Yet many people are not experiencing the benefits of this progress, despite actively seeking to more fully participate in and profit from new educational, financial, and work opportunities.
MIT believes that inclusive innovation – the use of technology to generate increased economic opportunity for moderate and low income earners – is an imperative with a tight deadline. The question we should be asking ourselves at this historic moment isn’t “what is technology going to do to our economy and society,” but rather “what will we do with technology?”
Efforts to increase economic opportunity are needed at the highest levels of business and government. At the same time, it’s often small, local entrepreneurs like those applying to the IIC, who are paving the way. Since 2016, 3,000 organizations have registered from more than 100 nations. It has worked with more than 100 Global Outreach Partners, 500 judges, and drawn 3,300 event attendees. New judges and new global collaborators will be added this year.
“Inclusive innovators aren’t just changing the game – they’re changing the world," says Erik Brynjolfsson, co-founder of the IIC. “IIC winning organizations exemplify scalable, working solutions that broaden opportunity and harness technology to include more people in the digital economy. The IIC’s goal is to accelerate the best future of work solutions on the planet.”
“Let’s not bury the lede. The lede is that our world and the state of humanity…is improving overall very quickly because of tech progress,” adds Andrew McAfee, co-founder of the IIC. “Our winners and other entrants show us that broadly shared prosperity is possible, which makes a great antidote to pessimism and negativity.