| Abstract: |
We consider the links between information and communications technologies
(ICTs) and the distribution of income, as mediated by problems of coordination
and control within organizations. In the large corporations of the
mid-twentieth century, a highly developed division of labor was coordinated
and controlled with the aid of relatively underdeveloped ICTs. This created a
situation in which the options of top manage- ment were constrained while the
individual and collective power of lower paid workers was enhanced. Only in
the late twentieth century, when the microprocessor and re- lated technologies
transformed the information systems of organizations, did improve- ments in
the tools of coordination and control race ahead of the growing demands of
coordination and control. These technological changes have reduced the power
of lower-paid employees, increased that for higher-paid employees, and led to
an increase in income inequality. Thus, the more important aspects of new
technology relate to the "power-bias", rather than the "skill-bias", of
technological change. JEL Categories: J31, O33 |