Indoor Plumbing Is an Amazing Invention
Indoor Plumbing Is an Amazing Invention By Matthew Yglesias | Posted Monday, Aug. 27, 2012, at 3:25 PM ET A young woman washes her face at a newly built deep water well in 2010 Photo by Roberto Schmidt/AFP/Getty Images. Robert Gordon has a working paper out making some not-particularly-persuasive, super-pessimistic, speculative claims about the future of American economic growth that does include, as an aside, this very persuasive observation about consumer surplus: A thought experiment helps to illustrate the fundamental importance of the inventions of [Industrial Revolution] #2 compared to the subset of [Industrial Revolution] #3 inventions that have occurred since 2002. You are required to make a choice between option A and option B. With option A you are allowed to keep 2002 electronic technology, including your Windows 98 laptop accessing Amazon, and you can keep running water and indoor toilets; but you can’t use anything invented since 2002. O...