Author
Listed:
- Regina Pleninger
- Dana Vorisek
- Shu Yu
- Gaurav Nayyar
Abstract
This paper summarizes the evidence on the growth and distributional effects of digitalization through four channels: average productivity growth, employment and wages, access to markets, and government finances. First, digitalization has increased average productivity growth by better matching demand and supply, improving the efficiency of business processes, and boosting the accumulation of intangible capital. For developing economies, the productivity gains from “smart” automation and artificial intelligence that reduce labor costs may be lower than from the previous wave of information and communications technologies, which improved the matching of sellers to buyers by reducing search and coordination costs. Second, there is little evidence that use of information and communications technologies has reduced aggregate employment or resulted in job polarization in developing economies, unlike the experience of advanced economies. However, distributional challenges within countries might increase to the extent that “smart” robots and artificial intelligence need complementary skills. Third, digitalization has enhanced market access for rural households, small firms, and unbanked populations in developing economies through improving information flows. Fourth, digitalization has improved the efficiency of government spending on, and revenue mobilization for, public services and welfare programs through its effect on transparency, accountability, simplification of bureaucratic processes, and adoption of new delivery models.
Suggested Citation
Regina Pleninger & Dana Vorisek & Shu Yu & Gaurav Nayyar, 2024.
"Digitalization and Inclusive Growth : A Review of the Evidence,"
Policy Research Working Paper Series
10941, The World Bank.
Handle:
RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:10941
Download full text from publisher
Corrections
All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:10941. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.
If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.
We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .
If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.
For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Roula I. Yazigi (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/dvewbus.html .
Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through
the various RePEc services.