How the $4 Trillion Flood of Covid Relief Is Funding the Future

Out of the $65 billion allocated to broadband in the recent infrastructure law, the bulk — $45 billion — is for installing broadband, compared with $17 billion for ongoing access and subsidy grants. “Our economy evolves and changes,” said Todd Schmit, an associate professor of applied economics and management at Cornell University, “and it’s really necessary now to think about broadband in an infrastructure space.” The billions in federal funding may build access to broadband, but it offers no guarantee to sustain it, which is especially crucial for the rural broadband access that this legislation tries to address. Schmit studies broadband access in areas of upstate New York with fewer than 10 subscribers per mile, where offering service often isn’t cost-effective. “If we can agree that access to broadband is a public good — for educating our children, for access to health care, for expanding business opportunities — there should be a defensible basis for government assistance in funding the operations of those programs,” he says. “But I think that’s a harder story to tell.”