US Government hangs up on Spanish-American War

[Hooligan]

Starting in July, you'll be seeing the cost of your land-line phone service drop a bit, courtesy of the federal government. Since 1898, the US government has collected a 3 percent tax on all long distance phone calls. This shows up on your bill as "federal excise tax," and was enacted to fund the Spanish-American War. Although the war itself ended over a century ago, the tax remained. This week, Congress and the Treasury Department finally caved in to years of pressure from interest groups ranging from consumer advocacy organizations to major corporations, and announced that the tax will end on June 30, 2006. A similar tax on local calls will remain in place for now.

The full article can be found on Ars technica (http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20060526-6928.html)