Top 5 Inventions for Economic Growth

The ultimate engine of economic growth is new technology. According to economists, the growth of output per capita is a fairly recent phenomenon. This can be attributed to all the new technology people have discovered in the past few centuries, causing output growth to surge and accelerate faster than ever before in history. The result of all these ingenious, innovative inventions has been a total revolution in the way people live their lives.

After examining the multitude of invention descriptions on the four websites and considering from other sources, I have concluded that the telephone, printing press, automobile, airplane and the computer have contributed most to economic growth.

First and foremost, the invention of the telephone is ranked number one among my five choices. From my own judgment, this would seem to contribute the most to economic growth. Until the invention of this magnificent device, messengers often had to be sent long distances to deliver information. Intercontinental and overseas communication would take months or even years. From an economic standpoint, companies could relay information between themselves and others instantaneously and make decisions and react to internal and external factors extremely quickly. Essentially, it accelerated the world economy.

Now, the second among my choices was the printing press invented during the Renaissance period by Johannes Gutenberg. This item revolutionized printing, "making it simple and more affordable" (http://www.enchantedlearning.com/inventors/indexp.shtml). This would enable information to become widely available among the populace. Although it may not have occurred right away, this would increase the education among a society and harvest more educated people with more potential.

Number three on the list is the automobile. This invention would enable people to traverse large distances in dramatically less time than ever before. Companies could deliver goods and services much quicker, people had much more control of where to go then previously with the steam engine. Also with the invention of the automobile, the horse and carriage and other modes of primitive transportation have become obsolete. This new technology ultimately would accelerate the speed of the economy and increase economic growth.

The invention of the airplane by the Wright brothers changed the world, so number four would be the airplane.