Technology deprivation is real and happening in the world today

In the world of technology that we live in today, it is pretty hard to survive even a day without the internet. From social media to lifestyle applications, every single breath we take us heavily influenced by at least one element off the internet. To use the internet, one definitely needs to have some electronic device. What they say is true, the poor cannot live in the world of today.

Having a stable fast internet and the basic electronic gadgets like a smartphone and laptop are all considered pretty basic, a lot of people do not have these facilities even when living in 1st world countries. As for the developing countries, the situation is far different. While many American households do comprise of these gadgets, the amount of them remains singular as not all households are high-income hence cannot afford them.

However, this hasn't been much of a constraint in most households. Even with a single smartphone, one can achieve all the tasks done on a laptop, PC, as well as a tablet. Because of it's multitasking abilities and the fact that they're much lighter on the pocket when it comes to the broadband bill, low-income houses more than often tend to opt for this single powerful device.

According to a PEW study, 27% of (considerably) low income households prefer having a single smartphone due to financial restraints. This is in fact a surprising number as we expected more low-income households to stick to a single smartphone due to finances. However, it seems like the internet has gotten to everyone hence functioning without multiple devices isn't everyone's cup of tea. Now, with the conversion of everything online, from school classes to businesses and small ventures, it is indeed a hard task to survive without the internet or even with a single device, but it should be noted that this study dates to 2013 therefore the results are not at all influenced by the pandemic in which we speculate the numbers to be even lower.

It also showed in the study that 11% of middle-income households also prefer a single smartphone because of finances while 6% of high-income households choose to have a single smartphone. This is surprising as we do not suspect any high-income house to have any financial constraints but it was time we were proven wrong. We're keeping in mind that finances might not be the only reason high-income households choose to have a single device.

As for low-income households, it was discovered that 76% of them had a smartphone, 59% had a laptop or PC, 57% had a home broadband, 41% had a tablet, while only 23% contained every single one of them. As the social classes went up, the percentages increased as well, but again, surprisingly, only 63% of high-income households had all devices which according to the stereotypes is significantly lower than expected.


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