The federal government is missing a crucial link in its plan to greatly expand access to high-speed internet service in rural America: enough workers to get the job done. Fiber splicers—the workers who install, maintain and repair wired broadband networks—are in short supply. “We’re running around like chickens with our heads cut off,” says Jason Jolly, chief executive of Fiberscope LLC, a Sullivan, Mo.-based company that does contracted fiber-splicing work. Mr. Jolly says his five-person crew has been “getting nonstop calls for the last two months.”

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