Intangible investment and human resources

To make intangibles more ‘tangible’ for empirical analysis, statistical cluster techniques are applied in the development of two new taxonomies of manufacturing industries. The first focuses on the distinction between exogenous, location dependent comparative cost advantages, such as the relative abundance of capital or labour, and endogenously created firm specific advantages resulting from intangible investments in marketing or innovation. The second taxonomy discriminates between industries according to their employment of skilled labour. Finally, econometric tests are used to investigate the presumed complementarity between intangible investments and human resources.