Research Catalog

Title

Why information grows : the evolution of order, from atoms to economies / César Hidalgo.

Author

Hidalgo, César A., 1979-

Publication

New York, NY : Basic Books, [2015]

Items in the Library & Off-site

Details

Description

xxi, 232 pages : illustrations; 25 cm

Summary

"Why do some nations prosper while others do not? Economists usually turn to measures such as gross domestic product or per capita income to answer this question, but interdisciplinary theorist Cesar Hidalgo argues that we can learn more by measuring a country's ability to make complex products. In Why Information Grows, Hidalgo combines the seemingly disparate fields of economic development and physics to present this new rubric for economic growth. He believes that we should investigate what makes some countries more capable than others. Complex products-from films to robots, apps to automobiles-are a physical distillation of an economy's knowledge, a measurable embodiment of its education, infrastructure, and capability. Economic wealth accrues when applications of this knowledge turn ideas into tangible products; the more complex its products, the more economic growth a country will experience. A radical new interpretation of global economics, Why Information Grows overturns traditional assumptions about the development of economies and the origins of wealth and takes a crucial step toward making economics less the dismal science and more the insightful one. "--

Subjects

• Physics
• Economic development
• New products
• Information theory in economics
• BUSINESS & ECONOMICS / Industries / General
• Knowledge, Theory of > Economic aspects

Bibliography (note)

• Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN

• 9780465048991
• 0465048994
• 9780465039715 (canceled/invalid)

LCCN

• 2015000882
• 99963848468

OCLC

• 900960212
• ocn900960212
• SCSB-9397645

Owning Institutions

Columbia University Libraries