The Second Machine Age: Work, Progress, and Prosperity in a Time of Brilliant Technologies

by Erik Brynjolfsson

Paul Krugman speaks for many, if not most, economists when he says, “Productivity isn’t everything, but in the long run it is almost everything.” Why? Because, he explains, “A country’s ability to improve its standard of living over time depends almost entirely on its ability to raise its output per worker”—in

“An imbalance between rich and poor is the oldest and most fatal ailment of all republics.” —Plutarch