Take off the blinkers

"IT is not the hub of all things, it is just another job type," commented one reader of this blog a few weeks ago.

Is this true?

I understand that no industry holds the answers to all the world's problems. I also know that every job — regardless of how meaningful or glamorous — involves some level of monotony. However, how many industries are enabling economic growth and prosperity on a scale never seen before?

In Forecasting productivity growth: 2004 to 2024, the Australian Government asserts that ICT has emerged as the main technological driver of national productivity growth, and that technological innovations are the main drivers of long-term productivity growth.

Indeed, according to the government, the introduction of new ICT technologies alone triggers a learning process that creates significant innovation across the Australian economy.

Improvements in productivity are widely agreed to be the fundamental cause of long-term improvements in a country's standard of living. One outstanding line of economic modelling (the Swan-Solow model of economic growth) suggests that productivity growth is the primary source of enduring growth in per capita incomes.

So, next time you relax in your media room, admire your iPhone or choose your next exotic holiday destination, consider the productivity gains that enabled you to enjoy these activities — IT. If you'd like to use your PC and Internet link to disagree with me in the Talkback below, please feel free!