The Technological Convergence & Divergence

This makes a lot of sense.

We study the cross-country evolution of technology diffusion over the last two centuries. We document that adoption lags between poor and rich countries have converged, while the intensity of use of adopted technologies of poor countries relative to rich countries has diverged. The evolution of aggregate productivity implied by these trends in technology diffusion resembles the actual evolution of the world income distribution in the last two centuries. Cross-country differences in adoption lags account for

This makes a lot of sense. Especially when you consider the figurative (maybe literal) exponential increase in technology adoption. They’re at radically difference places in the curve and the curve is so steep now that even a small lag creates gigantic discrepencies.