The Role of ICT on the Spanish Productivity Slowdown

Spain and most of the rest of the European Union (EU) countries have experienced a productivity slowdown since the middle of the nineties. During the same period, the United States (US) showed an upsurge of productivity that lasted until now. Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) were soon identifi ed as a major force in the reversal of the productivity slowdown in the US63. In contrast, no strong evidence in this direction is still available for most of the EU countries. Many studies concentrate on the aggregate behaviour –referring either to total output or to business sector output. However, it became soon evident that at least a distinction should be drawn between ICT producing sectors and the rest of the economy. Particularly, for those countries without a strong ICT production sector, the classifi cation of the different industries according to the intensity of their ICT use was a great step forward.