Template-type: ReDif-Paper 1.0 Author-Name: Borghans, Lex Author-Name: Weel, Bas ter Author-workplace-name: MERIT Title: Do We Need Computer Skills to Use a Computer? Evidence from Britain Abstract: Using data from the 1997 Skills Survey of the Employed BritishWorkforce, we examine the returns to computer skills in Britain.Many researchers, using information on computer use, have concludedthat wage differentials between computer users and non-users might,among others, be due to differences in the embodiment of computerskills. Using unique information on the importance, level of sophisti-cationand effectiveness of computer use, we show that computer skillsdo not yield significant labour market returns for most types of use.Examining the returns to computer skills at different levels of sophis-ticationof use, yields estimates suggesting returns to computer skillsat the highest level of sophistication of use only. Keywords: economics of technology ; Series: Research Memoranda Creation-Date: 2002 Number: 040 File-URL: https://unu-merit.nl/publications/rmpdf/removed.pdf File-Format: application/pdf File-Size: 314114 Handle: RePEc:unm:umamer:2002040