0.7 21st century technology, digital displacement, and the role of  (Page 22/17)

Technology without doubt has long been a strong determinant of development. More recent technology developed in the last three decades of the past century and the first 15 years of the 21st century has created opportunities for and challenges to economic growth and development that little resemble those of the past thousand years.

Even so, technological change, as well as stagnation in technological change, had important impacts on economies and societies for several millennia.

Major innovations in technology stretch back over 6,000 years, when biotechnology was first used to leaven bread and ferment beer, using yeast (see [link] ).

The technological innovations cited above surely improved human welfare not long after they were put into place. However, it is rarely recognized that technologies that are 500 or even 3,000 years ago are still yielding benefits in the 21st century: as one group of analysts put it in their study of older technologies in over 100 nations, the long eons of technological history still matter today Diego Comin, William Easterly and Was the Wealth of Nations Determined in 1000 B.C? Cambridge, MA: National Bureau of Economic Research, Working Paper #12657. , including and especially for emerging nations.

Examples of long-lived technological impacts include two transport technologies in 1000 B.C: vehicles and pack animals. But technologies developed around 1500 A.D. have had (unsurprisingly) even more contemporary impact. These innovations include ships capable of crossing oceans, magnetic block printing, the use of steel, gunpowder-based weapons and much more”. Ibid. p.10.

In the 21st century, new and startling applications of information technology, nanotechnology and biotechnology promise to vastly improve how we live, how well we live, and how long we live.

We will see that the 21st century technological revolution brings mixed blessings. For example, in the U.S., 70 out of 71 technology -oriented jobs, the median income is greater than that for all occupations. Moreover, in 57 of these occupations, the median income is 50% or greater than the median for all industry. See Gregory Tassey (2014, Winter), “Competing in Advanced Manufacturing: The Need for Improved Growth Models and Policies,” Journal of Economic Perspectives , 28(1): 27-48. As one analyst has put it, “the high- economy must be the high-tech economy. Daniel E. Hecker (2005, July), “High Technology Employment: A NAICS-based update,” Monthly Labor Review , 128: 57-68. At the same time some technological innovations, especially in information and digital technology, threaten to lead to a growing displacement of labor in production processes in the U.S. and around the world. We will see that 21st century technology may bring to humanity the “best of worlds”; some, however have mused that it could bring the “worst of worlds”, such as that depicted in Kurt Vonneguts novel, Player Piano in 1952, six decades ago. In that world, giant computers reign, making all decisions, while displaced humans face a bleak, purposeless future. Vonnegut’s novel was but two years after Alan Turing, the 20th century pioneer of the computational age (Charles Babbage the computational seer of the 19th century). Turing formulated the “Turing Test”, to determine if “machines could think”. He believed that by 2000, there would be such machines.