Induced Automation Innovation: Evidence from Firm-Level Patent Data
利用企业专利数据识别自动化专利，发现低技能工资上涨会显著增加自动化创新（弹性为2-5），而德国哈茨改革则减少了外国企业的自动化创新。
Do higher wages induce more automation innovation? We identify automation patents in machinery. We show that a higher automation intensity predicts a decline in routine tasks across US sectors. Then, we estimate how innovating firms respond to changes in their downstream firms’ low- and high-skill wages. We compute these wages by combining macroeconomic data on 41 countries with innovating firms’ global market exposure. Higher low-skill wages increase automation innovation (but not other machinery innovation), with an elasticity of 2–5. Finally, we show that the German Hartz labor market reforms reduced automation innovations by foreign firms more exposed to Germany.