Is technology meant to be for the benefit of a certain group of people rather than another?

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Power and Progress: Our Thousand-Year Struggle Over Technology andProsperity is an economic-historical study that extends a thought-provoking and bold perspective on the relationship between technology and prosperity throughout history. The authors argue that progress is not a reflex output of technological advancement — rather it depends on the choices we make regarding technology, its uses, and distribution. The book delves into historical examples, spanning thousands of years, to illustrate how technological advancements benefited a privileged few at the expense of the broader population. The authors highlighted instances where technology failed to create shared prosperity, such as the appropriation of agricultural wealth by the Church during the Middle Ages leaving the peasants miserable and poor and not benefiting from the agricultural progress. It then extends to today’s contemporary innovations in the fields of digital technologies and artificial intelligence which can exacerbate inequality, erode democracy, and invade privacy through excessive data collection through surveillance, automation, and without prior consent.