“Is the Rate of Scientific Progress Slowing Down?”, 2019-08-05 (; similar):
Our task is simple: we will consider whether the rate of scientific progress has slowed down, and more generally what we know about the rate of scientific progress, based on these literatures and other metrics we have been investigating. This investigation will take the form of a conceptual survey of the available data. We will consider which measures are out there, what they show, and how we should best interpret them, to attempt to create the most comprehensive and wide-ranging survey of metrics for the progress of science. In particular, we integrate a number of strands in the productivity growth literature, the “science of science” literature, and various historical literatures on the nature of human progress.
…To sum up the basic conclusions of this paper, there is good and also wide-ranging evidence that the rate of scientific progress has indeed slowed down, In the disparate and partially independent areas of productivity growth, total factor productivity, GDP growth, patent measures, researcher productivity, crop yields, life expectancy, and Moore’s Law we have found support for this claim.
One implication here is we should not be especially optimistic about the productivity slowdown, as that notion is commonly understood, ending any time soon. There is some lag between scientific progress and practical outputs, and with science at less than its maximum dynamic state, one might not expect future productivity to fare so well either. Under one more specific interpretation of the data, a new General Purpose Technology might be required to kickstart economic growth once again.