Did the U.S. “Digital Divide” just widen?

My wife is an educator – who frequently works with disadvantaged kids. Many of the families that she has come into contact with, are not going to “plug in” to the new digital environment (for a lot of reasons that I don’t want to debate here – food $ vs DTV $; illegals that won’t sign up for a convertor box coupon; etc.) Did we just increase the “digital divide” in this country? And, have we just created a black market for the convertor devices?

I have heard that we will realize a 4:1 energy efficiency gain related to analog:digital broadcasting energy “costs” – this is clearly a worthy goal. But are we really going to realize any “bang for our buck”? Could we not have channeled this national support / effort into a larger goal that truly benefits the masses?