# Can we see the computer age in the productivity statistics?

Robert Solow famously said:

You can see the computer age everywhere but in the productivity statistics

This quote is often linked with the productivity paradox (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Productivity_paradox), such that we don't see mayor productivity growth from new tech.

But there is something I don't understand. Economic growth is about percentage growth. A graph of GDP looks like an exponential function. So nominally a 5% growth is much much higher when the economy is that of the US than that of Malawi.

So we might not see an acceleration of economic growth, but we at least see continued growth, which allegedly becomes harder and harder as economies develop. This is the idea behind Solow's model, where without an exogenous percentage growth in A, output converges to the steady state.

So I don't really understand the problem. To me, computers are clearly visible in a growing economy. But this seems to be unsatisfactory for Solow, who wants to see what, a 10% growth rate?

What's wrong in my thinking?

• Interesting question, but the quote was by Robert Solow - see here, just before the big T in the third column. – Adam Bailey Nov 1 '18 at 12:07