Empirical Patterns of Firm Growth and R&D Investment: a Quality Ladder Model Interpretation

We present a partial equilibrium model of endogenous firm growth with R&D investment and stochastic innovation as the engines of growth, drawing on the quality ladder models in the macro growth literature, and the literature on patent races and the discrete choice models of product differentiation. The model fits a number of empirical patterns well, including: (i) a skewed size distribution of firms with persistent differences in firm sizes, (ii) firm growth independent of firm size, as stated in the so-called Gibrat's law, and (iii) R&D investment proportional to sales.     

The Size of Firms and R&D Investment

We construct an industry-equilibrium model in which it is costly for consumers who have previously purchased from one firm to switch to competitors. This gives firms a certain degree of market power over their established customers. The equilibria we identify under these conditions have the following properties: (1) there is a nontrivial size distribution of firms, although firms are intrinsically identical, (2) larger firms make higher profits, (3) larger firms spend more on R&D, (4) larger firms charge (on average) lower prices, and (5) profits are positively correlated over time. These properties match empirical regularities concerning the manufacturing and retail sectors in the U.S. economy.     

税收优惠与企业创新绩效 ——基于研发投入和非研发创新投入的双重中介效应

税收优惠政策对企业创新绩效的影响广受关注,其传导机制更是一个有待深入探讨的问题。基于2000-2015年全国规模以上工业企业的省级面板数据,采用中介效应分析方法,研究税收优惠对企业创新绩效的影响,并运用面板门槛模型对两者之间的非线性关系进行探讨。结果表明:税收优惠一方面可以直接对创新绩效产生正向推动作用,另一方面可以通过研发投入和非研发创新投入发挥部分中介效应,间接提高企业的创新绩效,中介效应值为39.5%,且两者还存在着正向的协同效应。同时这种内在的传导机制存在着区域异质性:对于东部沿海地区而言,研发投入和非研发创新投入同时发挥中介效应;但是对于中西部地区而言,非研发创新投入的中介效应不显著。而且税收优惠对企业创新绩效的促进效果并非一成不变,而是随着研发投入和非研发创新投入的逐渐增加呈递增态势。因此,进一步地加大税收优惠力度的同时,合理规划自主研发和外源技术的资金安排,有利于实现企业创新绩效的最大化。     

家族企业的控制目标、盈利目标与研发投入

以2011—2016年中国沪深两市家族企业为样本,采用二手数据Tobit回归方法,研究了家族企业控制目标和盈利目标的实现与否对研发投入的影响。结果显示:供应商对家族企业的威胁越大,家族企业管理者为了实现控制目标越倾向于增加研发投入;家族企业管理者对盈利目标和控制目标的重视遵循注意力顺序理论,即当盈利目标未实现时,家族企业管理者更关注盈利状况,较少关注控制威胁,因此会减少研发投入;当盈利目标实现后,家族企业管理者才关注控制威胁、增加研发投入;家族企业的资源禀赋优势有助于控制目标的实现。     

R&D, Imperfect Competition and Growth with Human Capital Accumulation

This paper studies the long‐run consequences of imperfect competition on growth and the sectoral distribution of skills within an R&D‐based growth model with human capital accumulation. We find that steady‐state growth is driven only by incentives to accumulate skills. In the model imperfect competition has a positive growth effect, while influencing the allocation of human capital to the different economic activities employing this factor input. Contrary to general wisdom, the share of resources invested in R&D turns out not to be monotonically increasing in the product market power and its correlation with the equilibrium output growth rate is not unambiguous.     

R&D, Human Capital and International Technology Spillovers: A Cross-country Analysis

This paper is based on recent developments in the theory of innovation-driven growth that emphasize both the importance of R&D efforts — domestic as well as foreign — for explaining national productivity, and the complementarity between R&D and human capital investments. Estimates of specifications, in growth terms and in level terms, on a cross-section of OECD countries from the early 1960s to the early 1990s lend strong support to this thesis. The data show a significant influence of both domestic and foreign R&D. Moreover, there is clearly a net positive impact of human capital. The level and growth rate of human capital are shown to affect productivity growth and there is evidence of interaction with the catch-up process.
JEL classification: O 33; O 47     

Technology clubs, R&D and growth patterns: Evidence from EU manufacturing

This paper investigates the forces driving output change in a panel of EU manufacturing industries. A flexible modeling strategy is adopted that accounts for: (i) inefficient use of resources and (ii) differences in the production technology across industries. With our model we are able to identify technical, efficiency, and input growth for endogenously determined technology clubs. Technology club membership is modeled as a function of R&D intensity. This framework allows us to explore the components of output growth in each club, technology spillovers and catch-up issues across industries and countries.     

The Catching-up of Japanese with German Industries: Production Organization, Infrastructure, and R&D

This paper presents an empirical productivity comparison between Japan and Germany, focusing on organization, R&D and infrastructure. Time-series datasets from the auto vehicle and electronic engineering industries are used to demonstrate the reversal in productivity advantage from Germany to Japan at around 1980. It is argued that Japanese productivity gains arose from a better infrastructure and from cost-reducing innovations such as lean production methods. An econometric model determines the causes for the observed differences in the quantities of inputs used. It shows that frequent external procurement in Japanese manufacturing has shifted the factor inputs from labor and capital to materials, a result in line with the philosophy of lean production.     

Imported Technology and R&D in the Taiwanese Electronic Industry

The paper identifies the R&D status of the Taiwanese electronics industry by employing a bivariate probit selectivity model to examine the relationship between imports of technology and inhouse R&D at the firm level. A complementary relationship between imported technology and inhouse R&D is observed, which implies that imported technology does not inhibit inhouse R&D in the Taiwanese electronic industry. However, technology-importing enterprises have a higher average level of R&D expenditure than nonimporting ones, indicating that the R&D conducted in the industry is dominated by the adaptive R&D of the technology-importing enterprises.     

Agricultural Productivity Growth and Escape from the Malthusian Trap

Industrialization allowed the industrialized world of today to escape from the Malthusian regime characterized by low economic and population growth and to enter the post-Malthusian regime of high economic and population growth. To explain the transition between these regimes, we construct a growth model with two consumption goods (an agricultural and a manufacturing good), endogenous fertility, and endogenous technological progress in the manufacturing sector. We show that with an exogenous increase in the growth of agricultural productivity our model is able to replicate stylized facts of the British industrial revolution. The paper concludes by illustrating that our proposed model framework can be extended to include the demographic transition, i.e., a regime in which economic growth is associated with falling fertility.     

Financing R&D in mature companies: An empirical analysis

We study financing patterns of publicly traded R&D-intensive manufacturing firms in Israel. We further characterize R&D-intensive firms by size, physical capital intensity, and whether they issued stocks in the United States, asking whether these features are associated with particular financing patterns. To address these issues, we present, for the first time, adjusted flow of funds charts that treat R&D expenses as a capital outlay (rather than an operating cost that reduces profits, as standard accounting principles prescribe). We also address the question of how R&D inputs should be measured - using R&D expenses or R&D personnel. We construct both expenditure- and personnel-based R&D measures for each firm in our sample, and investigate to what extent these measures are mutually consistent.     

R&D depreciation,stocks, user costs and productivity growth for US R&D intensive industries

This paper estimates R&D depreciation rates for U.S. R&D intensive industries. R&D annually depreciates at; 18% for chemical products, 26% for nonelectrical machinery, 29% for electrical products, and 21% for transportation equipment. These depreciation rates lead to new estimates of the marginal (gross of depreciation) returns to R&D capital; 0.25 for chemical products, 0.31 for nonelectrical machinery, 0.34 for electrical products, and 0.27 for transportation equipment. R&D investment significantly contributed to productivity growth; virtually 100% in chemical products, 55% in nonelectrical machinery, 38 percent in electrical products, and 84% in transportation equipment.     

Assessing the influence of differentiation strategy and R&D subsidies on R&D cooperation

This paper explores the R&D cooperation determinants of the innovative companies belonging to the Spanish manufacturing sector. Our findings suggest that the variable R&D subsidy is endogenous, significant, and has a strong positive influence on R&D cooperation. This is a clear indication that the achievement of public aid is often conditioned by the obligation for companies to cooperate in R&D. We have also found that the differentiation strategy variable is significant and has a negative influence on R&D cooperation. Companies positioned in a differentiation strategy probably own and use some different knowledge from other companies. Consequently, they will not have much interest in taking advantage of the spillovers generated by other companies. It is therefore logical that they are reluctant to establish cooperation agreements on R&D. Therefore, companies positioned in the differentiation strategy need public policies to support R&D that are not conditioned to the establishment of cooperation agreements.     

Market Value, R&D and Intellectual Property: An Empirical Analysis of Large Australian Firms

This paper considers the value of innovation to large Australian firms. Specifically, we investigate how R&D and intellectual property activity influences the market value of firms, using a Tobin's q approach. R&D data are available for the period 1994–96 and data on patent, trade mark and design applications for 1996. The findings suggest that R&D and patent activity are positively and significantly associated with market value. The results also suggest that private returns to R&D in Australia are low by international standards.     

Institutions and the R&D of GM-crops

This paper analyzes how different institutional structures shape the research and development (R&D) of genetically modified crops (GM-crops). Whether this R&D is conducted within companies, cooperatives or public research organizations (both publicly and privately funded R&D) is expected to influence the type of crops and traits that are developed and therefore the effects on society and ecosystems that potentially could follow from the use of GM-crops. This issue is analyzed empirically by statistical analysis of 1323 notifications for field trials with GM-crops that have been submitted under two EU Directives in seven European countries. The results show that the type of R&D organization influences the traits and crops that are developed. Companies are more likely to submit notifications that concern GM-crops that secure the potential for profit than are other types of R&D organizations, while R&D organizations that are purely publicly funded are more likely to submit notifications that only concern biosafety research than are cooperatives and companies. Consideration of the environment, food safety and food security might justify institutional reforms of R&D of GM-crops. This might include increased public funding combined with changes in intellectual property rights.     

Anti-competitive conduct, in-house R&D, and growth

Incumbent firms have two basic possibilities to improve their competitive position in the product market: Investment in R&D and the creation of entry barriers to the disadvantage of potential rivals, e.g. through lobbying activities, campaign contributions, bribes or the adoption of incompatible technologies. This paper proposes a simple oligopoly model which raises the possibility that such anti-competitive conduct and R&D investment are complementary activities for incumbents. Consequently, an institutional framework or technological possibilities which encourage anti-competitive conduct, although impeding entry of potential rivals and accentuating standard oligopoly distortions, may foster R&D-based growth and welfare. However, this outcome is less likely if entrants exert technological spillover effects, e.g. through foreign direct investment. Stronger protection of intellectual property rights, although triggering anti-competitive conduct and thereby impeding market entry as well, is more likely to foster economic growth.     

Spillover, Competition and Better R&D Organization

This paper examines several types of R&D organization, including one noncooperative (independent R&D) form and three cooperative ones (R&D coordination, an R&D consortium and a research joint venture (RJV)). We consider the sharing of both research inputs and outputs in an R&D consortium and an RJV. We show that the superiority of a form of R&D organization cannot be determined uniquely, but should be judged by four parameters. In addition, it is shown that there exist possible mixes of these parameters in which an R&D consortium is superior to either R&D coordination or an RJV in terms of technological improvement and social welfare.
JEL Classification Numbers: L13, L41.