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on Technology and Industrial Dynamics |
| By: | Barbieri, Laura (Università Cattolica di Piacenza); Piva, Mariacristina (Università Cattolica di Piacenza); Vivarelli, Marco (Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore) |
| Abstract: | This paper explores the employment impact of innovation activity, taking into account both R&D expenditures and embodied technological change (ETC). We use a novel panel dataset covering 265 innovative Italian firms over the period 1998-2010. The main outcome from the proposed fixed effect estimations is a labor-friendly nature of total innovation expenditures; however, this positive effect is barely significant when the sole in-house R&D expenditures are considered and fades away when ETC is included as a proxy for innovation activities. Moreover, the positive employment impacts of innovation activities and R&D expenditures are totally due to firms operating in high-tech industries and large companies, while no job-creation due to technical change is detectable in traditional sectors and SMEs. |
| Keywords: | technology, innovation, R&D, embodied technological change, employment |
| JEL: | O31 O33 |
| Date: | 2016–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp10354&r=tid |
| By: | Francesco Squintani (University of Warwick); Hugo A. Hopenhayn (University of California Los Angeles) |
| Abstract: | Research on the efficiency of innovation markets is usually concerned on whether the level of R&D firm investment is socially optimal. Instead, this paper studies whether R&D resources are employed optimally across research areas. Under weak assumptions, we find that competitive equilibrium innovative efforts are biased excessively into high returns areas. This form of market inefficiency is a novel result, and would take place even if innovators' profits coincided with the social value of innovations. We first demonstrate it in a simple, fundamental model. Then we embed our analysis in a canonical dynamic framework directly comparable with extant R&D models, and precisely identify the features of R&D competition that lead to the market failure we identify. |
| Date: | 2016 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:red:sed016:1357&r=tid |
| By: | Davide Consoli; Mabel Sánchez-Barrioluengo |
| Abstract: | This paper analyses the long-term transformations of local labor markets in fifty Spanish provinces to identify the extent and the drivers of employment polarization. We find that the decline of ‘routine’ mid-skill jobs is strongly driven by technology adoption and, also, that it is a strong predictor of the expansion of low-skill service employment. These results are not specific to large metropolitan areas, and are robust to various controls and instrumental variables that account for long-term industry specialisation. We also find a positive, albeit small, local multiplier effect of high-skilled workers on the demand for non-tradable service jobs. |
| Keywords: | Local labor market, Polarization, Multiplier |
| JEL: | J23 J24 R23 |
| Date: | 2016–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:egu:wpaper:1628&r=tid |
| By: | Clément Bonnet |
| Abstract: | We estimate a latent factor model (LFM) to compute an index that measures the quality of an extensive data set of inventions related to Low Carbon Energy Technologies (LCETs) and patented by seven countries during 1980-2010. We use the quality index to compute the stock of knowledge accumulated in the fifteen analyzed LCETs. We investigate the composition of the stock of knowledge and find that important substitutions between technologies have taken place: technologies such as solar thermal and nuclear have been progressively replaced by wind power, solar photovoltaic and to a less extent by few other technologies. This substitution effect can be decomposed into quantity (the number of inventions) and quality (the quality of inventions). Investigating the latter, the quality of nuclear-related inventions has decreased whereas it has increased for solar photovoltaic (PV), wind power and energy storage inventions. Few newer technologies, i.e. hydrogen and sea energy, also show signs of an increase of their average quality of inventions over the last years of the data set. We go further and investigate the inventions distribution in terms of quality and conclude that the potential for signifcant inventions related to nuclear technology has decreased over time whereas higher levels of quality have been reached in newer technological areas. A cross-country comparison is conducted to assess the innovation performance of the seven countries covered by our study. We conclude that technology policies are less efficient when demand-pull and supply-push approaches are not coupled. |
| Keywords: | patent data, latent factor model, energy technologies, carbon. |
| JEL: | C30 C11 Q40 Q55 |
| Date: | 2016 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:drm:wpaper:2016-37&r=tid |
| By: | Goedhuys, Micheline (UNU‐MERIT); Mohnen, Pierre (UNU-MERIT, and Maastricht University); Taha, Tamer (UNU-MERIT) |
| Abstract: | Using recently collected firm-level data from Egypt and Tunisia, this paper explores the effect of institutional obstacles and corruption on the innovative behaviour of firms and their effect on firms' employment growth. We estimate the micro-level interactions between corruption and institutional obstacles and test the hypothesis that corruption 'greases the wheels' of firm performance when bureaucratic procedures are more severe and hampering innovation. Accounting for endogeneity and simultaneity, the paper uses a conditional recursive mixed-process model (CMP). The results show that corruption has a direct negative effect on the likelihood that a firm is an innovator, but a positive effect when interacted with institutional obstacles. This provides support for the hypothesis that corruption serves as a mechanism to bypass the bureaucratic obstacles related to obtaining the necessary business permits and licences for product innovation. These effects also resonate into firm growth, through their effect on product innovation. |
| Keywords: | Innovation, corruption, employment growth, Egypt, Tunisia |
| JEL: | L25 D73 |
| Date: | 2016–10–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:unm:unumer:2016056&r=tid |
| By: | Sergio Petralia; Pierre-Alexandre Balland; Andrea Morrison |
| Abstract: | Despite being the main thriving force behind economic growth and industrial development, technological innovation remains highly concentrated on a handful of countries. It is therefore of a great interest to know how countries accumulate and develop their innovative capabilities, what kind of obstacles they need to overcome, and whether it is possible to identify opportunities to develop new areas of technological specialization. In this paper we analyze countries’ patterns of technological diversification and specialization along the development process. We provide evidence regarding the importance of existing technological capabilities and the relationship among technologies in shaping possible paths of technological development. We show that the likelihood of diversification is higher for those technologies that are related to countries’ existing profile of competences. Moreover, we show this effect to be stronger at earlier stages of development. Additionally, we show that countries tend to follow clear patterns of specialization along the development path, by moving towards more complex and valuable technologies. |
| Date: | 2016–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:egu:wpaper:1629&r=tid |
| By: | Javier Changoluisa (School of Economics and Business Administration, Friedrich-Schiller-University Jena); Michael Fritsch (School of Economics and Business Administration, Friedrich-Schiller-University Jena) |
| Abstract: | We investigate the relationship between new business formation and the level of competitive pressure perceived by manufacturing incumbent establishments. The perceived pressure of competition is stronger the higher the level of entries in the respective industry. This relationship holds not only for start-ups located in the same region of the incumbent, but also for start-ups across all regions of Germany. The productivity level of an incumbent moderates the extent of the perceived competitive pressure from start-ups. Highly productive incumbents are less threatened by new business formation. Such a moderating effect cannot be found for incumbent size and regional population density. |
| Keywords: | New business formation, competitive pressure, regional competition, incumbent firms, manufacturing industries |
| JEL: | L26 L60 D20 O12 R11 |
| Date: | 2016–11–14 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:jrp:jrpwrp:2016-019&r=tid |
| By: | Alexander Coad (European Commission – JRC); Nicola Grassano (European Commission – JRC Innovation) |
| Abstract: | What are the secrets for stimulating R&D investment and job creation? This question is of central importance for the EU Innovation Union strategy. This policy brief applies a new econometric technique to the EU Industrial R&D Scoreboard data on the world's top R&D investors, to highlight the key role of sales growth (instead of profits growth) as the engine of R&D investment and job creation. |
| Keywords: | R&D investment, firm growth, SVAR, sales growth, industrial dynamics |
| JEL: | O33 O31 C10 |
| Date: | 2016–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ipt:iptwpa:jrc103175&r=tid |
| By: | Zobel, Ann-Kristin (Dept. of Management, Technology and Economics, ETH Zürich); Lokshin, Boris (School of Business and Economics, Maastricht University); Hagedoorn, John (UNU-MERIT, and Royal Holloway University of London) |
| Abstract: | This paper analyses how firms' degree of openness and innovativeness influence their use of formal and informal appropriation mechanisms. Patents, trademarks, copyrights, and design rights are formal appropriation mechanisms. Secrecy, lead-time, and complexity are examples of informal appropriation mechanisms. Both external search breadth and depth are positively associated with firms' use of informal appropriation mechanisms, while only external search breadth is positively associated with formal appropriation mechanisms. Firms' degree of radical (incremental) innovation orientation is negatively (positively) associated with their use of formal appropriation mechanisms. Analysis of the joint impact of openness and innovativeness, suggests that for radical innovators it is external search breadth (rather than depth) that has a positive association with the use of informal appropriation mechanisms. In contrast, for radical innovators external search depth (rather than breadth) is associated with the use of formal appropriation mechanisms. For incremental innovators, external search breadth (rather than depth) is associated with the use of both formal and informal appropriation mechanisms. |
| Keywords: | Appropriation Mechanisms, Formal Appropriation, Informal Appropriation, External Search Openness, Incremental Innovators, Radical Innovators |
| JEL: | O34 O31 O32 K11 |
| Date: | 2016–10–26 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:unm:unumer:2016059&r=tid |