The communications revolution is no longer promising to shift production possibility frontiers outwardly, it is doing so rapidly. But there is a second shift we have not seen yet, and that's the big data shift. The capacity for organizations to improve decisions by rendering the changing digital footprint into meaningful direction, is going to reduce economic distortions in a number of ways. Firms will be able to match customers with products more efficiently. It will be clear which new products should be pursued. Moreover, improved public sector decision making should result in more efficient social welfare functions.

Overall, big data should mean more output and utility in regions where organizations are getting smarter. The internet of things promises to impact gross domestic product in a meaningful way, as well as, the demand for data science and research going forward.

And at the same time, most organizations openly suspect more gains are possible from those same data sources. 67% of companies surveyed in the Netherlands agreed the potential for data gains in their organization were great. While larger surveyed organizations were typically satisfied with their data knowledge resources, smaller and medium-sized professional organizations were decidedly less satisfied.