Internet Prices are Falling. Affordability Gaps are Fixable.

The digital divide is shrinking. Not only is universal broadband deployment well on its way, but broadband has continued to get more affordable. Yet much of the current broadband affordability debate is built not on market realities, but on selective data and political narratives that obscure the real broadband market.

For example, Senator Maria Cantwell (D-WA) recently published a report that claims “Rising Cellphone Service Prices” but cites only static country-level rankings to support that claim. That snapshot doesn’t tell us whether prices are on the rise. And when we look at Bureau of Labor Statistics price trends, they show that mobile service prices declined 4.1 percent in 2025.

Senator Cantwell’s claim also abstracts to country-level comparisons which ignore the substantial differences in cost structure that account for differences in user prices. For example, inputs like broadband labor are cheaper in Europe than in the United States, but that’s due to American broadband workers having well-paid, mostly union jobs. Would Senator Cantwell trade away those for cheaper phone plans? Further, U.S. mobile costs are also driven by the cost of spectrum, which is generally higher in the United States than in Europe. This disparity strengthens the case for a more abundant and productive spectrum policy—an effort the Senate Commerce Committee, under Senator Cantwell’s leadership, can and should lead.

Senator Cantwell’s report continues to make assertions not supported by the data when it comes to streaming. It indicts streaming services, stating “Streaming costs rose 13 percent year-over-year in 2025.” But this claim appears based on consumers’ total spending on streaming and does not control for consumers adding additional subscriptions, as opposed to real prices going up. The report calls out Netflix for price increases, but these changes simply track inflation. The $15.49 monthly price of the standard plan in January 2022 is equivalent to $17.85 in December 2025, less than 1 percent different from the current price of $17.99.

It’s not just senators. Another recent headline from the Benton Institute blares “Broadband Prices Increased in 2025.” But the data cited in the article show that the increase is driven entirely by speed tiers of 2 gigabits per second (Gbps) or above. That’s an absurdly high speed, 20 times more throughput than the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) definition of high-speed broadband. A 2 Gbps plan would support 500 simultaneous HD Zoom calls. While ISPs may sell and some consumers may buy these oversized plans at oversized prices, using them to argue that broadband has gotten more expensive misrepresents how most consumers use broadband. Here again, looking at more relevant data paints the opposite picture. The FCC data Benton cites show that the price of plans offering less than 2 Gbps has decreased by between 4 and 13.4 percent.

That consumer focus is the key to rational evaluation of broadband affordability gaps and rational policy solutions to them. Affordability is an attribute of a consumer relative to a price, not of a price in a vacuum. So, we should judge affordability relative to household income. The FCC and United Nations International Telecommunication Union (ITU) use a 2 percent metric for affordability; that is, broadband is affordable to a household if it accounts for no more than 2 percent of household income. On average, the United States does quite well on this metric of affordability. ITU data show Americans pay 0.71 percent of their income on home broadband, compared to Europeans who spend 1.08 percent. But, of course, some Americans’ income is far below the average. Policymakers should look to help those particular low-income Americans remain below the recognized 2 percent affordability threshold.

Blunt, macro-level responses to the micro level problem of affordability would be counterproductive in these efforts. Take, for example, rate regulation, in which the government sets the maximum price an ISP may charge for broadband service. New York has adopted one such law, capping prices for plans up to 200 Mbps at $20 per month. Rate regulation caps the benefits an ISP can reap for improved or more expansive networks. ISPs will not be so quick to deploy costly network upgrades that consumers value if those consumers are legally prohibited from paying for them. The immense upfront investment necessary to deploy new broadband infrastructure in hard-to-reach areas or compete with incumbents becomes less attractive if the ISP cannot recoup the investment at a price consumers are willing to pay. Rate regulation is thus an anti-consumer policy that lunges at short-term benefits at the expense of long-term network reach and quality.

Rate regulation is also bad as a matter of affordability policy because it treats the two-sided problem of affordability as one-sided. To say “broadband is affordable” is to speak not only of its price but also of consumer means. A rather expensive plan might be affordable to a wealthy household while even a below-average price might be unaffordable to a low-income household. So, for high-income households, a regulated rate incurs all the long-term detriments described above without moving the needle on affordability. For low-income households, even a low, regulated rate will leave behind those who most need help.

There’s a better solution: consumer-focused vouchers. In short, the FCC, through its Universal Service Fund, can determine which households are truly low-income and fund some or all those consumers’ broadband bills. The USF already contains a similar program called Lifeline, but it’s relatively small and inflexible compared to the rest of USF. Congress should change that balance to make an increased Lifeline benefit the focus of USF while also ensuring it is limited to those families who really need it.

This solution limits distortion to broadband prices so they reflect real costs and technological developments in the competitive marketplace, incentivizing investment and signaling that ISPs can profit from filling consumer needs. It also limits government spending by preventing subsidies from going to wealthy households who don’t need them. And finally, it provides positive help to low-income families by bringing good broadband service within their budget.

It is simply inaccurate to claim that broadband plans that match consumers’ needs are getting more expensive overall. The data paint the opposite picture. Broadband affordability is a solvable problem thanks to falling prices and policy options that can address remaining gaps. Policymakers should follow the best evidence and data to help their constituents, not fall prey to talking points that are better for politics than for consumers.