cover image: The New Digital Divide

20.500.12592/5l236ic

The New Digital Divide

12 Sep 2024

We build and analyze new metrics of digital usage that leverage telemetry data collected by Microsoft during operating system updates across forty million Windows devices in U.S. households. These measures of US household digital usage are much more comprehensive than those made available through any existing commercial or government survey. We construct representations of devices in ZIP codes and find evidence of significant variation in usage reflecting an urban-rural divide. We also show the existence of substantial disparities in usage even within narrowly defined Metropolitan Statistical Areas. Income and education correlate with these observed differences. These effects are large and suggest digital literacy gaps that extend beyond the availability of essential IT infrastructure at the local level. These findings call for interventions beyond the traditional focus on infrastructure access and address usage and skills development. The indices are made publicly available to support future research.
econometrics industrial organization estimation methods productivity, innovation, and entrepreneurship industry studies

Authors

Mayana Pereira, Shane Greenstein, Raffaella Sadun, Prasanna Tambe, Lucia Ronchi Darre, Tammy Glazer, Allen Kim, Rahul Dodhia, Juan Lavista Ferres

Acknowledgements & Disclosure
The first four authors contributed equally to this work. Raffaella Sadun appreciates funding for her research from Harvard University, Microsoft Corporation, NBER, NSF, Sloan Foundation, and Russell Sage Foundation. We thank Dafna Bearson for her helpful comments. All errors are our own. The views expressed herein are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Bureau of Economic Research.
DOI
https://doi.org/10.3386/w32932
Pages
31
Published in
United States of America

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