IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/cdl/bphupl/qt1wd73461.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Agglomeration and the Spatial Distribution of Creativity

Author

Listed:
  • Andersson, Roland
  • Quigley, John M.
  • Wilhelmsson, Mats

Abstract

This article analyses the spatial distribution of "creativity" - the production of new knowledge. We analyse commercial patents granted in Sweden between 1994 and 2001 using a panel of 100 labour market areas that encompass the entire country. We relate patent activity to measures of localisation and urbanisation, to the industrial composition and size distribution of firms, and to the regional distribution of human capital. Our analysis confirms the importance of human capital and research facilities in stimulating regional patent output. Our results document the importance of agglomeration and spatial factors in influencing creativity: patent activity is increased in larger and more dense labour markets and in regions in which a larger fraction of the labour force is employed in medium-sized firms. Our results also indicate that creativity is greater in labour markets with more diverse employment bases and in those which contain a larger share of national employment in certain industries, thus confirming the importance of urbanisation and localisation economies in stimulating creativity. Our quantitative results suggest that the urbanisation of Sweden during the 1990s had an important effect upon the aggregate level of patent activity in the country, leading to increases of up to 15 percent in aggregate patents.

Suggested Citation

  • Andersson, Roland & Quigley, John M. & Wilhelmsson, Mats, 2005. "Agglomeration and the Spatial Distribution of Creativity," Berkeley Program on Housing and Urban Policy, Working Paper Series qt1wd73461, Berkeley Program on Housing and Urban Policy.
    • Handle: RePEc:cdl:bphupl:qt1wd73461
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.escholarship.org/uc/item/1wd73461.pdf;origin=repeccitec
    Download Restriction: no

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Romer, Paul M, 1986. "Increasing Returns and Long-run Growth," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 94(5), pages 1002-1037, October.
    2. John E. Wagner & Steven C. Deller, 1998. "Measuring the Effects of Economic Diversity on Growth and Stability," Land Economics, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 74(4), pages 541-556.
    3. Grossman, Gene M & Helpman, Elhanan, 1989. "Product Development and International Trade," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 97(6), pages 1261-1283, December.
    4. Stuart S. Rosenthal & William C. Strange, 2003. "Geography, Industrial Organization, and Agglomeration," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 85(2), pages 377-393, May.
    5. Roland Andersson & John M. Quigley & Mats Wilhelmson, 2004. "University decentralization as regional policy: the Swedish experiment," Journal of Economic Geography, Oxford University Press, vol. 4(4), pages 371-388, August.
    6. Adam B. Jaffe & Manuel Trajtenberg & Rebecca Henderson, 1993. "Geographic Localization of Knowledge Spillovers as Evidenced by Patent Citations," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 108(3), pages 577-598.
    7. Adam B. Jaffe & Manuel Trajtenberg, 2005. "Patents, Citations, and Innovations: A Window on the Knowledge Economy," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 026260065x.
    8. repec:fth:harver:1473 is not listed on IDEAS
    9. Manfred M. Fischer & Attila Varga, 2003. "Spatial knowledge spillovers and university research: Evidence from Austria," The Annals of Regional Science, Springer;Western Regional Science Association, vol. 37(2), pages 303-322, May.
    10. Henderson, Vernon & Kuncoro, Ari & Turner, Matt, 1995. "Industrial Development in Cities," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 103(5), pages 1067-1090, October.
    11. Rosenthal, Stuart S. & Strange, William C., 2001. "The Determinants of Agglomeration," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 50(2), pages 191-229, September.
    12. Zvi Griliches, 1998. "Patent Statistics as Economic Indicators: A Survey," NBER Chapters, in: R&D and Productivity: The Econometric Evidence, pages 287-343, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    13. Audretsch, David B & Feldman, Maryann P, 1996. "R&D Spillovers and the Geography of Innovation and Production," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 86(3), pages 630-640, June.
    14. Anselin, Luc & Varga, Attila & Acs, Zoltan, 1997. "Local Geographic Spillovers between University Research and High Technology Innovations," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 42(3), pages 422-448, November.
    15. Krugman, Paul, 1991. "Increasing Returns and Economic Geography," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 99(3), pages 483-499, June.
    16. Jaffe, Adam B, 1989. "Real Effects of Academic Research," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 79(5), pages 957-970, December.
    17. Glaeser, Edward L & Hedi D. Kallal & Jose A. Scheinkman & Andrei Shleifer, 1992. "Growth in Cities," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 100(6), pages 1126-1152, December.
      • Edward L. Glaeser & Hedi D. Kallal & Jose A. Scheinkman & Andrei Shleifer, 1991. "Growth in Cities," NBER Working Papers 3787, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
      • Glaeser, Edward Ludwig & Kallal, Hedi D. & Scheinkman, Jose A. & Shleifer, Andrei, 1992. "Growth in Cities," Scholarly Articles 3451309, Harvard University Department of Economics.
    18. Rauch James E., 1993. "Productivity Gains from Geographic Concentration of Human Capital: Evidence from the Cities," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 34(3), pages 380-400, November.
    19. Roland Andersson, 2005. "The efficiency of Swedish regional policy," The Annals of Regional Science, Springer;Western Regional Science Association, vol. 39(4), pages 811-832, December.
    20. Paul Krugman, 1998. "Space: The Final Frontier," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 12(2), pages 161-174, Spring.
    21. Zoltán J. Ács, 2002. "Innovation and the Growth of Cities," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 2656, April.
    22. Acs, Zoltan J. & Anselin, Luc & Varga, Attila, 2002. "Patents and innovation counts as measures of regional production of new knowledge," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 31(7), pages 1069-1085, September.
    23. Lucas, Robert Jr., 1988. "On the mechanics of economic development," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 22(1), pages 3-42, July.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Agglomeration;

    JEL classification:

    • N34 - Economic History - - Labor and Consumers, Demography, Education, Health, Welfare, Income, Wealth, Religion, and Philanthropy - - - Europe: 1913-
    • O31 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Innovation and Invention: Processes and Incentives
    • R11 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - General Regional Economics - - - Regional Economic Activity: Growth, Development, Environmental Issues, and Changes

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:cdl:bphupl:qt1wd73461. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: (Lisa Schiff). General contact details of provider: http://edirc.repec.org/data/ibbrkus.html .

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service hosted by the Research Division of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis . RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.