Tag Archives: Technological change

Where the Digital Things Are I have suggested for a while here (this entry from May 2011) that deindustrialization in the US has not meant a decline in technological hegemony. Consider big tech digital firms in that respect. From the new Trade and Development Report: The widening gaps across firms have been particularly marked in the digital world. Of the top 25 big tech firms (in terms of market capitalization) 14 are based in the United States, 3 in the European Union, 3 in China, 4...

Map above shows the spread of chess from its original invention in India to the rest of Eurasia. There is an interesting analogy here with the diffusion of a game and of technology. Technological diffusion is a slow process, but an essential one, in which a significant part of the improvements are made. Gun technology, which also started in Asia, and discussed here before, is another case in point. And sometimes the latecomer has an advantage (Gerschenkron's the advantage of...

I posted about the driverless trucks a while ago. Now Amazon unveiled the no-checkout store, which would threaten the jobs of 3.5 million cashiers according to the Financial Times (subscription required). I was surprised by the figure below.It shows that one of the growing demands in the future will be statisticians. Statisticians? Oh well. Among the losers not just clerks, but also lawyers that specialize in shoplifting (and DUI in the case of the driverless vehicles, besides the obvious,...

[embedded content] I don't normally post about this stuff, but the possible implications of this technological change are far reaching, not just in terms of safety as implied in the video (somewhat promotional; hey, it's WIRED), but also in terms of employment. Jimmy Hoffa is turning on his grave, wherever that is. The original WIRED piece here.