国际经济与管理科学杂志

The new Industrial Revolution: manufacturing with 3D Printers and Polymer Materials in an Economy of Design, Innovation and Intellectual Property

Abstract

Lucas Agudiez Roitman and Michael Shanks

In this paper, we analyze the function and applications of a 3D printer in the context of a modern economic landscape. While other papers delve into the topic of printers in which users can download 3D models from various websites and replicate them, they do so on a surface level. This paper delves deeply in the potential economic changes that these devices could create. Unlike in regular manufacturing, these objects, made mainly from plastic material, can have internal gears and pieces that make a fully working mechanical product, without the need to assemble the individual parts into a larger contraption, and have been used even for the creation of fire weapons. We discuss the implications in regulation and control of the population and their creations.