e/Social savings

Information
has gloss	eng: Social savings (sometimes "Fogel social savings") is a growth accounting technique to evaluate the historic implications of new technology on economic growth. Developed in 1964 by American economic historian and scientist Robert Fogel, the methodology works to estimate the cost-savings of the new technology compared with the next best alternative. In the absence of the railroad, America’s large canal waterway system would have been expanded and its roads would have been improved through pavement as the next best alternative; both of these improvements would take away from the social impact of the railroad.<ref name="davis.shtml"/> In estimating that the "level of per capita income achieved by January 1, 1890 would have been reached by March 31, 1890, if railroads had never been invented,"<ref name="davis.shtml"/> the social savings analysis concluded that the difference in cost (or "social savings") attributable to railroads was negligible - about 1%.
lexicalization	eng: social savings
instance of	c/Theories of history