Latest Broadband Numbers Highlight Persistent Problems

[Commentary] A look at Pew’s findings in terms of broadband usage in the United States. Pew finds that 85% of American adults ages 18 and older use the Internet and 70% of American adults have a high-speed broadband connection at home, and 80% have a broadband connection, a smartphone or both. That means that 20% of Americans have neither a home broadband connection nor a smartphone. The demographic factors most correlated with home broadband adoption continue to be educational attainment, age, and household income. Including smartphones in Pew’s broadband definition actually exacerbates differences in broadband adoption rates between young and old. “It is dangerous to call everything ‘broadband,’” former White House aide to President Barack Obama Susan Crawford wrote in Wired, “because it allows us to pretend there’s a vibrant marketplace for high-speed Internet access, with satellite duking it out with cable modem access, mobile wireless supplanting the need for a wire at home, and no need for oversight or a change in industrial policy.” Pew does not include smartphones in its definition of what constitutes a “broadband user” – mainly because there is no widespread consensus as to whether 3G or 4G smartphones qualify as “broadband” speed, and many would question whether they offer the same utility to users as a dedicated home Internet connection.