Actualizing Internet for All: Exploring Federal Solutions to the Digital Divide

June 2023

Actualizing Internet for

All: Exploring Federal Solutions to the Digital Divide

Jasmine Lewis, John R. Lewis Social Justice Fellow

Overview

Today, despite the growing importance of reliable high-speed internet access, or “broadband,” a substantial number of communities across the nation—namely lowincome, elderly, urban, rural, and tribal communities—do not have adequate access to the internet. In fact, as of 2021, more than 42 million Americans did not have the ability to purchase broadband internet.1

This policy brief examines several key policies within the Internet for All Initiative established by the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) that aim to bridge the digital divide in the United States. It concludes by making recommendations for maximizing the efficiency, effectiveness, and longevity of the current available programs.

Exploring the Digital Divide and Its Implications

The economic, educational, and social inequalities between those who have the ability to fully access, utilize, and benefit from digital technologies and those who do not is referred to as the “digital divide.” The term emerged in the 1990s as mass internet access increased dramatically due to a surge in the ownership of personal computers and the development of internet browsers. While the term originally referred to the divide between those who had physical access to computers, it has expanded to include factors such as internet access and digital literacy skills.2 Although the digital divide has existed for decades, the COVID-19 pandemic illuminated its discriminatory effects. Internet access rapidly became a vital resource for participation in daily life, and the shift toward remote work, e-learning, and other virtual activities left individuals and households without reliable high-speed internet vulnerable, both economically and academically.

Minorities, in particular, have been disproportionately impacted by the digital divide. The Black population in the United States consistently has the lowest rates of broadband access. Approximately 40% of Black American households do not have high-speed internet. In urban cities, the Black population is twice as likely as their white counterparts to lack high-speed broadband. In the rural South, 38% of Black households lack broadband compared to 23% of white households in the same region.3 And while a larger share of rural households lack broadband, nearly three times as many households without broadband are in urban areas.4