Technology | Econofact

Election Infrastructure and the Market for Voting Technology

By Josephine Wolff and Miriam Wasserman·February 11, 2020
The Fletcher School, Tufts University and EconoFact

The Issue:

Voting technology should ideally be reliable, secure, and easy-to-audit, but elections often encounter technological problems from poorly designed custom apps to breaches of voter records. Despite all of the attention focused on improving election security in the aftermath of the 2016 election, voting

How Much Do Cybersecurity Breaches Really Cost and Why Does It Matter?

By Josephine Wolff·December 1, 2019
The Fletcher School, Tufts University

The Issue:

Firms making decisions about how much to spend on securing their computer systems and data often struggle with figuring out how much a cybersecurity breach will cost them and what the most cost-effective ways of protecting against such breaches are. In the absence of clear guidelines about how to secure

Big-Tech and the Resurgence of Antitrust

By Lynne Pepall and Dan Richards·January 28, 2019
Tufts University

The Issue:

In recent years, a number of analysts have increasingly railed against large firms, particularly modern technological giants such as Amazon, Google, and Facebook — calling for such firms to be regulated like public utilities or perhaps broken up as was famously done with Standard Oil over a century ago

Automation and the Growing Importance of Social Skills in the Labor Market

By David Deming·January 16, 2018
Harvard Kennedy School and Harvard Graduate School of Education

The Issue:

Automation has displaced workers in many occupations, from manufacturing to routine office jobs. New research finds that employment growth in high-paying jobs has slowed since the year 2000, and that this has been particularly true for jobs in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM).

The Productivity Slowdown is Even More Puzzling than You Think …

By Dan Sichel·May 17, 2017
Wellesley College

The Issue:

Labor productivity — the amount of output produced from an hour of work — is a key economic metric that characterizes how efficiently an economy is operating. In addition, over long spans of time, increases in productivity have provided the means for pushing living standards today well above those ...
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Will Manufacturing Jobs Come Back?

By David Deming·January 20, 2017
Harvard Kennedy School and Harvard Graduate School of Education

The Issue:

President Trump has made bringing back manufacturing jobs a central part of his campaign. He is focused on convincing companies to stay in the U.S. through a mix of carrots (tax breaks) and sticks (threatening import tariffs on companies that ship jobs overseas).

The claim that the President can bring