Cite as: 525 U. S. 366 (1999)
Opinion of Souter, J.
whether a carrier could offer a service using other unbundled elements within an incumbent LEC's network," ibid., and decided that whenever it would be more expensive for a competitor to offer a service using other available network elements, or whenever the service offered using those other elements would be of lower quality, the LEC must offer the desired element to the competitor, ibid.
In practice, as the Court observes, ante, at 389, the Commission's interpretation will probably allow a competitor to obtain access to any network element that it wants; a competitor is unlikely in fact to want an element that would be economically unjustifiable, and a weak economic justification will do. Under Chevron, the only question before us is whether the Commission's interpretation, obviously favorable to potential competitors, falls outside the bounds of reasonableness.
As a matter of textual justification, certainly, the Commission is not to be faulted. The words "necessary" and "im-pair" are ambiguous in being susceptible to a fairly wide range of meanings, and doubtless can carry the meanings the Commission identified. If I want to replace a light bulb, I would be within an ordinary and fair meaning of the word "necessary" to say that a stepladder is "necessary" to install the bulb, even though I could stand instead on a chair, a milk can, or eight volumes of Gibbon. I could just as easily say that the want of a ladder would "impair" my ability to install the bulb under the same circumstances. These examples use the concepts of necessity and impairment in what might be called their weak senses, but these are unquestionably still ordinary uses of the words.
Accordingly, the Court goes too far when it says that under "the ordinary and fair meaning" of "necessary" and "impair," ante, at 389-390, "[a]n entrant whose anticipated annual profits from the proposed service are reduced from 100% of investment to 99% of investment . . . has not ipso facto been 'impair[ed] . . . in its ability to provide the services
399
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