Finance Seminar（2021-08)

Topic: A Calculation of the Social Returns to Innovation

Speaker: Benjamin F. Jones, Kellogg and NBER

Time: Wednesday, 31 March,10:00–11:30 AM Beijing Time

Location: Microsoft Teams Online Conference Room

Abstract:

This paper estimates the social returns to investments in innovation. The disparate spillovers associated with innovation, including imitation, business stealing, and intertemporal spillovers, have made calculations of the social returns difficult. Here we provide an economy-wide calculation that nets out the many spillover margins. We further assess the role of capital investment, diffusion delays, learning-by-doing, productivity mismeasurement, health outcomes, and international spillovers in assessing the average social returns. Overall, our estimates suggest that the social returns are very large. Even under conservative assumptions, innovation efforts produce social benefits that are many multiples of the investment costs.

Introduction:

Benjamin F. Jones is the Gordon and Llura Gund Family Professor of Entrepreneurship, a Professor of Strategy, and the faculty director of the Kellogg Innovation and Entrepreneurship Initiative.An economist by training, Professor Jones studies the sources of economic growth in advanced economies, with an emphasis on innovation, entrepreneurship, and scientific progress. He also studies global economic development, including the roles of education, climate, and national leadership in explaining the wealth and poverty of nations. His research has appeared in journals such as Science, the Quarterly Journal of Economics and the American Economic Review, and has been profiled in media outlets such as the Wall Street Journal, the Economist, and The New Yorker.

A former Rhodes Scholar, Professor Jones served in 2010-2011 as the senior economist for macroeconomics for the White House Council of Economic Advisers and earlier served in the U.S. Department of the Treasury.

Professor Jones is a non-resident senior fellow of the Brookings Institution, a research associate of the National Bureau of Economic Research, and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.

https://www.kellogg.northwestern.edu/faculty/directory/jones_benjamin_f.aspx

Your participation is warmly welcomed!