More than an Ivory Tower: The Impact of Research Institutions on the Quantity and Quality of Entrepreneurship

Valentina Tartari and Scott Stern

No 28846, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: This paper provides systematic empirical evidence for the distinctive role of universities on local entrepreneurial ecosystems. Assessing the impact of research institutions on entrepreneurship is challenging, given that these institutions are often located in economic and innovation environments conducive to growth-oriented entrepreneurial activity, are themselves a source of local demand, and produce knowledge, which might serve as the foundation for new ventures. To overcome this inference challenge, we first combine comprehensive business registration records with a predictive analytics approach to measure both the quantity and quality-adjusted quantity of entrepreneurship at the zip-code level on an annual basis. We then link each location to the presence or absence of research-oriented universities or national laboratories. Finally, we exploit significant changes over time in Federal commitments to both universities and national laboratories. Our key finding is that changes in Federal research commitments to universities are uniquely linked to positively correlated changes in the quality-adjusted quantity of entrepreneurship. In contrast, increases in non-research funding to universities and funding to national laboratories is associated with either a neutral or negative impact on the quality-adjusted quantity of entrepreneurship. Research funding to universities seems to play a unique role in promoting the acceleration of local entrepreneurial ecosystems.

JEL-codes: L26 O3 R12 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021-05
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cse, nep-ino, nep-sbm and nep-ure
Note: PR
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.nber.org/papers/w28846.pdf (application/pdf)

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:nbr:nberwo:28846

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from
http://www.nber.org/papers/w28846

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc National Bureau of Economic Research, 1050 Massachusetts Avenue Cambridge, MA 02138, U.S.A.. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by ().