Download or read book The Postwar Evolution of Computer Prices written by and published by . This book was released on 1987 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Postwar Evolution of Computer Prices written by Robert James Gordon and published by . This book was released on 1987 with total page 96 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This study constructs new hedonic price indexes for electronic computers covering the period 1951-84. Regressions are estimated for four data sets, two used in previous studies by G. Chow and E. Dulberger, and two new data sets used for the first time in this study. Coverage is limited to mainframes until the late 1970s, but includes both " super-mini" computers and personal computers in the 1980s. The end result is a price index that exhibits a 1951 index number, on a base 1984 = 100, of 147,692, implying an annual rate of price change over the 33 years of -19.8 percent. Price changes for personal computer (PC) processors during the 1982-86 period appear to have been similar to those for mainframe computers during the 1977-84 period, in the range of -20 to -25 percent per year. Evidence for PC peripheral equipment is limited to 1984-86 and indicates a faster rate of price decline than for processors, particularly if the increasing availability of "clones" is taken into account. The paper places considerable emphasis on problems of weighting price indexes for computers together with price indexes for other types of "Office, Computing, and Accounting Machinery" (OCA) and other types of producers' durable equipment (PDE). The methodology used to construct the implicit price deflators in the National Income and Product Accounts, with a fixed 1982 base year, leads to a significant downward bias in the implicit OCA and PDE deflators after 1982, and an upward bias prior to 1982. A particularly disturbing aspect of the present national accounts is a spurious rise in the implicit OCA deflator of 157 percent between 1957 and 1971, despite the fact that its computer component exhibits a price decline and its non-computer component increases by only 8 percent. The paper recommends adoption of a chain-linked Laspeyres index number for any price index aggregate that includes computers. A properly weighted PDE deflator, using our computer price index, declines relative to the official implicit PDE deflator by 0.74 percent per year during 1957-72 and 0.87 percent per year during 1972-84
Download or read book The Postwar Evolution of Computer Prices written by Robert J. Gordon and published by . This book was released on 1989 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This study constructs new hedonic price indexes for electronic computers covering the period 1951-84. Regressions are estimated for four data sets, two used in previous studies by G. Chow and E. Dulberger, and two new data sets used for the first time in this study. Coverage is limited to mainframes until the late 1970s, but includes both " super-mini" computers and personal computers in the 1980s. The end result is a price index that exhibits a 1951 index number, on a base 1984 = 100, of 147,692, implying an annual rate of price change over the 33 years of -19.8 percent. Price changes for personal computer (PC) processors during the 1982-86 period appear to have been similar to those for mainframe computers during the 1977-84 period, in the range of -20 to -25 percent per year. Evidence for PC peripheral equipment is limited to 1984-86 and indicates a faster rate of price decline than for processors, particularly if the increasing availability of "clones" is taken into account. The paper places considerable emphasis on problems of weighting price indexes for computers together with price indexes for other types of "Office, Computing, and Accounting Machinery" (OCA) and other types of producers' durable equipment (PDE). The methodology used to construct the implicit price deflators in the National Income and Product Accounts, with a fixed 1982 base year, leads to a significant downward bias in the implicit OCA and PDE deflators after 1982, and an upward bias prior to 1982. A particularly disturbing aspect of the present national accounts is a spurious rise in the implicit OCA deflator of 157 percent between 1957 and 1971, despite the fact that its computer component exhibits a price decline and its non-computer component increases by only 8 percent. The paper recommends adoption of a chain-linked Laspeyres index number for any price index aggregate that includes computers. A properly weighted PDE deflator, using our computer price index, declines relative to the official implicit PDE deflator
Download or read book Second Bibliographic Guide to the History of Computing Computers and the Information Processing Industry written by James W. Cortada and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 1996-01-30 with total page 428 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Complementing the author's 1990 bibliography, A Bibliographic Guide to the History of Computing, Computers, and the Information Processing Industry, this bibliography provides 2,500 new citations, covering all significant literature published since the late 1980s. It includes all aspects of the subject—biographies, company histories, industry studies, product descriptions, sociological studies, industry directories, and traditional monographic histories—and covers all periods from the beginnings to the personal computer. New to this volume is a chapter on the management of information processing operations, useful to both historians and managers of information technology. Together with the earlier bibliography, this work provides the most comprehensive bibliographic guide to the history of computers, computing, and the information processing industry. The organization of the book follows that of the earlier work, with the addition of the new chapter on the management of information processing. All entries are new to this volume. Titles are annotated, and each chapter begins with a short introduction. A full table of contents and author and subject indexes enhance accessibility to the material.
Download or read book The Economics of New Goods written by Timothy F. Bresnahan and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2008-04-15 with total page 508 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: New goods are at the heart of economic progress. The eleven essays in this volume include historical treatments of new goods and their diffusion; practical exercises in measurement addressed to recent and ongoing innovations; and real-world methods of devising quantitative adjustments for quality change. The lead article in Part I contains a striking analysis of the history of light over two millenia. Other essays in Part I develop new price indexes for automobiles back to 1906; trace the role of the air conditioner in the development of the American south; and treat the germ theory of disease as an economic innovation. In Part II essays measure the economic impact of more recent innovations, including anti-ulcer drugs, new breakfast cereals, and computers. Part III explores methods and defects in the treatment of quality change in the official price data of the United States, Canada, and Japan. This pathbreaking volume will interest anyone who studies economic growth, productivity, and the American standard of living.
Download or read book The Measurement of Durable Goods Prices written by Robert J. Gordon and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2007-12-01 with total page 744 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: American business has recently been under fire, charged with inflated pricing and an inability to compete in the international marketplace. However, the evidence presented in this volume shows that the business community has been unfairly maligned—official measures of inflation and the standard of living have failed to account for progress in the quality of business equipment and consumer goods. Businesses have actually achieved higher productivity at lower prices, and new goods are lighter, faster, more energy efficient, and more reliable than their predecessors. Robert J. Gordon has written the first full-scale work to treat the extent of quality changes over the entire range of durable goods, from autos to aircraft, computers to compressors, from televisions to tractors. He combines and extends existing methods of measurement, drawing data from industry sources, Consumer Reports, and the venerable Sears catalog. Beyond his important finding that the American economy is more sound than officially recognized, Gordon provides a wealth of anecdotes tracing the postwar history of technological progress. Bolstering his argument that improved quality must be accurately measured, Gordon notes, for example, that today's mid-range personal computers outperform the multimillion-dollar mainframes of the 1970s. This remarkable book will be essential reading for economists and those in the business community.
Download or read book The Business Value of Computers written by Paul A. Strassmann and published by Information Economics Press. This book was released on 1990 with total page 558 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The book addresses the practical needs of executives responsible for planning, budgeting & justifying information technology expenditures. Written by the former chief information executive (1956-1978) & vice president of strategic planning (1978-1985), author of the widely acclaimed & translated INFORMATION PAYOFF - THE TRANSFORMATION OF WORK IN THE ELECTRONIC AGE (Free Press, 1985), lecturer & university professor. Reviews: "A New Bible for Management Information Systems. An eminently readable book made more so by a playful sense of humor" -Information Week-; "Strips away obfuscation that has concealed the real value of computers." (The Financial Post); "A true path to the Holy Grail of business value." (Computer Weekly); "Some surprising answers to familiar questions cast new light on investing profitably in computer hardware & software." (The Conference Board); "All those either transfixed or baffled by the powers & potential of computers would do well to heed Strassmann's advice." (Daily Telegraph); "Measuring managerial productivity is the key to knowing how to invest in information technology. Strassmann's new book sets out the results of his research in detail. His argument comes through clearly." (The Financial Times).
Download or read book The Computer in the United States written by James W. Cortada and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2016-09-16 with total page 181 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book studies how a technological innovation -- in this case the computer -- progresses from its origin as an idea in someone's mind to its eventual manifestation as a useable and marketable consumer product.
Download or read book Price Index Concepts and Measurement written by W. Erwin Diewert and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2010-02-15 with total page 531 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Although inflation is much feared for its negative effects on the economy, how to measure it is a matter of considerable debate that has important implications for interest rates, monetary supply, and investment and spending decisions. Underlying many of these issues is the concept of the Cost-of-Living Index (COLI) and its controversial role as the methodological foundation for the Consumer Price Index (CPI). Price Index Concepts and Measurements brings together leading experts to address the many questions involved in conceptualizing and measuring inflation. They evaluate the accuracy of COLI, a Cost-of-Goods Index, and a variety of other methodological frameworks as the bases for consumer price construction.
Download or read book Price Measurements and Their Uses written by Murray F. Foss and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2007-12-01 with total page 404 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In an economy characterized by frequent change in technology, in the types of goods and services purchased, and in the forms of business organization, keeping track of price change continues to pose many difficulties. Price change affects the way we perceive changes in such basic measures as real output, productivity, and living standards. This volume, which brings together academic economists with those responsible for official price indexes, presents outstanding new research on price measurement. Half of the papers focus on prices for mainframe and personal computers, semiconductors, and other high-tech products, using mainly hedonic techniques. The volume includes a panel discussion by distinguished economists about the theoretical and practical considerations of how best to measure price change of capital goods whose quality is changing rapidly. The authors also present new research on more conventional but still unsettled problems in the price field affecting both the consumer and producer price indexes of the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Download or read book Survey of Current Business written by and published by . This book was released on 2000 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Deconstructing the Computer written by National Research Council and published by National Academies Press. This book was released on 2005-10-28 with total page 182 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Starting in the mid 1990s, the United States economy experienced an unprecedented upsurge in economic productivity. Rapid technological change in communications, computing, and information management continue to promise further gains in productivity, a phenomenon often referred to as the New Economy. To better understand this phenomenon, the National Academies Board on Science, Technology, and Economic Policy (STEP) has convened a series of workshops and commissioned papers on Measuring and Sustaining the New Economy. This major workshop, entitled Deconstructing the Computer, brought together leading industrialists and academic researchers to explore the contribution of the different components of computers to improved price-performance and quality of information systems. The objective was to help understand the sources of the remarkable growth of American productivity in the 1990s, the relative contributions of computers and their underlying components, and the evolution and future contributions of the technologies supporting this positive economic performance.
Download or read book A Microeconomic Approach to the Measurement of Economic Performance written by Catherine J. Morrison and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2012-12-06 with total page 300 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This text is designed to provide a comprehensive guide to students, researchers, or consultants who wish to carry out and to interpret analyses of economic performance, with an emphasis on productivity growth. The text includes an overview of standard productivity growth measurement techniques and adaptations, and data construc tion procedures. It goes further, however, by expanding the tradition al growth accounting (index number) framework to allow consider ation of how different aspects of firm behavior underlying productivity growth are interrelated, how they can be measured con sistently in a parametric model, and how they permit a well-defined decomposition of standard productivity growth measures. These ideas are developed by considering in detail a number of underlying theoretical results and econometric issues. The impacts of various production characteristics on productivity growth trends are also evaluated by overviewing selected methodological extensions and em pirical evidence. More specifically, in the methodological extensions, emphasis is placed on incorporation of cost and demand characteristics, such as fixity and adjustment costs, returns to scale, and the existence of market power, into analyses of productivity growth. These character istics, generally disregarded in such analyses, can have very important impacts on production structure and firm behavior, and thus on economic performance. They also provide the conceptual basis for vii viii PREFACE measures that are often used independently as indicators of economic performance, such as investment, capacity utilization, and profit measures.
Download or read book The Service Sector Productivity and Growth written by Ernesto Felli and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2012-12-06 with total page 355 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The economics of the service sector has recently attracted a large attention. At a macroeconomic level, the discussion has been focused on the issues concerning the relationship between the expansion of the service industry and the potential for a stable and sustained growth. Slow productivity growth, due to the largely non tradable nature of the output, lack of competition due either to regulations or to barriers to entry are among the "bads" sometimes associated with a "service led" growth. On the other hand new working places are created in the service industries at a rate much higher than in the industrial ones. Is a lower rate of technological change and the continuing of inflationary tensions the price to pay for a sustained expansion of employment in the service sector? These are in a nutshell the questions that led CElS (Centre for International Studies on Economic Growth - University of Rome "Tor Vergata") to organize the International Seminar on "The Service Sector: Productivity and Growth" held in Rome in May 1993, whose revised proceedings are published in this volume. The economists and academicians invited to the conference have faced the issues mentioned above from different perspectives, but they concentrated especially on the problems relative to growth and productivity.
Download or read book History of Technology written by Ian Inkster and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2016-09-30 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The technical problems confronting different societies and periods and the measures taken to solve them form the concern of this annual collection of essays. It deals with the history of technical discovery and change and explores the relationship of technology to other aspects of life - social, cultural and economic - showing how technological development has shaped, and been shaped by, the society in which it occurred.
Download or read book International Economic Transactions written by Peter Hooper and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2009-02-15 with total page 512 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How the government arrives at its official economic statistics deeply influences the lives of every American. Social Security payments and even some wages are linked to import prices through official inflation rates; special measures of national product are necessary for valid comparisons of vital social indicators such as relative standards of living and relative poverty. Poor information can result in poor policies. And yet, federal statistics agencies have been crippled by serious budget cuts—and more cuts may lie ahead. Questioning the quality of current data and analytical procedures, this ambitious volume proposes innovative research designs and methods for data enhancement, and offers new data on trade prices and service transactions for future studies. Leading researchers address the measurement of international trade flows and prices, including the debate over measurement of computer prices and national productivity; compare international levels of manufacturing output; and assess the extent to which the United States has fallen into debt to the rest of the world.
Download or read book The Golden Age Illusion written by Michael John Webber and published by Guilford Press. This book was released on 1996-09-20 with total page 582 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What happened to the so-called "golden age" of the postwar boom? Unprecedented rates of economic growth, profitability, and wage increases during the 1950s and 60s have given way to a global capitalist economy in disarray. Reassessing common interpretations of postwar economic history and geography, this book focuses on the evolution of the global economy from the 1950s to the present. Based on extensive research, the book assesses histories of growth, profitability, and technological change in core industrial economies (Japan and the USA), raw material dependent economies (Australia and Canada), and several newly industrializing countries (Brazil, South Korea, and Taiwan). The authors build on standard models of economic change to incorporate new developments in regional dynamics: they use nonlinear, nonequilibrium, and evolutionary arguments to frame discussions of profit rates, technological change, and interregional capital flows.
