IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/fth/norgee/20-98.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

From Growth Theory to Technology Policy -Coordination Problems in Theory and Practice

Author

Listed:
  • Klette, T.J.
  • Moen, J.

Abstract

Economists, in particular Bresnahan and Trajtenberg (1995), have recently drawn attention to the importance of generic or general purpose technologies (GPTs) and their significance for economic growth. An interesting part of this research identifies coordination problems in the introduction of GPTs, and the potentially large benefits in coordinating research and product development. Thinking about information technology as a GPT, with the associated coordination problems, seems to fit well with the motivation behind governmental support schemes to IT and related high-tech industries in Norway. The first part of our study focuses on a series of such IT-programs that have been implemented in Norway from the early 1980s with the objective of coordinating the development of information technology and its application throughout the economy. We examine in some detail the largest of these IT-programs through its planning and implementation stages and emphasize how closely it is connected to recent economic analysis of GPTs. The second part of our study examines to what extent these governmental plans and subsidy schemes have been successful in creating economic results in terms of growth and profits in the IT and IT-related industries. In the final part of the paper we discuss some of the lessons about the problems with technology policy at a practical level.

Suggested Citation

  • Klette, T.J. & Moen, J., 1998. "From Growth Theory to Technology Policy -Coordination Problems in Theory and Practice," Papers 20/98, Norwegian School of Economics and Business Administration-.
  • Handle: RePEc:fth:norgee:20/98
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    To our knowledge, this item is not available for download. To find whether it is available, there are three options:
    1. Check below whether another version of this item is available online.
    2. Check on the provider's web page whether it is in fact available.
    3. Perform a search for a similarly titled item that would be available.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Bresnahan, Timothy F. & Trajtenberg, M., 1995. "General purpose technologies 'Engines of growth'?," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 65(1), pages 83-108, January.
    2. ,, 1998. "Problems And Solutions," Econometric Theory, Cambridge University Press, vol. 14(5), pages 687-698, October.
    3. Paul M. Romer, 1993. "Implementing a National Technology Strategy with Self-Organizing Industry Investment Boards," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 24(2 Microec), pages 345-399.
    4. Kiminori Matsuyama, 1995. "Complementarities and Cumulative Processes in Models of Monopolistic Competition," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 33(2), pages 701-729, June.
    5. Griliches, Zvi & Hausman, Jerry A., 1986. "Errors in variables in panel data," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 31(1), pages 93-118, February.
    6. Jakob Klette & Svein Erik Førre, 1998. "Innovation And Job Creation In A Smallopen Economy-Evidence From Norwegian Manufacturing Plants 1982-92," Economics of Innovation and New Technology, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 5(2-4), pages 247-272.
    7. Irwin, Douglas A. & Klenow, Peter J., 1996. "High-tech R&D subsidies Estimating the effects of Sematech," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 40(3-4), pages 323-344, May.
    8. Dixit, Avinash & Olson, Mancur, 2000. "Does voluntary participation undermine the Coase Theorem?," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 76(3), pages 309-335, June.
    9. Milgrom, Paul R & Qian, Yingyi & Roberts, John, 1991. "Complementarities, Momentum, and the Evolution of Modern Manufacturing," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 81(2), pages 84-88, May.
    10. Murphy, Kevin M & Shleifer, Andrei & Vishny, Robert W, 1989. "Industrialization and the Big Push," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 97(5), pages 1003-1026, October.
    11. ,, 1998. "Problems And Solutions," Econometric Theory, Cambridge University Press, vol. 14(3), pages 381-386, June.
    12. Nicolas Bloom & Rachel Griffith & John Van Reenen, 1999. "Do R&D tax credits work? Evidence from an international panel of countries 1979-1994," IFS Working Papers W99/08, Institute for Fiscal Studies.
    13. ,, 1998. "Problems And Solutions," Econometric Theory, Cambridge University Press, vol. 14(4), pages 525-537, August.
    14. Kiminiori Matsuyama, 1995. "Economic Development as Coordination Problems," Discussion Papers 1123, Northwestern University, Center for Mathematical Studies in Economics and Management Science.
    15. Tor Jakob Klette & Jarle Møen, 1999. "From Growth Theory to Technology Policy - Coordination Problems in Theory and Practice," Nordic Journal of Political Economy, Nordic Journal of Political Economy, vol. 25, pages 53-74.
    16. ,, 1998. "Problems And Solutions," Econometric Theory, Cambridge University Press, vol. 14(2), pages 285-292, April.
    17. ,, 1998. "Problems And Solutions," Econometric Theory, Cambridge University Press, vol. 14(1), pages 151-159, February.
    18. Caves, Douglas W & Christensen, Laurits R & Diewert, W Erwin, 1982. "Multilateral Comparisons of Output, Input, and Productivity Using Superlative Index Numbers," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 92(365), pages 73-86, March.
    19. Kamien, Morton I & Muller, Eitan & Zang, Israel, 1992. "Research Joint Ventures and R&D Cartels," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 82(5), pages 1293-1306, December.
    20. Gronhaug, Kjell & Fredriksen, Tor, 1984. "Governmental innovation support in Norway : Micro- and macro-level effects," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 13(3), pages 165-173, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. O'Brien, Raymond & Patacchini, Eleonora, 2003. "Testing the exogeneity assumption in panel data models with "non classical" disturbances," Discussion Paper Series In Economics And Econometrics 0302, Economics Division, School of Social Sciences, University of Southampton.
    2. O'Brien, Raymond & Patacchini, Eleonora, 2003. "Testing the exogeneity assumption in panel data models with "non classical" disturbances," Discussion Paper Series In Economics And Econometrics 302, Economics Division, School of Social Sciences, University of Southampton.
    3. Dolf Talman & Zaifu Yang, 2012. "On a Parameterized System of Nonlinear Equations with Economic Applications," Journal of Optimization Theory and Applications, Springer, vol. 154(2), pages 644-671, August.
    4. Zhiqiang Zheng & Balaji Padmanabhan & Steven O. Kimbrough, 2003. "On the Existence and Significance of Data Preprocessing Biases in Web-Usage Mining," INFORMS Journal on Computing, INFORMS, vol. 15(2), pages 148-170, May.
    5. Herings, P.J.J. & Talman, A.J.J. & Yang, Z.F., 1999. "Variational Inequality Problems With a Continuum of Solutions : Existence and Computation," Other publications TiSEM 73e2f01b-ad4d-4447-95ba-a, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    6. Carlos R. Handy & Daniel Vrinceanu & Carl B. Marth & Harold A. Brooks, 2015. "Pointwise Reconstruction of Wave Functions from Their Moments through Weighted Polynomial Expansions: An Alternative Global-Local Quantization Procedure," Mathematics, MDPI, vol. 3(4), pages 1-24, November.
    7. Allen C. Goodman & Miron Stano, 2000. "Hmos and Health Externalities: A Local Public Good Perspective," Public Finance Review, , vol. 28(3), pages 247-269, May.
    8. Bode, Sven & Michaelowa, Axel, 2003. "Avoiding perverse effects of baseline and investment additionality determination in the case of renewable energy projects," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 31(6), pages 505-517, May.
    9. Ala, Guido & Fasshauer, Gregory E. & Francomano, Elisa & Ganci, Salvatore & McCourt, Michael J., 2017. "An augmented MFS approach for brain activity reconstruction," Mathematics and Computers in Simulation (MATCOM), Elsevier, vol. 141(C), pages 3-15.
    10. Bettina Campedelli & Andrea Guerrina & Giulia Romano & Chiara Leardini, 2014. "La performance della rete ospedaliera pubblica della regione Veneto. L?impatto delle variabili ambientali e operative sull?efficienza," MECOSAN, FrancoAngeli Editore, vol. 2014(92), pages 119-142.
    11. Haider A. Khan, 2004. "General Conclusions: From Crisis to a Global Political Economy of Freedom," Palgrave Macmillan Books, in: Global Markets and Financial Crises in Asia, chapter 9, pages 193-211, Palgrave Macmillan.
    12. Penn Loh & Zoë Ackerman & Joceline Fidalgo & Rebecca Tumposky, 2022. "Co-Education/Co-Research Partnership: A Critical Approach to Co-Learning between Dudley Street Neighborhood Initiative and Tufts University," Social Sciences, MDPI, vol. 11(2), pages 1-17, February.
    13. Broekhuis, Manda & Vos, Janita F.J., 2003. "Improving organizational sustainability using a quality perspective," Research Report 03A43, University of Groningen, Research Institute SOM (Systems, Organisations and Management).
    14. van der Laan, G. & Talman, A.J.J. & Yang, Z.F., 2002. "Perfection and Stability of Stationary Points with Applications in Noncooperative Games," Discussion Paper 2002-108, Tilburg University, Center for Economic Research.
    15. Edcarlos D. Silva & J. C. Albuquerque & T. R. Cavalcante, 2021. "Fourth-order nonlocal type elliptic problems with indefinite nonlinearities," Partial Differential Equations and Applications, Springer, vol. 2(2), pages 1-22, April.
    16. YongSeog Kim & W. Nick Street & Gary J. Russell & Filippo Menczer, 2005. "Customer Targeting: A Neural Network Approach Guided by Genetic Algorithms," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 51(2), pages 264-276, February.
    17. Montijano, J.I. & Rández, L. & Van Daele, M. & Calvo, M., 2020. "On the numerical stability of the exponentially fitted methods for first order IVPs," Applied Mathematics and Computation, Elsevier, vol. 379(C).
    18. Yanling Li & Zita Oravecz & Shuai Zhou & Yosef Bodovski & Ian J. Barnett & Guangqing Chi & Yuan Zhou & Naomi P. Friedman & Scott I. Vrieze & Sy-Miin Chow, 2022. "Bayesian Forecasting with a Regime-Switching Zero-Inflated Multilevel Poisson Regression Model: An Application to Adolescent Alcohol Use with Spatial Covariates," Psychometrika, Springer;The Psychometric Society, vol. 87(2), pages 376-402, June.
    19. Jensen, Nathan M. & Li, Quan & Rahman, Aminur, 2007. "Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard are sweeter : understanding corruption using cross-national firm-level surveys," Policy Research Working Paper Series 4413, The World Bank.
    20. Oscar J. Cacho & Robyn L. Hean & Russell M. Wise, 2003. "Carbon‐accounting methods and reforestation incentives," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 47(2), pages 153-179, June.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    TECHNOLOGICAL CHANGE ; INNOVATIONS ; INDUSTRIAL STRUCTURE;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • O30 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - General
    • O40 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Growth and Aggregate Productivity - - - General
    • L10 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance - - - General

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:fth:norgee:20/98. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Thomas Krichel (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/nhhhhno.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.