Economic benefits of the availability and use of high-broadband networks

The high-speed broadband expansion represents an important tool for many governments of developed economies for the preservation of competitiveness and for the further development of the business location. to implement broadband infrastructure across the board. However, the creation of this infrastructure requires high support from local and national governments, which have already provided billions of euros for public broadband funding in the past. So far, however, it has hardly been empirically researched what effects fiber-based broadband coverage and use have on economic performance.

In this research project, the following research questions are specifically examined:

a) What is the causal effect of supply-side coverage with high-speed broadband on economic performance (GDP)?

b) What is the causal effect of the demand-side acceptance of high-speed broadband services on economic performance (GDP)?

c) Do the estimated overall benefits on the supply and demand side outweigh the total cost of infrastructure expansion?

research goal

This project thus represents an important contribution to research into the effects of fiber-based broadband infrastructure expansion and contrasts the benefits of these investment measures to the costs, which will enable more evidence-based economic policy decisions to be made in the future.