The digital divide and e-government services

Abstract

There is much research examining the digital divide and what it looks like in society. This research often describes the digital divide as yet another symptom of the current socio-economic division in our society. Based on this research, one would expect that online government services targeting the lower income population would not become a policy focus. However, around the United States, programs are being adopted to provide e-government services to low-income populations who are receiving public welfare benefits. This raises a question as to whether this population can avail itself of e-government services and whether e-government services generally serve to create differences in government service provision between the wealthy and better educated compared to the poor and less educated. Our findings indicate that, as would be expected in the American context, there is a digital divide gap between these two populations. This gap begins with access to the Internet but also extends to the use of e-government services among those who have Internet access. We see that education and income are strong predictors of both the use of e-government services and the volume of e-government services used. This has implications for the expansion and use of e-government in the U. S. and internationally.