IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/dsc/wpaper/4.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Direction and Intensity of Technical Change: a Micro Model

Author

Listed:
  • Luca Zamparelli

Abstract

This paper develops a growth model combining elements of endogenous growth and induced innovation literatures. In a standard induced innovation model firms select at no cost innovations from an innovation possibilities frontier describing the trade-off between increasing capital or labor productivity. The model proposed allows firms to choose not only the direction but also the size of innovation by representing the innovation possibilities through a cost function of capital and labor augmenting innovations. By so doing, it provides a micro-foundation both of the intensity and of the direction of technical change. The policy analysis implies that an increase in subsidies to R&D as opposed to capital accumulation raises per capita steady state growth, employment rate and wage share.

Suggested Citation

  • Luca Zamparelli, 2009. "Direction and Intensity of Technical Change: a Micro Model," Working Papers 4, Doctoral School of Economics, Sapienza University of Rome.
    • Handle: RePEc:dsc:wpaper:4
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://phdschool-economics.dse.uniroma1.it/website/workingpapers/zamparelliWP4.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Shah, Anup & Desai, Meghnad, 1981. "Growth Cycles with Induced Technical Change," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 91(364), pages 1006-1010, December.
    2. Aghion, Philippe & Howitt, Peter, 1992. "A Model of Growth through Creative Destruction," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 60(2), pages 323-351, March.
    3. Bester, Helmut & Petrakis, Emmanuel, 2003. "Wages and productivity growth in a competitive industry," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 109(1), pages 52-69, March.
    4. Robert J. Gordon, 2000. "Interpreting the "One Big Wave" in U.S. Long-Term Productivity Growth," NBER Working Papers 7752, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    5. Hellwig, Martin & Irmen, Andreas, 2001. "Endogenous Technical Change in a Competitive Economy," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 101(1), pages 1-39, November.
    6. A. J. Julius, 2005. "Steady‐State Growth And Distribution With An Endogenous Direction Of Technical Change," Metroeconomica, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 56(1), pages 101-125, February.
    7. Frank Thompson, 1995. "Technical Change, Accumulation and the Rate of Profit," Review of Radical Political Economics, Union for Radical Political Economics, vol. 27(1), pages 97-126, March.
    8. Robert J. Gordon, 1991. "Productivity, Wages, and Prices Inside and Outside of Manufacturing in the U.S., Japan, and Europe," NBER Chapters, in: International Volatility and Economic Growth: The First Ten Years of The International Seminar on Macroeconomics, pages 153-207, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    9. Thomas Michl, 1999. "Biased Technical Change and the Aggregate Production Function," International Review of Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 13(2), pages 193-206.
    10. Foley, Duncan K., 2003. "Endogenous technical change with externalities in a classical growth model," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 52(2), pages 167-189, October.
    11. Romer, Paul M, 1987. "Growth Based on Increasing Returns Due to Specialization," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 77(2), pages 56-62, May.
    12. van der Ploeg, F., 1987. "Growth cycles, induced technical change, and perpetual conflict over the distribution of income," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 9(1), pages 1-12.
    13. Daron Acemoglu, 2002. "Directed Technical Change," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 69(4), pages 781-809.
    14. Irmen, Andreas, 2005. "Extensive and intensive growth in a neoclassical framework," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 29(8), pages 1427-1448, August.
    15. Daron Acemoglu, 2003. "Labor- And Capital-Augmenting Technical Change," Journal of the European Economic Association, MIT Press, vol. 1(1), pages 1-37, March.
    16. F. A. Lutz, 1961. "The Theory of Capital," International Economic Association Series, Palgrave Macmillan, number 978-1-349-08452-4 edited by D. C. Hague, December.
    17. Nelson H. Barbosa‐Filho & Lance Taylor, 2006. "Distributive And Demand Cycles In The Us Economy—A Structuralist Goodwin Model," Metroeconomica, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 57(3), pages 389-411, July.
    18. Funk, Peter, 2002. "Induced Innovation Revisited," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 69(273), pages 155-171, February.
    19. Nicholas Kaldor, 1961. "Capital Accumulation and Economic Growth," International Economic Association Series, in: D. C. Hague (ed.), The Theory of Capital, chapter 0, pages 177-222, Palgrave Macmillan.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. zamparelli, luca, 2008. "Direction and intensity of technical change: a micro-founded growth model," MPRA Paper 10843, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    2. Ekaterina Ponomareva & Alexandra Bozhechkova & Alexandr Knobel, 2012. "Factors of Economic Growth," Published Papers 172, Gaidar Institute for Economic Policy, revised 2013.
    3. Daniele Tavani, 2013. "Bargaining over productivity and wages when technical change is induced: implications for growth, distribution, and employment," Journal of Economics, Springer, vol. 109(3), pages 207-244, July.
    4. Luca Zamparelli, 2015. "Induced Innovation, Endogenous Technical Change and Income Distribution in a Labor-Constrained Model of Classical Growth," Metroeconomica, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 66(2), pages 243-262, May.
    5. Zamparelli, Luca, 2024. "On the positive relation between the wage share and labor productivity growth with endogenous size and direction of technical change," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 131(C).
    6. Joao Paulo A. de Souza, 2014. "Real wages and labor-saving technical change: evidence from a panel of manufacturing industries in mature and labor-surplus economies," UMASS Amherst Economics Working Papers 2014-03, University of Massachusetts Amherst, Department of Economics.
    7. Tavani, Daniele, 2012. "Wage bargaining and induced technical change in a linear economy: Model and application to the US (1963–2003)," Structural Change and Economic Dynamics, Elsevier, vol. 23(2), pages 117-126.
    8. Daniele Tavani & Luca Zamparelli, 2017. "Endogenous Technical Change In Alternative Theories Of Growth And Distribution," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 31(5), pages 1272-1303, December.
    9. Marwil J. Dávila-Fernández, 2018. "Alternative Approaches to Technological Change when Growth is BoPC," Department of Economics University of Siena 795, Department of Economics, University of Siena.
    10. Tavani, Daniele & Zamparelli, Luca, 2021. "Labor-augmenting technical change and the wage share: New microeconomic foundations," Structural Change and Economic Dynamics, Elsevier, vol. 56(C), pages 27-34.
    11. Irmen, Andreas & Tabaković, Amer, 2017. "Endogenous capital- and labor-augmenting technical change in the neoclassical growth model," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 170(C), pages 346-384.
    12. Luca Zamparelli, 2011. "Induced Innovation, Endogenous Growth, and Income Distribution: a Model along Classical Lines," Working Papers CELEG 1102, Dipartimento di Economia e Finanza, LUISS Guido Carli.
    13. Zamparelli, Luca, 2022. "On Labor Productivity Growth and the Wage Share with Endogenous Size and Direction of Technical Change," MPRA Paper 112684, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    14. Daniele Tavani & Luca Zamparelli, 2020. "Growth, income distribution, and the ‘entrepreneurial state’," Journal of Evolutionary Economics, Springer, vol. 30(1), pages 117-141, January.
    15. Daniele Tavani & Luke Petach, 2021. "Firm beliefs and long-run demand effects in a labor-constrained model of growth and distribution," Journal of Evolutionary Economics, Springer, vol. 31(2), pages 353-377, April.
    16. Stamegna, Marco, 2022. "Wage inequality and induced innovation in a classical-Marxian growth model," MPRA Paper 113805, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    17. Mariolis Theodore & Konstantakis Konstantinos N. & Michaelides Panayotis G. & Tsionas Efthymios G., 2019. "A non-linear Keynesian Goodwin-type endogenous model of the cycle: Bayesian evidence for the USA," Studies in Nonlinear Dynamics & Econometrics, De Gruyter, vol. 23(1), pages 1-16, February.
    18. Stamegna, Marco, 2022. "A Kaleckian growth model of secular stagnation with induced innovation," MPRA Paper 113794, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    19. repec:awi:wpaper:0493 is not listed on IDEAS
    20. Jose Barrales‐Ruiz & Ivan Mendieta‐Muñoz & Codrina Rada & Daniele Tavani & Rudiger von Arnim, 2022. "The distributive cycle: Evidence and current debates," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 36(2), pages 468-503, April.
    21. A. J. Julius, 2005. "Overtakable capitalist growth paths," Macroeconomics 0501030, University Library of Munich, Germany.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Induced innovation; endogenous growth; direction of technical change;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • O31 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Innovation and Invention: Processes and Incentives
    • O33 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Technological Change: Choices and Consequences; Diffusion Processes
    • O40 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Growth and Aggregate Productivity - - - General

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:dsc:wpaper:4. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    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 bibliographic 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.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Claudio Sardoni (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/ferosit.html .

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

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.