COVID-19 worsens our digital divide

COVID-19 highlights society’s inability to cope, even amid the technology prowess of the US.  In the land that invented the microchip, we have neglected the fundamentals. One particular concern is how internet broadband is not available to many workers and students in some rural and inner-city areas and on Native American lands. If you can’t work or take classes from home because you don't have internet, you are at a distinct disadvantage.

Honestly, if we face it as a nation, when we count all the workers and students who don’t have internet access, then add in the plurality of students that find online learning less than effective or even laughable, wouldn’t we deserve a pretty poor grade for our priorities?  Something less than a gentleman’s C, perhaps. Having said as much, there are still people dying from COVID-19 and doctors and nurses are getting sick themselves from stepping up heroically to help. Sadly, the same people who don’t get internet are often service workers who care for the sick and elderly, sanitize bathrooms,pick up trash, and prep or pick strawberries to help the rest of us stay comfortable at home before multiple computers. Things are out of whack, but that started well before the virus struck.