How's Life in the Digital Age?
Opportunities and Risks of the Digital Transformation for People's Well-being
This report documents how the ongoing digital transformation is affecting people’s lives across the 11 key dimensions that make up the How’s Life? Well-being Framework (Income and wealth, Jobs and earnings, Housing, Health status, Education and skills, Work-life balance, Civic engagement and governance, Social connections, Environmental quality, Personal security, and Subjective well-being). A summary of existing studies highlights 39 key impacts of the digital transformation on people’s well-being. The review shows that these impacts can be positive as digital technologies expand the boundaries of information availability and enhance human productivity, but can also imply risks for people’s well-being, ranging from cyber-bullying to the emergence of disinformation or cyber-hacking. In sum, making digitalisation work for people’s well-being would require building equal digital opportunities, widespread digital literacy and strong digital security. Continued research and efforts in improving statistical frameworks will be needed to expand our knowledge on the many topics covered in this report.
How's life in the digital age in Switzerland?
Compared to other OECD countries, people in Switzerland report high benefits from the digital transformation thanks to widespread use of a variety of online activities. In many domains, Switzerland boasts high shares of people engaging in online activities, such as in purchasing goods and services online, expressing political opinions and the use of e-government services. Internet access (93.1%) and use (94.5%) levels are indeed among the highest in OECD and are combined with a relatively low degree of inequality of uses within the population. By contrast, the use of online education services stands below the OECD average, as is the case for online social networking. Due to the relatively low share of people with computer-based jobs, the negative impacts of job stress and worries about work when not working are limited. The share of children reporting having been cyberbullied is below the OECD average, as is the share of extreme Internet users among children. The digital transformation is associated with the generation of E-waste, which, at 23.6kg per inhabitant, stands above the OECD average.