• there is always a demand (potential market) for ways to make life easier
• is it simply impossibility that holds back progress?
• or is the issue that the person who invents one doesn't necessarily get rewarded?
• but reward isn't just profit
  

separate demand and income

• demand goes up when income goes up
• but if technology causes income to go up then demand is not an independent variable

what are the social factors?

• the common individual preferences in society will have some effect: willingness to take risks, work hard and defer gratification
• also how seriously is concern about change or even damage to the environment
  
• what about putting people out of work
• the Rust Brothers demonstrated a cotton harvesting machine in 1935
• they were concerned about the unemployment this would cause
• they also didn't have enough capital to bring it into commercial production
• International Harvester started selling a similar machine in 1947
• how strong is the attachment to stability

Factors that encourage technological progress:

• longer life expectancy, but the evidence isn't very convincing
  
• better nutrition (in the southern US pellagra was common--a disease caused by low levels of protein)
• willingness to take risks and optimism (thinking the risks are lower than they are)
• availability of resources, but the argument isn't straightforward
• technological progress may cause utilization of resources rather than vice versa, or lack of resources may stimulate invention

Path dependency or technological momentum

• one technology leads to another
• some paths lead to more and more progress, others to dead ends
• but path chosen doesn't describe very well why some societies are technologically successful

labor costs

• high wages may stimulate the invention of labor-saving technologies
• but the inventors of the early British industrial revolution weren't focused on saving labor

What about science?

• not the key stimulating factor because technologies are often developed before the necessary science

Religion

• does the religion support human mastery over nature?
• consider the Hindu caste system as a disincentive to technological progress--it is impossible to better your lot in life

Values

• how much value is put on wealth?  this varies in different societies
• is it better to be brave or wise than to be rich?
• is property valued more highly than money?
• prejudices may affect what succeeds
  
• what are the relative values placed on useful vs. beautiful?
• Europeans were more pragmatic

Institutions and property rights

• pluralist societies are probably more progressive
• security in ownership would encourage people to take risks
• intellectual property (patents)?
• could stimulate invention but certainly many inventors made do without
• could slow progress

Resistance to innovation:

• those who have invested in one technology will resist technologies that replace it

Politics and the state

• weak governments are usually good for innovation
• government encouragement of innovation plays a significant role
• how much tolerance is there for nonconformity?

War

• military produces new needs and is willing to develop technologies that would not be profitable
• but also puts a very high value on conformity
• whether war results in technological innovation depends on other factors

Openness to new information

• prejudice against outsiders reduces diffusion of ideas
• in the later Islamic world the word for innovation also meant heresy
• a common language helps a lot

Demography

• population growth leads to innovation?
• or population density?
• there are many counter-examples
•