Boosting, Sorting, and Complexity. Urban Scaling of Innovation Around the World

Tom Broekel (), Louis Knupling and Lars Mewes

No 2308, Papers in Evolutionary Economic Geography (PEEG) from Utrecht University, Department of Human Geography and Spatial Planning, Group Economic Geography

Abstract: It is widely understood that innovations tend to be concentrated in cities, which is evidenced by innovative output increasing disproportionately with city size. Yet, given the heterogeneity of countries and technologies, few studies explore the relationship between population and innovation numbers. For instance, in the USA, innovative output scaling is substantial and is particularly pronounced for complex technologies. Whether this is a universal pattern of complex technologies and a potential facilitator of scaling, is unknown. Our analysis compared urban scaling in urban areas across 33 countries and 569 technologies. Considerable variation was identified between countries, which is rooted in two fundamental mechanisms (sorting and boosting). The sorting of innovation-intensive technologies is found to drive larger innovation counts among cities. Among most countries, this mechanism contributes to scaling more than city size boosting innovation within specific technologies. While complex technologies are concentrated in large cities and benefit from the advantages of urbanization, their contribution to the urban scaling of innovations is limited.

Keywords: innovation; urban scaling; complexity; patents; sorting; geography of innovation (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O18 O33 O57 R12 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023-03, Revised 2023-03
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-des, nep-geo, nep-ino, nep-sbm, nep-tid and nep-ure
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

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Journal Article: Boosting, sorting and complexity—urban scaling of innovation around the world (2023)
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