The Economics of Intangible Capital
研究无形资产的特性（如非竞争性和有限排他性）如何影响其价值和使用，并解释这些特性如何帮助理解生产率、要素份额、不平等、投资估值、租金与市场势力以及企业融资等宏观与金融趋势。
Intangible assets are a large and growing part of firms’ capital stocks. Intangibles are accumulated via investment—foregoing consumption today for output in the future—but they lack a physical presence. Rather than stopping with this “lack,” we instead focus on the positive properties of intangibles. Specifically, intangibles must be stored, so characteristics of the storage medium have important implications for their value and use. These properties include non-rivalry, allowing the intangible to be used simultaneously in different production streams, and limited excludability, which prevents the firm from capturing all the benefits or rents from the intangible. We develop these ideas in a simple way to illustrate how outcomes such as scalability and distribution of ownership follow. We discuss how intangibles can help to understand important trends in macroeconomics and finance, including productivity, factor shares, inequality, investment and valuation, rents and market power, and firm financing.