TY  - RPRT
        AU  - Castellani, Davide
AU  - Piva, Mariacristina
AU  - Schubert, Torben
AU  - Vivarelli, Marco
        TI  - The Productivity Impact of R&D Investment: A Comparison between the EU and the US
        PY  - 2016/May/
        PB  - Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)
        CY  - Bonn
        T2  - IZA Discussion Paper
        IS  - 9937
        UR  - https://www.iza.org/publications/dp9937
        AB  - Using data on the US and EU top R&D spenders from 2004 until 2012, this paper investigates the sources of the US/EU productivity gap. We find robust evidence that US firms have a higher capacity to translate R&D into productivity gains (especially in the high-tech industries), and this contributes to explaining the higher productivity of US firms. Conversely, EU firms are more likely to achieve productivity gains through capital-embodied technological change at least in medium and low-tech sectors. Our results also show that the US/EU productivity gap has worsened during the crisis period, as the EU companies have been more affected by the economic crisis in their capacity to translate R&D investments into productivity. Based on these findings, we make a case for a learning-based and selective R&D funding, which – instead of purely aiming at stimulating higher R&D expenditures – works on improving the firms' capabilities to transform R&D into productivity gains.
        KW  - R&D
KW  - productivity
KW  - economic crisis
KW  - US
KW  - EU
        ER  -