I visit my local hospital and am in the back getting tests, etc. and the number of employees on their personal phones bugs me.
Supervisors could just request users to step out into the hall and check their phone. The amount of non work that occurs when people become glued to their phone is incredible.
Legislation often lags immensely behind change. The worst of this has only being going on for a little over 10 years. Maybe 12, so 3x changes of elected legislators.
Some of these issues are also safety issues. Being distracted is certainly obvious in a car, and massive fines and even criminal charges are now the result. But there are subtle things one must do in many jobs, just generically paying attention, which results in a save vs unsafe outcome. Boredom at work used to be filled with paying attention to ... work.
The garbage truck example I mentioned? I can think of a dozen safety issues. Safety for the employee, safety for someone walking by. Any accident could result in criminal charges for negligence, surely, but workplace safety rules are an issue too.
Soon, eventually, workplace safety rules will likely mandate "No phone at work, period"... at least for many professions. At least, that's how I see some of this resolving.
Another possibility is governments outlawing addictive social media. There are probably several ways this could be done, but breaking up the big advertising monopolies would be a good first start
I would love to see Social Media and addictive apps like sports betting treated like smoking. If not outlawed altogether, at least forbidden to children, and socially and legally discouraged for adults. We need to start seriously treating these things like the terrible things they are.
