President Obama Announces ConnectALL Initiative

President Barack Obama unveiled ConnectALL, an initiative to help Americans from across the country, at every income level, get online and have the tools to take full advantage of the Internet. The Administration submited its recommendation that the Federal Communications Commission reform Lifeline, a $1.5 billion per year Reagan-era phone subsidy program, to turn it into a 21st Century national broadband subsidy to help low-income Americans get online. Alongside this FCC filing, the Administration is releasing a new study on the economic importance of broadband and calling for nonprofits, businesses, technology experts, and Government to join a national effort to reach the ConnectALL goal of connecting 20 million more Americans to broadband by 2020. A new Issue Brief released today by the Council of Economic Advisers outlines how being offline is more than inconvenient; it creates specific economic costs, especially for job-seekers unable to access online job search tools.

Today, because of a digital divide, low-income Americans have a harder time accessing these tools, and unemployed workers without home Internet access take a longer time to find employment. Given these costs, we cannot be satisfied if broadband is out of reach for anyone in America, and today, President Obama is acting to make that a part of the past. ConnectALL will also address:

• Increasing the affordability of broadband for low-income Americans.
• Bringing together private sector companies helping to deliver affordable connectivity.
• Initiating a national service effort to deliver digital literacy skills.
• Increasing access to affordable devices.
• Announcing the development of a tool to support broadband planning.
• Marshaling philanthropic support for digital inclusion.