Learning in the Knowledge Economy: The Role of Technology
The Knowledge Economy
For the last two hundred years, economics have recognized only two factors of production: labor and capital. This is now changing. Information and knowledge are replacing capital and energy as the primary wealth-creating assets, just as the latter two replaced land and labor 200 years ago. In addition, technological developments in the 20th century have transformed the majority of wealth-creating work from physically-based to "knowledge-based.".
Technology and knowledge are now the key factors of production. With increased mobility of information and the global work force, knowledge and expertise can be transported instantaneously around the world, and any advantage gained by one company can be eliminated by competitive improvements overnight. The only comparative advantage a company will enjoy will be its process of innovation--combining market and technology know-how with the creative talents of knowledge workers to solve a constant stream of competitive problems--and its ability to derive value from information. We are now an information society in a knowledge economy.