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World Bank Says Internet Technology May Widen Inequality (nytimes.com)
HughPickens.com writes: Somini Sengupta writes in the NY Times that a new report from the World Bank concludes that the vast changes wrought by Internet technology have not expanded economic opportunities or improved access to basic public services but stand to widen inequalities and even hasten the hollowing out of middle-class employment. "Digital technologies are spreading rapidly, but digital dividends — growth, jobs and services — have lagged behind," says the bank in a news release announcing the report. "If people have the right skills, digital technology will help them become more efficient and productive, but if the right skills are lacking, you'll end up with a polarized labor market and more inequality," says Uwe Deichmann. Those who are already well-off and well-educated have been able to take advantage of the Internet economy, the report concludes pointedly, but despite the expansion of Internet access, 60 percent of humanity remains offline. According to the report, in developed countries and several large middle-income countries, technology is automating routine jobs, such as factory work, and some white-collar jobs. While some workers benefit, "a large share" of workers get pushed down to lower-paying jobs that cannot be automated. "What we're seeing is not so much a destruction of jobs but a reshuffling of jobs, what economists have been calling a hollowing out of the labor market. You see the share of mid-level jobs shrinking and lower-end jobs increasing."
The report adds that in the developing world digital technologies are not a shortcut to development, though they can accelerate it if used in the right way. "We see a lot of disappointment and wasted investments. It's actually quite shocking how many e-government projects fail," says Deichmann. "While technology can be extremely helpful in many ways, it's not going to help us circumvent the failures of development over the last couple of decades. You still have to get the basics right: education, business climate, and accountability in government."
The report adds that in the developing world digital technologies are not a shortcut to development, though they can accelerate it if used in the right way. "We see a lot of disappointment and wasted investments. It's actually quite shocking how many e-government projects fail," says Deichmann. "While technology can be extremely helpful in many ways, it's not going to help us circumvent the failures of development over the last couple of decades. You still have to get the basics right: education, business climate, and accountability in government."
The same argument could be made for reading.
What you should try is:
youtube-dl
http://rg3.github.com/youtube-...
A lot of people post here [at the Official Tor Blog] saying with each new TBB release, "Flash still doesn't work!" No kidding? We don't know that already?
Check youtube-dl's list of supported sites at their website. You don't need a browser plugin/addon/extension for this.
I don't know if torify/torsocks is included in the TBB*, but in TAILS I run at the command line (after downloading youtube-dl and a quick verify of the md5/sha1 or sha256 checksums):
chmod a+rx youtube-dl
^ the chmod command only once, then:
torsocks ./youtube-dl URLtovideoorpagewithvideo
Easy. There are other options such as the "User Agent" you may wish to use.
Again, if you use TBB instead of TAILS, programs like youtube-dl may need an additional option, the website for youtube-dl explains it very well.
We realized it is more fun to have more disposable income and the freedom to use and enjoy it.
It's more fun to have a sports car, nice house and toys and freedom to travel, than to be anchored down with a house full or yard apes/rug rats/curtain climbers.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
It is believed
By whom, and with what evidence?
"I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
The difficulty with the idiocracy hypothesis is not that the less intelligent outbreed the more intelligent (so you have fewer captains of industry and more rank-and file... the world will survive) it's that the intelligent are having to subsidize an ever increasing amount of the less intelligent.
Yeah yeah yeah, 1%; that's not the point. From laws to protect idiocy from itself, which end up as hindrances to find better solutions, to intelligence being looked upon as near witchcraft; society is heavily geared towards mediocrity so the pinheads have a fighting chance.
But it comes at the cost of further development, and especially when the intelligent figure "why bother" to explore new horizons, especially when they have to fight off the idiot hoard as well.
Regression towards mean is a scary prospect when the lower bound keeps sinking.
I worked in automation equipment for many years. Companies would typically come to use when they needed to expand capacity. When we would work up a quote we would look at their current process and come up with several options from very simple conveying system with manual tool stations for the operators to fully automated systems. Obviously there was a huge capital cost difference between these options. Two big factors that went into the recommendation were the labor rates and interest rates. The companies were looking for a specific return on investment. In a free market when interest rates are low and labor rates are high due to low unemployment and lots of savings it is better to automate as the interest on capital costs are low. When the interest rates are high and labor rates are low due to high unemployment and low savings it is much better to hire people and go with manual stations. This is as it should be and would lead to sustained growth.
But when the Central Banks lower interest rates way below the market rates it makes automation cheap no matter what is going on in the economy. This is the situation we are in. It is cheaper to automate even though labor rates are low and there is low workplace participation. Allow rates to return to their market levels and this will change and we can go back to sustainable growth. Of course we won't do this because it would hurt the Wall St. Banks and politicians pocketbooks.
I love Jesus, except for his foreign policy.
Anytime you provide society with a productive enabler, those who are more eager to build wealth will use it to, you guessed it, build wealth. The lazy of society will not use it to build wealth.
There are always people who are more willing to work, more willing to produce, and more eager to build wealth, than other people. This is what so-called social scientists do not understand about human nature. People are not all the same, and the only way to make them so is to DISABLE the eager beavers (which are the vast minority of people).
It is easier to prohibit someone being productive than it is to force someone to be productive. Enforcing a policy of equal poverty (except for the ruling elite, of course) has been the goal of the leftist ruling elite since the dawn of human civilization.
Unfortunately, fun does not perpetuate a functional society.
No single thing does, but I would argue that the enjoyment of at least a portion of one's time, be it at work or play, is an important element in a functional society.
You will NEVER solve poverty, as long as poverty is defined as being in the bottom quintile of income, as most Governments and NGOs typically do. You'll ALWAYS have someone at the bottom 20% - and thus always have "poverty". Why? It's a great way to grow Government, increase Government's own reach and power (as long as they're the ones dispensing the largesse), and have something to distract a goodly portion of the remaining 80%.
As far as access to everything, the rich can buy access if they want, but have to use their own resources to do so; the poor have access to anything the Government chooses to give to them, paid for by those same rich. Note that most of the Government poverty programs, and even Government retiree programs, are means tested. Meaning you cannot have access if you're not poor.
There's a definite benefit to Government maintaining the status quo, keeping a large section of the population dependent, and fomenting class warfare. It enhances Government itself, allows Government to claim ever-larger chunks of power "for the benefit of others", and generally enrich those who have chosen to become career bureaucrats. After all - who benefits from lobbyist trips, from very well funded retirement pensions, and big "consulting" payoffs from private enterprise? Those in Government who keep the system rigged.
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
As always, addressed best by Margaret Thatcher: https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
For now. How would things be in eg America if the government had to balance its budget? Probably be done through extreme austerity and all those Walmart workers would suddenly have a hell of a time making ends meet without government help.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverted_totalitarianism