This new knowledge economy will rely heavily on knowledge workers.... the most striking growth will be in knowledge technologists: computer technicians, software designers, analysts in clinical labs, manufacturing technologists, paralegals.... They are not, as a rule, much better paid than traditional skilled workers, but they see themselves as professionals. Just as unskilled manual workers in manufacturing were the dominant social and political force in the 20th century, knowledge technologists are likely to become the dominant social—-and perhaps also political—-force over the next decades.

"The next society" Economist.com (November 2001)