R&D subsidies in a model of growth with dynamic market structure

This paper presents the effects of an R&D subsidy in a Schumpeterian general equilibrium model with rich industry dynamics. R&D subsidies raise the long-run growth rate, but they also raise the level of industry concentration. In the model firms compete for market share through process R&D endogenously determining the market structure within and across industries. Endogeneity of the market structure allows for analysis of changes in the moments of the firm size distribution in response to policy. R&D subsidies primarily benefit large incumbent firms who increase their innovation rates creating a greater technological barrier to entry. Concentration increases with fewer firms and a higher variance in the market shares. In general equilibrium, the greater distortions in the product market cause the wage rate to fall which leads to increased turnover rates. In addition, the analysis demonstrates that the model captures a large number of empirical regularities described in the industrial organization literature, but absent from most endogenous growth models. These features, such as entering firms are small relative to incumbents, the hazard rate of exit is negatively related to firm size, and large firms spend more on R&D than small firms play important roles in understanding the impact of R&D subsidies on the economy.     

产业政策中的资金配置:市场力量与政府扶持

产业政策具有重要的国家战略意义,如何有效引导经济资源流向政策支持产业,是产业政策发挥成效的关键.现有相关研究未深入考察经济资源在扶持行业之间及行业内部配置的规律,而且没有综合探讨不同资金配置的关联.文章考察了市场力量与政府扶持两种机制如何引导产业政策下的资金配置.研究发现,产业政策支持的企业获得了更多的债务融资和政府补助.其中,债务融资更多地流向了成长行业中规模较大的企业,政府补助使成长行业中的小规模企业和成熟行业中的大规模企业受益更多.研究结果表明,市场看重企业的增长机会,政府补助则会顾及当前成长性较弱而相对不受市场青睐的企业,对产业政策下的市场化资金配置起到了补充作用.文章的研究为如何协调市场机制和政府扶持两种力量提供了一定的借鉴.     

The Innovation Potential and Thematic Leadership of Austrian Industries: An Interpretation of the Technology Delphi with Regard to the Old Structures/High-performance Paradox

The Austrian Technology Delphi searched for problem-oriented fieldsof potential leadership of Austrian scientists and firms. This study classifies the Delphi results according to standard industry classifications in order to facilitate their use by industrial economists and to propose an explanation of the old structures/high performance paradox. It reveals that expertsawarded the top marks for innovativeness to low- and high-qualification as well as to mainstream and research intensive industries, not to medium qualification and to marketing and labour-intensive ones. This implies that innovation is by no means restricted to high-tech industries and that the standard industry classifications are not well suited to deal with aspects of technology policy. Old structures need not hinder high performance.     

科技资源配置何以促进高技术产业TFP增长——基于29个省域案例的fsQCA分析

高技术产业作为国际经济和科技竞争的重要阵地,对加快科技强国和制造强国建设具有重要战略作用。结合DEA-Malmquist模型和模糊集定性比较分析(fsQCA)方法,以中国内地29个省份高技术产业为样本,探讨科技资源配置规模、配置方式和配置环境对高技术产业TFP增长的组态效应。结果表明,高技术产业TFP增长与科技资源要素投入存在复杂并发因果关系,单个科技资源要素不构成高技术产业高TFP的必要条件;存在两类提升高技术产业TFP的组态路径,即以计划配置、产品开发为核心条件的政府主导型条件组态和以市场配置、R&D人员投入为核心条件的市场主导型条件组态,市场主导型条件组态又包括“市场+研发改造型”“市场+开放合作型”“市场+产学研型”3种类型;中国高技术产业在效率增长和TFP路径等方面呈现出显著的区域差异,但市场资源配置和R&D人员投入在提升高技术产业TFP路径中发挥普遍作用。     

Entry,market turbulence and industry employment growth

This paper investigates the relationship between industrial dynamics in terms of firm entry, market turbulence and employment growth. Do entry of firms, the composition of industry dynamics (net entry) and market turbulence (entry and exit) influence industrial employment growth? This paper provides an empirical investigation, using unique data for 42 disaggregated Swedish industrial sectors during the period 1997–2001. It is hypothesised that the importance of entering firms, net entry and market turbulence may differ significantly across industries. A quantile regression method is used in order to detect industrial differences in the response to industrial employment growth. The empirical evidence shows that, on the one hand, firm entry and market turbulence have a positive effect on employment for fast growing industries and that the effect is larger for high growth industries. On the other hand, the composition of industry dynamics in terms of net entry rates has a more dispersed effect across all industries, even though the effect of net entry is larger for high growth industries.     

Localised Technological Progress And Intra-Sectoral Structures Of Employment

In this paper we put forward a model that explains a firm's employment growth with the degree of technological efficiency and labour costs. To measure efficiency, we use a non-parametric linear programming method. DEA. The results of empirical analysis of 450 firms in 12 manufacturing sectors confirm that innovative firms experience stronger employment growth. Because the demand growth effect of technological leadership outweighs the factor saving effect, firms which m technological leaders are in most cases the creators of jobs. Technologically backward firms, on the other hand, have few options to compensate their demand loss probably caused by deteriorating competitiveness. Consequently, their employment growth is relatively weak. The employment growth additionally depends on the type of factor combination, i.e. the technological trajectory chosen by an individual firm. The trajectory's effects vary significantly across industries. The effect of labour costs is generally negative. However, technologically leading industries are. less sensitive to increases in labour costs than nature industries.     

Firms and industries in evolutionary economics: lessons from Marshall, Young, Steindl and Penrose

Evolutionary economists have tended to assess firms and industries separately, neglecting the role of their interaction in the process of economic growth and development. We trace the separation of firms and industries to the introduction of population thinking in the discipline of industrial economics, including some broadly evolutionary analyses. If researchers conflate a population of firms with an industry, they introduce “thin” means of relating firms to one another and to industries. Despite his device of the ‘representative firm’, Marshall develops “thick” means of relating firms to industries by means of their internal and external organizations. Penrose avoids the notion of industry by focussing on heterogeneous and potentially mobile firms. Young and Steindl develop mundane explanations of firms’ relations within groups and locate the impetus for economic growth in a poorly understood environment. We conclude that evolutionary economists should revisit firms’ boundaries, not in the sense of explaining the existence of firms but in a relating and communicating sense in which boundaries signify the selective means of firms’ relationships.     

Environmental innovation policy and international competition

We consider one polluting industry in an open economy. The national government implements a policy of industrial pollution control, by inducing appropriate technological innovation to reduce toxic emissions. The emission-reducing innovations are developed through firm-specific costly investments. Under different hypotheses on market structure (perfect competition, Bertrand and Cournot oligopoly), international competition forces the national government to subsidize innovation. The appropriate subsidy scheme varies according to the information available to the government and according to market structure. If information is asymmetric, the subsidy must include the information premium necessary to separate different types of firms.     

HIGH‐TECH AND HIGH CAPABILITY IN A GROWTH MODEL*

A growth model is developed to substantiate the conventional wisdom that regards high‐tech high‐capability firms as an engine of sustained technological progress. High‐tech industries are characterized by abounding technological opportunities, which promote endogenous high capability firms due to a competitive escalation mechanism. While high‐tech high‐capability firms capitalize on and discharge the existing innovation potentials, they also contribute to recharge (due to knowledge spillovers). They are a source of growth and high wage rate. An inquiry into the reasons why the high‐tech/high‐capability growth mechanism is not widely adoptable across countries points to the role of the underlying corporate governance systems.     

Productivity growth from an international trade perspective

This paper presents a framework to assess the relative importance of three key sources of productivity growth that international trade research focuses on: (1) inter‐industry specialization; (2) intra‐industry reallocation of resources across heterogeneous firms; and (3) technological progress. We illustrate how to apply the framework by deciphering the productivity dynamics of the Swiss manufacturing industry. We find that intra‐industry reallocations are the most important source of growth in aggregate total factor productivity, spurred by the productivity growth of large, incumbent firms and the entry of new firms. Inter‐industry specialization and general technological progress, nevertheless, remain important supplementary sources of productivity growth.     

The Role of Firms' Collaborative Agreements in the Information Technology Industry Transformation

While most articles on firm partnerships focus on the firm, the alliance or networks, we investigate the role of collaborative agreements during industrial transformation phases. Observation of a single industry, the Information Technology (IT) industry, shows that the growth of collaborative agreements formed by industry leaders in the early 1990s can be interpreted as an attempt to absorb a major industry shock characterized by vertical disintegration and the emergence of 'divided technical leadership'. Such firms have adopted collaborative agreements to maintain their leadership by controlling new entrants in the new industry segments that have resulted from the disintegration. Partnerships became a strategic component of the new 'divided technical leadership' market structure that emerged from the competitive crash of the early 1990s.     

Micro evidence on international patenting

Globalization, high growth rates in high-tech industries, growing emerging markets and harmonization of patent institutions across countries have stimulated patenting in foreign markets. We use a simple model of international patenting, where the decision to patent in a foreign country depends on country characteristics and the quality of the patented invention. With access to a detailed database on individual patents owned by small Swedish firms and inventors, we are able to estimate some of these relationships and test their validity. Our results indicate that the propensity to apply for international patent protection increases with indicators of the quality of the invention, technological rivalry and market size in the host market.     

External economies as a mechanism of agglomeration in EU manufacturing

Productive externalities are significant determinants of agglomeration, not deeply studied at the industry and international level. We analyse the impact on productivity growth of technological externalities, both inter- and intraindustry, national or international, at the industry level for the EU countries and the period 1995–2002. The results confirm the advisability of considering international externalities when countries are taken as regions, whose omission underestimates national spillovers. Together with national endowments and a central geographical position, the growth of productivity is encouraged by national and international specialization as a general result; moreover, it is fuelled by stronger interindustry spillovers and productive diversification, a result more evident for high technology industries, while lower technology industries are more sensitive to the omission of international externalities. Economic integration seems to be relevant, because supranational regions with less friction for goods and factor movements are more likely to take advantage of external economies as a mechanism of productivity growth and agglomeration.     

人工智能对制造企业是否存在“生产率悖论”

在新一轮科技变革和产业革命背景下,人工智能已深度融入国民经济各产业,成为产业发展的重要驱动力。人工智能能否促进制造企业生产率提升,已成为新时代中国制造业高质量发展的关键。利用2015—2017年中国A股制造业上市公司相关数据,实证检验人工智能对制造企业生产率的影响,构建基于结构方程的多重中介效应模型,分析制造企业应用人工智能技术影响生产率的内在机制及路径。研究发现,人工智能提升了制造企业生产率;市场份额对人工智能与制造企业生产率的关系有显著负向调节作用;人工智能通过劳动力数量、物质资本使用效率和技术创新产出3种中介变量显著促进企业生产率提升,并通过人力资本使用效率和技术创新投入抑制企业生产率提升。     

Competition, Imitation and Growth with Step-by-Step Innovation

Is more intense product market competition and imitation good or bad for growth? This question is addressed in the context of an endogenous growth model with "step-by-step" innovations, in which technological laggards must first catch up with the leading-edge technology before battling for technological leadership in the future. In contrast to earlier Schumpeterian models in which innovations are always made by outsider firms who earn no rents if they fail to innovate and become monopolies if they do innovate, here we find: first, that the usual Schumpeterian effect of more intense product market competition (PMC) is almost always outweighed by the increased incentive for firms to innovate in order to escape competition, so that PMC has a positive effect on growth; second, that a little imitation is almost always growth-enhancing, as it promotes more frequent neck-and-neck competition, but too much imitation is unambiguously growth-reducing. The model thus points to complementary roles for competition (anti-trust) policy and patent policy.     

DISAGGREGATING FIRMS IN ANALYSING THE COSTS AND BENEFITS OF THE UNIVERSITY–INDUSTRY RELATIONSHIP: BASED ON AN ANALYTICAL AND EMPIRICAL STUDY FROM SCOTLAND

It has been acknowledged that universities are key institutions in national and regional systems of innovation. This recognition has led to a rich stream of literature analysing the university–industry relationship. However, relatively little attention has been devoted to disaggregating the ‘industry’ side of this relationship and examining the costs and benefits to the disaggregated parties involved. In the present article, which draws on an analytical and empirical study from Scotland, it is suggested that it makes sense to distinguish between three kinds of firms in analysing the university–industry relationship: large national and international R&D-intensive firms, university spin-out firms, and established small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) that have had little interaction with universities. The different costs and benefits facing these firms in their interactions with universities are analysed. It is concluded that the established SMEs confront relatively high costs in relating to universities. Finally, the policy implications are explored.     

经济政策不确定性与企业退出决策:理论与实证研究

经济政策影响微观企业经营是现有研究的共识.在已有文献基础上,文章考察了经济政策不确定性对企业退出决策的影响.文章基于一个代表性企业最优退出决策的框架,构建了经济政策不确定性影响企业退出决策作用机制的理论模型,并利用1998?2011年中国工业企业微观数据对理论模型进行了实证检验.研究结果显示,经济政策不确定性通过增加市场预期收益的机制降低了企业的退出概率,即面对高水平的经济政策不确定性时,企业对未来市场形成了良好的预期,倾向于采取理性的"延迟退出"决策.进一步分析发现,企业退出决策的"延迟现象"在不同企业、行业和区域间呈现出异质性,经济政策不确定性更多地延迟了具有优越发展前景的企业、行业及区域的市场退出.从企业方面来看,这一现象在规模小、跨产业经营、出口、政府补贴的企业及创新企业中更加显著;从行业方面来看,这一现象在资金技术密集型的行业及生产率高的行业中更加显著;从区域来看,这一现象在市场化程度高的区域及经济增长快的区域更加显著.可见,政府的经济政策变动,不仅引导了企业制定理性的战略决策,而且激励了优势资源和市场的持续发展.     

培育经济发展新动能的技术、产业、政策机理研究

伴随着国际、国内经济形势发生深刻变化，我国经济过去主要依靠投资、劳动力、自然资源投入的粗放型发展模式已经难以为继，急需培育促进经济实现高质量发展的新动能。现有成果主要围绕技术基础、产业载体及政策制度等培育经济发展新动能的丰富内涵和多样化模式展开，针对内在机理的探讨较少。从新兴技术对产业结构优化起基础支撑作用、新兴产业载体释放经济新动能、市场与政府相结合的政策制度助力经济高质量发展三大维度论述基本原理，系统梳理新兴技术聚合迸发新动能、传统产业升级培育新动能以及政策制度创新生成新动能3种主要模式。最后，提出以推动技术引领发展、促进产业调整升级和出台政策“靶向支撑”为核心的“创新链-产业链-政策链”对策建议。     

Advertising Subsidy and International Oligopolistic Competition

This paper examines the strategic role of advertising subsidies in a third‐country trade model in which two firms located in different countries export their products to a third country. First a basic model of advertising in oligopolistic industries is developed in which firms decide how much to invest in either predatory or cooperative advertising and then engage in product market competition either as Cournot competitors or as Bertrand competitors. It is shown that firms invest in only one form of advertising; which form they invest in depends on the relative effectiveness of the two types of advertising, the degree of product differentiation, and the form of product market competition. The paper then studies strategic industrial policy and shows that an advertising subsidy is the optimal strategic policy irrespective of the form of product market competition and the form of advertising in which firms invest.     

对外直接投资逆向技术溢出的行业内与行业间路径检验——基于对空间计量方法的嫁接

创造性地对空间计量经济学中的空间相关性思想进行嫁接利用,在思路方法上进行开拓,构建反映同行业内企业间相互联系与各行业间相互关联的空间权重矩阵,建立空间杜宾模型,并以制造业为例,对ODI逆向技术溢出效应的行业内和行业间路径进行实证检验。对行业内路径的检验表明,企业全要素生产率受到同行业内其它企业ODI活动的影响,行业内企业通过ODI促进自身技术进步之后,又通过企业间各种竞争合作关系促进同行业其它企业生产率提高,行业内路径由此得以验证。对行业间路径的检验表明,各行业通过ODI促进本行业技术进步之后,又通过行业间前向与后向产业关联,对其它关联行业的技术进步和生产率提高起到促进作用,且产业完全关联下的促进作用大于直接关联,由此行业间路径得以验证。