The LA Times has a story today about a couple of fraudulent PACs that scammed both Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton in 2016. The bad guys are now behind bars, but I was intrigued by this brief aside:
The two groups made more than 275 million robocalls over a 16-month period and netted nearly $4 million in small-dollar contributions.
So on average, a single robocall nets one-hundredth of a dollar. If we could just figure out a way to make phone calls cost a penny apiece, it would put the whole robocall industry out of business.
That should be easy to do. There are only a limited number of phone service providers. Just have them collect a tax and add it to customers' bills.
And add how much to the profits of TPC? What fraction of total calls in the United States are robocalls?
Every phone call should cost 1¢ regardless if it is cell, land, fax, or whatever. The phone company can credit person account 1$ a month to cover expected normal outgoing calls (you could negotiate to increase this depending on circumstances).
This would put a disincentive to bulk robo-calling (the actual amounts can be tweaked if they are insufficient).
"So on average, a single robocall nets one-hundredth of a dollar. If we could just figure out a way to make phone calls cost a penny apiece, it would put the whole robocall industry out of business."
Net and gross aren't the same. It could be a robocall already costs a penny but yields 1.01 cent. As for putting the robocall industry out of business these guys may not have typical costs and revenue per call.
"... about a couple of fraudulent PACs that scammed both Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton in 2016. "
Somebody actually scammed Donald Trump?
It is easy to to describe how to do it, the problem is implementation. That's because step 2 in every plan is "get legislation passed over the objections of the telecom oligopoly." You know, the same one that got the FCC to castrate itself under Trump.
You know all the hate everyone has for social media companies? Your phone company is so much worse, and far less regulable. I'd actually prefer state telecom monopolies to what we have - those can be controlled.
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I think your solution isn't quite right.
The other side, so to speak, gets a choice in the matter. They can, after all, choose to target their robocalls based off a purchased donor list, rather than purely random robocalling.
On top of that, you make it more expensive for pollsters and campaigns.
"On top of that, you make it more expensive for pollsters and campaigns."
I'm not a pollster, but I suspect pollsters would be *delighted* by this change if it successfully wiped out most robocalls. Telephone polling response rates have cratered in recent years -- largely because no one picks up the phone for unknown callers any more. (More here: https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2019/02/27/response-rates-in-telephone-surveys-have-resumed-their-decline/ )
Where have you been, Kevin? This dynamic has long been true. The typical yield on mass mailings has long been under 1%. Robocalls have typically had low return rates. Taxes and fees have not restrained them; the difference in gross and net mentioned in other responses is accurate. No matter where you set the fee the cost will still be low and the return only has to beat that cost by a smidge in order to make money. The secret is in the large input. 1 percent of a gajillion calls adds up to a boatload of money.
On a personal level, my response to robocalls has been to answer calls from unknown phone numbers in Swedish. Occasionally this has freaked out a customer service rep who is returning one of my calls, but they are usually smart enough to mention my particular concern with them, and then they get to laugh at my bad Scandinavian accent. But when it's not a person, the program usually gives up by the third attempt to understand me. By that time I've had a chance to insult the caller's mother without them ever knowing! But I suppose sooner rather than later AI is going to worm its way in and I will get a response to my "Vah noo doh?" that says "Ay doo ooptahgen fur urgohnblicket?" And my little game will be done.
What taxes and fees?