Tommaso Reggiani (Masaryk University) on "Broadband Internet and Social Capital" (with A. Geraci, M. Nardotto, F. Sabatini)

The seminar will take place as a Webinar. Please, join the Meeting at this link: https://univr.zoom.us/j/91093232631

We study how broadband penetration affected social capital in the UK. Our empirical strategy exploits a technological feature of the telecommunication infrastructure that generated variation in the quality of Internet access across households. Merging information on the topology of the broadband network with geo-coded longitudinal data about individual social capital, taken from the British Household Panel Survey, we show that access to broadband Internet caused a significant decline in civic and political engagement. Overall, our results suggest that the introduction of fast Internet crowded out several aspects of social capital.