A new report from the Small Business Administration’s Office of Advocacy, Broadband Use by Rural Small Businesses, reviews
reports showing links between IT investment, broadband penetration, and economic growth. These results, combined with documented lower levels of rural small business broadband use, indicate the existence of an urban-rural digital divide. It concludes that without increased broadband access rural economies could miss out on higher levels of growth and job creation.
No kidding.
And don’t forget that rural doesn’t necessarily mean the heartland of America. It also means parts of Loudoun County, Virginia – one of the fastest growing areas in the country – are without broadband. And I bet that’s not the only suburban DC area where government workers can’t get broadband at home. What happens to telework?
There’s a long article in Government Technology about local governments trying to get the broadband/telework movement out of the blocks. One of the examples is Loudoun County where the Telework Consortium discovered that Loudoun's broadband infrastructure isn't sufficient to support telework and telecommuting.
That's a problem.
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