The Impact of ICT Investment on World Economic Growth

Within the past few decades, ICT has revolutionized work, communications, and recreation around the world. Moreover, investment in ICT has had a significant impact on the growth and structural change in both industrialized and emerging economies. This Special Issue of the Journal of Telecommunications Policy examines the effects of ICT on economies in Asia, Europe, and the Americas. Our objective is to understand how economic policies can be designed to foster growth and international competitiveness by encouraging the effective utilization of ICT equipment and software. While ICT has proved to be a powerful driver of economic growth and structural transformation, the promotion of ICT adoption is not a simple task. The challenges to successful ICT policies have risen steadily with the increasing sophistication of ICT equipment. The rapid pace of advances in technology has been maintained over decades and will continue well into the future. However, the frontier of these advances has shifted away from individual devices to integrated systems of interrelated devices of truly staggering complexity