Internet Access is a Human Right

Opinion – The MSU Exponent

Now that schoolwork, job applications, college applications and virtually every other element of modern life takes place online, the Internet is an absolute necessity and a human right. However, it’s currently treated much more like a luxury than a necessity. Americans pay more than the rest of the developed world for slower service because our government has failed to recognize Internet access as a right rather than a privilege.
Ask any free market advocate about government intervention in the economy and you’ll always get the same answer: the free market creates competition; the government creates waste. They’re so certain of this cornerstone of their faith that none of them seem to have checked the real world to see if it’s true.
It’s not. U.S. telecom companies have divided up the service map so completely that 90.2 percent of Americans have a choice between a maximum of two service providers for low-speed Internet, and 74.7 percent have one or zero options for broadband fast enough for a family to use together. Deregulation has allowed the massive telecom companies that own the physical networks to stifle competition and drive up their rates at our expense. For middle and low-income Americans, higher rates eat into budgets for food, education and healthcare, or shut them out of Internet access entirely.
None of this would be a problem if Internet access was a commodity or a luxury like any other. No one complains about gaps in the diamond market because it’s not important for everyone to own diamonds, but Internet access is necessary for modern life and should be treated as such. In France, where Internet access is recognized as a human right, broadband is two to three times cheaper than U.S. rates for the same speed. Rather than allow telecom companies to own their own network and shut ...


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