Sunday, February 23, 2020

Social Impact of Technology Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Social Impact of Technology - Essay Example These very children, who were undernourished, hailed from the underprivileged and sidelined segments of the society and also happened to be pathetically illiterate, were using the internet to have some meaningful peep into the unconcerned world surrounding their dismal existence. This conclusively explains the impact that the computers have on our society. Therein lays the power of computer, the great equalizer. The overall social impact of computer is defined by one word that is 'accessibility'. While the fall of the Berlin Wall in December 1990 initiated the demise of communism, there exists no doubt pertaining to the fact that the much touted capitalistic societies had dangerously ushered in an unequal distribution of wealth (Friedman, 2006, p.50). Till the advent of computers, there existed an unjust world in which the lucrative data and information were accessible only to a privileged few and thus the underprivileged strata of the society was highly limited in its ability to take advantage of the opportunities for growth and development. Computers turned out to be great equalizers in the sense that they enhanced the universal accessibility to information like never before. Doing so they ended up empowering the hitherto sidelined sections of the society by offering the requisite information to everybody and anybody located anywhere in the world, at the click of a mouse and that to at a relatively affordable price. It was a British computer scientist, Tim Berners-Lee, who while working for CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research at Switzerland, pioneered the concept of a World Wide Web, which was primarily intended to be a system for creating, organizing and linking documents so as to make them accessible via internet (Friedman, 2006, p. 59). This concept eventually metamorphosed into the invention of easy to install and consumer friendly commercial browsers that served as a media for universal connectivity. This made possible the interaction of multiple online computers and networks. The scope of these nascent inventions was exponentially multiplied by the advent of new software. Now the computers enabled everybody with a reasonable digital literacy to create and share digitalized information. Infact the concerned computer nerds all around the world are working hard to revolutionize the sharing of data by creating more potent software and uploading them on the internet to be acce ssed and downloaded by all for free. This ushering in of the community software is drastically cutting the power of the middlemen and the vested interests in the market for digital technology and all the related commercial and humanitarian frameworks. Computers had an unforeseeable yet salubrious impact on the way economies interact and operate. Computers not only enabled the corporations to take advantage of the resources, capital and the skilled labor

Friday, February 7, 2020

Macroeconomics and Microeconomics - Merced County Research Paper

Macroeconomics and Microeconomics - Merced County - Research Paper Example Sixty eight percent of the population lies between 18 and 65 years, which is a good indicator of the county’s labor force market. Agriculture is the base of the county’s economy. As a result, Merced has been ranking among the top producers of chicken, cattle, calves, milk, cream, tomatoes, and silage in the state of California. In addition, the county is home to some of the world’s largest agricultural processing facilities, including the Hilmar Cheese production, Fosters Farms Poultry processing, Ingomar Packing Company tomatoes processing, and Ernest and Julio Gallo winery. Despite this, the unemployment rate has been on a steady rise since 2000 in the county. Census reports indicate that the rate of unemployment was 9.6% in 2000, shooting to 16% in the 2009 census. The country’s overall economic crisis since 2001 may be a reason, but there is need to salvage the situation. The rise in unemployment is a contributing factor to the current high rates of cr ime. Another economic metric of concern is the labor market, which stood at 90,500 in 2000, increasing to 105,200 in 2009 (US Census Bureau). The figures indicate that there has been a relative growth in the county’s labor force. Accordingly, 86,678 individuals older than 16 years were under employment in comparison to 105,059 the year 2009 in the same category, indicating a slow growth of employment opportunities in the county. New business establishments rose from 4700 in 2000 to 5832 in 2009. Other metrics indicate that the county is experiencing a dormant growth in large-scale business establishment, but with more small-scale businesses being setup. The result is the absorption of a relatively small percentage of the labor market by the new businesses. Another concern is the educational level of the county’s population. According to the US census Bureau data of 2000, only about 68.5% of individuals older than 25 years had attained a high school diploma, and a mere 11% had a bachelor’s degree or higher education. these percentages are low compared to the averages of California state, which recorded 76.8% in high school diploma holders and 26.6% with a bachelor’s degree or higher, indicating that the work force is relatively under-qualified. Sustainability in the food manufacturing and processing has changed the heavy reliance of the economy on production of farm crops. Consequently, the county has been attracting a significant number of manufacturing and processing plants with interests outside the agricultural sector. The county’s economic development is a responsibility of the Merced County Economic Development Corporation (MCEDCO). The corporation oversees the economic coordination of various efforts and organization that seeks to improve the county’s labor force market as well as provide a favorable business environment that will attract new businesses into the region (Moffat 46). MCEDCO claim that the county ha s been changing its reliability on agriculture but the fact is that the county still relies on the agricultural sector, from revenues to job (which often pay low wages and are seasonal). In order to maintain economic sustainability of the county, there is need for the MCEDCO to engage in several economic development efforts, including general economic development, economic base diversification, workforce training and education, economic partnerships, existing business retention and expansion, new business recruitment and attraction, and tourism attraction. The MCEDCO (whose members