General Purpose Technologies

According to Lee (2018), GPTs are technologies that affect multiple industries. Lee (2018) suggests that steam power, electricity and ICTs belong to the category of GPTs. GPTs alter the way we live and work forever. They enable many inventions which tend to heighten the pace of automation across all sectors. Therefore, GPTs change the way we manufacture and trade goods in a great way. GPTs replace human labour through automation on a large scale, compared to a single technology, e.g., a typewriter. But GPTs also lead to the creation of many new jobs which never existed.

A picture of a typewriter

typewriter.jpg

Let us examine steam technology. Few highly skilled people (known as artisans) lost jobs. However, less skilled people gained employment on a larger scale. Farmers lost their jobs, but millions of jobs were created for them in the emerging urban centres. Electricity has had the same effect. The use of electricity in manufacturing created a whole new range of engineering jobs.

Although automation led to the loss of jobs and downward mobility, it also created jobs including those that never existed were created. Progress in technology increased the demand for highly-skilled, educated workers. These jobs are known as white-collar jobs (non-manual, professional jobs often carried out in offices).