It's only January, but what may be the year's most important book on economics has already been published. Called "The Rise and Fall of American Growth: The U.S. Standard of Living Since the Civil War," it argues that we can't expect new technologies to rekindle rapid economic growth. Despite all the Internet hoopla, advances in living standards will be modest and grudging. This somber message goes to the heart of the debate about America's future.
It's not that the author, economist Robert J. Gordon of Northwestern University, dislikes technology. Just the opposite: He's fascinated by it, and almost all his 762-page masterpiece describes the huge gains, mostly derived from new technologies, that have transformed daily life since the late 1800s. Until then, writes Gordon, "life and work were risky, dull, tedious, dangerous and often either too hot or too cold."
Take laundry. It involved the "most physically demanding" household chore: hauling water. Before washers and dryers, "washing, boiling and rinsing a single load of laundry used about 50 gallons of water," estimated an 1886 study. Housewives had to lug that water from outside, often eight to 10 times a day.