This paper documents home Internet access, types of Internet access, connection speeds, and prices for basic home Internet in tribal areas of the United States. We find that the share of households with Internet access is 21 percentage points lower in tribal areas than in neighboring non-tribal areas. When compared to these non-tribal areas, download speeds, whether measured using fixed or mobile broadband networks, are approximately 75% slower in tribal areas, while the lowest price for basic Internet services in tribal areas is 11% higher. Regression techniques reveal that traditional cost factors such as terrain and population density fully explain the price gap but account for only a fraction of the tribal differences in Internet access and connection speeds. Income differences are strong predictors of Internet access but do not affect connection speeds. A sizable amount of the variation in the access and home connection gap between tribal and non-tribal is left unexplained. We conclude with a discussion of how federal broadband programs have penetrated Indian Country, how tribal-specific factors are related to the variation in Internet access within Indian Country, and the potential policy implications of our findings.

本文记录了美国部落地区的家庭互联网接入、互联网接入类型、连接速度和基本家庭互联网的价格。我们发现部落地区拥有互联网接入的家庭比例比邻近的非部落地区低 21 个百分点。与这些非部落地区相比，部落地区的下载速度（无论是使用固定宽带网络还是移动宽带网络测量）大约慢 75%，而部落地区基本互联网服务的最低价格要高出 11%。回归技术表明，地形和人口密度等传统成本因素完全解释了价格差距，但仅占互联网访问和连接速度部落差异的一小部分。收入差异是互联网访问的有力预测因素，但不影响连接速度。部落和非部落之间的访问和家庭联系差距的很大一部分变化无法解释。我们最后讨论了联邦宽带计划如何渗透到印度国家，部落特定因素如何与印度国家内部互联网接入的变化相关，以及我们的研究结果的潜在政策影响。