Abstract
Whilst the importance of internet-related technologies and digitization practices to economic performance is well documented, little is known about the long-term effects of the early adoption of such technologies. We use novel, geolocated data about the volume of online content from the Internet Archive to approximate the active engagement with digital economic activities. Using panel-data methods, we find significant positive and long-lasting effects of online content creation in 2000 on subsequent regional productivity levels up to 16 years later. Our findings highlight the sizeable effects of the digital economy that policy-makers should consider when developing future rollout strategies.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 1924-1938 |
| Number of pages | 15 |
| Journal | Regional Studies |
| Volume | 55 |
| Issue number | 12 |
| Early online date | 17 Nov 2020 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 2021 |
Bibliographical note
Funding Information:The authors acknowledge the useful comments made by the participants at the 2019 Winter Seminar of the German-speaking section of the RSAI, the 2019 Meeting of the AAG, the RSA's 2019 Winter Conference, the 2019 ERSA-OECD winter school, the RSAI-BIS Conference in the same year, and the 2018 and 2019 ERSA Congress. Also, they acknowledge the support from BRIDGE (Birmingham-Illinois Partnership) and Facebook in pursuing the research, and thank the guest editors and the reviewers for the very useful comments. All errors are the authors' alone.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2020 Regional Studies Association.
Research Groups and Themes
- Jean Golding
Keywords
- archives
- digital economy
- internet
- productivity
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Professor Emmanouil Tranos
- School of Geographical Sciences - Professor of Quantitative Human Geography
Person: Academic