Low-income

The Washington Post recently reported that Verizon is telling low-income, Emergency Broadband Benefit Program participants that they can't stay on their “old” data plans, so they’ll have to switch. For home Internet, Verizon doesn't make the subsidy available at all on legacy DSL plans, which it offers in areas where it hasn't upgraded copper lines to fiber.

More than 825 broadband providers are taking part in the Federal Communications Commission’s new Emergency Broadband Benefit (EBB) program. One of the participants is TruConnect, a mobile virtual network operator that uses T-Mobile’s network. “Lifeline has been a terrific solution,” for getting communications into the hands of those who need it but can’t afford it, said Matthew Johnson, co-CEO of TruConnect, who runs the company with his brother Nathan Johnson. But it was frustrating during Covid-19.

The government has a new program, the Emergency Broadband Benefit, to help Americans pay their Internet bills. Unfortunately, companies like Verizon are twisting it into an opportunity for an upsell. All Internet service provider participation in the program is voluntary, and each ISP gets to write some of its own rules for how to hand out the money.

This week, the Federal Communications Commission adopted rules for the Emergency Connectivity Fund Program, providing $7.171 billion for schools and libraries for the purchase of connected devices and broadband connections for use by students, school staff, and library patrons at locations other than a school or library.

This report identifies solutions and best practices to accelerate internet adoption through sponsored-service programs. These recommendations are critical to achieving educational equity and minimizing the risks of the digital divide—including income loss and economic exclusion—for the duration of the pandemic and beyond. As the government pursues additional education and low-income-support programs, the lessons from sponsored-service programs are applicable more broadly.

The new broadband affordability programs [the Emergency Broadband Benefit Program and the Emergency Connectivity Fund] are just temporary — and advocates say lawmakers need to develop a long-term program that will ensure low-income Americans can afford the Internet. “We’re not going back to 2019,” said Benton Senior Fellow and Public Advocate Gigi Sohn. “The digital divide doesn’t end when the pandemic ends.

My top priority for the year ahead, which should surprise no one, is continuing the work we have been laser-focused on all year: making sure all Americans have access to high-speed broadband. Here, in year two of our battle with the COVID-19 pandemic, we are enduring the lingering effects of a multilayered crisis that has reverberated across healthcare, education, the economy, widespread job losses, and food insecurity.

Internet service isn’t a luxury – it’s a necessity like any other utility. This has never been truer than it is now, as hundreds of millions of families across the country are relying on it to telework, attend tele-health appointments, and keep their kids learning in virtual classrooms. Our economy would fall apart without it, yet right now millions of Americans are struggling to afford it. That’s why Congress enacted the Emergency Broadband Benefit last year – because it’s time to get serious about bridging the digital divide, and in that fight, affordability is half the battle.

The Emergency Broadband Benefit Program launches on May 12. Here's what you need to know

Funding - Congress dedicated $3.2 billion to the Emergency Broadband Benefit.

Discounts – eligible households can receive discounts off monthly broadband service:

Beyond supporting students, information being collected by schools across the country could prove useful when addressing the problem of the digital divide. The work to close the so-called homework gap, exacerbated when the coronavirus pandemic shut down schools and forced 50 million students to suddenly adopt remote learning, could also provide the federal and state governments a roadmap toward fixing the broader digital divide problem. The homework gap is a subset of a much larger d