Concepts

Plain-language guides to the economic ideas that connect the timeline.

  1. Baumol’s cost disease

    When productivity rises quickly in some sectors but slowly in others, labor-intensive services become more expensive relative to manufactured or automated goods.

    1 related timeline entry

  2. Jevons paradox

    Making a resource more efficient to use can lower its cost, expand its uses, and ultimately increase total consumption.

    2 related timeline entries

  3. Relational economy

    As automated goods get cheaper, spending and work may shift toward goods and services where human involvement is part of the value.

    1 related timeline entry

  4. Solow paradox

    Powerful new technologies can spread rapidly while taking years to produce visible gains in economy-wide productivity.

    4 related timeline entries

  5. Weak links

    When production depends on many complementary steps, improving most of them may do little if one essential step remains hard or unreliable.

    3 related timeline entries