Digital poverty impacts poverty
If we’re to solve poverty, we must address digital exclusion. Whether it’s accessing education, the social security system, job opportunities or cheaper gas and electricity, it’s a core part of how we live.
The growing divide
With each new development in technology, more people are left behind. This also makes existing inequities around race, gender, age, ability and income worse.
Digital poverty: The Facts
Digital Poverty Alliance
https://digitalpovertyalliance.org/
1 in 5
children home schooling during the pandemic did not have access to an appropriate device like a laptop.
26%
of young people do not have access to a laptop or similar device.
53%
of people offline can’t afford an average monthly broadband bill.
2.5 mil
people are behind on their broadband bills.
Digital poverty impacts poverty
If we’re to solve poverty in the UK, we must address digital exclusion. Whether it’s accessing education, the social security system, job opportunities or cheaper gas and electricity, it’s a core part of how we live.
The growing divide
With each new development in technology, more people are left behind. This also makes existing inequities around race, gender, age, ability and income worse.
This is an urgent issue
The pandemic made us all more aware of the digital divide. Some initial progress was made in response, but we must go much further to address the determinants of digital poverty. Providing access to a device alone cannot end digital exclusion.
How we define digital poverty.
“The inability to interact with the online world fully, when where and how an individual needs to”.
We believe that digital poverty and its definition needs to feature in the current agendas including social mobility and levelling up the UK. We believe that this definition needs to develop and we will iterate over time based on community insight.
We convene, collaborate and increase sustainable capacity within the digital ecosystem. We are a member-based organisation, building collective action, learning and sharing with UK-based and international organisations.
Together we can end digital poverty.
You’re far less likely to have access to the online world if you’re living on a low income. In fact, the lower your income the less likely it is. That means – increasingly so – not having access to the fundamentals of life. From social security, to healthcare, education and training, to finding work and applying for jobs – critical services are more and more online.
So digital inclusion is no longer something that’s ‘nice to have’ – it’s an essential. And being cut off from digital isn’t just an inconvenience – it compounds and exacerbates poverty. That’s no longer something we can ignore if we’re interested in a just society.
Our focus at the DPA
We want to make sustainable change. To do that, we’re connecting the system and supporting partners, champions and people who want to help to deliver holistic solutions for all the determinants of digital poverty and inequality, to those most in need more quickly and more effectively.
A lack of digital skills and access can have a huge negative impact on a person’s life, leading to poorer health outcomes and a lower life expectancy, increased loneliness and social isolation, less access to jobs and education.
~ GOOD THINGS FOUNDATION, 2022
デジタルスキルがない・アクセスがないということは、人の生活に大きな悪影響を及ぼし、健康状態の悪化を招き、平均寿命を短縮し、孤独と社会的な孤立を深め、仕事と教育へのアクセスを制限してしまう。