Information Technology and Economy

The impacts of Information Technology in the Economy are not an issue that can be fully covered in a presentation or a research work. This subject includes a lot of aspects and dimensions and has stimulated the interest of researchers, research centres and international organisations the last 30 years. As far as the evaluation of the impacts of Information and Communication technologies in the Economy are concerned, the multidimensional character is also accompanied by different points of view [1],[3] regarding the achieved results up to today, as well as fr the oncoming consequences the following years. The extensive utilisation of Information technology in business sectors began the 70s. Since the 70s up to day a huge improvement has taken place and more are in progress with no visible or predictable limits together with the development of the innovation team up with the wide enforcement of the technological achievements to the business sector. The changes of the economic and social status were tremendous worldwide. This is the reason that this period is characterized as the Third Industrial revolution. Generally, we can distinguish the history of inrush and exploitation of Information and Communication technologies into three separate phases:
A) The first phase includes the period that Information technology was mainly used for the recording and processing of information and for supporting the economical and productive units to increase their productivity. This was initiated by the appearance of microcomputers during the early years of the 80s providing the necessary accessibility and availability to the digital technology and making it popular.

B) During the second phase, which is called “Information Society”, the digital technology influenced all sectors of the Social and Economic Life. The degree of influence was so intense that led to large rates of growth in Industry and Services. The Information Technology industry as well as other sectors,