THE ROLE OF SUNK COSTS IN THE DECISION TO INVEST IN R&D*
研究了沉没成本如何影响企业研发投资决策，发现研发历史对当前决策有显著影响，且大型高科技企业的沉没成本更高。
We present a dynamic empirical model of a firm's R&D decisions that is consistent with the existence of sunk R&D costs, taking into account that these costs may differ between small and large firms, and among different technological regimes. We estimate a multivariate dynamic discrete choice model using firm‐level data of Spanish manufacturing for 1990–2000. Conditional on firm heterogeneity and serially correlated unobservable factors, we find that R&D history matters. This true state dependence allows inferring the existence of sunk R&D costs associated with performing R&D. Sunk R&D costs are found to be higher for large, high‐tech firms.