Measuring the digital economy: A reading from the international context

The rapid progress of the industry based on information and communications technologies (ICT) is designing a future economy that is moving away from traditional manufacturing structures. The traditional instruments of analysis are revealing their intrinsic limitations for understanding what is happening in the new economy. Until a few years ago the importance of the information and communication sector was centred on its own technological development (infrastructure); at the present time the synergic effects of this development have spread to all branches of activity so that the centre of interest must be based on the study of the digital economy. The lack of measures of activity of this new economy is a reality and represents one of the first obstacles to be overcome in order to comprehend the size of this new sector in relation to the economy as a whole. Very few studies have focused on the measurement of the digital economy from the standpoint of applied economics. This paper presents a methodology for measuring the new economy and its results applied to economic activity as a whole. This quantification is based on the contribution of the information sector to the whole of the economy.