One explanation for the growing productivity gap between Europe and the US is strong productivity growth in the US. This, in turn, can be attributed to information and communication technologies or ICT (Havik et al., 2008). The contribution of ICT to US growth went up from 43% for the period 1971–1995 to 59% for the period 1995–2000 (Jorgenson et al., 2008).
The growth contribution of increased investment in ICT capital almost doubled. ICT is a general purpose technology with a broad impact on many sectors of the economy. New digital technologies might spur productivity growth in a similar manner as the last wave of information and communication technologies. They can contribute towards closing gaps in productivity.