Free Movement of Inventors: Open-Border Policy and Innovation in Switzerland
研究了1999年瑞士与欧盟签署的人员自由流动协议对创新的影响，发现该协议增加了靠近边境地区的专利申请，且未挤兑本地发明者，反而通过合作提升了其生产率。
Abstract We study the innovation effects of the Agreement on the Free Movement of Persons, signed by Switzerland and the European Union in 1999. We exploit a quasi-experimental setting created by Switzerland’s implementation of the treaty, which initially eased entry restrictions only for commuters from neighboring countries, thereby inducing a large inflow of “cross-border inventors” in regions close to the border. We find that the treaty increased patenting in such regions relative to comparable ones farther away from the border. We find no evidence indicating the displacement of native inventors or a reduction in the patenting activity of Switzerland’s neighboring countries. We also find that incumbent inventors in regions next to the border increased their productivity, thanks to patents in collaboration with cross-border inventors. We provide evidence suggesting that cross-border inventors contributed to Swiss patenting by enabling R&D laboratories to enlarge, albeit without increasing the productivity of local peers outside direct collaborations.