The standard view of U.S. technological history is that the locus of invention shifted during the early twentieth century to large firms whose in-house research laboratories were superior sites for advancing the complex technologies of the second industrial revolution. In recent years this view has been subject to increasing criticism. At the same time, new research on equity markets during the early twentieth century suggests that smaller, more entrepreneurial enterprises were finding it easier to gain financial backing for technological discovery. We use data on the assignment (sale or transfer) of patents to explore the extent to which, and how, inventive activity was reorganized during this period. We find that two alternative modes of technological discovery developed in parallel during the early twentieth century. The first, concentrated in the Middle Atlantic region, centered on large firms with in-house R&D labs and superior access to the region’s rapidly growing equity markets. The other, located mainly in the East North Central region, consisted of smaller, more entrepreneurial enterprises that drew primarily on local sources of funds. Both modes seem to have made roughly equivalent contributions to technological change through the 1920s. The subsequent dominance of large firms seems to have been propelled by a differential access to capital during the Great Depression that was subsequently reinforced by the regulatory and military procurement policies of the federal government.
Download Info
To download:
If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the
proper application to
view it first. Information about this may be contained
in the File-Format links below. In case of further problems read
the IDEAS help
page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS
site. Please be patient as the files may be large.
As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version under "Related research" (further below) or search for a different version of it.
Publisher Info
Paper provided by National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc in its series NBER Working Papers with number
15440.
Length: Date of creation: Oct 2009 Date of revision: Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:15440
Note: DAE Contact details of provider: Postal: National Bureau of Economic Research, 1050 Massachusetts Avenue Cambridge, MA 02138, U.S.A. Phone: 617-868-3900 Email: Web page: http://www.nber.org More information through EDIRC
For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its listing, contact: ().
Related research
Keywords:
Other versions of this item:
Find related papers by JEL classification: N0 - Economic History - - General O3 - Economic Development, Technological Change, and Growth - - Technological Change
This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:
References listed on IDEAS Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.: