Indirect ICT investment

Abstract

Numerous economic studies have highlighted that information and communication technology (ICT) investment expenditure appears to be greater in the field of services, and above all in certain activities such as financial services and wholesale trade, than in industry. This analysis examines whether the investment data compiled by national accountants underestimate productive ICT expenditure, and whether this is more pronounced in the case of industry than for services. For that purpose, we propose an assessment of the size of ICT inputs (termed ‘indirect ICT investment’) in non-ICT investment expenditure for France in 2000. The main result of our analysis is that the amount of ‘indirect ICT investment’ appears to be small, compared with ‘direct ICT investment’, suggesting that the biggest investors in ICT remain services, regardless of whether we consider ‘direct’ or ‘direct’ plus ‘indirect investment’.

Notes

¹ The product codes indicated are those of the French classification.