Do Poor Countries Really Need More IT? : The Role of Relative Prices and Industrial Composition

Eden, Maya ; Gaggl, Paul

World Bank, Washington, DC

关键词: FINANCIAL SERVICES;    SOFTWARE INVESTMENT;    EQUIPMENT;    COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGIES;    PRODUCTION;   

DOI  :  10.1596/1813-9450-7352
RP-ID  :  WPS7352

学科分类：社会科学、人文和艺术（综合）

来源: World Bank Open Knowledge Repository

【 摘 要 】

Conventional wisdom suggests too littleinformation and communication technologies (ICT) in poorcountries. Indeed, within 70 countries at various levels ofdevelopment, there is a positive relationship between incomeper capita and the capital share of ICT. While thisregularity is consistent with explanations based ontechnology adoption lags and ICT-labor substitutability,there is little empirical support for these hypotheses.Instead, the paper establishes that this regularity can befully accounted for by (a) relatively higher ICT prices inlow-income countries and (b) industrial composition.