Are Inventors or Firms the Engines of Innovation?
利用美国37年专利数据，发现发明家的人力资本对创新产出差异的解释力比企业能力高5-10倍，且高才能发明家倾向于流向企业创新能力弱但聚集其他高才能发明家的企业。
In this study, we empirically assess the contributions of inventors and firms for innovation using a 37-year panel of U.S. patenting activity. We estimate that inventors’ human capital is 5–10 times more important than firm capabilities for explaining the variance in inventor output. We then examine matching between inventors and firms and find highly talented inventors are attracted to firms that (i) have weak firm-specific invention capabilities and (ii) employ other talented inventors. A theoretical model that incorporates worker preferences for inventive output rationalizes our empirical findings of negative assortative matching between inventors and firms and positive assortative matching among inventors. This paper was accepted by Ashish Arora, entrepreneurship and innovation.