The House Commerce Subcommittee on
Telecommunications, Trade, and Consumer Protection currently is
considering a bill to authorize appropriations for the Corporation
for Public Broadcasting (CPB). H.R. 2384 seeks to increase the
CPB's funding from the current fiscal year (FY) 1999 level of $250
million to $300 million for FY 2000 and $340 million for FY 2001
(an increase of 36 percent over FY 1999). And the bill would enable
federal appropriations for the CPB to grow to as much as $475
million by FY 2002--a 90 percent increase over current funding
levels. Moreover, H.R. 2384 would grant a one-time appropriation of
$770 million over the next five years to assist the public
broadcasting industry to transition into providing digital
television.
This
stunning potential increase in the CPB's budget would amount to an
unwarranted waste of tax dollars because the organization's mission
is both obsolete and redundant. A broad array of competitors offers
Americans nearly identical television program options. But this
proposed hike in funding is surprising because, just four years
ago, Washington seriously debated reforming and even privatizing
the CPB. Instead of automatically increasing the budget of an
agency whose services no longer are necessary, legislators should
give serious consideration to ending all federal subsidies for a
service adequately provided by the free market.
An Obsolete Mission.
Congress created the CPB under the Public Broadcasting Act of
1967 to fill an apparent need for additional sources of
high-quality informational, educational, and entertainment-oriented
television and radio programming. Over the past three decades, the
CPB has funded a wide array of so-called noncommercial services and
programs, including the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS), National
Public Radio (NPR), and many other specific projects and types of
programming.
Regardless of how well policymakers and
the public feel the CPB has performed, its mission is obsolete and
redundant today. There now exists an endless variety of
high-quality channels with entertainment, informational, and
educational programs that do not rely on public funding to bring
quality shows to home viewers and listeners. And the list of
options providing essentially the same service as the CPB is
growing rapidly. Ironically, CPB President and CEO Robert T.
Coonrod makes this point eloquently on the CPB's Web site (http://www.cpb.org):
Cable's spending for original production
is increasing today at a rate nearly double that of public
television. In addition to Discovery [Channel] and its siblings,
The History Channel, Home and Garden Television, and A&E, the
expansion of cable's digital tier will give birth to tens if not
hundreds of new channels. What impact this tidal wave of content
will have on viewers we do not know, but we can predict competition
on a level we have never before contemplated.
It
is this very competition, however, that makes the CPB's original
mission obsolete. Not only do programming providers such as C-Span,
the Disney Channel, the Food Network, Fox Family, Nickelodeon, and
those Coonrod mentions offer options similar to CPB's
taxpayer-subsidized programs, many alternative vendors of
high-quality programming exist, including satellite television,
video- and audiotapes, instructional computer programs, the
Internet, and (in the very near future) high-definition digital
television. In a world of proliferating options, taxpayer funding
of the CPB makes little sense.
The
funds that H.R. 2384 would provide the CPB to assist in its
transition to digital television illustrate that the broadcasting
agency has strayed far from its original mission. Although the CPB
originally was viewed as a method of providing high-quality
programming to lower-income Americans, most low-income families
would not be able to spend thousands of dollars to purchase
digitally ready, high-definition television sets to receive the new
digital transmissions CPB hopes to offer.
Commercial Appeal.
Today, the CPB is perfectly capable of standing on its own
without federal funds. In fact, public funding may crowd out
additional private funding today. Despite boasting a non-commercial
format, CPB officials and PBS affiliates increasingly engage in
overtly commercial activities, such as a mail-order catalog
business, the operation of retail chain stores, and the sale of
popular television and radio programs on video- or audiotapes or
such program-related merchandise as Barney or Sesame Street dolls,
toys, or games. CPB and PBS products have widespread commercial
appeal and profit potential that further justify ending taxpayer
funding of the organization.
Programming Balance or Bias?
So long as the CPB remains a publicly funded agency, the
public's concerns over its commitment to objectivity and balance in
programming will persist. Unfortunately, in the past various media
watchdog groups--conservative groups in particular--have criticized
particular PBS and NPR reports and programs for their obvious
liberal or "big-government" bias.
Members of Congress began to question
CPB's supposedly "independent" or "non-partisan" status this month,
after The Boston Globe reported the Democratic National
Committee (DNC) had sent a fundraising letter to a four-year-old
boy whose mother had contributed $40 to the local public broadcast
station (WGBH-TV) in his name. When the boy's mother inquired as to
how the DNC had acquired her son's name, she discovered that the
station had given the DNC a list of donors in exchange for DNC
mailing lists. In addition to the political concerns over this
incident, such reports heighten calls for Congress to make the CPB
independent and self-sufficient, so that tax dollars would not be
squandered on partisan activities or on programming that many
Americans might find offensive.
Conclusion.
After 32 years, the CPB has proved successful enough to stand
on its own as a high-quality programming service. Even if it once
required federal funding to carry out its initial mission (which is
debatable), taxpayer subsidies no longer are justified. Instead of
doubling the size of the CPB's budget and allowing it to drain
important funds away from other federal programs, policymakers
should use the opportunity presented by H.R. 2384 to construct a
comprehensive reform plan for the CPB, leading to its eventual
privatization.
Adam D. Thierer
is a former Alex C. Walker Fellow in Economic Policy for The Thomas
A. Roe Institute for Economic Policy Studies at The Heritage
Foundation.