Countries began to specialize more, and international trade became key to connecting supply and demand. In the third industrial revolution, advances in computing power and communications technology led to breakthroughs in the way information could be stored, processed and transmitted.
The associated advances in global logistics enabled even greater specialization in production—the development of global supply chains—making the world even more dependent on trade to connect supply and demand. Importantly, all of these revolutions caused hardship for people in industries that were disrupted. Yet, the enormous gains in productivity and the advances these new technologies spawned form the basis of our modern economy.