[LINK] NBN cost-benefit

[Andy Farkas]

I watched Bill Morrow's speech at the APC the other day. At first my anger
was steadily rising, but then I had an epiphany. Bill is only doing what
he's been told to do by Trumble and Fifi.

Now that he is taking his millions and going back to the Northern Hemisphere
he is actually bagging the LNP for enforcing their ill-conceived non-fibre
MTM. (couldn't read the article because of paywall:
https://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/technology/nbn-boss-blames-turnbull-for-network-complaints/news-story/bf5d375210a807a8bfa3eb9bd3c3258c
)

Paul's article reiterates some of the points Bill made:

http://paulbudde.com/blog/nbn-cost-benefit-vindication/

"Rarely has the importance of the social and economic benefits of the 
NBN been
used by the government to promote this investment. Instead they have 
constantly
played it down and blamed the previous government for an alleged “‘NBN 
disaster’.
So it was a very pleasant surprise to see that NBN Co had commissioned 
renowned
research company AlphaBeta to use, among other data, the 2016 Census to
investigate the impact of the NBN, basically by comparing economic and 
social
activity between those areas connected to the NBN and those that were 
not yet
connected. Mr Morrow provided some of the highlights of the report:

- In NBN regions, it is estimated between 1,900 and 5,400 new businesses 
were
created in 2017. This was five times the pace of regions without NBN. If 
this
rate of growth continues, by the end of the rollout there will be 
between 30,000
and 80,000 additional new businesses as a result of the NBN network.

- The number of self-employed women in NBN regions grew at an average 
2.3% every
year, compared to just 0.1% in non-NBN areas. That’s 20 times more 
likely than in
non-NBN areas. If this trend continues, up to 52,000 additional 
Australian women
will be self-employed by the end of the rollout, due again to the ‘NBN 
effect’.

- In the financial and professional services industry it is estimated 
that this
industry alone has benefited from productivity gains worth around $260 
million in
2017.

- The NBN generated an estimated $1.2 billion of additional economic 
activity in
2017. By the end of the rollout, the ‘NBN effect’ is forecast to have helped
create 31,000 additional jobs.

- By the end of the rollout, this ‘NBN-effect’ is predicted to have 
multiplied to
$10.4 billion a year, and this effectively equates to a net present 
value of $122
billion.

- People with NBN are twice as likely to enrol in on-line courses than 
their non-
NBN counterparts.

- People with NBN are 1.3 times more likely to use internet-connected 
devices to
improve their health and well-being. NBN users are almost a third more 
likely to
use health devices like FitBits or smart watches.

- The ‘NBN effect’ is estimated to have contributed about $90 million 
dollars in
productivity gains to the health industry thus far.

- NBN users are 1.4 times more likely to socialise using the internet 
than non-NBN
users."

-andyf