My worry about technology innovation

This article aims to express my personal worry about technology innovation. I do not worry too much about the potential possibility of a battle between AI and humans. Not because I do not think it is impossible, it is possible but I think is very likely to happen in a very far future. I think that there is some immediate worry about technology innovation, inequality. 

I think technology development is likely to create a much impenetrable barrier between the wealthy and the poor (or even the ordinary); moreover, such barrier does not only lie between individuals, but also lie between companies as well. There are lots of examples showing such case. For example, Apple is reported to be in talk with Intel about buying its 5G Modem business, the reason for this potential deal is Apple wants to have the ability to produce its own 5G chips rather than relying on Qualcomm’s chips. Moreover, some potential consumers had doubts about Huawei smartphones because of the previous ban on Huawei signed by the US president. These consumers were afraid that without the software support from Google and the supply of many US chipmakers, a Huawei smartphone seemed much less reliable. Therefore, when firms build up massive technology assets, many other firms have to rely on them and are difficult to challenge them in their sectors.

For individuals, this may be a much bigger problem. Because companies are easier to employ more people and invest more money to compensate the scarcity of time than individuals, individuals are more likely to rely on more work of many others. People who have specialised skills will be much harder to be replaced by others; although people can learn and be educated to gain specialised skills, such investment can be too costly for the people who are struggling for their everyday living. Furthermore, when there is a problem which requires specific technical skills,  the wealthy people can employ other people and invest money to save time to solve this problem, but the ordinary people have to spend time on learning the skills then solve the problem. When the wealthy people can solve more problems than the ordinary people, they are more likely to become even wealthier and the wealth gap between the super wealthy and the ordinary will be widened.

Overall, inequality is my major concern about technology development and I personally believe this should be the immediate downside of rapid technology development.