Who We Are

Speed Matters promotes affordable high-speed Internet for all Americans. Working with our partners and allies we advocate for programs and policies that build affordable, universal high-speed broadband investment.

Speed Matters is a project of the Communications Workers of America. CWA is the union for the Information Age, representing 700,000 workers in communications, media, airlines, manufacturing, and public service.

Universality Speed Open Protection

Universal Broadband

Just as government policies helped bring affordable telephone service to everyone, our policies should ensure that every individual, family, business, and community has access to and can use high-speed Internet at a price they can afford – regardless of their income or geographic location.

High Speed

Speed matters on the Internet. U.S policies should promote higher Internet speeds and higher capacity networks. The U.S. should adopt policies to get us to 10 megabits per second downstream, 1 megabit per second upstream by 2010, with new benchmarks for succeeding years.

Open Internet

To protect free speech we must build high-capacity networks to ensure that all Americans have fast, open access to content on the Internet. There should be no degradation of service or censoring of any lawful content. Reasonable network management is necessary to preserve an effective and open Internet.

Consumer Protections and Good Jobs

Public policies should include consumer and worker protections, should support the growth of good, career jobs, and require the public reporting of deployment, actual speed, price, and service.

Get the Report: A state-by-state report of internet connection speeds.

ACI study finds network operators create more, better paying jobs

According to a new American Consumer Institute Center for Citizen Research study, "network" companies, such as AT&T and Verizon - produce more, better paying jobs than non-network companies like Google and eBay. It found that for every $1 billion in revenue, network companies provided 2,329 jobs while non-network companies provided 1,199 jobs. Read More »

Disability advocates laud CWA’s broadband plan recommendations

In its public notice on the National Broadband Plan, the Communications Workers of America cited the "adoption gap" as one of the main barriers to implementing effective broadband policy. CWA noted that individuals with disabilities are disproportionately less likely to adopt broadband, in part because of complications with accessibility. The Coalition of Organization for Accessible Technology (COAT) praised CWA for their inclusion of disability access in the recommendations.  Read More »

CWA calls for broadband goal of 50 mbps downstream and 20 upstream by 2015

The Communications Workers of America used the FCC's last request for public comment before the release of the national broadband plan to issue a public notice laying out what they consider to be top priorities for the plan. CWA's proposals include bringing U.S. networks to world-class standards by setting ambitious, but achievable goals, with an immediate goal of 10 megabits per second downstream and 1 megabit per second up; and 50 megabits down and 20 up to 80 percent of the population by 2015. Read More »

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