Daniel Gross, in one of his more interesting columns recently, says this in part:

And prolonged periods of high growth have always been spurred by a game-changing megatrend that ultimately touched every segment of the economy: the steam engine, electricity, railroads, the availability of credit, the microchip, and most recently, the Internet, globalization, and cheap money. Finally, when you're dealing with an economy the size of the United States, you need a pretty powerful lever to create meaningful growth. Having a boom in a few sectors likely won't be enough.

So it looks like we're in trouble. Right now, it's difficult to sense the Next Big Thing. (Of course, that's usually how it goes. Back in 1992, when the economy seemed mired in the mud, President-elect Clinton summoned the nation's best economic minds to a summit in Little Rock, Ark. In the voluminous briefing papers prepared for the event, the words the Internet likely appeared rarely, if at all.)

LeRoy: Cheap money as a 'game-changing megatrend'? Well, it certainly shouldn't be considered in the same category as the steam engine, electricity, railroads, or the microchip, all of which were earth-shattering technological macro-inventions. We can always create cheap money: just print more of it. All that the cheap money of this decade got us was a massive housing bubble, representing a grotesque mis-allocation of resources. The largest financial/credit bubble in recorded history, by some measures---that was NOT a 'good' thing. We are dealing with the wreckage now. Schumpeterian creative destruction is one thing---deliberately created financial bubbles are another thing entirely.

Having said that....you often hear that the 'Next Big Thing' will be the GRIN technologies. GRIN stands for genomics, robotics, information technology, and nanotechnology. And there may very well be synergistic/symbiotic interactions between these emerging strands of technology, such as bio-chips or microscopic robots, or designer brains. If we'd been working harder on these things all during this decade, instead of building so many damnable McMansions, maybe we'd be in a heckuva technology boom right now.

What we might need to bring this about is more young Americans majoring in the STEM fields---another potent acronym for you. STEM stands for science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. [You know, the hard subjects...] Most of our graduate students in these areas are foreign students, usually heavily subsidized by their governments. Those foreign governments seem to have a better sense of what is valuable, and what is more likely to generate economic growth, than we do. We have plenty of students majoring in medieval French romantic poetry, or in recreational forestry. Maybe Newt Gingrich was right in suggesting that we should be bribing our good math and science students. That seems to be what other countries are doing.

And, oh yeah, back in 1992, I know of one guy who was talking about the Internet a lot.

His name was Al Gore.

Wonder where we'd be today if Al Gore had become President in 2000...........

The best way to get American students to study science? Make sure there are jobs for them after they graduate. I can't speak about other science fields, but I'm an organic chemist, and I've just about given up on science. I was laid off three times in the last six years. Most of my former coworkers have similar stories - one layoff after another, moving from city to city to find work, even though we all have graduate degrees in science. Most of them have either left science or are considering it. Meanwhile, my college friends who majored in poetry or basket weaving went to work on Wall Street and are driving BMW's. Or at least got nice, stable jobs and live in nice, stable houses. They aren't moving from city to city, trying to find a job at a biotech that will last more than a year or two.

kwheless:

The best way to get American students to study science? Make sure there are jobs for them after they graduate. I can't speak about other science fields, but I'm an organic chemist, and I've just about given up on science. I was laid off three times in the last six years. Most of my former coworkers have similar stories - one layoff after another, moving from city to city to find work, even though we all have graduate degrees in science. Most of them have either left science or are considering it. Meanwhile, my college friends who majored in poetry or basket weaving went to work on Wall Street and are driving BMW's. Or at least got nice, stable jobs and live in nice, stable houses. They aren't moving from city to city, trying to find a job at a biotech that will last more than a year or two.

here's another one. after a while, the choice between continual booming and busting at a biotech or holding a steady gig in academe for $30k a year gets too old to indulge myself with the luxury of using my brain for a living. but at least i haven't so given up on using my intelligence for a living that i've allowed myself to rise into middle management.

I thought about majoring in Chemistry in college . . . but then I met a bunch of brilliant people with Chemistry B.A.s, and even Ph.D.s, who couldn't get jobs. I thought wait a minute, I'm supposed to do something this hard, and then there's not even going to be a job for me? Forget about it!

I don't know what's wrong with the U.S. economy that things of obvious value, like science, get rewarded less well than totally meaningless paper shuffling, but it puts the lie to anyone who says that the free market automatically allocates resources to the most worthwhile uses. The government should tax the financial "industry" into oblivion and use that money to subsidize science. In the long term, we'd be much better off.

Limey Kyle: I don't know what's wrong with the U.S. economy that things of obvious value, like science, get rewarded less well than totally meaningless paper shuffling, but it puts the lie to anyone who says that the free market automatically allocates resources to the most worthwhile uses. The government should tax the financial "industry" into oblivion and use that money to subsidize science. In the long term, we'd be much better off.

LeRoy: Yes. Exactly right.

LeRoy_Was_Here:

Limey Kyle: I don't know what's wrong with the U.S. economy that things of obvious value, like science, get rewarded less well than totally meaningless paper shuffling, but it puts the lie to anyone who says that the free market automatically allocates resources to the most worthwhile uses. The government should tax the financial "industry" into oblivion and use that money to subsidize science. In the long term, we'd be much better off.

LeRoy: Yes. Exactly right.

Show me any corporation which downsized, where HR ever cut a higher proportion of HR jobs than any other department. I've never seen one where HR ever downsized itself at all. In fact, they complain that the downsizing means they have more to do.

same as having ceo compensation decided by boards composed largely of other ceos.

of course, anyone with science, technical, or engineering training which these folks lack will immediately see positive feedback loops, and will realize that these are typically highly undesirable for a system's stability. that's why they are the folks who get downsized.

And, oh yeah, back in 1992, I know of one guy who was talking about the Internet a lot.

His name was Al Gore.

Wonder where we'd be today if Al Gore had become President in 2000...........

oh yeah, I remember him. Wasn't he the guy that invented the internet?

You have been successfully propagandized.

What Al Gore said was that he was 'instrumental' in 'creating the Internet'. And I know more than a few computer science professors who will give him credit for exactly that.

After all, can you name any other Congressmen or other major political figures who were talking about the Internet so much back in 1992? And in fact, Mr. Gore was talking about it much earlier than that.

But, of course, you will never give him credit for that.

It would go against your political leanings.

LeRoy_Was_Here:

You have been successfully propagandized.

What Al Gore said was that he was 'instrumental' in 'creating the Internet'. And I know more than a few computer science professors who will give him credit for exactly that.

After all, can you name any other Congressmen or other major political figures who were talking about the Internet so much back in 1992? And in fact, Mr. Gore was talking about it much earlier than that.

But, of course, you will never give him credit for that.

It would go against your political leanings.

its called a joke... I already knew what he actually said.

However, regardless of what some kiss-ass CS profs said, he had nothing to do with the internet. The internet would have taken off regardless of what any political talking head had to say about it.

That's like saying that someone who thought the model-T was cool back in the day and talked about it was responsible for making cars catch on. Some technologies, like the internet, needed no big push from a talking head, and they surely shouldn't get any credit for talking about them. And while 1992 might have been the beginning of the popularity of the internet, it was no where close to the beginning of it.

It would go against your political leanings.

and what exactly are my political leanings, by the way?

FirstInLastOut: its called a joke... I already knew what he actually said.

LeRoy: Well, you gave no evidence that you did. So I simply wanted to make sure you did.

FirstInLastOut: However, regardless of what some kiss-ass CS profs said, he had nothing to do with the internet. The internet would have taken off regardless of what any political talking head had to say about it.

LeRoy: No doubt those 'kiss-ass CS profs' had nothing to do with the Internet, either. To say that Al Gore 'had nothing to do with the Internet' is about like saying Arthur C. Clarke had nothing to do with the space program. [All Arthur C. Clarke did was write about space, in a way that many people found inspiring.]

FirstInLastOut: That's like saying that someone who thought the model-T was cool back in the day and talked about it was responsible for making cars catch on. Some technologies, like the internet, needed no big push from a talking head, and they surely shouldn't get any credit for talking about them. And while 1992 might have been the beginning of the popularity of the internet, it was no where close to the beginning of it.

LeRoy: Uh, as for your last sentence, I said as much in my post. I said that "Mr. Gore was talking about it much earlier than that [1992]." I remember Al Gore talking about the World Wide Web in 1985, in Congress, and what a boon it could be for the economy. Here's the right analogy to your Model T car thought: suppose you had a U.S. Senator back in 1905 who was repeatedly giving speeches on the floor of the U.S. Senate on how America was about to undergo a revolutionary change in our transportation system. And urging it on. Most of the other Senators would have been dozing off, bored silly by such pie-in-the-sky talk. Perhaps they would have made up derogatory nicknames for that Senator, like calling him Mr. Horseless Carriage. Or perhaps they would have called him a horse's ass. And yet twenty years later, at least some people would come to recognize that he was a visionary. [Not you, though: had you been around in 1925, you probably would still have been calling him a horse's ass, and saying silly things like he certainly didn't deserve any credit for just talking about automobiles and what they would do for our economy.] And sure enough, when Al Gore was talking up the World Wide Web in 1985 in Congress, most of his fellow Congress-critters were taking the time to catch up on their snoozing.

People most certainly should get some credit for accurately prophesying the future, for laying out a vision of where our society ought to be going, and for persuading a lot of people of the truth of that vision. Indeed, such people are often found to be the most influential people in history. Think how influential Isaac Asimov was with all his robot stories. Yet he had virtually nothing to do with the actual development of robots. He 'merely' inspired many if not most of the people who have gone into that field.

[Not you, though: had you been around in 1925, you probably would still have been calling him a horse's ass, and saying silly things like he certainly didn't deserve any credit for just talking about automobiles and what they would do for our economy.] And sure enough, when Al Gore was talking up the World Wide Web in 1985 in Congress, most of his fellow Congress-critters were taking the time to catch up on their snoozing.

I completely agree, I still wouldn't give him credit in your version of the analogy. Why? Because he didn't put in the work to create the car.

As for Gore and the internet, all of the countless thousands of man hours developign the idea, testing, re-testing, getting funding, marketing, etc... he did NONE of it. Not one iota. all he did was "predict" that a technology was going to take off, as if this actually helped anything at all. Guess who else predicted it? ALL of the engineers who put in the effor to make it actually work. How do I know this? Because they wouldn't have put in the work otherwise.

If you come up with a cool invention, develop it, test it, get it to market, start a good and rapidly growing user-base, and then I come along and see that your invention is about to take off and tell some of my friends about it, should I get credit for "predicting" your invention's sucess? Why? I did nothing. It cost me nothing to make that prediction, no work, no money, nothing.

People most certainly should get some credit for accurately prophesying the future, for laying out a vision of where our society ought to be going, and for persuading a lot of people of the truth of that vision. Indeed, such people are often found to be the most influential people in history. Think how influential Isaac Asimov was with all his robot stories. Yet he had virtually nothing to do with the actual development of robots. He 'merely' inspired many if not most of the people who have gone into that field.

Asimov was predicting things that haven't been invented yet and thus can be given actual credit for his creative thought process. If someone was inspired to build a robot based on his idea, then sure he gets some credit. Gore didn't do this. Gore saw a robot that was already built, with news stories already all over slash-dot about it, and then told all the old-fogeys in congress about the robot and tried to steal credit for its invention.

Its amazing what you can find on the internets.

LeRoy, I recently finished Ray Kurzweil's "The Singularity is Near". It is an almost stunning take on the coming effects of the coming GRIN revolutions (although he presents it as GNR, seeing information more fundamentally). Have you read anything by him?

I've read both The Singularity Is Near and an earlier book by him, The Age of Spiritual Machines.

His ideas are certainly invigorating. They are also controversial---not everyone agrees with him that technological progress is accelerating. The 'rate of technological progress' is a maddeningly difficult thing to measure. Mr. Kurzweil may be right, but I think the jury is still out.