Paul Ong, research professor and director of the Center for Neighborhood Knowledge at UCLA Luskin, spoke to the Los Angeles Times about the lack of affordable and reliable internet access available to low-income communities within Los Angeles County. Data has shown that big internet providers like Spectrum, AT&T and Frontier often charge higher rates for identical internet services to high-poverty neighborhoods compared with non-high-poverty neighborhoods. “By the time our young people graduate from high school and either move to college or to the labor market, they’re severely disadvantaged because we have moved to a system where we believe access to the computer and internet and broadband is taken for granted by most people. People who don’t have that access, they are left behind,” Ong said.
