[darkerside]

The macroeconomics of this make sense, but the behavioral impacts of this could be damaging. For that reason, I'd rather see this framed as a tax credit for essential workers. It ends up being similar, but framed as a positive reinforcement instead of a negative punishment.

[darkerside]

Another thought, why not tax internet traffic instead? In a world where internet is driven by natural resources, be they spectrum, cables, or other, it makes sense to internalize the costs of those resources to the system.

[marcosdumay]

Cables are not exactly natural resources.

By all means, tax the spectrum. Also work on making its distribution egalitarian.

[darkerside]

The ground they run through certainly is

[marcosdumay]

Yes, that's a good point.

That ground is 3D and plentiful (for cables) almost everywhere. When access to it is hard, it's usually because somebody is artificially restricting it. The solution is to stop restricting it, not to tax it.