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on Knowledge Management and Knowledge Economy |
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Issue of 2016‒02‒17
seven papers chosen by Laura Ştefănescu Centrul European de Studii Manageriale în Administrarea Afacerilor |
| By: | Hiller, Sanne; Bitzer, Jürgen; Gören, Erkan |
| Abstract: | This paper explores the role of immigrant employees for a firm's capability to absorb international knowledge. Using matched employer-employee data from Denmark for the years 1999 to 2009, we are able to show that non-Danish employees from technological advanced countries contribute significantly to firm's economic output through their ability to access international knowledge. The empirical results suggest that the immigrants' impact increases if they come from technological advanced countries, have a high educational level, and are employed in high-skilled positions. However, the latter does not hold for immigrant managers. |
| JEL: | D20 J82 L20 |
| Date: | 2015 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:vfsc15:113205&r=knm |
| By: | Vuong, Van Anh; Peters, Bettina; Roberts, Mark |
| Abstract: | In this paper, we estimate a dynamic structural model of a rm s decision to invest in R&D and use it to measure the expected long-run bene t from R&D investment. We apply the model to German rms in ve high-tech manufacturing industries and distinguish rms by whether they sell in just the domestic market or also export some of their production. We nd that R&D investment leads to a higher rate of product and process innovation among exporting rms and these innovations have a larger impact on productivity improvement in export market sales. As a result, exporting rms have a higher payo from R&D investment, invest in R&D more frequently than rms that only sell in the domestic market, and, subsequently, have higher rates of productivity growth. The endogenous investment in R&D is an important mechanism that leads to a divergence in the long-run performance of rms that di er in their export market exposure. |
| JEL: | L60 O31 O33 |
| Date: | 2015 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:vfsc15:112938&r=knm |
| By: | Werner, Katharina; Prettner, Klaus |
| Abstract: | We analyze the short- and long-run effects of public education on economic growth and welfare. In so doing, we extend an R&D-based economic growth model by including a governmental sector that levies labor income taxes and uses the proceeds to finance teachers. An increase in the tax rate reduces consumption possibilities (and thereby individual utility), and the number of workers available for final goods production and research. At the same time, however, it increases the educational resources available per pupil. Consequently, economic growth slows down immediately after an increase in educational investments but it speeds up during the transition toward the long-run balanced growth path. Altogether, this implies a dynamic tradeoff in the sense that current cohorts loose due to educational reform, whereas future cohorts gain. We show that there exists an interior welfare-maximizing level of the provision of public education for each time horizon and show that it is higher than the levels we typically observe in industrialized countries. Since the transitional effects of an education reform on growth and welfare can be negative, our framework has the potential to explain resistance against long-run welfare improving education reforms. |
| JEL: | I25 J24 O31 |
| Date: | 2015 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:vfsc15:112997&r=knm |
| By: | Fürnkranz-Prskawetz, Alexia; Sanchez-Romero, Miguel; d'Albis, Hippolyte |
| Abstract: | This paper presents an analysis of the differential role of mortality for the optimal schooling and retirement age when the accumulation of human capital follows the so-called "Ben-Porath mechanism". We set up a life-cycle model of consumption and labor supply at the extensive margin that allows for endogenous human capital formation based on Card (2001). This paper makes two important contributions. First, we provide the conditions under which a decrease in mortality leads to a longer education period and an earlier retirement age. Second, those conditions are decomposed into a Ben-Porath mechanism and a lifetimehuman wealth effect vs. the years-to-consume effect. Finally, using Swedish data for cohorts born between 1865 and 2000, we show that our model can match the empirical evidence. |
| JEL: | J10 J24 J26 |
| Date: | 2015 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:vfsc15:112937&r=knm |
| By: | Bolli, Thomas; Kemper, Johanna |
| Abstract: | This paper exploits exceptions in the application of employment protection legislation (EPL) to small firms beneath a particular size threshold to test the theoretical hypothesis that EPL increases the incentives of firms to train their employees in a regression discontinuity setting. Using firm-level data from Finland and Italy provides no empirical evidence for this hypothesis. In fact, the results rather suggest a potentially negative impact, which is unstable across empirical specifications though. We test whether this might be due to a negative selection of employees by comparing firms with low and high shares of old employees. The insignificantly higher effect of EPL for firms with older workers provides at best suggestive evidence that EPL affects training negatively though. |
| JEL: | J24 J21 L51 |
| Date: | 2015 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:vfsc15:112895&r=knm |
| By: | Dahmann, Sarah |
| Abstract: | This paper investigates two mechanisms through which education may affect cognitive skills in adolescence: the role of instructional quantity and the timing of instruction with respect to age. To identify causal effects, I exploit a school reform carried out at the state level in Germany as a quasi-natural experiment: between 2001 and 2007, academic-track high school (Gymnasium) was reduced by one year in most of Germany's federal states, leaving the overall curriculum unchanged. To investigate the impact of this educational change on students' cognitive abilities, I conduct two separate analyses: first, I exploit the variation in the curriculum taught to same-aged students at academic-track high school over time and across states to identify the effect of the increase in instructional time on students' crystallized and fluid intelligence scores. Using rich data on seventeen year-old adolescents from the German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP) study, the estimates show that fluid intelligence remained unaffected, while crystallized intelligence improved for male students. Second, I compare students' competences in their final year of high school using data from the German National Educational Panel Study (NEPS). Preliminary results suggest that students affected by the reform catch up with their non-affected counterparts in terms of their competences by the time of graduation. However, they do not provide any evidence for the timing of instruction to matter in cognitive skill formation. Overall, secondary education therefore seems to impact students' cognitive skills in adolescence especially through instructional time and not so much through age-distinct timing of instruction. |
| JEL: | I21 I28 J24 |
| Date: | 2015 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:vfsc15:112917&r=knm |
| By: | Stiebale, Joel |
| Abstract: | This paper analyzes the effects of cross-border mergers and acquisitions (M&As) on the innovation of European firms. The results indicate a considerable increase in post-acquisition innovation in the merged entity. This is mainly driven by inventors based in the acquirer's country, while innovation in the target's country tends to decline. The asymmetry of effects between acquiring and target firms increases with pre-acquisition differences in knowledge stocks, indicating a relocation of innovative activities towards more efficient usage within multinational firms. Instrumental variable techniques as well as a propensity-score matching approach indicate that the effect of cross-border M&As on innovation is causal. |
| JEL: | F23 D22 G34 |
| Date: | 2015 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:vfsc15:112898&r=knm |