Following our discussion of the merits of the FCC's Connect America Fund and Public Utility Commissioner Chris Nelson's critique thereof, I read this Atlantic article on the potential for the Internet to save small towns... or at least keep some alive. Economic competitiveness expert Edward Alden says that location subsidies—money governments spend to entice companies to change where they do business—are usually a zero-sum game for the country. Yet he agrees that more broadband can bring more economic activity to rural America:
...the same technological innovation that killed some small towns may, in theory, offer some hope for their revival. The commercial possibilities of the internet and modern communications mean that many jobs, particularly in business services, can be done remotely. In all likelihood, companies have only begun to experiment with the cost savings that could come from allowing more employees to work from home or at cheaper satellite offices. New, small-scale manufacturing technologies using 3-D printing could also begin to decentralize manufacturing. With high housing prices and traffic congestion plaguing many cities, an escape back to small town living would seem to be attractive to some &ndash as long as there is a way to make a living.
Connectivity is key to any of this happening. This is the theory behind the Obama administration's National Broadband Plan. The 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, more commonly known as the stimulus, allocated $7.2 billion to expand broadband capability in rural America. The evidence to date is mixed. While internet connections may create some local jobs, they could also eliminate others &ndash when, for instance, residents begin to shop online rather than in local stores. But on balance, as a recent study from the Public Policy Institute of California showed, there appear to be modest gains in employment for towns and regions that are better connected.
Broadband is the sort of open-ended infrastructure that makes sense for government investment in regions where the private sector lacks the incentive to build it out, though in practice it is often difficult to distinguish exactly where public investment is necessary. Broadband offers the possibility, though not the guarantee, of connecting remote regions of the country in a new way to the national and global economy, much as rural electrification did in the 1930s [Edward Alden, "How the Internet Could Save America's Small Towns," The Atlantic: Cities, 2012.07.31].
Broadband won't solve all of rural America's problems. It won't make Lake and Moody counties more economically or culturally attractive to the masses than Minneapolis or Chicago. For every one person who chooses to live in rural America, four choose city life. But better broadband connectivity opens business, cultural, and personal opportunities that make small-town life thinkable for a few more Americans. And we all enjoy having options... right?
Update 20:42 CDT: Then again, building a lot of low-density infrastructure may be a really bad idea....
Sure do appreciate high-speed Internet here in Lead. Were it not for that service and the Deadwood Rec Center, I'd have gone back to some urban zone long ago.
How do we get broadband to more remote spots? Satellite? Bandwidth is at a premium. Wireless? Maybe, as those technologies improve.
A nationwide fiberoptic system would be great. It could be hardened against the electromagnetic pulse (EMP) threat more easily than other systems. But would the public pay for such a network?
Maybe people will start to get fed up with the crime, noise, congestion, and pollution of big cities and move to the country in increasing numbers. But I don't see that happening yet.
I'm for fiber, Stan: most reliable, faster than any satellite signal. But that is a lot of infrastructure to run to every cabin in every peak and valley southwest of Lead. Practically, there is some threshold at which we've got to say to certain remote rural dwellers, "Enjoy your solitude; you're just not going to get amenities X, Y, & Z."