Names, diversity and innovation

Anna Kremer

No 03/21, CEPIE Working Papers from Technische Universität Dresden, Center of Public and International Economics (CEPIE)

Abstract: Diversity of a country is often measured by the amount and spread of nationalities that live there. But also within a country, regions vary in their traditions and culture. Cultural homogeneity within communities is mixed up by (internal) migration, that, like international migration, increases diversity of a place. In a novel approach I therefore look at diversity in German municipality associations measured by different family names and investigate the effect it has on the number of generated patents. I show that cultural diversity and openness of a place affect its economic performance positively in terms of innovation also when referring to intra-country differences.

Keywords: cultural diversity; innovation; openness; phonebook; patents; local level; Germany; kulturelle Diversität; Innovation; Offenheit; Telefonbuch; Patente; lokal; Deutschland (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J61 O1 O31 R12 Z10 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-geo, nep-gro, nep-ino, nep-mig, nep-tid and nep-ure
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:zbw:tudcep:0321

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