From Industry 4.0 to Society 5.0: Digital manufacturing technologies and the role of workers

New enabling technologies are shaping the transformation of production activities, characterised by growing digitization and inter-connectivity. A transformed industry has a transformative impact on society as well. From Industry 4.0 to society 5.0, the path described in this thesis accentuates a clear change from mass automation to the process of enhancing the capabilities of human workers. However, the diffusion of new technologies is very uneven, and firms display different adoption behaviours. By using data provided by Istat on a large representative sample of Italian firms, the patterns and determinants of new digital technology adoption are assessed. Furthermore, it is provided econometric evidence on the positive effects of human capital and training, showing heterogeneous results between large and small and medium-size firms.