S. 503, NET Act

S. 503 would require the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to assess, in its biennial report on the state of the communications marketplace, how the availability of network equipment has affected the deployment of advanced telecommunications capabilities, such as broadband Internet.

Based on the costs of similar activities, CBO estimates that implementing S. 503 would cost the FCC less than $500,000 over the 2026-2030 period. Because the agency is authorized to collect fees each year sufficient to offset the appropriated costs of its regulatory activities, CBO estimates that the net cost to the FCC would be negligible, assuming appropriation actions consistent with that authority.

If the FCC increases annual fee collections to offset the costs of implementing provisions in the bill, S. 503 would increase the cost of an existing private-sector mandate on entities required to pay those fees. CBO estimates that the incremental cost of the mandate would be small and would fall well below the annual threshold established in the Unfunded Mandates Reform Act (UMRA) for private-sector mandates ($206 million in 2025, adjusted annually for inflation).

S. 503 contains no intergovernmental mandates as defined in UMRA.

The CBO staff contacts for this estimate are David Hughes (for federal costs) and Rachel Austin (for mandates). The estimate was reviewed by H. Samuel Papenfuss, Deputy Director of Budget Analysis.