Category: Reports & Articles

Economic Impact of the ARRA, Five Years Later

From the White House Council of Economic Advisors

As part of the accountability and transparency provisions included in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA), the Council of Economic Advisers (CEA) was charged with providing to Congress quarterly reports on the effects of the Recovery Act on overall economic activity, and on employment in particular. In this final report, we provide an assessment of the effects of the Act through the fourth quarter of 2013 as well as an assessment of subsequent jobs measures.

Wilson’s Greenlight Leads North Carolina in Fast Internet

Following the collapse of key industries, a town of 50,000 in eastern North Carolina had to make a hard choice. It wanted to support existing businesses and attract new ones but the cable and telephone companies were not interested in upgrading their networks for cutting edge capacity.

So Wilson decided to build its own fiber optic network, now one of the fastest in the nation, earning praise from local businesses that have a new edge over competitors in the digital economy. In response, Time Warner Cable lowered its prices and modestly boosted available Internet speeds, contributing to the $1 million saved by the community each year.

The Killer App: Economic Development and Job Creation

By Jim Baller

Economic development has been the “killer app” of community broadband, particularly fiber-to-the-home projects, during the last fifteen years. What’s more, economic development is likely to become an even more powerful driver of community broadband in the years ahead, as our knowledge of the relationship between high-capacity broadband connectivity and economic development continues to grow and mature, and as the lessons learned from the federal broadband stimulus program, Google fiber, Gig.U, and other gigabit initiatives work their way across the nation. This paper examines what we know about the relationship between broadband and economic development today, what we are likely to learn in the months and years ahead, and what this means for our communities and our nation.

Eliminating the Waiting Game and Driving Network Uptake

By Doug Adams & Michael Curri, Strategic Networks Group

In working across the globe and working with multiple carriers deploying new, more robust broadband networks, Strategic Networks Group (SNG) consistently comes up against the notion that once the network is built, adoption will naturally follow. “Build it and they will come” is a school of thought that expresses the great hope that potential subscribers will naturally adopt, however this notion goes against what we have always known about technology adoption.

Digital Divide: Expanding Broadband Access to Small Businesses

Testimony of The Honorable Lawrence E. Strickling Assistant Secretary for Communications and Information National Telecommunications and Information Administration United States Department of Commerce. Before the Committee on Small Business United States House of Representatives.

Innovation and Employment in the Intelligent Community

In 2013, Intelligent Community Forum will examine the relationship between innovation – one of the Intelligent Community Indicators – and employment in communities around the world. A massive body of evidence points to the fact that innovation creates prosperity. The prosperity flows from new demand – who needed an iPod or iPad until one was created? – or from empowering us to do more with the same resources of raw materials, people and money. But prosperity is not always the same as employment. In each recession of the past 50 years, job recovery has been significantly slower than in the previous recession. The recent recession in the industrialized world is only the most dramatic example of a “jobless recovery” – and that is in nations managing to post positive economic numbers at all.

Broadband as an Economic Driver

By David Salway

There is little debate that increasing broadband access spurs economic development, but can this be quantified? There have been numerous studies by economic and telecommunications analysts which study the correlation between broadband access and number of jobs created, as well as measuring the economic impact of broadband. There are multiple economic factors that could affect the results, as well many facets of providing broadband Internet access, which have the potential to significantly affect the results.

Primer: What Fiber Broadband Can Do For Your Community

From Broadband Communities Magazine

Fiber to the home (FTTH) has become the leading technology for next-generation communications networks worldwide. On every continent, telecom providers are building fiber optic networks. They know that only FTTH can meet the growing demand for broadband services that require delivering video to (and from) multiple tablets, computers and television sets in a home, all at the same time.

 

Fiber critical for growth in Dan River Region

By Tara Bozick, Go Dan River

High-speed broadband infrastructure is key to future growth for Martinsville and the region, economic development leaders say. Over the past 10 years, Martinsville expanded its Martinsville Informational Network or “MINet” to more than 20 miles of fiber optic cable throughout Martinsville and Henry County.