Human capital, trade flows and technology balance
Ανθρώπινο δυναμικό, εμπορικές ροές και ισοζύγιο τεχνολογίας
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Ανθρώπινο δυναμικό ; Εμπορικές ροές ; Ισοζύγιο τεχνολογίαςAbstract
This dissertation aims to evaluate the following topics and issues. Chapter 1 introduces the topic of patents and knowledge spillovers. One of the most challenging issues in the recent literature on innovation has been related to the “geography of innovation” or “spatial clustering of innovations”. The relationship between technology and geography is a topic of growing interest in both economics and regional science. The main questions are the extent that knowledge spillovers (knowledge externalities) are geographically localized and their impact on the innovative performance of regions. Chapter 2 shows that patents, industrial and university research, and human capital in firms have similar patterns of spatial correlation. Actually, they suggest that research conducted by firms and universities has a strong effect on the count of product patents observed in USA. This finding suggests local knowledge transfers. In addition to searching for evidence of local knowledge effects, the spatial extent of these effects gets particular attention in this chapter. Chapter 3 examines how the spatial concentration of innovation activity shapes the production of innovation in the US states. We augment the standard knowledge production function with a structure that allows for spatial effects, income effects and trade effects. We account not only for bilateral influences, but also for effects from the rest of the states in technology production. In doing so, we avoid overestimating the effect of local and external technological knowledge in producing local technological products. Chapter 4 summarizes the results.