Productivity of and Returns to Knowledge Investments

Åke E Andersson ()
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Åke E Andersson: CESIS - Centre of Excellence for Science and Innovation Studies, Royal Institute of Technology, Postal: CESIS - Centre of Excellence for Science and Innovation Studies, Royal Institute of Technology, SE-100 44 Stockholm, Sweden

No 165, Working Paper Series in Economics and Institutions of Innovation from Royal Institute of Technology, CESIS - Centre of Excellence for Science and Innovation Studies

Abstract: Information and knowledge are essential to the decision making of firms. However, information is a primitive in the formation of knowledge. Information and the related concepts of risk and surprise are primarily of importance for rational decision making while knowledge is a form of (non-material) capital to be used as a resource in the transformation of different inputs into valuable outputs. Knowledge can be embodied in educated labor, in material capital, as patented production recipes or as contents of publically available documents and other media. In the paper optimality aspects of the acquisition of knowledge capital is analyzed. Estimates of private and public returns to investments in knowledge are reported. Some economic consequences of frictions over time and space are analyzed and new models containing such frictions are proposed.

Keywords: productivity; growth; knowledge; R&D; returns to R&D; returns to knowledge (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O11 O31 O33 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-ino and nep-knm
Date: 2009-01-28
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Persistent link: http://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:hhs:cesisp:0165

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