Between 1997 and 2001 the economist Robert Jensen studied a set of coastal villages in Kerala, India, where fishing was the main industry.10 Jensen gathered data both before and after mobile phone service was introduced, and the changes he documented are remarkable. Fish prices stabilized immediately after phones were introduced, and even though these prices dropped on average, fishermen’s profits actually increased because they were able to eliminate the waste that occurred when they took their fish to markets that already had enough supply for the day. The overall economic well-being of both
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