Congress should stop short-changing America regarding our airwaves

As Congressional negotiators were nearing agreement last month on a massive budget deal, they once again looked behind the couch and between the cushions to find any loose revenue to pay for the deal.  And once again, they turned to their favorite piggybank: auctioning our nation’s airwaves.  From a fiscal perspective, this makes sense and always receives strong bipartisan support.

But for all the potential benefits, Congress shortchanges the country when it treats these auctions as only an accounting gimmick.  Because our airwaves are a critical national resource that does much more than fill in gaps on our balance sheets.

{mosads}Consumers’ skyrocketing demand for the wireless services that use these airwaves is well documented.  According to industry reports, nearly 90 percent of us subscribe to wireless plans; almost 40 percent of all U.S. households are wireless only.  For one in ten Americans, their mobile device is the only way they get online.  That number is generally higher in minority communities.

Mobile usage skews higher in younger age groups, which means demand for mobile services will likely only go up over time.  This trend is already taking over.  Experts predict that consumers will use seven times more data over wireless devices in 2019 than they did last year.

So what does all this data mean in the real world?  It means more than just better smartphones—although that is certainly true too.  But a deeper look shows that wireless services are fundamentally changing nearly all aspects of our lives.

For instance, wireless technologies have combined with the benefits of the Affordable Care Act to make healthcare more accessible, more affordable, and more reliable than ever before.  For chronic patients, wireless monitoring translates into fewer doctor visits and more time living their lives.  For patients who do not live near top specialists, remote connections reduce the need for long, often painful trips to faraway cities.  And for all of us, new mobile fitness devices keep us healthier and minimize trips to the doctor.

Moving from the individual to a global scale shows that wireless technologies are reducing our impact on the environment.  Utilities and oil refineries use wireless gauges and valves to become more efficient and eliminate problems before they happen.  Traffic apps and eventually autonomous cars use mobile technologies to decrease the amount of time we are stuck on roads and bridges.  All these developments result in less stress on the planet.

The list goes on.  But unfortunately, Congress overlooks these benefits when it is running from one budget crisis to the next.  Instead, it gets stuck believing that our airwaves are only as a neat trick to get out of the next fiscal fiasco.  Congress is forced to work so hard to keep its own lights on that it is missing the impact its policies have on real people’s lives.  Instead, it spends its time talking to the Congressional Budget Office rather meeting than with consumers. 

Now is the time for that to change.  The budget office does what it can to predict valuations for the next decade.  But with the quickly evolving demand for our nation’s airwaves, we are asking them to solve an impossible riddle.  Ten years ago, the smart phone did not even exist.  How can we ask anyone to predict the technological innovations we have in store for the next decade?

In the end, when Congress looks to budget forecasts rather than evaluate what’s good for the country, the numbers will never add up.  And when it comes to valuable national resources like spectrum, Washington needs to stop staring down at the accounting ledger.  We should fix our gaze at the future and find a way to lead.

Pallone represents New Jersey’s 6^th Congressional Distrrict and has served in the House since 1988. He is ranking member on the Energy and Commerce Committee.