I guess I’m not a big fan of technology. I’m not technologically challenged. I have an iPhone and an iWatch and I know how to use them. I know my way around the Internet, and having the world at your fingertips certainly makes writing a weekly newspaper column a lot easier. I have a personal Facebook page and one for my band. I created a rudimentary website for the band. I have a couple of Twitter accounts. But I rarely tweet. I rarely post stuff on Facebook and I only update the band’s schedule on the website. So I ask myself, “Self, why are you so averse to such things?” I guess it’s largely because I see so many people spending so much time poring over social media looking at meaningless posts, senseless memes and mindless videos. I see this level of technology as having the potential to dumb down an entire generation of Americans. Productivity is falling because so many people are staring at their devices all day at work. The notion that we are all smarter because of this technology is a total red herring. Oh, we’re smarter, all right. As long as your definition of smart is seeing a picture of somebody’s lunch or learning how to quickly and easily slice a ball of watermelon into something resembling a flower. The main thing social media technology has done is turned all of us into narcissists. Quick. Gotta get this uploaded. Look at what I did. Look how smart I am. Look at this great thing I’ve accomplished. Look at this great thing I made. Read my awesome story. Read my awesome poem. Check out my clever observation. Look at my video. OMG! Maybe it will go viral! Look at me. Look at me! Look at me! Like me. Like me. Like me! The other thing social media technology has done has divided us. Yes, I know. It’s supposed to unite us. But it doesn’t. It divides us. We don’t seek out opposing viewpoints. We cozey up with people who believe the same thing we do so we can all be members of the same mutual admiration societies. If we do venture out and post a contrary opinion somewhere, we are immediately and roundy vilified for holding such a backward view. We move on and we never return. All this technology certainly is making Americans more sedentary. Just what we need right now, right? The more people sit around poking at their devices, the less they actually get out and do something. What that anyone would actually get outside and do something. Who does that? The unintended consequences of this level of technology is chilling. And it’s only going to get worse – or is that better? Pretty soon, there won’t be any reason to drive. Shortly after that, there won’t be any reason to own a car. Why do you suppose car companies and Google are investing in companies like Uber and Lyft? You will fire up your app and send out a request. Within minutes, a driverless dronecar will arrive at your home. You will hop in and the dronecar will deliver you to your destination. I remember the advent of email and personal computers. We were told how much less paper we would use because there simply would be no need to print anything. All files would be electronic. Of course, we all know what happened. Computer and printer technology just made it super easy to print stuff and paper consumption went through the roof. More recently, experts were telling us that technology would deliver a huge payoff because of its power and efficiency. You basically have a device in your pocket that contains more computing power than a desktop computer of 10 years ago. You can get instant answers to the most complex or obscure question you can think to ask, but how does that translate into an economic payoff? A New York Times article this past week explored that very question under the headline “Why the Economic Payoff From Technology Is So Elusive.” “... for several years, economists have asked why all that technical wizardry seems to be having so little impact on the economy. The issue surfaced again recently when the government reported disappointingly slow growth and continuing stagnation in productivity. The rate of productivity growth from 2011 to 2015 was the slowest since the five-year period ending in 1982. The Times spoke with a family physician in Tennessee who recently made the shift from paper to computerized patient records. There are benefits, the doctor said, but grappling with the software and new reporting requirements has slowed him down. He sees fewer patients, and his income has slipped. “I’m working harder and getting a little less,” he said. The Times mentions Robert J. Gordon, an economist at Northwestern University, author of a new book, “The Rise and Fall of American Growth.” Gordon says the current crop of digital innovations does not yield the big economic gains of breakthrough inventions of the past, like electricity, cars, planes and antibiotics. The Times also quoted optimists like Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee, co-directors of the MIT Initiative on the Digital Economy. They argue that there have always been lags between when technology arrives and when people and institutions learn to use it effectively. That has been true for a range of technologies, including the electric motor and the Internet, which contributed to the last stretch of healthy productivity growth in the late 1990s and early 2000s. But research shows, the Times reports, technology spending has been robust, rising 54 percent over a decade to $727 billion last year. Despite all the smartphone sales to consumers, most of the spending is by companies investing in technology to increase growth and productivity. But an industry-by-industry analysis, published by the McKinsey Global Institute, the research arm of the consulting firm McKinsey & Company, found that the march of digital technology across the economy has a long way to go. The McKinsey researchers examined 22 industries, measuring not only investment but also the use of technology to change how work is done. Some industries, like technology, media and financial services, were well along, while others, like health care and hospitality, trailed. Only 18 percent of the American economy is living up to its “digital potential,” the report concluded. And if lagging industries do not catch up, we will not see much of a change in national economic statistics, said James Manyika, a director of the McKinsey Global Institute. So, basically, it seems as if all this technology really isn’t transforming us into a more efficient, economically profitable society – at least not yet. But frankly, I guess I really didn’t need to have an expert from MIT or a research firm tell me that. All I really had to do is walk into a restaurant at suppertime and look around at all the tables full of people looking at their devices instead of each other. Long term, I don’t see how this is a good thing.
