Those numbers are bogus but keep parroting them. If ONE address inside a census block qualifies for high speed internet then the FCC data assumes they all they do. Census blocks can be rather large in less populous areas, but even inside cities you see places where one side of the street can get high speed DSL and another can't, or it ends when the street hits the city limit or something like that.
There is also ZERO verified of the data, the FCC just trusts the providers. One company no one has ever heard of claimed they served 62 million addresses and until a reporter uncovered it the FCC was ready to publish data including that.
Microsoft did their own study and estimated 162 million Americans lack access to broadband (i.e. 25 Mbps down / 3 Mbps up per the current FCC definition) which is basically half the country!
Experts are furious over the FCC’s rosy picture of broadband access
First, it wasn't me who brought up what the FCC estimates, it was Radioguy41. I was simply pointing out that he was making a false statement and corrected it with the figures reported by the FCC.
How accurate the FCC's figures are is another matter. But that Microsoft study claiming nearly half of the US can't access broadband is laughable.
Let's start with this: the 2020 US census says that there are about 127 million US households. Next, simply add up the reported number of broadband subscribers from the nation's largest cable and telco providers, as this report from Leichtman Research Group did.
www.leichtmanresearch.com
They found a 2019 total of about 100.6 million. They believe that total represents 96% of the overall market. They do note that some of the reported sub counts may include businesses and not be strictly residential. But OTOH, this is only counting *actual* subscribers, not homes where service is available. There's a decent chunk of US households that choose not to purchase broadband service (or simply can't afford it). So those factors cancel each other out, to some extent.
That 100.6 million total is equal to 79% of the total number of households in the country. So again, the idea that nearly half the country does not have access to broadband, as Microsoft's flawed study claims, is laughable.
Even an activist group like Broadband Now, who criticizes the FCC data, comes up with an estimated total of 42 million *people* in the US without access to broadband, i.e. about double what the FCC claims.
The Federal Communications Commission says 21 million Americans lack high-speed internet access, but a new report says the actual figure is double that.
www.bloomberg.com
That comes to 12.7% of the 331.4 million people living in the US (per the 2020 census) without broadband access. I can believe that figure. But any figure well in excess of 20%? Nah, simply not credible.
