5 ms·

This article lost all credibility with me here: > ...this means that only 20% of labor productivity growth in the US since 1988 has been driven by R&D spending

This article lost all credibility with me here: > ...this means that only 20% of labor productivity growth in the US since 1988 has been driven by R&D spending! Capital deepening accounts for around half of labor productivity growth in this period... This is like saying that Jeff Dean's net worth is attributable not to his programming skills, but to the capital deepening of his bank account. The authors are working with concepts at a level of abstraction where they've lost contact with what they're saying.

__loam 2y ago
Bizarre way to describe capital deepening. Jeff's programming skills probably got a lot more relevant because of things like the proliferation of internet access and utility computing. Seems like a pretty simple statement to me but maybe that's too abstract for you.
tbrownaw 2y ago
You know how office workers are more productive because of computers? This didn't just happen because various companies did R&D investments in building (better) computers, but also because companies actually spent money buying computers for their office workers and because those office workers spent time learning how to use computers.
- getnormality 2y ago
  If A caused B caused C, how does one determine the relative contributions of A and B to C? It makes no sense.
  - tbrownaw 2y ago
    That's because binary logic is the wrong model. B requires A. C requires both A and B. But also, A has a cost and B has a cost, and spending more on A or B can maybe get you more C. Maybe spending more on developing better computers won't actually help anything (because they've already got 640k memory, which is enough for anyone). But only half of the people who can benefit from them have actually bought one so far, so collectively spending twice as much on buying computers can make them collectively twice as beneficial.
nthingtohide 2y ago
It has become fashionable to write think pieces without thinking too much.

__loam 2y ago

Bizarre way to describe capital deepening. Jeff's programming skills probably got a lot more relevant because of things like the proliferation of internet access and utility computing. Seems like a pretty simple statement to me but maybe that's too abstract for you.

tbrownaw 2y ago

You know how office workers are more productive because of computers? This didn't just happen because various companies did R&D investments in building (better) computers, but also because companies actually spent money buying computers for their office workers and because those office workers spent time learning how to use computers.

getnormality 2y ago
If A caused B caused C, how does one determine the relative contributions of A and B to C? It makes no sense.
- tbrownaw 2y ago
  That's because binary logic is the wrong model. B requires A. C requires both A and B. But also, A has a cost and B has a cost, and spending more on A or B can maybe get you more C. Maybe spending more on developing better computers won't actually help anything (because they've already got 640k memory, which is enough for anyone). But only half of the people who can benefit from them have actually bought one so far, so collectively spending twice as much on buying computers can make them collectively twice as beneficial.

nthingtohide 2y ago

It has become fashionable to write think pieces without thinking too much.