Eric Cohen

In the following viewpoint, Eric Cohen contends that civil rights leaders have exaggerated the problem of unequal access to computers and the Internet because they do not want to address deeper social issues such as out-of-wedlock childbearing that keep people poor. He claims that civil rights leaders use outdated studies to prove that such a digital divide exists. Moreover, Cohen insists that civil rights leaders ignore more current studies showing that minorities are actually purchasing computers more rapidly than Caucasians, which means that the digital divide is closing. Eric Cohen is managing editor of the Public Interest magazine.

As you read, consider the following questions:

1. According to Cohen, in the period from 1994 to 1998, what was the rise in the percentage of Caucasians who owned computers as compared to the percentage of...