|
Showing 1 - 7 of
7 matches in All Departments
Services today account for a major share of employment and national
product in the U. S. , with the employment share up from 57 percent
immediately post-war to well over 70 percent today (if
communications, utilities and transportation are included). This
transformation (which is also occurring with varying lags in the
othereconomically advanced economies) is driven by a variety of
forces : by changes in consumer demand, by the rising demand for
health and educational services, by new ways in which businesses
are organized and the increasing importance ofcertain functions (e.
g. new demands for monitoring, financing, sales promotion, and
responding to regulatory agencies), and, closely related, by the
continuing advances in electronic technology. Moreover, these
multiple transformations have been accompanied by changes in the
way work is carried out (e. g. the dramatic increases in the
utilization of white collar workers, particularly professionals and
managers, and the employment of women and educated workers), and by
shifts in the location of work and of the population (e. g. rising
importance of key cities within the urban system and of suburbs
generally). The role of services in modem capitalistic economies is
not yet integrated into the body of economic theory, although the
need for such integration, especially as regards theories ofgrowth,
market structure, and pricing, is critical. Some economists and
sociologists, however, have since the days of Adam Smith, dealt
with certain aspects of the role of services.
The 'new economy' has been criticised greatly of late, and after the speculation and hype that surrounded the internet bubble, this is hardly surprising. This book, first published in French and updated here, however treats the 'new economy' as a discourse - one that is often misleading. In order to understand what happened during the internet bubble and the fuss that surrounded it, a central element - intellectual speculation - needs to be understood. New Economy, New Myth treats this speculation as a form of 'ultra-free-market' thinking. According to this line of thought, the internet and the digital revolution are acting as a sort of Trojan horse in spreading market deregulation across the globe. With so much having been written about the new economy, this book employs a mixture of academic rigour and readable prose and comes as a welcome relief. It will be an intriguing reading to those interested in the internet bubble - and the hyperbole that surrounded it.
The 'new economy' has been criticised greatly of late, and after the speculation and hype that surrounded the internet bubble, this is hardly surprising. This book, first published in French and updated here, however treats the 'new economy' as a discourse - one that is often misleading. In order to understand what happened during the internet bubble and the fuss that surrounded it, a central element - intellectual speculation - needs to be understood. New Economy, New Myth treats this speculation as a form of 'ultra-free-market' thinking. According to this line of thought, the internet and the digital revolution are acting as a sort of Trojan horse in spreading market deregulation across the globe. With so much having been written about the new economy, this book employs a mixture of academic rigour and readable prose and comes as a welcome relief. It will be an intriguing read for those interested in the internet bubble - and the hyperbole that surrounded it.
First Published in 1988. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor and
Francis, an informa company.
First Published in 1988. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor &
Francis, an informa company.
Services today account for a major share of employment and national
product in the U. S. , with the employment share up from 57 percent
immediately post-war to well over 70 percent today (if
communications, utilities and transportation are included). This
transformation (which is also occurring with varying lags in the
othereconomically advanced economies) is driven by a variety of
forces : by changes in consumer demand, by the rising demand for
health and educational services, by new ways in which businesses
are organized and the increasing importance ofcertain functions (e.
g. new demands for monitoring, financing, sales promotion, and
responding to regulatory agencies), and, closely related, by the
continuing advances in electronic technology. Moreover, these
multiple transformations have been accompanied by changes in the
way work is carried out (e. g. the dramatic increases in the
utilization of white collar workers, particularly professionals and
managers, and the employment of women and educated workers), and by
shifts in the location of work and of the population (e. g. rising
importance of key cities within the urban system and of suburbs
generally). The role of services in modem capitalistic economies is
not yet integrated into the body of economic theory, although the
need for such integration, especially as regards theories ofgrowth,
market structure, and pricing, is critical. Some economists and
sociologists, however, have since the days of Adam Smith, dealt
with certain aspects of the role of services.
Services now account for almost three quarters of economic activity
in advanced market economies and two of the principal topics that
researchers on services have been concerned with are, on the one
hand, productivity, and on the other, innovation in and through
services. These two issues, and finding ways to measure and
conceptualise them, lie at the heart of this book. The productivity
question is a puzzle in many so-called 'stagnant services', where
national accounts show little or no increase in productivity, while
closer empirical investigations and case studies reveal that some
of these sectors are in fact as dynamic as their manufacturing
counterparts. How can these opposing views be reconciled? The same
applies to innovation in and through services, where many of the
existing approaches retain much of their bias towards manufacturing
and technology, and fail to capture some of the fundamental aspects
of innovation in services. Written by some of the most
distinguished authors in the field, this book elucidates the
critical and complex relationships between services, production and
innovation. The authors discuss the limitations of current theories
to explain service productivity and innovation, and call for a
conceptual re-working of the ways in which these are measured. They
also highlight the important role of knowledge in the production
system and in doing so make an important contribution to a key
debate which has emerged in the social sciences in recent years.
Productivity, Innovation and Knowledge in Services will inform and
interest those in the fields of economics, management, business
studies and economic geography.
|
|