Economic Impact of the Personal Nanofactory

Robert A. Freitas Jr
Institute for Molecular Manufacturing, Palo Alto, California, USA


Is the advent of, and mass availability of, desktop personal nanofactories (PNs) likely to
cause deflation (a persistent decline in the general prices of goods and services), inflation (a
persistent general price increase), or neither?
A definitive analysis would have to address: (1) the technical assumptions that are made,
including as yet imprecisely defined future technological advances and the pace and order of
their introduction; (2) the feedback-mediated dynamic responses of the macroeconomy in
situations where we don’t have a lot of historical data to guide us; (3) the counter-leaning
responses of existing power centers (corporate entities, wealthy owners/investors, influential
political actors, antitechnology-driven activists, etc.) to the potential dilution of their power,
influence, or interests, including their likely efforts to actively oppose or at least delay this
potential dilution; (4) legal restrictions that may be placed on the widespread use of certain
technological options, for reasons ranging from legitimate public safety and environmental
concerns to crass political or commercial opportunism; (5) the possibility (having an as yet illdefined probability) that nanotechnology might actually “break the system” and render conventional capitalism obsolete (much as solid state electronics obsoleted vacuum tubes), in which
case it is not clear what new economic system might replace capitalism; and (6) the changes in
human economic behavior that may result when human nature itself may have changed.
A definitive answer is beyond the scope of this essay. Here, we take only a first look at
the question...

http://www.rfreitas.com/Nano/NoninflationaryPN.pdf