[Page: H11944]---
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of January 6, 1999, the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. TAUZIN) is recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the majority leader.
Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Speaker, I rise tonight in special order to begin what will become in the next year, the year 2000, one of the most serious debates that I think this House will ever engage in. As we meet here in this Chamber, an historic revolution is occurring, as silently as the day, perhaps, when the United States produced more plastic than it did steel.
As we speak today, a revolution in our economy, in our communications, in our whole international social structure, is happening all around us. It is a revolution called the Internet, and it is about to explode upon the world in a new and faster form called broad band Internet.
Just recently one of the groups here in Washington, Legg-Mason, did a study to indicate how fast would this new broad band high-speed Internet be deployed in our great country, how soon would citizens have access to this amazing new system by which we will not only conduct our business, but entertain one another and learn from one another, and eventually even deliver medical services to one another?
Legg-Mason indicated that 3 years from now they anticipate that approximately half of Americans will have access to high-speed broad band Internet
[Page: H11945]
Then they look at the other half of America. The other half of America they looked at 3 years from now they estimate will only have access to a single provider, in some cases, and for a full fourth of Americans, there will be no provider of Internet high-speed broad band services.
What does that mean in a real sense? It means that for one-fourth of America there will be no chance to access high-speed digital broad band Internet services. It means that for that one-fourth of America, they will be left out of this high-speed electronic commerce revolution. It means for that one-fourth of America, that children will grow up in an educationally and informationally deprived society.
It means that new high-speed electronic commerce services will not be available to those businesses. It means that citizens will not have access to all of the long-distance learning and telemedicine that the high-speed broad band services will bring.
In short, it means that as this incredible fast train of broad band services is leaving the station, that some Americans are going to be left in its dust, and will have no access to the incredible opportunities the new millenium will bring in the digital age.
Who are those one-quarter of Americans who will have no access? Members probably can guess who they are. They are going to be the citizens in the most poverty-ridden sectors of our country, the minority centers of our country, the poor rural minority and poor rural sectors of America, the poorest and most sparsely populated parts of the West, and some parts of the South.
A good way to see that one-quarter of America is to look at a map that shows where the high-speed hubs are, where the backbones for these new systems are currently deployed.
We will see, for example, that California has 177 of these high-speed hubs, and in Louisiana we have two. We have one in Baton Rouge and one in New Orleans. California has more of these high-speed hubs, in fact, than does 31 other States combined. Most of the States of the West and the rural parts of our country have no such high-speed hubs. That is where we will find that part of America that is going to get left behind in this incredible information revolution.
Look to the inner cities, look to the poverty, the minority centers of our country, and we will again see a lack of high-speed deployment of broad band services. We will see again a sector of our country that will be left out.
For a full quarter of America who will have at least one Internet broad band provider, we will see a part of America that unfortunately will have to deal with a monopoly, a single provider of these immense services. So for one-half of our country 3 years from now, Americans will either have none of these services or, unfortunately, have a service that is provided by a single monopoly player.
Yesterday this House took dramatic action to provide a new form of law to give to the satellite television companies new rights to compete against the monopoly cable companies in our communities. That is pretty important. A monopoly cable company can charge what it wants, can lump as much programming into a package as
they want, and we have to take it or leave it.
When the satellite company can offer a full component of packaged products that includes local signals as well as cable broadcast programming, all of a sudden consumers have a choice. All of a sudden television services become much better for consumers. As choice and competition comes to the marketplace, better prices, better terms, better conditions.
The gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. MARKEY) and I just talked about another bill to free up international satellite communications in order to create competition, lower prices, choice for consumers, not only here in America but across the world.
What I am speaking of tonight is a situation that is about to develop in this incredible world of Internet services where television, telephones, data will all combine in a digital stream that will arrive at our homes or not arrive in our homes, depending upon whether or not we are connected to broad band and to broad band networks.
Let me just give an idea of about how important this is. In just 5 years, since the first introduction of the World Wide Web, the Internet economy, which is now $301 billion, already rivals old economy sectors like energy, at $223 billion, and autos, at $350 billion, and Telecom at $270 billion. It is already, in 5 years, as big as some of these century-old economy sectors that took hundreds of years, literally, to get as big as they are.
The Internet spread to 25 percent of our population in just 7 years. By contrast, electricity reached 25 percent of Americans in 46 years. Telephone took 35 years.
[Time: 19:15]
Television took 26 years. The Internet took 7 years to reach a quarter of America. Commercial activity on the Internet is expected to be $100 billion by the end of 1999, and double that in the year 2000. By 2002, on-line business-to-business transactions will total a whopping $842 billion. MCI/WorldCom, for example, said that net income nearly tripled to $1 billion for the third quarter in 1999, and 40 percent of their company revenues are now in Internet and data services.
What I am saying is that the Internet has arrived. It created 1.2 million jobs in the U.S. in 1998. Ten percent of the United States adults, 19.7 million persons, are now telecommuters. They work from home and they save employers $10,000 per employee because they telecommute, reducing absenteeism, lowering job retention costs. I could go on and on, I think my colleagues get my drift.
Mr. Speaker, the Internet is upon us, but if my colleagues think this old slow Internet has made a difference in this economy and is currently making a huge difference in the success of the American economy and freeing up economies across the world, they ain't seen nothing yet. Wait until they see high-speed broadband.
People have asked what is the difference? Internet has to be turned on. One has to dial it up, have to wait for it to warm up and heat up and compete with more and more traffic on the slow system. Sometimes the traffic gets so heavy as new customers come on line that it is difficult to get service.
High speed Internet is like that refrigerator. It is always on, always chilled, always ready to go and it is hot and it is fast and it is full of information. It will contain real-time video. High-speed broadband digital services means on television direct telephone calls where we can see one another. It means on television all the Internet commerce services which are growing and growing in the economic sectors of America. Business-to-consumer commerce totaled $8 billion. That is huge. Business-to-business commerce totaled $43 billion last year, and we are told by 2003 it will become $1.3 trillion.
Mr. Speaker, all of that business happening on high speed networks, but some people will be left out. In this coming year, we will begin debating whether or not it is time in America for this House, this Congress, to declare broadband Internet policy. To make sure, as we have tried to do with cable, as we have tried to do with satellites, as we have tried to do with so many of our economic sectors, that no longer will some people be left out, caught on the wrong side of the wire, caught in this great digital divide, left out as this fast, high-speed train leaves the station. Deprived and depressed and left behind in a faster and faster world, or whether we will have a policy in America that says to broadband Internet providers, ``Here is your chance to serve every American.'' And every American is entitled to a choice of different providers, so that every American has a chance to be on that system.
I recently had a high-tech conference in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, where we explored that whole set of issues in my home State of Louisiana. We were recently ranked in Louisiana as 47th in the Nation in terms of Internet connection. That is not good. That is awful. We need to be way up there.
Why? Because Louisiana has a huge problem of adult illiteracy and an education system that cannot seem to cure it. We have one of the highest uninsured populations in America per capita. We need some help. High-speed,
[Page: H11946]
We learned at that conference that there are children in my home State who start first grade with a 50-word vocabulary. Who go to school in the first grade knowing what a tomato looks like, but not knowing the word ``tomato.'' Who know what a wagon does, but ``wagon'' is not in their vocabulary. Imagine those children connected to the Internet at home and all the sudden exposed to a worldwide view of information and learning. Connected to their teachers's web site at night to get help with homework and enlarge that vocabulary and give themselves a chance in the world.
Imagine if we do connect and we get high-speed services to a State like Louisiana what a difference it can make for the people of our State. And yet, those children today start with a 50-word vocabulary. Most children in America start with at least a 500-word vocabulary. Now, imagine if my State, or many parts of it, are left out of this high-speed digital revolution. Imagine if our children still start with that 50-word vocabulary and other kids in America connected to the broadband start instead with a 5,000-word vocabulary or 10,000-word vocabulary. Imagine how much further behind those kids become.
Imagine a small business in a rural town that is told because they do not have high-speed broadband
Internet connectivity to the rest of the economy that their customers will not do business with them anymore. They are out of business unless they move to a high-speed Internet center somewhere. Imagine what it does to rural America, to poverty America, to minority centers in this country when they are told businesses cannot operate here because they are not connected and Washington never created a policy to ensure that they would be connected.
Imagine our company, our town, our school, our city, our hospital connected to a single monopoly provider unregulated by government. Imagine those conditions. We are not much better off than the one who is not connected at all. That is the world Legg Mason predicted for America in 3 years if we do not soon declare a new broadband policy for this country.
Mr. Speaker, when we come back to session early next year, I will be joined by the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. DINGELL), former chairman of the Committee on Commerce and now ranking minority member. I will be joined by the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. GOODLATTE), and the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. BOUCHER). The gentleman from Virginia (Mr. BOUCHER) who serves on both the Committee on the Judiciary and the Committee on Commerce and the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. GOODLATTE) who is an esteemed and honorable member of the Committee on the Judiciary.
We will be joined on the floor by many other Members who will begin talking about this issue and begin trying to elicit the help of Americans in create an interest here in Congress toward building a broadband Internet policy for this country that says no child will be left out, no one will be caught outside the digital divide, no one will be left behind as the high speed train leaves the station.
Recently, a book was published by a fellow named Tom Friedman called ``The Lexus and the Olive Tree.'' In it he says in this new millennium there will not be a First World and Third World anymore. There will not be First World economies and Third World economies anymore. There will either be a fast world, part of this incredible high speed electronic commerce world where we all are connected and we all can reach each other and communicate and teach and learn and commerce with one another, or the slow world, left out, left behind.
Mr. Speaker, I am trying to say tonight, and we will try to say next year in special order after special order, that America could not and should not let that happen to any citizen of our country. We cannot have half of America left behind. We cannot have a fourth of America totally locked out of this digital revolution. We cannot say that this is the land of opportunity for some but not for others.
Mr. Speaker, I will be back on the floor with my colleagues when we come back in January and we will burden you night after night because we will be on this floor talking about this digital divide, talking about the necessity to have real competition and real delivery of services to every citizen of this country in broadband Internet digital commerce, teaching, learning, medicine, and all the wonderful opportunities that those systems will bring.
END