5G Wireless Services are a Complement to Wired Tech – Not a Replacement!

A wireless network will only be as good as the wired infrastructure beneath it. More users and devices on a wireless network eventually necessitate more wired infrastructure upgrades to accommodate increased traffic and consumer demands, and many consumers’ bandwidth consumption is growing at a pace where only fiber will ultimately be able to satisfy demands. Moreover, in sparsely populated rural America, the distances between homes and businesses make it such that fiber is going to have to be nearly ubiquitous in order to deliver 5G at the same kinds of speeds that are promised in urban areas. I hope policymakers will continue to keep these lessons of physics and economics in mind as they craft policies to bridge the digital divide.