Resources for the Information Economy

The contribution of the information economy to overall economic growth and performance is related to the amount of resources devoted to new information technologies, whether in terms of consumption, investment or innovative efforts. This chapter looks first at the share of information and communication technologies (ICTs) in total investment. Investment in ICT establishes the infrastructure for the use of ICT and provides productive equipment and software to businesses, which helps raise labour productivity growth. Statistics on ICT investment are therefore an important indicator of the diffusion of ICT. While ICT investment has accelerated in most OECD countries over the past decade, the pace of that investment differs widely. Data availability and measurement of ICT investment based on national accounts (SNA93) vary considerably across OECD countries, especially as regards measurement of investment in software, deflators applied, breakdown by institutional sector and temporal coverage.