People feel like individuals more than ever before. Decline in personal privacy with sophisticated eavedropping and surveillance devices. Privacy was not always a good thing, especially if it meant one died alone. Social security, public education, and public health measures would not be given up for privacy. Increasing power of government.
Government is more lacking in confidence than ever before.
According to Professor Shils, technological change has implications for the balance that individuals find between individual or private goals and responsibilities as a public citizen. The political requirements of a modern technological society seem to call for more emphasis on public responsibility. The power blackout in the northeastern United States showed how widespread and concentrated the effects of advanced technology can be. Private Firms and Public Goods Corporations play a key role in developing technology. According to Galbraith, corporations and market forces are better at providing for and creating private wants than they are at satisfying public needs.