ABSTRACT
The ‘New Economy’ proponents pointing to the recent and exceptional performance of the US economy are talking about a new golden age. This new age of the economy would be the result of a combination between the implementation of new information and communication technologies, a neutral monetary policy and a market-oriented finance mechanism. The 2001 report of the US council of economic advisers is more impressionist when it points out that ‘extraordinary gains in performances ... have resulted from this combination of mutually reinforcing advances in technologies, business practices, and economic policies’ (Economic Report of the President, 2001, p. 23). Beyond the semantic differences, a real debate about the nature of growth should be brought back to the surface. The problem is to know whether a change in ‘fundamentals’ - technology, tastes, institutions - has the effect of shifting upwards the productivity trend and making obsolete the business cycle, or whether a better co-ordination of economic activity has been obtained, independently of the nature of the ‘fundamentals’.
