Unboxed - Innovation Should Mean More Jobs, Not Less - NYTimes.com

While creating jobs by upgrading the nation’s physical infrastructure may help in the short term, Mr. Atkinson says, “there’s another category of stimulus you could call innovation or digital stimulus — ‘stimovation,’ as a colleague has referred to it.” Although many economists believe that a stimulus package must be timely, targeted and temporary, Mr. Atkinson’s organization argues that a fourth adjective — transformative — may be the most important. Transformative stimulus investments, he said, lead to economic growth that wouldn’t be there otherwise.

A new report by the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation presents the case for investing $30 billion in the nation’s digital infrastructure, including health information technology, broadband Internet access and the so-called smart grid, an effort to infuse detailed digital intelligence into the electricity distribution grid.

The stimulus money, he says, is “a wonderful opportunity” to integrate innovative technologies at a far faster pace than would otherwise be possible. “You’d have an economy and society within three to four years that would be a lot better than we have today,” Mr. Atkinson says, “and you’d create a lot of jobs.

”Beyond direct stimulus investments, he supports an initiative being circulated in Silicon Valley that seeks an information technology investment tax credit to foster innovation through the downturn.

Unboxed - Innovation Should Mean More Jobs, Not Less - NYTimes.com