(2002-03-06) c

Michael Schrage reports that A recent McKinsey Global Institute report analyzing the spurt in U.S. productivity growth from 1995 to 2000 proffers provocative statistics that should give champions of "supply-side" innovation pause. "By far the most important factor in that is WalMart," reports Robert Solow, the MIT Nobel Prize-winning economics professor emeritus who chaired the report's advisory committee. "That was not expected. The technology that went into what Wal-Mart did was not brand new and not especially at the technological frontiers, but when it was combined with the firm's managerial and organizational innovations, the impact was huge."