Communications and economic growth

摘要

Over the past millennium, each of the three centuries of most rapid demographic growth in the West coincided with the diffusion of a new communications technology. This paper examines the hypothesis of Harold Innis (1894-1952) that there is two-way feedback between such innovations and economic growth. First, detailed historical evidence is studied. Second, Innis's ideas are translated into a formal growth model. Finally, the model is simulated and its predictions compared with historical data. The results suggest a technological explanation for the long cycles of the period 1000-1975 and for the puzzling productivity growth slowdown in industrialized countries after 1975.