A note on the drivers of R&D intensity

Azèle Mathieu and Bruno van Pottelsberghe de la Potterie

No 08-002.RS, Working Papers CEB from Université Libre de Bruxelles, Solvay Brussels School of Economics and Management, Centre Emile Bernheim (CEB)

Abstract: The objective of this paper is to evaluate the extent to which technological specialization influences the observed R&D intensity of countries, and hence would bias the well-known country rankings that consist in comparing aggregate R&D intensity. The econometric analysis performed on a cross-country cross-industry panel dataset (21 industrial sectors, 10 countries, from 1991 to 2002) suggests that accounting for the technological specialization of countries drastically reduces the differences in relative R&D efforts observed at the country level. The only exception is Sweden (and the USA, but to a lower extent), which has an ‘above-than-average’ R&D intensity in most industries. Countries like Finland, Japan or Germany do not have an R&D intensity that is particularly higher than their industrial structure would predict.

Keywords: R&D intensity; S&T policies; high-tech industries (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: E22 O31 O57 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-ino and nep-mac
Date: 2008-01
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http://www.solvay.edu/EN/Research/Bernheim/documents/wp08002.pdf First version, 2008 (application/pdf)

Related works:
Working Paper: A Note on The Drivers of R&D Intensity (2008)
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Persistent link: http://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sol:wpaper:08-002

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