Implications of Information Technology for Employment, Skills, and Wages: A Review of Recent Research

The extraordinary diffusion of computers and information technology (IT) in the past 20 years has prompted interest in the implications of IT for employment levels, workplace skill demands, and earnings levels and inequality. This interest has centered on a number of questions: Does IT eliminate more jobs than it creates? Is there a shortage of IT professionals? Does the spread of computers explain the significant growth in wage inequality in the United States in the past 20 years by altering the occupational distribution of employment and/or the skill content of occupations themselves?