[niteriderxp]

My phone if tethered to my computer easily pushes 1.5mbit/s in metropolitan areas of Greater Seattle when I have good signal. In suburban and low signal areas it drops down to 300-400kbits/s.

There are many factors that determine the connection speed you get. If a cell tower's backhaul is saturated or just plain slow, don't expect fast speeds. Also if your phone is showing 2/5 bars, your connection is going to be slow.

Beware of any "fixes" as many of them simply work as a group placebo effect.