Information and communication technologies effects on economic growth

While Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) are seen to be drivers of economic growth, it is unclear how this change takes place, especially since social and human factors are often seen to change as a result of ICTs. This paper investigates the effects of ICTs, and social and human factors in terms of skills, education, and labor, on economic growth. An augmented production function is used to quantify the effects that infodensity levels, defined as the combination of ICT networks and skills, education, and labor, have on the economic growth of high and low-to-middle income economies. This research draws upon data collected from the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) and the World Bank on a sample of 72 high and low-to-middle income economies covering the years 2000 to 2008. Panel data is used in this research to account for the time series factor present in the data range. The results indicate that while secondary levels of education are not significant, infodensity and tertiary levels of education have a significant contribution on the levels of economic growth per capita.