"SCIENCE" Technological Gains and Their Uses: Jeb. 28-1947 A Review of Some Recent Economic Changes Frederick C. Mills Columbia University, New York City ORE THAN HALF A CENTURY HAS M to fivefold expansion, from the opening of the century to passed since the U. S. Commissioner of 1945, of the total stream of goods and services produced Labor officially reported that the era of rapid in the United States. The population of the country had industrial advance had ended for the then-civilized increased, in the meantime, by 86 per cent. The average world, that the future of the great industrial countries real income per capita of the population had been held no such opportunities as had the preceding 50 years multiplied by two and one-half in less than half a cen- for the creation of new tools and the profitable employ- tury. This is a staggering gain, when set in contrast to the ment of the vast amounts of existing capital. Some new long periods of stagnation in human history and the processes of manufacture could be expected, and these slow pace of advance as men have gradually won con- would act as an ameliorating influence, but the main trol over the forces and resources of nature. Here was task remaining was that of consolidating and utilizing such an industrial revolution as the world had never the great technical discoveries of the 19th Century. known. The fallibility of extrapolated human judgments has It is a notable fact that the gains of these years were perhaps never been more glaringly revealed than it is not distributed evenly over time. From 1899 to 1914 the when we set the accomplishments of the last 50 years gain in real income per capita of the population was at a against these somber predictions. The economic gains of rate slightly less than 2 per cent a year. During the next the United States in the first half of the 20th Century 15 years, from 1914 to 1929, the rate of advance was have exceeded those of any period in the history of our one-third again as great. The 10 years from 1929 to 1939 country and probably those of any period in the history were a period of retrogression, with real national income of any ern.industrial economy. Modes of production per head of the population actually declining. The war and industrial organization that were only adumbrated years from 1939 to 1945 brought an unprecedented by the industrial arts of the 1890's have been developed gain, exceeding 6 per cent a year. A substantial part of to yield extraordinary harvests of economic goods. the added income was used, of course, for purposes of It is true that we have not used our resources, our equip- national defense; consumer well-being did not advance ment, and our skills with steady maximum effectiveness, at any such rate. But the figure reveals the extraordinary, nor have the ends to which we have devoted our energies and in good part unsuspected, potentialities of the industrial machine. always been those that would be sought in a world of peace and good will. But for extended periods we have FACTORS CONTRIBUTING TO PROGRESS been able to produce goods at rates and in amounts What were the conditions that made possible this exceeding any previously recorded. striking advance? The work input is, of course, a major factor in determining the magnitude of the national THE MAGNITUDE OF PROGRESS output. Estimates of changes from time to time in the The over-all gains of the years 1899-1945 may be total work input must take account of changes in the defined in terms of national income, corrected to take total number of persons productively employed and in account of changes in the purchasing power of the dollar, the average length of the working week. Relevant data or in terms of physical output.1 The former measure is are reasonably good for manufacturing and mining, the more comprehensive, but the two sets of records less accurate for agriculture, and still less satisfactory may be used as complementary and, in some degree, for the wide variety of service industries. Over-all independent estimates. Conjointly, they indicate a four- estimates based on these data indicate that the volume of work input in the United States in the decade 1919-28 The series utilized are the national income estimates of Simon Kuznets (National Bureau of Economic Research) and of the U. Department of was some 53 per cent greater than in the 10 years pre- Commerce, and the production indexes of the National Bureau of Economic ceding 1899 and declined to 44 per cent above the base Research. in the decade 1929-38. Substantial increases in the size Vice-presidential address delivered at Boston, Decem- of the working force had, in the 1930's, been in part ber 27, 1946, before Section K, AAAS. offset by material reductions in the length of the work 220