The collapse of U.S. productivity growth since the late 1960s has been the most severe and persistent of recent economic problems. This volume reviews the extent of the growth slowdown, evaluates several contributing factors, and suggests strategies for improvement. The authors find that inflation, recessions, oil price fluctuations, and other economic disruptions in the 1970s had an averse effect on economic performance, but, they suggest, a slowing in the pace of innovation and a failure to exploit the benefits of innovation also contributed to the weakness in productivity.Baily and Chakrabarti provide a comprehensive assessment of U.S. technology policy and its importance to growth. They argue for continued support of basic science, even though strength in this area does not give the U.S. economy an immediate competitive advantage, and advocate increased support for ""middle ground"" and commercial research. They conclude that this support must be structured to preserve the advantages of the market.

Jorg Bensinger, a group head of Audi corporation's R&D depart ment, had been waiting for long to find a chance to advertise his idea of a four-wheel drive for passenger cars to one of the board mem bers. Favorable experiences had been collected in drive tests with the lItis, a jeep-like car developed for use in the German army. The ex periences showed extremely good performance on icy roads and in snow. Bensinger's chance came in February of 1977, when he could talk to Ferdinand Piech, then R&D vice president of Audi and a technology buff. At this time Audi wasn't quite considered as a tech nological leader in the public. Technology based innovations were expected from Mercedes or Porsche by many customers. Piech, Ben singer, and others sensed that introducing the four-wheel drive to passenger cars could initiate a strategic change. Under great secrecy development work and prototype construction were commissioned. One obstacle seemed to be space requirements for the gear-box. Hans Nedvidek, former race-track engineer in the Mercedes team, was assigned to the team, and he developed an ingenious solution to the problem. It took until September of 1977 until other board mem bers were informed, and after some rallying the board found a con sensus in the next month to authorize further development steps for a four-wheel drive car. However, Audi is a subsidiary of Volkswagen Corp. The accord of the much bigger mother had to be secured."

Jorg Bensinger, a group head of Audi corporation's R&D depart ment, had been waiting for long to find a chance to advertise his idea of a four-wheel drive for passenger cars to one of the board mem bers. Favorable experiences had been collected in drive tests with the lItis, a jeep-like car developed for use in the German army. The ex periences showed extremely good performance on icy roads and in snow. Bensinger's chance came in February of 1977, when he could talk to Ferdinand Piech, then R&D vice president of Audi and a technology buff. At this time Audi wasn't quite considered as a tech nological leader in the public. Technology based innovations were expected from Mercedes or Porsche by many customers. Piech, Ben singer, and others sensed that introducing the four-wheel drive to passenger cars could initiate a strategic change. Under great secrecy development work and prototype construction were commissioned. One obstacle seemed to be space requirements for the gear-box. Hans Nedvidek, former race-track engineer in the Mercedes team, was assigned to the team, and he developed an ingenious solution to the problem. It took until September of 1977 until other board mem bers were informed, and after some rallying the board found a con sensus in the next month to authorize further development steps for a four-wheel drive car. However, Audi is a subsidiary of Volkswagen Corp. The accord of the much bigger mother had to be secured."