The Role of Infrastructure in the Rural - Urban Digital Divide

Brian Whitacre and Bradford Mills

No 19352, 2005 Annual meeting, July 24-27, Providence, RI from American Agricultural Economics Association (New Name 2008: Agricultural and Applied Economics Association)

Abstract: A significant gap exists in the percentage of rural and urban households that connect to the Internet. Furthermore, this "digital divide" has been increasing with respect to high-speed connections. The primary course of action to address this emerging high-speed digital divide has been to subsidize digital communications technology (DCT) infrastructure. This paper explores the diffusion of DCT infrastructure in both rural and urban areas over the period 2000 - 2003, and estimates its contribution to the emerging divide in high-speed access. The findings suggest that the rural - urban high-speed divide is more strongly associated with differences in household characteristics like education and income than differences in infrastructure.

Keywords: Research; and; Development/Tech; Change/Emerging; Technologies (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 37
Date: 2005
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ags:aaea05:19352

DOI: 10.22004/ag.econ.19352

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