Mr. [Elmer] Griffin is among the roughly 20 percent of American adults who do not use the Internet at home, work and school, or by mobile device, a figure essentially unchanged since Barack Obama took office as president in 2009 and initiated a $7 billion effort to expand access, chiefly through grants to build wired and wireless systems in neglected areas of the country.<\/p>\n
Administration officials and policy experts say they are increasingly concerned that a significant portion of the population, around 60 million people, is shut off from jobs, government services, health care and education, and that the social and economic effects of that gap are looming larger. Persistent digital inequality \u201d\u201d caused by the inability to afford Internet service, disinterest or a lack of computer literacy \u201d\u201d is also deepening racial and economic disparities in the United States, experts say.<\/p>\n