Testimony
Source: Center for American Progress
Recipient: Agriculture Subcommittee on Appropriations
Date: 10/23/07
Imagine that there is a way to bring the advantages of the city to the country. Imagine that you can lead a life that is slow and peaceful and full of the sounds and fresh air of the country but in an instant you can be in the city. In an instant you can get the latest information about prices, or talk with international sellers, or show your products to Wall Street traders. Imagine that you can make a good living in the small town your parents grew up in and still make sure your parents see the best doctors even though they are far away at the Mayo Clinic or Johns Hopkins. Imagine that your children can also live in that small town but can take advantage of the best schools and libraries and museums . . . maybe even Harvard and the Smithsonian and the Library of Congress. This is the rosy promise of the digital age. The ugly nightmare of the digital age is that new information technologies will increase the advantages of urban and suburban America and deepen the disadvantages of small towns and rural America. The ugly nightmare is that you can live on a farm only 50 miles from the nearest big city, say New York or Chicago, and be unable to compete as effectively for business as somebody sitting in a skyscraper. The ugly nightmare is that your children will simply not have educational options equal to others, that your parents will not have access to the best care available. Whether we realize the dream or the nightmare will not be because of computer engineers or the free market. Public policy makers will choose either the promise or the nightmare. Public policy makers will choose between a widening digital divide or an investment in our small towns and country lanes.
Imagine that there is a way to bring the advantages of the city to the country. Imagine that you can lead a life that is slow and peaceful and full of the sounds and fresh air of the country but in an instant you can be in the city. In an instant you can get the latest information about prices, or talk with international sellers, or show your products to Wall Street traders. Imagine that you can make a good living in the small town your parents grew up in and still make sure your parents see the best doctors even though they are far away at the Mayo Clinic or Johns Hopkins. Imagine that your children can also live in that small town but can take advantage of the best schools and libraries and museums . . . maybe even Harvard and the Smithsonian and the Library of Congress. This is the rosy promise of the digital age.
The ugly nightmare of the digital age is that new information technologies will increase the advantages of urban and suburban America and deepen the disadvantages of small towns and rural America. The ugly nightmare is that you can live on a farm only 50 miles from the nearest big city, say New York or Chicago, and be unable to compete as effectively for business as somebody sitting in a skyscraper. The ugly nightmare is that your children will simply not have educational options equal to others, that your parents will not have access to the best care available.
Whether we realize the dream or the nightmare will not be because of computer engineers or the free market. Public policy makers will choose either the promise or the nightmare. Public policy makers will choose between a widening digital divide or an investment in our small towns and country lanes.
