What we find here is that the quality-adjusted screen time price index is down 39 per cent since 2000, but that change is overwhelmingly a function of improvements in quality, not declines in prices paid for devices, subscriptions and so on. So the steep rise in screen time over the past 20 years has led to a 52 per cent rise in real-terms spending per person on digital technology.
What seemed at first like a story of screen time outcompeting socialising and reading thanks to a widening advantage on cost, now looks more like digital technology winning out through the sheer force of unparalleled convenience and attention capture, even if that comes at a mounting financial (let alone social) cost.
Here is more from John-Burn Murdoch at the FT, wwmas?
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