The leading Democratic presidential candidates are all calling for major increases in spending for roads, bridges, rural broadband and other infrastructure needs, but they'll need large increases in tax revenue to pay for their plans. The Democrats' plans rely far less heavily than private investment than President Donald Trump would, as President Trump's 2018 budget proposed spending $200 billion “to spur at least $1.5 trillion in infrastructure investments with partners at the State, local, Tribal, and private level.” President Trump hasn't pursued the plan with Congress. Sen Bernie Sanders (I-VT) argues he can pay for his infrastructure plan by "closing corporate income tax loopholes and overseas tax havens." Sen Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) wants to raise the corporate income tax from 21% to 25% as well as reduce corporate tax incentives.

The candidates all promise to pour money into rural broadband. Some are proposing as much as $80 billion to $150 billion in new spending, with an emphasis in some cases on helping local communities build networks to fill gaps left by private internet service providers. Former South Bend (IN) Mayor Pete Buttigieg, for example, promises to work for a federal law that would prevent states from blocking the establishment of community-run networks. 

Meanwhile, farm groups have come to regard broadband as essential to economic success, even survival. Just a few years ago, the American Farm Bureau Federation said transportation facilities were its clear top priority for rural infrastructure. Now, broadband has joined transportation as the organization’s two priorities for infrastructure spending, says R.J. Carney, an AFBF congressional relations director. Fortunately, "we’ve seen a lot of bipartisanship in regards to broadband infrastructure," he said. He points to the US Dept of Agriculture's ReConnect Program, launched with $600 million in 2018 to provide grants and loans to extend broadband to unserved and underserved rural areas. In Dec another $555 million was added. 

Conventional wisdom says a town with less than 200 people wouldn’t have the resources to establish and maintain high-speed Internet for its residents. But Mount Washington, located in Berkshire County (MA) contradicted such wisdom in Nov 2017 when it activated its municipal fiber broadband service.  From one angle, the case of Mount Washington is a miracle. Before broadband, Internet options for the town’s citizens were either dial-up or a long-distance Wi-Fi service that provided a download speed of less than 1 Mbps.  “You could barely use Wi-Fi calling, and it was impossible to stream anything,” said Brian Tobin, Mount Washington select board member. “You could send emails, and you could do Internet searches that just took a long time.” But from another angle, the massive turnaround for Mount Washington, which offers Internet speeds that can reach 500 Mbps, is part of a larger state plan to bring broadband to 53 rural towns that have lacked service to a significant degree. 

Mount Washington benefited from the Last Mile Program, which provided more than $35 million in grants for rural broadband. The program is run by the Massachusetts Broadband Institute (MBI), which is part of the state agency Massachusetts Technology Collaborative (MassTech). Funds from the Last Mile Program wouldn’t have as much practical value for off-the-grid communities if not for a key piece of middle-mile infrastructure called MassBroadband 123, a 1,200-mile, $84.9 million fiber-optic network that covers more than one-third of the state. Although this network’s primary purpose is to give public institutions — such as schools and libraries — broadband access, it helps connect rural communities that otherwise would have greater difficulty finding economically viable last-mile solutions. 

Nearly half of Americans do not have an internet connection that meets minimum broadband speeds. Moreover, a staggering number of poor people of color do not have home internet access of any kind. And, across the board, Americans are charged some of the highest prices for internet service in the developed world. These are all symptoms of a much larger, structural problem: the corporate capture of the pipes, wires, and other infrastructure that powers the internet. As the fog of neoliberalism begins to lift and the horizons of political possibility extend forward, we should not be satisfied with dithering at the edges of the vast empires of cable and telecom monopolies. This requires not just rearguard critique of the existing communications order, but an affirmative vision of what a more democratic communication system that operates outside of the market would like.

There are strong signs that we are at the beginning of such a reckoning: in recent months, the UK Labour Party, Sen Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), and, most recently, Sen Bernie Sanders (I-VT) have all unveiled ambitious plans to create publicly-owned broadband internet networks. Taken together, this troika of plans represents a growing rejection of what was once seen as commonsense: that internet access can only be provided by large corporations such as Comcast and Verizon, unsavory as they may be. Sen Sanders’ High-Speed Internet for All plan proceeds along three broad dimensions of action: imposing strict public interest regulations on behemoths like Comcast, using antitrust legislation to break them up, and creating publicly-owned alternatives to corporate ISPs. The latter is the most transformative plank of Sanders’ Internet for All platform, and is also the one emphasized most heavily in the proposal. We should ultimately at least have a “public option” for internet service that is available to everybody regardless of their city, state, or zip code. After all, the internet was invented thanks to massive public investment: it should be returned to its rightful owners.

[David Elliot Berman is a doctoral candidate at the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Pennsylvania and the co-author of After Net Neutrality: A New Deal for the Digital Age. This article was originally published Dec. 23, 2019]

The Senate Commerce Committee's first hearing of 2020, "Industries of the Future" dealt with the federal government's role in advancing new technologies. Federal Communications Commissioners Jessica Rosenwrocel and Michael O'Rielly testified and spoke about 5G. On the issue of speeding the 5G rollout, Committee Chairman Roger Wicker (R-MS) pointed out that there is "a company on TV" already advertising that they are already leading the industry in 5G. Commissioner Rosenworcel said there have been some deployments, which was exciting, but that they were chiefly in urban areas. But she said that, overall, there were more deployments in countries like Switzerland, and far more in China. Commissioner O'Rielly said the priority was speed, while Commissioner Rosenworcel said it should be "getting it right."

Commissioner Rosenworcel took a critical view of what she said was the FCC's focus on high-band spectrum. She said the US was alone in focusing on auctioning high-band early on, which she said was only good for urban America, not rural. She said the FCC needs to pivot to mid-band (freeing up C-band spectrum for 5G). Chairman Wicker asked if the FCC commissioners agreed on the need for that pivot. Rosenworcel said the committee could help get agreement by coming up with legislation to chart out the best way forward on 5G spectrum. Chairman Wicker said the committee would certainly want to be heard from on where the money from those spectrum auctions go. Commissioner Rosenworcel said legislation was needed to clarify the FCC's practice of reclaiming spectrum and to direct where the billions of dollars in proceeds should be directed.  Satellite companies have argued the FCC does not have the authority to simply take the spectrum without compensating them for it. But some in Congress, on both sides of the aisle, are concerned that paying satellite operator incumbents, all international companies, would be taking money that could instead be spent on things like public safety and rural broadband.  

The trade deal that President Donald Trump and Chinese Vice Premier Liu He signed left the tech world clamoring for more. Industry leaders praised the deal’s progress on forced technology transfers and intellectual property theft in China and expressed optimism about its next iteration. But they were also quick to point out how the agreement fails to address key concerns and noted that the remaining tariffs would continue to interfere with supply chains, drive up costs and hurt market access for tech companies. “Some of the thorniest issues confronting innovation-driven industries are still on the table, including the lavish industrial subsidies China showers on its companies, including its state-owned enterprises,” said Robert Atkinson, president of the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation. He added, “China has shown itself to be a master of obfuscation when it comes to living up to its agreements.” IPC, the electronics manufacturers association, added that the deal does not address cybertheft or the tariffs still hampering their industry.

The phase one terms partially walk back tariffs on some tech gear (like TVs, smart watches, smart speakers and earbuds) and postpone duties on others (like smartphones, tablets and laptops). But tariffs remain for tons more products, including chargers, power adapters and desktop computers. “Market uncertainty remains until we see permanent tariff removal,” said Consumer Technology Association President and CEO Gary Shapiro. The group hopes phase two “will eliminate special tariffs on Chinese imports once and for all,” Shapiro added, a view echoed by ITI President and CEO Jason Oxman. The result is increasing frustration among some American businesses and technology companies who feel Trump is trading away hard-earned leverage in exchange for an agreement that does little to resolve the systemic issues that led the White House to begin imposing tariffs against China two years ago.