Technology gap: reality or illusion
President Carter ordered a study of industrial innovation, the process by which scientific and technical advances are incorporated into the economy, made to determine where and why the U.S. is losing its technological leadership. Various interpretations of this lag abound and some analyses are made. One source of concern is the success in the Americam marketplace of high-technology goods from abroad. The SST, the fast breeder, and Japanese cameras and electronic equipment are a few examples. A country-by-country comparison of R and D expenditures as a percentage of GNP indicates that, during the mid- and the late 1960s and continuing into the 1970s, the ratio declined in the U.S. and increased in most of the rest of the world. While Americans are also patenting fewer inventions both here and abroad, the number of foreign inventions patented in the U.S. has increased substantially. But the U.S. scientists have been responsible for more than half of the major technological innovations made since 1953 with such things as the polio vaccine, oral contraceptives, the transistor, the nuclear reactor, and recombinant DNA technology. The problem facing the U.S. according to some is that the basic scientific discoveries are not put to practical application. Other observers charge that government regulations regarding pollution control, worker safety, and tax and accounting procedures divert funds from research and stifle creativity. A review of the U.S. role in science up to the 1970s and its link with the American economy are examined. (MCW)
- OSTI ID:
- 6445229
- Journal Information:
- Ed. Res. Rep. (Wash., D.C.); (United States), Vol. 2:24
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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