Questions tagged [technology]
The technology tag has no usage guidance.
48
questions
3
votes
3answers
185 views
Increasing returns, implications?
If a firm has increasing returns to scale (i.e., doubling inputs more than doubles output) would that firm logically end up being the sole firm in its sector in the long run?
If not, what is the ...
0
votes
1answer
32 views
Can demand side restrictions explain the productivity paradox (Solow paradox)?
Productivity paradox https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Productivity_paradox is the name for the slow productivity growth (i.e. slow GDP growth) of the developed economies despite the robotics, AI, ...
0
votes
1answer
29 views
How much is currently invested in artificial general intelligence research and development?
Glossary: Artificial general intelligence (AGI) is the name given to an upcoming technology that would be able to solve all sorts of problems, like a human, and unlike more specialized existing ...
3
votes
1answer
56 views
Would directing more money to science and research and development be an effective response to recessions?
Typical responses to recessions is to follow Keynesian economics and support demand. Would directing money towards science and research and development be a better long term solution to recessions ...
1
vote
1answer
39 views
What is technology in the Ricardo model?
I've been reading about the Ricardo and Heckscher-Ohlin models. I'm having trouble following what makes a worker in the former able to produce more or less of a given good.
So e.g. suppose a US worker ...
1
vote
2answers
50 views
Why labor-augmenting technological progress increases employment and wages?
My textbook says that advances in technology typically raise the marginal product of labor and shift the labor demand curve to the right and calls it labor-augmenting technological advances. The book ...
1
vote
1answer
39 views
Define structural unemployment
I am a bit confused regarding the actual definition of structural unemployment. Some places say that it is the permanent decline of a particular industry, leading to workers being unemployed as they ...
2
votes
4answers
492 views
Why do companies launch products at much higher prices, only to reduce the price drastically after a few months?
I see this to be a prevalent trend - companies too often launch products at much higher prices than they know is gonna lead to good sales numbers, only to reduce the price drastically after a few ...
-1
votes
1answer
70 views
How do people check or trust that central bank is not cheating? [closed]
How people can be sure that somebody, cooperating with central bank (or working in it), is not creating money in digital or paper form for themself, so that nobody else notices it?
4
votes
2answers
46 views
How do tech giants manage turnover costs?
Lately I was struck by different studies concluding median job tenure at Google, Facebook, Amazon, Microsoft and Apple is 1 to 2 years, very low compared to the Bureau of labor statistics which is a ...
3
votes
2answers
41 views
Technological unemployment
I am doing a project on technological change in the job market, that is the substitution of routine occupations and increasing demand for high-skilled jobs.
I have done some research on this and now I ...
0
votes
1answer
27 views
Understanding what's in the frequently reported and discussed high demand in IT specialists in Germany - is the IT Fachkräftemangel real?
So far, I can observe the following contradictory evidences what I perceive from the media.
Statement group #1. In the press, there are repeated reports from different sources about missing ...
3
votes
3answers
435 views
Cobb-Douglas production function, given $w$ get $r$ regardless of input levels. Why?
There is a market economy with technology given by:
$$Y = K^\alpha L^{1-\alpha} \tag{1}$$
Firms behave competitively and input prices are:
$$r = \alpha K^{\alpha-1}L^{1-\alpha} = \alpha(\frac{L}{K})...
1
vote
1answer
68 views
Factor-augmenting technologies (Acemoglu and Restrepo 2018c)
In that paper, they consider the following production function:
$Y = F(A_KK,A_LL)$.
Where:
K denotes capital, L is labor, and $A_K$ and $A_L$ denote capital-augmenting
and labor-augmenting ...
1
vote
0answers
20 views
How is labor demand measured?
For instance, in the introduction of this paper (first paragraph), talking about Figure 1, they say that labor demand is measured as the real wage bill normalized by population.
Is it common to ...
1
vote
0answers
114 views
Can one single payment contain multiple Merchant Category Codes (MCC)? [closed]
Some payment cards can be limited for certain purposes only (e.g. for paying only for food, or only for car fuel). When you try to pay for a different purpose, the system rejects the payment.
I ...
2
votes
0answers
19 views
Understanding Boserup's theories on food and overpopulation
From what I understand about Boserup's theories, she claims that when populations grow and near the carrying capacity of whatever habitat they live in, businesses will have incentive to invest in new ...
2
votes
0answers
71 views
Research community around logistics micro-economic topics?
Is there the equivalent of a Rand Journal of Economics for the topic of logistics, focusing on the micro-economics of productivity gains via automation or disruptive technologies.
There is the ...
1
vote
3answers
648 views
Claiming that food delivery apps are purely rent extraction
I engaged in an argument with a friend about whether takeaway food ordering apps had any 'value'. I tried to persuade him that they were rent extraction enterprises but he wasn't convinced. So I want ...
2
votes
0answers
51 views
Reference Request: Primer on Relationship Economic Growth and Science / Technology
I'm in the early stages of planning a research agenda in this area, which means studying the current literature with an eye for further research opportunities.
The Economics of Science and ...
1
vote
2answers
101 views
Productivity and wages in a task-based model
In a task-based model like the one developed in Acemoglu&Autor 2011 with two types of worker, can the low type have a higher wage with respect to the high type?
More specifically: if the ...
1
vote
2answers
163 views
How technology will help economists to do better predictions?
Would technologies as AI, BI and Big Data help the economists to make better predictions and test models to solve problems like "What level of fiscal stimulus is better for a especific country?"
Is ...
1
vote
3answers
187 views
Why Is the West providing technology to India? [closed]
Previously, we have seen that Europeans and Americans provided various technologies (high-speed rail[1], aerospace[2][3], microprocessor[4], etc.) to China to earn instantaneous money. Later what ...
2
votes
2answers
76 views
What does it mean for a technology to have a $|\rho|<1$?
Nowadays, when trying to model (log)technology $a_t$, I've seen many times the following: $a_t = \rho a_{t-1}+\epsilon$, where epsilon is given a certain probability distribution. What does it mean ...
2
votes
2answers
957 views
Proxies for technological change in an economy?
I am writing a paper on the application of Value-Added TFP to measurement of technological change. Just thinking of throwing in a few variables into my regression. I have ICT capital share (as seen in ...
5
votes
4answers
5k views
Labour Saving vs. Labour Augmenting - what is the difference?
It seems reasonable to say that technology generally increases output per unit of labour. Therefore in any factory which has installed new technology one can reasonably expect that for the same ...
2
votes
1answer
32 views
Energy saving technology and energy service price
I want to assess the effects of energy saving technologies on output growth using time series data. My work would benefit from time series data on patents for energy saving innovations, but this is ...
0
votes
0answers
38 views
Which way is the pendulum swinging with regards to “Access to Capital”
The premise is said best by the economist George Magnus in 2015:
"Advances in technological productivity gains are benefiting a limited number of people. The principal rewards of modern technology ...
2
votes
1answer
198 views
Help with this microeconomics exercise
The question:
A price-taking farmer produces a crop with labor L as the only input.
His production function is:$$F(L) = 10L^{1/2} ā 2L$$
He has 4 units of labor
in his family and he cannot hire ...
1
vote
2answers
223 views
How exactly can blockchain technology be used to make a supply chain more efficient?
I am a software developer, and have been studying Bitcoin, Ethereum and blockchain technology over the last 8 months or so. I have read a lot on the Internet about how blockchain technology will ...
2
votes
1answer
39 views
Disruptions in Server / Data Center Market
With the advent of cloud computing, data storage and scaling has become extremely cheap when compared to the strictly physical server alternative (which require a dedicated facility and substantial ...
4
votes
1answer
234 views
Difference between Value-Added TFP and Gross-Output TFP?
I am working with EU-KLEMS data, and I am using TFP growth as a proxy for technological change. However, there are 2 variables for TFP - TFP based on Gross Output and TFP based on Value Added.
I ...
2
votes
1answer
97 views
Question about skill-biased technical change, Acemoglu
I am writing about skill-biased technical change, and in particular the 2001 Acemoglu (http://economics.mit.edu/files/283) paper on the topic, in which there is a part I am very stuck on.
In the ...
4
votes
2answers
350 views
Is Artificial Intelligence a completely new (and underestimated) production factor?
Accenture research defines Artificial Intelligence as completely new production factor along labour and capital. Is such notion acceptable by economists?
As far as I understand then every asset of AI ...
2
votes
0answers
66 views
Is there proof that today more than 50% of the lowest income society lives worse than 50 years ago
The Economist on 12.11.2016 number (first number after getting US election results) wrote: "In real terms median male earnings are still lower than they were in the 1970s. In the past 50 years, ...
1
vote
1answer
59 views
Factoring Technology into Economics models
There has been tremendous improvement in technologies in recent years. My question is: have economists been able to properly evaluate and factor the values of recent innovations in the technology ...
1
vote
1answer
34 views
Are there big waves of entrepreneurship over time?
In some models there are times when there are many entrepreneurs, and others when there are not. Is this a stylized fact of some kind? Are there any statistics about how entrepreneurial a particular ...
3
votes
1answer
133 views
Why do developing countries adopt 21st century technology, but stay behind in output per capita?
The economic growth rate of Latin America has been about 3% per year for decades; but if you have ever visited, many of the natives have: internet, smartphones, tomography, hybrid cars, etc.
Why don'...
6
votes
3answers
1k views
Understanding Tertiarization of the Economy
Trying to understand some of the core mechanics of tertiarization in developed economies.
According to the WorldBank,
"As incomes continue to rise, peopleās needs become less āmaterialā
and they ...
4
votes
2answers
398 views
Is information technology going to turn most “common goods” into private goods?
Common goods, (not public) are so because they are non-excludable and rival. Often this reflects the impracticality of excluding some users, rather than an absolute impossibility. For example, a park ...
1
vote
0answers
293 views
Examples of technical progress
I'm wondering if anyone can give me some intuition about technical progress. I can buy the idea that factors improve in quality over time. So 5 workers and/or 5 machines in 1990 can produce more than ...
4
votes
6answers
486 views
Have automation and technological advance been shown to have a positive impact on society and the economy or a negative one?
My friends and I, 2 of which are computer science majors think it is worse because is humans can't work and thus afford necessities, how will they survive? The definition of automation: the use of ...
1
vote
3answers
165 views
Do machines reduce labor… or so they redistribute, alter, and globally increase labor?
John Stuart Mill famously remarked that labor-saving machines have not saved one minute of labor. More seriously, Marx argued, roughly, that machines can gain temporary market advantage, but cannot ...
1
vote
0answers
162 views
Microeconomic Model of Knowledge and Technology
Can you point me to any microeconomic models of knowledge and technology?
It is intended to be used for simulation.
The problem that arises is that you need to simulate the effects of technology on ...
5
votes
2answers
831 views
Neoclassical economic profit and growth theory versus marxian
Marxists have a very specific "profit" and "economic growth" theory. According to marxists, profit doesn't come from technology, whose cost will be reflected in the price of whatever commodity the ...
5
votes
2answers
149 views
What are some growth theories that are considered the most correct at the moment?
In under grad intermediate macro classes they often teach the Solow model. While intuitively it makes sense, it seems like it no longer is really taken seriously anymore (I could be wrong).
From my ...
1
vote
1answer
2k views
factors of production (and their relative contribution)
I am reading mankiw's intermediate economics text. what i find is that when he writes a production function for how much will be produced in an economy. he says it is dependent upon quantity of inputs ...
12
votes
2answers
2k views
Why in most macro models technology is labor-augmenting?
Take Romer's advanced macro book as reference. In it the Solow model,the Ramsey model and the Diamond OLG all contain the fundamental $A_t$ variable representing technological progress.
In all these ...
