Affordability, Adoption, Availability, and Equitable Access Impact FCC's Broadband Deployment Report

On March 14, 2024, the Federal Communications Commission concluded that broadband is not being deployed in a reasonable and timely fashion. Since the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, Congress has allocated tens of billions of dollars to support broadband deployment so it may not come as a huge surprise that the FCC came to this conclusion. Approximately 24 million Americans (7% of the total U.S. population)—including almost 28 percent of Americans in rural areas, and more than 23 percent of people living on Tribal lands—lack access to fixed broadband of 100 megabits per second (Mbps) download speed paired with 20 Mbps upload speed. For these people, networks that can provide affordable, reliable high-speed Internet service cannot be deployed soon enough. In the wake of the FCC's latest broadband deployment report, much of the attention has been on the FCC's new benchmark for high-speed fixed broadband: 100/20 Mbps. In the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, Congress determined that locations without access to networks that can deliver 25/3 Mbps service are "unserved" and locations without access to 100/20 Mbps service are "underserved." So the FCC's new standard reflects a minimum for broadband service as envisioned by Congress. But the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act is also having a deeper (although less flashy) influence on the FCC's annual determination of whether or not broadband "is being deployed to all Americans in a reasonable and timely fashion." The FCC is now looking past just the physical deployment of networks and also considering broadband affordability, adoption, availability, and equitable access.