[1] Other subsections of section 254 support this conclusion. For example, Congress stated that "universal service is an evolving level of telecommunications services that the Commission shall establish periodically." (Section 254(c)(1)).

In addition, with respect to "advanced services", the Commission is instructed to establish competitively neutral rules to "enhance, to the extent technically feasible and economically reasonable, access to advanced telecommunications and information services for all . . . elementary and secondary school classrooms, health care providers, and libraries. Had Congress intended that all advanced telecommunications and information services be eligible for discounts, again, it could have easily so provided. Instead, it only provided that the Commission should "enhance" access to advanced telecommunications services. The members of ALTS take no position on whether the Commission has the ability to require discounts for some advanced telecommunications services other than to note that Congress clearly did not intend that all such services be eligible for discount. At the very least there would have to be a strong showing that the discount for a particular service, enhanced the public interest and was directly linked to a valid educational goal.

Finally, with respect to health care providers, subsection (h)(1) provides only that services "necessary for the provision of health care" in rural areas must be provided at rates that are "reasonably comparable to rates charged for similar services in rural areas in that state." Thus, this subsection contemplates a discount for rural health care providers only when there is a significant difference between the price in the rural and urban areas of the state and only for those services necessary for the provision of health care.

[2] Cf. P. Pitsch and A. Bresnahan, Common Carrier Regulation of Telecommunications Contracts and the Private Carrier Alternative, 48 Fed. Comm. L.J. 447, 451-52 ("[I]t appears from the definitions of 'telecommunications service' and 'telecommunications carrier' in the Telecommunications Act of 1996 that Congress has extended the common carrier classification . . . to assist in the identification of entities and services to be subject to the requirements of the new law.")