Congratulations! The US Is 32nd Worldwide On Broadband Affordability
from the nice-job-everybody dept
I’ve spent the better part of two decades writing about how telecom monopolization (and the corruption that protects it) results in expensive, spotty, sluggish, broadband and historically terrible customer service. The cause of our substandard broadband isn’t much of a mystery, but because of these companies’ political influence, state and federal policymakers often lack the courage to do much about it.
So the problem persists. One recent study found that the U.S. was currently ranked somewhere around 32nd globally, behind countries like Russia, Lithuania, and Bulgaria (you can find the full breakdown here):
“The United States and Canada both have one of the highest internet costs,” Alex Tofts, the Broadband Expert for Broadband Genie, said in a summary. “It’s driven by a lack of competition and bigger distances to connect, with lower population density than other developed countries. However, both have average wages in the top fifteen in the world, compensating for the high cost of internet.”
For decades, people (mostly the industry) tried to suggest the problem was because America was just so gosh darn big. But you’ll notice that China and Russia, (ranked 25th and 17th, respectively) still perform better. Data routinely shows that affordability is the key obstacle to access, yet it’s only been in the last few years that you’ve started to see this reality reflected in U.S. policymaking.
Usually after a study like this appears, telecom monopoly lobbyists and think tankers will subsequently try to claim that U.S. broadband is actually super affordable if you stand on your head, squint, and only look at the metrics in some bizarrely specific way, like only looking at relative value in cost-per-Megabits per second in some markets at certain times of day. I wish I was kidding.
But again, the cause of this problem is very clear: monopolization and consolidation, protected by corruption. Few U.S. markets have the choice of more than one broadband provider at next-generation speeds. And that’s because federal and state lawmakers are so comically corrupt, they routinely let AT&T, Comcast, Charter, or Verizon lobbyists endlessly merge, crush all competition, then literally write state or federal legislation and policy over several decades.
But it’s not all doom and gloom. Decades of federal policy corruption and dysfunction have created an extremely strong, local, bipartisan grassroots movement for better broadband access. In countless towns and cities, municipalities, cooperatives, city-owned utilities, and creative new partnerships are building new, open access fiber networks with an eye on competition and cost.
The federal government hasn’t proven to be entirely useless. Both COVID relief and infrastructure bill legislation are delivering more than $60 billion to fix the problem. And yes, while a big chunk of this money will be dumped in the back pocket of telecom monopolies responsible for spotty access and high costs in the first place, a big chunk will also be headed to these community-built alternatives.
Still, it’s comical and grotesque that it’s 2023 and a country that fancies itself a technology giant still can’t meaningfully tackle equitable broadband access and affordability. And that telecom and media policy has basically become a boring afterthought in the era of “Big Tech.” Ensuring equitable access to an essential utility is just too boring for most 2023 policy circles, much less the modern attention economy.
The FCC has made it very clear it’s an agency staffed by careerists who don’t really care about monopoly power or broadband consumer protection. Most of the agency’s Democratic policy proposals are (sometimes) well intentioned regulatory theater. Most GOP proposals don’t even bother with the illusion that consumers matter (see: Ajit Pai). When anybody tries to disrupt that dynamic, you generally get treated the way Gigi Sohn was when her nomination was scuttled earlier this year by industry.
As a result, all the interesting telecom policy is happening locally, block by block by communities pissed off by decades of neglect and overbilling. And the entrenched monopolies they’re taking aim at deserve every last bit of the long-overdue disruption headed their way.
Filed Under: broadband, broadband costs, digital divide, high speed internet, tech, telecom
Comments on “Congratulations! The US Is 32nd Worldwide On Broadband Affordability”
How to fix it...
All dark fiber should be in the public domain and available to local community providers without any limitations by various protectionist state laws.
Google ran fiber thru my yard two years ago and it remains dark and likely will never get lit.
Re:
You’re talking about “dark fiber” as in fiber optic lines that are unused, rather than fiber optic lines that don’t appear on the charts, right? ’cause if you’re talking about the latter, you’ll have to talk to folks from the three letter agencies…
Ironically, it’s State run ISPs in municipalities that are consistently appearing in the top positions in terms of price, reliability and customer satisfaction… That’s too communist of you, US.
Re:
the data is super clear on this, yep. Cooperatives, utilities (many city owned), and municipalities provide better, cheaper, faster broadband. AND it’s locally owned by people who have a direct responsibility to the markets they serve. It’s not some magical panacea, and there’s certainly a huge role for private ISPs, but the path forward here is pretty clear. Tons of community-owned open access fiber networks, leased to multiple competitors.
Place 32?
Frankly, who wouldn’t have guessed that the U.S. isn’t rather to be found at place 132?
However, this mystery has a solution:
“Broadband affordability is defined by the percentage of a country’s average salary that would need to be spent to cover the average cost of internet connectivity.”
So in a country with a monthly income of $50, broadband access costing more than $1.50 per month will land the country in a place worse than the U.S. regarding “broadband affordability”.
Now the equipment costs roughly the same dollar amounts in the world market. Admittedly, the labor costs for wiring everybody up will differ according to country.
But the point is that this “place 32” does not at all reflect the pricing markup people in the U.S. pay for getting broadband access because it is calculated in relation to average income, not cost of the equipment and utilities.
Re:
yes, most analysis also doesn’t include the hidden fees buried below the line. That just technically doesn’t exist, and that’s where cable and telecom giants make huge chunks of their profits.
I’ve long argued that the cables should be built and maintained by either governments or utilities as physical infrastructure is a natural monopoly and we should strive to serve all, not just those that it’s profitable to serve. Then, companies should be able to auction usage of those cables, creating a rich marketplace with a low barrier to entry.
not just affordability but on speed and customer service as well! and the way the government is still scared to do anything to remove control from the major suppliers, while it’s still scared of some sort of spying being done by Chinese hardware, without producing even a single shred of evidence and while it’s still shit scared of the power the major isps show they have in order to get millions of hard working peoples dollars, all under false pretenses, while producing only a fraction of what they are supposed to, what they commit to give in return, the USA will do nothing on this table except slide down further! it’s an absolute fucking disgrace!!
“Yes!
As your newly selected FCC Chairperson, I vow to increase competition in the US ISP —hold on, my lobbyist is calling…”
Clarification?
” Democratic policy proposals are (sometimes) well intentioned regulatory theater. Most GOP”
You start with a full name for 1 group, then use ‘GOP’ for the other side?
Back to subject.
A few points.
WHO helped pay for the original lines for the phone system?
Who installed the original lines for the internet?
WHO let a Corp OWN the internet lines? Who/why were the Tier 1 access sold? FOR CHEAP?
Who is responsible for those Lines and updating them?
It was interesting in the past when the Gov. controlled many of the utilities and the prices were controlled.
But for some Odd reasoning the congress came to the idea that the GOV. is not supposed to COMPETE with the corps.
Why the HELL NOT? It gives a BASE to see how prices and goods are being controlled. ANd Could lead to NO’ Taxes Needed for the WHOLE nation.
I find it a bit disingenuous to list Lithuania and Bulgaria as “such countries as”.
Both are EU members, both are smaller countries, Lithuania is officially a developed nation.
I understand the impulse to point out lesser-known or bad-reputation countries to make it sound more sensational, but this is basically saying “countries like Austria and Netherlands”.