The United States has spent decades and billions of dollars to achieve universal broadband access. Today, we’ve completed the last steps toward that goal, thanks to advances in satellite networks and fixed wireless technologies.
Yet, as Joe Kane writes for InsideSources, the digital divide continues because many Americans still face barriers to affordability or lag in digital literacy. Unfortunately, our broadband policies are neglecting the real barriers keeping millions offline. It’s time for a bold rethinking of broadband policy to match today’s realities—and stop wasting taxpayer dollars on problems we’ve already solved.
Federal programs like the $42.45 billion Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) initiative, the Federal Communications Commission’s High-Cost Fund, and the Agriculture Department’s ReConnect program remain fixated on expensive infrastructure projects even as those deployment gaps have closed.
This misalignment of priorities is inefficient and a missed opportunity to address the deeper issues causing the digital divide. So, Kane outlines a new blueprint for broadband affordability:
- Congress should reallocate funds from costly deployment initiatives to affordability and digital literacy to deliver greater effect and cost taxpayers much less.
- The National Telecommunications and Information Administration should reform BEAD to make it technology-neutral and then cap per-location costs at $1,200 to finish any remaining deployment gaps for a fraction of the cost of the current fiber bias.
- States should then use the savings to address the affordability and digital literacy barriers that comprise the bulk of the remaining digital divide.
Read the op-ed.
