers University Project on Information Policy.

[7] Section 254(e) of the Telecommunications Act of 1996 provides, in part, as follows: "A carrier that receives such [universal service] support shall use that support only for the provision, maintenance, and upgrading of facilities and services for which the support is intended."

[8] Public institutions, like other customers, typically are eligible today for volume and term discounts under tariff.

[9] The concept of a "discount" is normally associated with "price" not "cost." And there is nothing in the Telecommunications Act of 1996 which suggests that the Congress intended that any universal service discount should be based on cost.