“I have seen the future and it works” – Lincoln Steffins
“Everything’s up to date In Kansas City / They gone about as fer as they can go” – Oscar Hammerstein II
The business writers have been busy lately. There’s been news about AI (artificial intelligence) replacing humans, and about how inflation is coming down and hiring going up, and how the major tech companies have been laying off thousands of workers. Meta (Facebook) reported 11,025 layoffs and Amazon laid off 10,000 workers. Elon Musk’s $44 billion investment in Twitter fired 9,250 employees, and HP 4,4580. The list goes on into companies that are either less well known or less identified with computerization, such as Peloton (exercise bikes, 4,100 layoffs) and Ford (cars, 3,000 layoffs).
One explanation, not the worst, is that the corporations saw the COVID-19 lockdowns as a sign that the nature of work was changing, that people would never stop working from home, and the demand for technology would continue to grow. This led them to a round of excessive hiring, but instead many things, from the price of gasoline to the nature of work, are returning to the status quo ante. Fear that the steps being taken by the Federal Reserve would cause a recession. So far things seem to be heading for a soft landing.
Another explanation offered is that the demand for technology has matured. The market for home computers and peripherals was hot during the lockdown, and now everybody who wants one has one. The answer to that is: not quite. There’s a certain analogy to electric cars. Automobile manufacturers are converting from internal combustion to electricity, but the demand is limited by a shortage of charging stations. According to Forbes magazine, “Millions Of Americans Are Still Missing Out On Broadband Access And Leaving Money On The Table—Here’s Why.” The article begins, “Across the country, rural households and low-wage workers are stuck with slow or no internet while the rest of the world moves forward with high-speed broadband—a problem that has ramifications more dire than not being able to stream the latest Netflix show.”
When COVID-19 forced a shutdown and people were required to stay home, we, as a nation, tried to use the internet as an alternative to going to work or to school. For some people it worked – for some, particularly school children, it didn’t work very well, and for millions of others it didn’t work at all, simply because they still lacked access to any form of internet connection let alone high speed. The minimum level of high-speed broadband is 25 mps (Megabits per second) but in households where there are two or more users working or studying at the same time, a minimum speed of 40 mps is commonly recommended.
In 2015, President Obama announced the Connect Home program, a program designed to expand high-speed internet so it would connect 99% of K-12 students to high-speed Internet in their classrooms and libraries over the next five years. It was a worthy program, but well past the five-year goal, 42 million Americans lack access to high-speed internet. While people in major population centers are offered internet service that offers a maximum connection speed of 1 gigabit per second (Gbps), millions of people are still trying to get along with dial-up connections, or driving to the nearest Starbucks and sitting in the parking lot with their cell phones. Rural areas and Indian reservations are particularly among the neglected areas, but the estimated number of people come to over 42 million.
The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA), also known as the Bipartisan Infrastructure Bill and originally in the House as the INVEST in America Act (HR 3684), was signed by President Joe Biden on Nov. 15, 2021. This includes a public-private expansion of broadband internet. The White House issued a notice:
Get Internet
CLAIM YOUR AFFORDABLE CONNECTIVITY PROGRAM BENEFIT
Learn how President Biden and Vice President Harris are reducing the cost of high-speed internet and find out if you qualify to sign up.
The program is important, and may be life changing for millions of people – once they find out about it. There have been many notices to encourage people to sign up for this program. The only problem is, too many of the notices are on the internet. If you’re reading this notice in our paper edition, find that link in our online article at populist.com.
Sam Uretsky is a writer and pharmacist living in Louisville, Ky. Email sdu01@outlook.com.
From The Progressive Populist, March 15, 2023
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