Teachers post class handouts and video demonstrations on the network, and students use it for everything from studies to "laundry view" software that helps find and reserve unused washing machines around campus, even paying for them over the network.

FORBES: Wi-Fi With a Coat and Tie

Most former welfare mothers are not leaping from handouts to the middle class.

ECONOMIST: The poor are still there, and need helping

The Democrats have turned themselves into the party of suburban complacency, against welfare handouts but in favour of middle-class safety nets.

ECONOMIST: Glad to be Gray

Emigration had eased some of the pressure on rural Sicily, while handouts from Rome and Brussels had educated and enriched its middle class, so the old violent habits came to seem shameful.

ECONOMIST: Danilo Dolci