Wireless Broadband Would Account for More than 1/2 of Losses Under Net Neutrality Rules

Network neutrality rules would reduce the growth rate of the broadband sector by around 15 percent per year, according to an analysis by the Brattle Group. The loss—$5 billion in 2011, growing to $100 billion by 2020—increases over time and represents a 2.5 percent smaller sector in 2011 and a 17.7 percent smaller sector by 2020.

Wireless broadband would bear much of the brunt of the reduction, as mobile broadband is expected to be the driving force for broadband overall starting about 2013, Brattle Group says. The share of revenue from mobile broadband lines grows over the period, overtaking revenue from wireline broadband lines by 2013. The business versus residential split is fixed at its 2008 proportions of 37 percent business and 63 percent residential.

Residential fixed lines continue to grow at eight percent per year rate until they reach 90 percent of households and thereafter grow at two percent per year. The business fixed lines grow at the same rate.

Mobile broadband is expected to be the source of most of the broadband growth over the next decade and consequently would bear the largest share of the economic burden of network neutrality regulations.

In 2008, mobile broadband lines accounted for only about a quarter of all broadband lines, but would likely account for more than half of the economic losses over the coming decade if the proposed network neutrality regulations are put into place.

Link to full analysis