Technological Progress Analysis: Some Input-Output Approaches

Abstract

If the cost decrease is a target of technological progress, one of the progress assessments is a change in the cost structure. It is due to the uneven impact of new technologies on different elements of product costs. Hence it is possible to determine three types of technological progress: labor saving, fixed capital saving and material saving. In reality, any new technology or technological progress as a whole changes all the three elements of costs, but historically it is possible to determine the periods when one of them dominated. The reasons of such an uneven influence are the dynamics of relative prices of each resource, on the demand side, and the objective dynamic possibilities of scientific and technological development.