Does Human Capital Homogeneously Improve the Corporate Innovation: Evidence from China’s Higher Education Expansion in the Late 1990s

Meiling Kang, Yucheng Li, Zhongkuang Zhao, Minjuan Zheng and Han Wu ()
Additional contact information
Meiling Kang: Department of World Economy, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430072, China
Yucheng Li: Department of World Economy, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430072, China
Zhongkuang Zhao: Department of World Economy, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430072, China
Minjuan Zheng: Department of World Economy, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430072, China
Han Wu: State Grid Nanchang County Electric Power Supply Company, Nanchang 330200, China

Sustainability, 2022, vol. 14, issue 19, 1-19

Abstract: The effect of human capital on corporate innovation varies with the distribution of human capital intensity among industries. To analyze this heterogenous effect, we utilized the variation of college enrollment expansion across different regions in China as an exogenous human capital shock. Using a sample of Chinese industrial enterprises from 1998 to 2008 and the difference-in-difference strategy, we found that industries with intensive human capital significantly increase the number of patent applications after the expansion policy. The effect is pronounced in invention patents and significantly positive in exporting and capital-intensive corporates. As for the channels, corporates in these industries are apt to adopt new technologies and increase R&D expenditures. Moreover, the agglomeration of new graduates accelerates knowledge spillover, thus promoting innovation in knowledge-intensive industries. In sum, this paper verifies the importance of policy intervention on skilled labor supply towards corporate innovation and supports the talent introduction plan of local government in China.

Keywords: college expansion; corporate innovation; heterogenous industry; R&D expenditure; agglomeration (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/14/19/12352/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/14/19/12352/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:14:y:2022:i:19:p:12352-:d:927984

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().