The next coronavirus relief bill needs to solve America's unbanked and unwired crises

Just two weeks after Congress passed the $2.2 trillion CARES Act to provide relief to businesses and families hammered by the coronavirus lockdown, discussions are turning to another legislative package, which simply must address two urgent problems: Too many Americans don’t have access to banks, and they don’t have high-speed broadband. If they don’t get both soon, they will be in desperate straits. Twenty-three percent of Americans in urban areas and 28 percent in rural areas don’t have access to or can't afford high-speed internet. This isn’t tenable at a moment when tens of millions of kids are out of school (New York City just announced they’ll be out until at least September) and online learning almost certainly will be more heavily integrated when they come back. Meanwhile, access to telemedicine for patients nationwide is more essential than it has ever been, with so many ERs and hospitals overwhelmed. The next bill needs to significantly expand funding for federal programs like the FCC’s Lifeline, which subsidizes phone and internet services for low-income Americans. Let’s be clear: Access to banking and to broadband is related, it’s urgent and it is needed to ensure there is equity in the trillions Washington is spending.

[Fred P. Hochberg, former president and COO of Lillian Vernon Corp., was chairman and president of the U.S. Export-Import Bank, 2009-2017, and deputy and then acting administrator of the Small Business Administration during the Clinton administration.]